Mind Series Wiki/The Beginner's Guide to Making a Mind Series

So, you want to make your own Mind Series, and follow in the time-honoured tradition passed down across the ages of in-character let's play. Well, before you get started, here's a few pointers to get you on the right track for starting. This isn't meant to put anyone off from trying; merely some friendly words of advice born of experience.


 * 1) Before starting, make sure this is absolutely right for you. Making a Mind Series isn't as easy as it might look. It's time-consuming and the writing takes a lot of effort to get right. If you're just going to half-ass it for three episodes, get tired and then call it a day, then don't bother. But if, on the other hand, you actually have the dedication and the determination to go through with it and do it properly, then by all means proceed.
 * 2) Prepare.
 * 3) Find the game that's right for you, depending entirely on your level of expertise in a number of fields - most evidently, your competency as a player. It's best to go for a game with a Silent Protagonist, as the majority of Mind Series have, though if you're good with technical aspects such as audio or file editing, you can probably work around a voice protagonist by replacing the original voice with your own. You may find that someone else has made a Mind Series in the game before, but this isn't always a setback.
 * 4) Once you've picked the game, know your character. Do research. Find out more about the world the game is set in and how that applies to the protagonist. Decide what tone you want to set. Work out how your character's personality, how they interact with the world and the characters.
 * 5) On a related note, make sure you have a suitable voice to portray your character. Generally, having an unbroken, pre-pubescent voice whilst portraying an adult generally isn't going to cut it with people. If you don't feel your voice is ready for this, consider putting the series off until it is. Alternatively, you could try getting someone else to voice the character, though if you do try this make sure it's someone you trust to see it through and finish the series with you.
 * 6) Plan out your series to a degree. Play through the game once or twice to work out how long a particular section will take. A typical episode will run about ten minutes, though this is incredibly variable - some can run as short as five, while others go on a full hour.
 * 7) Get a recording software. Don't use the popular 2010 method of pointing a camera at the screen. It looks amateurish, nobody can tell what's going on, and there's plenty of alternatives available, the most popular being Fraps, Bandicam, and more recently, Open Broadcaster Software, and for those of you who are able to get hold of paid software, Action Loader.
 * 8) And when you're sure all of the above is working and ready, start writing. The general production method is to write and record one episode at a time, and Chunkboi's writing method is well documented both here and on his personal blog. It's well worth reading.
 * 9) There. Now you should be able to avoid any unforeseen consequences.
 * 10) Don't be a Freeman's Mind clone. It's been tried before and it never works, because nobody does Ross Scott better than Ross Scott does Ross Scott. Own your own character, and make them any way you want them, but don't actively try to ape other Mind creators for the sake of aping other Mind Creators.
 * 11) If at first you don't succeed, try again. It may not pick up for quite a while, and that's fine. Sometimes people won't like it, and that's fine. If you find with experience that you dislike your earlier episodes and want to try them again, nobody will object.
 * 12) *A word of caution, though - don't do what certain creators did and obsessively constantly remake your series from the ground up. This is unhealthy behavior and will only result in people all round feeling bad. Just remake the episodes you feel need remaking. Headhunter only remade one episode of Powell's Mind, and that was the episode Simon and Jared riffed on in Out Of Our Minds. (it's Episode 8, if you're wondering - so now you know why halfway through the series, the quality jumps right up for one single episode and Powell randomly references "emperor Simon"...).

Well, that's all for now. There may be updates in the future but don't rely on it.