The key to not making a Mary Sue is to make the character flawed. Mary Sues are by definition perfect.

Also my first thought on the monkey was the monkey from Babar

Zephir ?

I've been hearing lately that making a character thats too flawed is just as bad as making a perfect character. But flawed is good.

Oh **$+ not this again.

Writers have this thing about Mary Sues. The official definition of what the majority of fan fiction writers refer to as a "Mary Sue" is below.

Mary Sue - All fan characters except mine.

Now as to what the real "definition" is?

Basically there is no physical trait that says "This character is a mary sue". Harley went on a literal TYRAID over this about a hundred years ago insisting she'd made/found the perfect "are you a Mary Sue?" quiz for characters. She didn't like it when I put well known characters and if I remember right some of her own and my own characters through it's gauntlet of nonsensical questions like "Does your character have wings?" "Does your character have red eyes?" "Do/Have your character's eye's changed color?" and most importantly "Do you like your character?"

What is a Mary Sue? Only the creator can turn a character into a Sue. A Sue is a character the author is so bat@$#% insane for that they decimate every semblence of a plot or hurdle placed in front of them. I don't care if your character is the spitting image of 4chan's S.D.N. that doesn't make it a Sue. (If you don't know what that is... do NOT ask.) A rabid fanboy writer can turn Han Solo into a Mary Sue. A good writer can turn a 500 pound diarrhea chunk with wings held together by a diaper into a good character.

The only thing that makes a Mary Sue is the player, not the character. Your flying monkey is fine.

~Tobe

Actually the flying monkey has little to do with the discussion. I just didn't want to start a new topic to show it.

Yeah I know this question is decades old. But I never really cared about it until now. I'm seeing across the board a lot of rants about mary sueism. Apparently the one thing that makes a fancharacter a mary sue is that it EXSISTS! And I was like "well that can't be true!" But for a majority it seems the only good fancharacter is one that is never made.

Man I took that Mary Sue quiz with one of my characters. It sucked, it was multiple choice and none of the answers applied to my character

i took a mary sue quiz with one of my characters in mind and he is not a mary sue lol! actually should be gary stu. okay mary sue characters i dont mind its the creators, if they are all pig headed and "my characters pwns your character instantly" i dont like those but actual decent people with a rather mary sue esque character i will let slide. even more so if this decent person is a beginner at character creating because we all have to start somewhere. its like with artist who has a character thats just sonic painted pink or whatever, if they think its the absolute best character and completely ignore and denies its a recolour then yeah smack them upside the head.

the thing i hate the most about this mary sue thing is it makes me extremely paranoid about whether my characters are mary/gary stu's or not D:. some of them do have rather angsty pasts and one of y hedgehog characters is pretty much a red female sonic but i'm working on improving her design plus i have gone past the stage that my three main girl characters are sonic,tails, knuckles GF's lol!!

sorry rambled there, awesome winged monkey character D.B he looks very cute ^^

Well, the newbie's don't have good figureheads to look to. Sega just likes to recolor characters for new ones. Sometimes they invert a spike or two and maybe slap a pot leaf on it's head, but still. They see Sonic... then Amy. So the next logical step is to make a green-oops... I mean black.... rats.... white? Oh darn. Yello-oh for pete's sake you know what I mean.

Even recolors could just be a author with no hand for drawing, I REALLY TRY to reserve judgment till I learn about the character.

~Tobe

how about tye dye?

haha, maybe thats what i should do, reserve judgement till i get to know the creator more, i find i keep trying to befriend people who end up being the type who's quick to anger or annoy >.o. yeah Sega has not been proving themselve to be good inspiration over recent years, though i have seen some fans out their inspired by archie comics. Thankfully for me it was Old Sega sonic games and Fleetway that was my inspiration when i began since i didnt have internet all those years ago.
i'm actually surprised i'm so easy on their characters in my experience being a sonic fanartist i have befriended 3 people in real life and taught them how to draw sonic and in their early days they end up copying my artwork.
i guess i give the less pig headed, ignorant beguinner artists slack because thats the way i am, and i like simple characters if they look cool to me, that and i know i used to be in their position when i began drawing, of course if they get all too big for their britches and start spouting how wonderfull, perfect and brilliant their sue character is then yeah they need a good talking too. Instant sue's dont make good characters, if they are a character that was designed and has slowely been improving and progressing over time then yeah thats fine by me but then thats what a lot of my characters are like, if i force idea's to them i find they dont work or just dont suit the character, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesnt.

haha i'm spouting again, no when it comes to Mary sue characters, i'm aware of how much a major no no sue's can be but i think since i have come across characters with some rather sue-ish qualities to them but i like the character then thats fine by me, lol not saying i like every mary sue characters of course there are the terrible ones out there that make my stomach churn.
so putting it short, some sue's i hate, while there are some that i like. : p.

