Creepypasta: What Truly Defines the Genre

Lost Episodes, Video Games: Hyper Realism = Extreme

Early on, stories involving video games or lost episodes were relatively well received and have even gone down as classics. The most notable being, Ben:Drowned, Suicide Mouse, Dead Bart, and Sonic.Exe. The purpose of these stories and the theories that can spawn from then like, Ash's Coma, and Rugrats Theory is to ultimately ruin ones childhood, through the use of gory imagery that distorts how the character would usually look.

However, the execution of these stories is where they collapse and are inevitably overlooked for being clichéd. With the exception of Ben: Drowned in some cases, as it was executed in a creative and unique manner but most stories of these are told like this;

Shady dealer sells game/Intern stumbles upon or is invited to watch footage that would never usually be shown

Game degrades into a gore fest/Animation degrades into gore fest

Protagonist dies/ Intern goes insane.

The underlying issue with this particular style is the over reliance of blood or 'hyper realism', especially when saying it's real blood, real faces, or the players face. The first mistake in doing this, is that you're telling the reader, when really it should be described. Simply cut out the word real, and use in game graphics instead, as the only effect evoked by throwing scenes of mutilations into the face of the reader is disgust.

The same with found footage, it always seems to go off the same form of template. People don't want a Suicidemouse story or another Ben Drowned. They want something different.

It's a difficult style to write, because you are limited by many things, gaming systems, characters, and setting. Perhaps instead of finding said footage of game, have a game they are presently playing, slowly degrade. Not immediately noticeable, but things start going wrong. Then the player turns it off and doesn't play it. However, they end up having nightmares, and suffer from mild to severe illusions. The key thing with a ghost is, incorporate the environment. Have the console be the vessel. As far the characters are concerned, do the opposite of Sonic.exe. Depict as they are in game. Have them change over time but play off the normality initially. These are things I would consider if I were to write this type of story.

Furthermore, there are other examples of haunted technology. A lot of it is well done, such as Candle Cove that has spawned many spin offs. It plays off childlike imagination, and slaps you in the face in the end. The reality is far worse than you imagine.

I'm not saying you shouldn't write this form of pasta. But you should at the very least consider what's already out there and how you can improve or do it better. There is a lot of potential with these stories/theories. When done right, the believability can really mess with the reader. It's all comes down to the execution of the narrative and that is where they inevitably fall flat due to being a carbon copy of other stories.