I'm just curious to see what makes a Character memorable. Characters are a major part of the story but their are those that are easily forgotten.
I'll start:
The character must not be afraid to get their hands dirty, take it as you can imagine. They must have a never say die attitude even when beaten yet know their own limits. Have a unique design and an impressive entrance.
Your turn
I think the personality just has to be described. Like from the most basic he is courageous to he is afraid of spiders and hates spicy food. He has a bad mouth to that he or she is a pushover. The most unusual character trait that shows repetition throughout the story makes a great character, but the true icing on the cake is a character one we can relate to and is believable. Like even if a villain does bad things, but he just has an example rougher approach than the MC or is willing to sacrifice others for something he believes in all his heart make him a great character then straight out "he is evil" or that "he is good".
Honestly, the most memorable characters are those whose personalities or traits are directly linked to the story or plot itself. Normally nobody will remember the irrelevant traits. Like, why should we care about your character's favorite food unless the story is a cooking story?
Zhuo Fan in Magic Emperor Butler is memorable because the story is about him bringing about the rise of the Luo Clan. And he's scheming, ruthless and cunning to the max. I don't think strength is his memorable trait (strength can only get you so far, and basically his enemies are of a higher cultivation realm than him), but the way he schemes and outfoxes his enemies to get to the top is truly memorable.
JWhite_9988
Meh, just doesn't make boring characters.
People will remember both good entertaining characters who they love and awful characters that they hate.
They need to be well developed and believable. So your character needs strengths and flaws and your reader needs to care about them from the very beginning of your story. I have a form with questions that I fill out for my major characters. I also created one for my creative writing classes that is more condensed. I can share it here if you want.
LVTeacherman that would help.
I'm enjoying all this feed back and will consider it in the future. Thanks everyone.
What @LVTeacherman said. Take him up on the forum or search on line for character building sheets. Most forgettable characters just don’t have enough thought out into them. You should know the characters like you know a best friend. Thinking like the character is crucial! Otherwise, all of your characters end up the same: they all act like you.
Another thing to consider is that writing/plot is built around conflict. Good characters need to be involved with the conflict or conflicted themselves. Characters that have an internal or external conflict that is logical (in every way) will almost always be memorable. Even your villains will be better when they have reasons for their actions. Some of the best villains are raged up because of grief or another strong emotion. If your reader can’t relate to their reasons, then they won’t relate to the character.
AlexanderCao I feel this is a bit too basic, and wouldn't leave much of an impression. If I describe myself, for example, I'm a 21 year old college student studying computer science, and as hobbies, I enjoy writing novels and reading manga. Was that memorable? Okay, let's go further. I have brown hair, green eyes, a knack for engineering, and a taciturn nature in person. Was that any better? In my opinion, no. After all, I'm only telling you what I'm like. Sure, maybe the dichotomous nature of my hobbies and profession (humanities vs sciences) is interesting, but beyond that, none of this leaves much of an impression.
Tomoyuki I agree. What you said is spot on, since what makes a character memorable isn't some shtick or unique trait, but how that trait plays into the overall plot. Though I'd like to add that the most important thing is how the character's personality, past experiences, and relationships with other characters change them, or those around them. Let me give an example:
I love Oregairu, the abbreviation of the Japanese title, "My Youth Romantic Comedy is Wrong, as I expected. The main character, Hikigaya Hachiman, is a pessimistic, seemingly self-centered yet self-degrading high school student who made love, life, and the illusory goodness of "youth" his enemies after a confession gone wrong. As he meets people, most notably his counterparts Yukinoshita and Yui, his selfishness collides with his self-degradation, and he finds himself throwing himself under the bus for other people, apparently because it was more efficient to do than through any other means. Whether it was playing the villain in a nasty spat, or showing a hopeless romantic that they didn't have a chance at their crush by literally confessing to the girl himself, he ruined his own reputation for the sake of others, all because he simply didn't care.
This, in my opinion, is a solid example of a memorable character. The dichotomous traits Hikigaya possesses, coupled with his relationships with others, are what makes him shine.
So in essence, what I'm trying to say is the characteristics of a character aren't what makes them memorable. It is, as Tomoyuki says, how it plays into the plot, and more specifically, the interactions, decisions, and choices brought about by those characteristics.
ShoeInk
Bruh! You shouldn't be sharing your personal information online...
But, since you study computer science, here's a question for you:
Assuming a system consists of only addition and subtraction of integers, is it complete?
Ignore that, so we're talking about characters! Let me think... hmmm...
[Booting the system]
[Booting complete]
[Initalizing the Thinking algorithm]
[Thoughts cleared]
[Thoughts generated]
[Thinking complete]
Aha! Found it!
What makes a character memorable is whether thay stay in our memories or not! I am a genius!
Wait wa??? Sorry wrong question... hmmm...
[Rebooting]
[Rebooting complete]
[...]
Aha! Found it!
Characters that leave a mark on the readers are more memorable. What defines leaving a mark? Well, for one, having more screen time count as one, having a unique trait counts as another, having a background story, experiencing their pain, blablabla, tons of reasons, in the first place, what do you define memorable as? Will a hated character be defined as memorable?
Any hardcore character is easily forgotten by me. They're boring because they aim to be memorable. Basically, any character that embodies stereotypes/etc.
Realistic characters are more memorable. I just read a novel where the author did an actually good job at portraying a "normal persons reaction", which made the character memorable since, well, yeah.
An MC who is all gun-ho and has a "never say die" attitude is forgotten instantly. They are lame and stupid, since most authors have a shit reason for their actions and behavior.