Its jsut that I have or 'had' an idea for a set of characters. But disgarded them because they reeked of Sue.

here's mah cheractor

name: light the hedgeog
race: hedgehog
age: 18
powers: he can run at speed of light and run fast and also do the things that sonic can do. also he can do the double light speed dash which is faster than the light speed dash and also stronger. and he also can glide like knuckles and punch hard. he also knows how to use order control (just like chaos control except better)
appearance: looks like sonic but also has more spikes and also wears a shirt and pants and he also has yellow instead of blue.
background: hes shadows brother and sonic's brother but sonic isnt shadows brother but he was separated from them years ago and also he tries to find sonic but he's on a different planet! hes the real ultimet life form, hes awesome and was made a year after shadow but he got lost so thats why shadow thinks hes the best but lights the better one if shadow and light fighted shadow would loss.
occupation: bounty hunter, but he only kills murderers
weapon: gun, chainsaw, katana, bombs, missile launcher, airplane with machine guns on it (he calls the airplane the whirlwind)
personality: hes nice and also brave and generous and hell always help a man in need!!!!!!

Any questions?

Man you stole my character >:(

uuum maybe my ideas didn't reek that heavily of sue o o;

I'm glad that I was able to be of service.

<=)

lol, like I said. a yellow recolor of sonic isn't a overall bad thing. But like Kio proved, the background is the defining proof. XD

~Tobe

Harley went on a literal TYRAID over this about a hundred years ago insisting she'd made/found the perfect "are you a Mary Sue?" quiz for characters. She didn't like it when I put well known characters and if I remember right some of her own and my own characters through it's gauntlet of nonsensical questions like "Does your character have wings?" "Does your character have red eyes?" "Do/Have your character's eye's changed color?" and most importantly "Do you like your character?"

Was this the one?

I had it saved for the lulz.Gyser scored an 88 on that test. Irredeemable it said. Start over.

You know what's really sad? Sooo many character WADs for Sonic Robo Blast 2 are these. It got so bad that we created...

The sad thing is, the kids there immediately took him as the very template as to how a character should be designed. I wish I was kidding.

ED: srb2.org is down, so here's a mirror of the image for the lulz

kids these days.. i really do wonder how they are being brought up -.-

They're being brought up by us. The problem here is obvious.

~Tobe

gyser, your link doesn't actually link to anything. o.o

what's a 'WAD'?

I can understand how some people can see Mary Sue characters cliche/sterotypical and unorginial, though I don't quite understand the red hot hatered for those type of charaters. I looked at one Mary Sue test, and one of the questions asked was something like, 'is the character generally well liked by most of the characters that end of the story?" I was thinking"why would someone hold that aganist someone else?" It bothered me that people would say a character I liked, Sally, was a Mary Sue; yes I know it shouldn't bother me what other people think. All characters, I believe, are flawed becasue they have human personalities, it is just that some flaws don't show that much or don't seem that bad. I guess Mary-Sue characters, or characters that seem perfect, just don't bother me(call me strange). I can even like them. Sometimes flaws can be overdone and can destract from the heroism or goodness of the good guys, like what has happened somewhat with Sonic IMO. My advice would be just do what you want with your character and don't care what others think.

a WAD is a file with customized content that is meant to be inserted into an existing computer game. WADs are often composed of customized levels or characters.

I can understand how some people can see Mary Sue characters cliche/sterotypical and unorginial, though I don't quite understand the red hot hatered for those type of charaters. I looked at one Mary Sue test, and one of the questions asked was something like, 'is the character generally well liked by most of the characters that end of the story?" I was thinking"why would someone hold that aganist someone else?" It bothered me that people would say a character I liked, Sally, was a Mary Sue; yes I know it shouldn't bother me what other people think. All characters, I believe, are flawed becasue they have human personalities, it is just that some flaws don't show that much or don't seem that bad. I guess Mary-Sue characters, or characters that seem perfect, just don't bother me(call me strange). I can even like them. Sometimes flaws can be overdone and can destract from the heroism or goodness of the good guys, like what has happened somewhat with Sonic IMO. My advice would be just do what you want with your character and don't care what others think.

