The voting is finished! Transformation Park, my upcoming crowdfunded story project, is the world's first transformation-themed amusement park, in which everything from the rides to the concession treats cause transformations. It will feature a series of zones, like Fairy Tale Land, Super Hero Stadium, the terrifying Haunted Hanger, as well as a new offshore attraction called "Transformation Island."
Yes, in honor of the fact that this was such a close vote, Transformation Island will live on as a special section of Transformation Park!
I'll be unveiling my new plans for the funding and stretch goals soon, as well as preparing to launch the actual campaign (expect it to launch sometime late-April and run for 30 days.) In the meantime, if you have any specific suggestions for other zones of the Park you'd like to see, please leave a comment below. I'll take your suggestions into considerations as I prepare the stretch goals.
Thanks for your votes and your feedback on this process so far, and I hope you enjoy the ride!
Introducing Transformation Park and Transformation Island. Vote Now!
Friday, 15 April 2016 T.F. Wright BlogI announced earlier that I was taking suggestions for my next big crowdfunding story project, similar to The Transformation Mall and Transformation TV. You sent in many suggestions, and I'm very thankful to all of you for your advice. I've come up with 2 project ideas, described below. I'll hold voting open for one week, shortly thereafter, I'll launch the campaign.
Even if you don't see your idea listed, I wanted to let you know that there's still a good chance it could be part of the project in some form. Some of the ideas - such as a transformation themed restaurant, or movie theater, might wind up as sub-plots inside the project, while others (a transformation-themed witness project program) might be used for individual characters, rather than a theme for the whole project. Transformations of all types will feature in both projects, so you can vote solely on which setting you find more appealing.
With that in mind, here are my two new ideas:
Transformation Park:
Transformation Park: the most magical place on earth. It's amusement park where rides and concessions cause all manner of transformations. Like many popular parks, Transformation Park will have many different areas, showcasing different kinds of rides, concession stands for food, exhibits, fortune telling, people dressing in costume, and more. Transformation Park will be similar in style and tone to The Transformation Mall and Transformation TV, because it will allow the park's guests to enter individual zones of the park and enjoy their own, largely independent story lines. Because of the park setting, it will also feature an upbeat, lighthearted tone, like in Mall and TV.
Strengths: The different sections of the park will allow a lot of fun and variety. Certain ideas from earlier voting series, such as those involving super hero characters or fairy tales, could get second chances as sub-sections of the park.
Transformation Island:
You don't go to Transformation Island - Transformation Island finds you. Many of those supposedly lost on sunk ships and crashed planes mysteriously wind up here, a remote jungle island from where there is no apparent escape and no way to contact the outside world. Everything about the island - vegetation, waterfalls, mysterious caves, underwater grottoes - causes some kind of transformation. Transformation Island is a significant departure from Transformation TV and Mall because it will be more serious and have a distinctly darker tone. While the story lines for characters and sub-sections of the island will be separate, the larger mystery of discovering the truth about the island will connect all the stories.
Strengths: Transformation Island will be a fresh an innovative take on the genre, unlike anything I've written to date. Being trapped on the island creates new opportunities for conflict and new ways to explore the consequences of transforming.
Cast your vote now! I'll leave the voting up for one week. Along the way, I'll describe the new ideas I have for the stretch goals. If you can, please leave a comment letting me know which idea earned your vote and why. Thanks again as always for your support!
Gender change is a genre that's extremely popular online. There are thousands of stories and many huge sites dedicated to the genre. It can be a bit difficult to navigate through them, though, especially because the genre can be extremely varied in terms of how the subject is handled.
My first ever story written online was gender change anime fanfiction, so this is a genre that holds a lot of interest for me, at least in some variations.
One of the most obvious facts about gender change stories it that, overwhelmingly, they are about turning from male to female. There are several reasons why this may be the case. One, there's a greater taboo factor. Women are encouraged to break some taboos surrounding their gender, but men are not given that same support. Men can still be ridiculed for wearing women's clothes, but there no longer is such as thing as "men's clothes." The taboo factor makes the change more dangerous and thus more exciting. It also encourages men who feel a desire to express their feminine side to sublimate those feelings, meaning seeking out a story online can be one of the only ways they connect with that part of themselves.
Another reason for the "gender gap" is that, as a society, we view women as the ideal in terms of beauty. Depending on your point of view, we glorify or objectify the feminine. This can make a feminine transformation seem more alluring.
Gender change transformation catalysts can include magic wishes, science fiction, potions, curses, products associated with women (such as clothing or shampoos), and - less commonly - the realistic process of hormones and surgery.
Gender change is one of the few transformation genres in which the physical transformation need not take center stage in the story. Sometimes, the character wakes up having already been fully changed. Instead, a significant focus is often placed on how the character's life has changed, post transformation.
Like many other types of transformations, there's a divide within gender change stories between seeing the transformation as fortunate or as a punishment. In the "punishment" stories, the character often becomes a slut or a bimbo. Though they often have fun sexually, there's an undercurrent that being forced to be female is a humiliation. A similar genre is stories involving "forced feminization" or "sissification" in which the character is made to be more feminine but not actually turned into a girl - these stories also play on the association between humiliation and male femininity. I would love to see a "forced fem" story where being feminine is portrayed as a positive instead of a humiliation, so if you know of one, please share in the comments.
The "fortunate" stories usually leave their characters happier, better adjusted, more successful romantically, and closer to their "true" selves after the change. Kashimashi: Girl Meets Girl, the anime I recently reviewed, is a great example of this type of story. I tend to prefer the "fortunate" stories overall, though I'm always up for a dark story if its well written and the idea has some element of uniqueness.
If you're looking for a gender transformation story that places a lot of detail on the process of the change, Cheer is a great one. If you're looking for a story that places a lot of detail on the process and involves a rare female to male change, Sex Change Computer Virus would be my choice.
As for my own work, I think that From Nathan to Nanako: Changed into a Cheerleader is one of my best treatments of the gender change genre. Nathan to Nanako is also available as a beautifully narrated audiobook. You can buy the audiobook on Amazon, or you can sign up for a free trial of Amazon Audible, and listen for free.
