
Ask HN: What are some ways to gamify writing? - rayalez
I&#x27;m practicing writing fiction, and it&#x27;s gradually coming along, but it&#x27;s pretty hard for me. I really want to get good at it, but my reddit-addicted brain just seems to refuse to engage in this activity, doesn&#x27;t enter the flow. Programming, on the other hand, works very well(it has an immediate feedback&#x2F;gratification loop and clear goals). So I&#x27;m trying to figure out what kind of system would help me to experience the same thing in writing.<p>&#x2F;r&#x2F;WritingPrompts is pretty helpful, and blogging has sort of natural gamification(traffic&#x2F;upvotes&#x2F;comments) embedded in it, but these are misleading, my brain is getting dopamine spikes out of seing upvotes or refreshing the stats, not out of the writing process itself.<p>I&#x27;ve been thinking about making a website with daily flashfiction challenges(100-1000 words, winners determined by voting, leaderboard of the best writers), but it&#x27;s not that different from writingprompts. Github-like streaks could help perhaps(a visual representation of how many words you have written every day, and how many days in a row you write). Or maybe a text editor with a progress bar that would show how much words you have written until reaching a daily goal....<p>There&#x27;s gotta be a way to design a feedback loop that would make writing fiction addictive.<p>What are some ways to make writing process more fun and engaging? Are there some tools&#x2F;techniques I can use?
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exolymph
Something I love doing is collaborative writing -- my chat group [1] has a
#storytelling channel and people toss around ideas in there. Or I'll chat back
and forth with one individual and we'll shape the story together. Not exactly
gamified, but when you're working with another person there's a pressure to
respond quickly that helps me loosen up and just write.

Another idea: use
[http://www.themostdangerouswritingapp.com/](http://www.themostdangerouswritingapp.com/)
and literally reward yourself after each sprint -- try chocolate chips or
something.

[1] [http://exolymph.com/cyberpunk-futurism-chat-
group/](http://exolymph.com/cyberpunk-futurism-chat-group/)

~~~
bayonetz
A sort of tangent to this was when I would play writing/poetry golf with
someone else. Literally, I write a line, then they write a line, and so on.
Our products would often lead to ideas I'd take on solo later.