Yes I always thought that to be sort of weird. In a show or book where there are bunch of characters who all mutually like one another. Why is it bad that by the end of your story that they like your character as well? Are they supposed to hate your character? Be indifferent towards them?

It's not that they like your character, that in and of itself is fine. The problem arises when the they like your character instantly or for no readily apparent reason. Or that they like your character no matter what they do.

Basically: Liking your character though a genuine growing freindship, good. Likeing your character because they are your character and can do no wrong? bad.

Because angry broody characters that hate everyone are cool now. Liking things is uncool. Just look at this forum. *zing*

Seriously though, Crimmy got it. Ignore the idiots, you know what makes sense for a character and what doesn't. These guys rules for creating a non-sue are almost akin to the rules the crazy set bible thumpers give for living. Don't like people, Don't hate people. Don't be flawed, Don't be flawless. Trying to follow the non-nonsensical mishmash of contradictions those zany fanfic writers spew forth to Teh Interwebz is a prime example of what people call 'an exercise in futility'.

~Tobe

Mmm I think I understand now. Its not the abilities that make the character. What makes a OC bad is when the writer like....depends on the characters abilities to define them and not their personality?

Well I mean if the character is in a universe where everybody has super powers.

<strong class="quote-title" B Vulpix wrote:

---

What makes a OC bad is when the writer like....depends on the characters abilities to define them and not their personality?

Isn't that why we hate the official Sonic characters nowadays?

Well yes I think so. If that weren't an issue the cast wouldn't have grown so much either. Since Sonic Team would have been smart enough to just teach old dogs new tricks and not buy the whole damn puppy farm.

basically. Tailor the character you make to the universe they are in. I can use my character's in virtually every scenario because I will find some way of using props to inhibit or power them up to the level needed for what they are being used for.

~Tobe

http://www.homestarrunner.com/sbemail188.html - Whats the worst word to couple with 'Fan?' you guessed. Fiiiiiiction

Fan-fiction. Granted you do have a few fresh minds just practicing their art. But as a general rule? Nowhere in the universe will you find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.

~Tobe

Except for Mos Eisley. I'm pretty sure Obi Wan was aware of fanfiction when he said that line... PRETTY sure.

Dude, where do you think fan-fic writers hang out? Mos Eisley is actually one big AFF.com con.

Fan-fiction. Granted you do have a few fresh minds just practicing their art. But as a general rule? Nowhere in the universe will you find a more wretched hive of scum and villainry.

~Tobe

Fixed. =P

lol@crim

TTG, prove it. Villanry isn't even a word.

~Tobe

I took one of those tests and my RP character turned out to be a 'mary sue'. But i can't control if other people's characters like mine or not, or forgive her when she's done something stupid, etcetc.. so i found that test a bit unbalanced. oo;

Mary sue is usually established by backstory/history, a character's powers/abilities, and things like that.

However, I think what makes a mary sue truly a mary sue isn't how they're made, it's how they're used. For an RP instance, my character SX is...pretty much a mary sue in backstory. Canon to her backstory, she's a secret GUN project parallel to Project Shadow, who was frozen when Shadow was and inadvertently freed during the events of SA2. He (I'm not mixing up pronoun gender here, it's a long story.) stayed out of the way of SA2's events and then attacked GUN (unconnected terrorism incidents actually are mentioned in a clip in SA2, by the way) before fleeing the planet later...

...yeah, not the most original story for a Sonic fan character. But in a story that takes place about a decade after that on another planet, it actually has absolutely nothing to do with the character, even though it's canon to the story. I think it's thwarted by her lack of powers in the story - which is made up by a very high degree of skill in gunplay, but she predates Shadow the Hedgehog, thank you - and otherwise lack of Shadow- or Sonic-like qualities.

I don't think it's either you're a mary sue or you aren't. Every primary character in a story, RP, fanfic, movie, game, or any mode of fiction has at least some tendancies of a mary sue. However, any character with all the tendancies tend to be characters viewers/readers/RPers roll their eyes and say "Oh, come ON" at - a definate "needs help" character. Note that I said "needs help" and not "needs replacement."