Basically, it's how characters deeal with an extra e with shit that makes them memorable. I remember side-characters more for this reason, since for whatever reason sidecharacters seem more realistic than the MC.
you get what am sayingggg????
SlaveOfTheLord Heh, who says it's all true? I can assure you, my appearance I told you is bogus. That, my friend, is the nature of the internet. Take everything anyone says with a grain of salt; trust no one, for you will be trolled. That said, in your process of elimination, you can tick off brown hair and green eyes, right? You're like 50 permutations away now from my true appearance :D
I know you said to ignore it, but I can't. If you meant complete as in "turing complete", well, no, it doesn't adhere to the definition, as it needs to be able to "simulate" other system architectures, as a general-purpose architecture. Addition and subtraction alone won't be able to do this.
Instruction-wise, You need shift operations to implement multiplication and division efficiently (you can add a number to itself n times to do it as well, but no one wants to wait a year to get a result from that method back).
And if you're implicitly stating that the system ONLY has addition and subtraction, then definitely no. While you might be able to add and subtract integers, you have to be able to move that data about, i.e. data transfer instructions. It's like having a farm, but no way to haul the produce out, or haul tools in. Unrealistic to the extreme, right?
From a numerical point of view, it falls short to some degree. Sure, maybe you COULD simulate a floating-point standard with very precise bit-wise addition and subtraction instructions, which rules it out entirely as a practical system. Just look at the IEEE 754 standard, and you'll see how streamlined it is.
Also, lol.
edited sidenote: It's all rather subjective, since what is computation anyway? That's what Turing's famous paper demonstrates in its attempt at defining computation. But from my practical experience, my answers are just as valid as any other.
I see that your practice sorcery… as interested as I am in this black magic, we are really getting off topic as to how to write a memorable character lol.
shadowdrake27 I practice the dark arts, yes. Though SlaveOfTheLord seemed interested, so why not oblige? Who knows, maybe someone can use this knowledge to make a character like me, a tech junkie. Isekai him to the dark ages and let him make computer shit.
I would read it, 100%.
ShoeInk
Yeah, it's indeed all rather subjective, but how did you miss the obvious answer of "No, since there's no complete system," ????
Also, you can argue that it indeed is Turing complete. Take an infinitely large number(this acts as your tape) then take one and multiply it by ten a number of times enough to reach the desired arbitrary position along your number. Now, you can do shifting, writing, and reading. The assumption here that you are the main operator(the one doing the data transmission thing).
Also, who cares about efficiency in an abstract scenario??
SlaveOfTheLord I did, just in a roundabout way. The second paragraph sorta does anyway, I was looking at it more from a practical point of view, rather than theoretical.
I say data transfer is a problem (I believe this still holds, even for multiplication, which isn't an explicit instruction, but instead simulated through addition), but now that I looked at it a little deeper, another one crops up due to the fact that there is no conditional branch instruction. You're never going to be able to jump to a location based on a previous location. You can explicitly tell it to jump to a location, but it will never be able to discern, "based on location A being a 1, jump to the locations 20 cells relative to where you are now." This is a key condition for a system to be "turing complete".
Efficiency is everything, even in abstract models. Time complexity holds, regardless of whether or not you're speaking theoretically or practically, the latter of which was what I was using to explain my thoughts. I think we can both agree, if an algorithm in a turing machine has O(n) time complexity, it's far better than an algorithm that has O(n2) time complexity. These complexities can rise exponentially the more cells you have on your tape (for addition, every cell you add adds another n to the complexity, so if the base algorithm is O(n) time (for the one-by-one symbol-wise addition of 10 and the base number, then the overall algorithm will be O(cn2) combined, or simply O(n2) if you ignore the constant). Likewise, the time complexity will go up with the less complex instructions the system possesses.
Though let's be real here. We're confusing turing machines and actual systems. turing machines don't have "add" and "subtraction" instructions. They only have read, write, and conditional jump instructions, whereas actual systems have add and subtract inherently built into them (adder circuits and such, along with registers). The argument is straining at a gnat, since in a typical turing machine, it's already complete, considering it possesses the conditional jump, read, and write instructions, as well as a boundless tape, which are the four fundamental requirements a machine needs to be "complete".
JWhite_9988
This is from the sheets I use in my classes. It's not as exhaustive as one's online, but I teach teenagers and so I simplified it down. Feel free to use and abuse.
Character’s First & Last Name:
Physical description
Height: Weight: Tattoos & Piercings?:
Eye Color: Hair Color: Skin/fur/scale color:
Answer the following using complete sentences
How old are they? (And how old are they mentally?)
Are they physically fit? Why or why not?
How is their mental and emotional health?
Where do they live?
Are they rich or poor?
Did they have a happy childhood? Why/why not?
Past/present relationships? How did they affect them?
Who is your character’s best friend?
Who is their biggest rival or enemy and why?
What do they care about?
What are they obsessed with?
What is their biggest fear?
What is the best thing that happened to them?
What is the worst thing that happened to them?
What was the most embarrassing thing that ever happened to them?
What pulls them into the story?
What is their fatal flaw (greed, temper, lazy etc.) and why?
What do they want to accomplish by the end of the story?
Who or what is in the way of them accomplishing their goal?
What keeps them going during the story?
Hmm, characters who have the same background as you do.
I always like that kind of character for example Tomoko from Watamote, the MC defines me and I love her because we're the same. Same goes to Sagiri from Eromanga-sensei where I like the character because I want to be like her same goes to Izumi Masamune. I kinda think those what make them special amd memorable, I guess.
