Do you write in first person or third person?

There are varying ways to write fiction. You can either delve deep into the mind of the main character and perceive the entirety of the book from their perspective, or take a more indirect approach and look at the scenes from a more third person perspective; but which is better?

First person - When writing in first person, you as the writer have one major advantage. Your writing is not your own narrated language but rather that of the character themselves. This can make it much easier to understand and develop your characters conflicts and motivations more precisely but also provide them with their own individual voice.

This can quickly become a problem however because as the creator of the story, we usually have a wider perspective on how the story is going to pan out and to a lesser extent, the characters and environments our character is going to be flung upon. With this knowledge, it can be very tempting during the writing process to deviate from the first person rule. We may want to give other characters more depth for instance or tell the story in part from others perspective. This ofcourse being impossible under a first person persona.

Writing in first person has its advantages but it also has its restrictions.

Third person - The more commonly used writing style, third person writing gives the writer the freedom to write the story from multiple viewpoints and therefore this gives scope for branching story lines and more developed character profiles.

Whatever your choice, its important to choose a writing style and stick to it, no matter how tempting it may seem to deviate. Breaking this rule only opens the story up to confused, disjointed writing which can be hard to follow. Personally, i feel a writer chooses very early on what kind of writing they are better suited for and sticks to that for the majority. For me, it is third person, but ofcourse, it purely depends on the type of book you are writing.

Call Of Duty: Noobs, Killcam and Mannequins!

I feel this may just be me in my own little world, however let me begin.

On the seemingly regular occasion that I do something not all together normal, some would call 'noobish' in Call of Duty. Say for instance:

- Try to walk into an area that clearly is not part of the map and get greeted with an invisible wall.
- Shoot a mannequin in Nuketown, thinking its another player.
- Accidentally slip on the right trigger in panic and try to knife the player from 10 feet away.

I find that for the brief second or two after this moment, I'm almost that tiny bit reluctant to kill anybody I see in my line of sight. Mainly due to the fact that my foolery will then be paraded in front of them in widescreen from my killcam. The shame.

Not that this stops me ofcourse, when a noob has his/her chance, he/she must take it.

We have all been noobs once though surely.

Call Of Duty: What About Aliens?!

Call of Duty has been going for many many years now and there clearly isn't a financial, or any real reason to change a winning formula (rather than the imminent tweaks and little additions year on year).

I'm also aware that Call of Duty seems to like to keep itself within the possible (or at least the normal, bar the zombies addition of-course).

What would everyone's stance be on the Call of Duty franchise delving into a sci-fi feel. For instance, the inclusion of an alien invasion in one of their future games. Fighting am alien bombardment rather than merely just another country. A step too far perhaps?

Personally, I feel with all the maps and story lines, there is room for new originality. A company with such a large wallet, thanks to the success of this franchise, is a company that surely should be pioneering into new things. It should be one that is able to breed originality into the gaming industry. The smaller developers lack this as they cannot financially undertake such risk as its too consequential to their entire operation.

You may say that aliens is hardly a new and original concept in any regard. It's at least something new to try and something I think would be just as addictive, if not more so, with the Call of Duty mechanics running in the background.