Most mary sues tend to have a few traits in common, though, and the most obvious warning signs would be these:
-Perfection. Definately #1, a character who never, ever, ever loses at something - or, in the worst case scenario, never loses at anything. Luckily, this is the easiest to thwart, just have your character periodically get beaten at whatever they're doing. Not so much that they come off as weak, but enough that they seem more real.
-Being obviously based off of or canon to an official character, in the case of fan characters. Sonic's secret twin brother who's faster than Sonic but smarter than Tails and stronger than Knuckles, or Sonic's long lost girlfriend who's hotter than Amy and smarter than...rouge? I don't know. Anyway, things like that. Oh, and this covers if your lead character is a hedgehog, your quirky, but useful and handy sidekick is a fox, and your does-his-own-thing powerhouse is an echidna.
-Poor character balance. By far the most common. Ideally, for every strength, power, or skill, there's a weakness or something the cahracter can't do well. This is somewhat excusable, particularly in fantasy settings, because reading about or watching normal people tends to be more boring than reading about believable, but still much-more-awesome-than-real-life people.

There are a lot of other things, but most tend to be excusable or explainable in and of themselves, but if a character has most or all of those, they're probably a mary sue. There are a lot of mary sue tests out there, and it's a good idea to run a character through them prior to introduction into a story.

Just keep in mind that on those mary sue tests, you need to think about whether or not to answer a question based on what's established and acceptable in the story's world. Some mary sue tests consider having some kinds of powers to be a huge negative, but if everyone in the story has them, then you should check no anyway. Don't read a question as "Does your character have/do/act like this?" Read it as "Is your character the only one that has/does/acts like this?"

as my character manages to loose most of the fights she's in, isn't related to any sega character, tend to pass out after using her powers and can't read or write properly, i think i'm safe. :p

My person opinion is the more times events and especially characters from established fiction are referenced when talking about a character, the more "help" they need. Of course, many years ago, I became so jaded with the "fan fiction" the very word started making me cringe at it's sheer utterance. So it naturally followed I would work to remove all references to published works from my own works.

My person opinion is the more times events and especially characters from established fiction are referenced when talking about a character, the more "help" they need. Of course, many years ago, I became so jaded with the "fan fiction" the very word started making me cringe at it's sheer utterance. So it naturally followed I would work to remove all references to published works from my own works.

I'm slowly starting to go down that path myself.

That's why my primary character very, very rarely references her "official" history as relates to Sonic canon. The closest she gets is mentioning her training with GUN or reminding someone that she's not native to the planet.

Of course, since the Sonic Adventure video games are canon to SX's world, and the actual video game exists in the world she's on now, this is a source of amusement to her.

gyser, your link doesn't actually link to anything. o.o

I fails at teh linking. ...And the checking on topics I post in as well. oo

http://ponylandpress.nfshost.com/ms-test.html

Topic died, but I found the test I was looking for.

Actually, the Mary Sue test I use is this test here. It's not too bad, BUT you have to keep in mind that you have to "skew" your answers based on the norm for whatever story you're in. Otherwise you're gonna get a very, very high score.

Also, do read what the writer says before the test - these aren't inherently bad in and of themselves, they're necessary to make a character interesting. Like a spice, in some amounts a dish tastes better with them, but if you overdo it, it tastes bad.

blarg I hate it when people say "stop writing fanfiction and get a life!" But have enough fancharacters to start an entire comic book series if they weren't just thinly accented Sonic recolors.

I think the reason I started becoming a writer in the first place was because, in the very early days of Sonic fanfiction (circa 1997), I was reading some of the lamer entries that were hosted on a site that primarily had works by Bookshire Draftwood, but also had...less desirable works. It was after reading some of the better works, and then some of those which we would classify as classic examples of poor fanfics, that I decided "Hey, I can do better than THAT!"

A few very badly written stories and badly formed characters later, I realized it wasn't as easy as it looked. I didn't realize how bad they were at first, although I was always striving for something better. The important thing is that my imagination was on fire, and I was on the track to becoming the writer I am today.

I think this has been said before, but really, I think that fanfiction can be a "starting point" for writers to cut their teeth on before they move on to new ideas of their own. Some of my early stuff, if it could be recovered, would be ghastly to read now, but it was a way to explore myself as well as what I wanted to portray through my writing. Nobody just becomes a great writer, after all.

As for bad character design...I have seen some characters that seemed like they would tank, and they have proven popular; I have seen some characters that seemed good in design, but lacked personality; and I have seen some characters become incredibly popular primarily because of their bust size. 😛 I think you have to choose what audience you want to appeal to when writing your stories and creating your characters, rather than trying to write to please everyone - but if you must write or make characters, the person who must be most satisfied is yourself. You must be analytical of your own abilities and of that of your characters; improvement and development are paramount. No one gets anywhere by standing still.