Creepypasta Cliches

[RedDeadFred]

The things that annoy me most are when people use too much description. The unknown is a lot more terrifying than a complete description of the monster (or villain/place in general). I like it when they don't feel the need to explain exactly what has happened too.

One of my favourites is a really long one called "The Showers". There are two parts to it and the writer creates such an incredible sense of mounting dread. The scenes that I was imagining in my mind were truly terrifying. There's two parts to it.

 

[Some_weirdGuy]

Dunno if this is a cliche particular to Creepypasta or just an aspect of amateurish fiction in general, but I was reading The Russian Sleep experiment recently and despite the overuse of gore as opposed to psychological horror I thought this was a fairly compelling story. Then I got to the last large paragraph in the story and the "scary guy" fucking explained who he is and what his character was all about and it ruined the mood worse than a wet fart during sex.

Creepy is what happens when people can't understand something with their conscious mind. If I can rationalize what the "creepy force" in your story is about then the part of my brain that reacts when you say "BOO" is disengaged and told to get out of the way for the part of my brain that wants to analyze the economic factors that influence two-ply versus single-ply toilet paper. Even worse, when the "creepy force" in your story doesn't just explain itself to me, but the character under the influence of the creep knows what it's all about, well that pulls me out of it worse than a wet fart during sex after eating dinner at Chipotle's.

Things are spooky when we don't get them explained to us. They're even spookier when the people doing them can't explain them because they're just as limited in their understanding as we the readers are. To be truly creepy you need to seek out the uncanny valley and give me just enough information for me to recognize and buy into your setting before you turn it all weird, like a G̭̹͖̼̫̝̦̕a̧̺̣͎̺r̥̤̖̠͙̰̞f̬i̹̗éͅld̦̰̠̲̤̳ ̪̫̯͙̻̥͕͢c̱̳̬̺͎̫̘o̶̩͍m͙̯ì̻͎̪͍͉c͎͍̹̗̕ ̲̤͙̕ẁ͓͉̬̟̝͍it̯̯͎h̸ ̻͈͔͘h͇̣͇͙̬͟is͓̹̙̫̦ ͖̘͕ȩ̞̝͎̟y͔̱̞e̢s̮̳̙̟ ̜̟b͓̘̖͔̬̳ͅl̜̝̤͔a͙̜̼̤̱̟͎͘c͚k̡͕̱̯͙̙ḙ̝͙̙̳̯́n̩̮̜͡e̬̺̮̺ḏ̺̯͍͖̲͚͟.̴̹͉̘̝̟̦̟

Oh man the Russian Sleep Experiment -
I cannot even remember how it ended/went any more, but I specifically remember that the ending ruined the whole thing.


When it comes to annoying and creepy-pasta... can I say just straight up 'Jeff the Killer'? The name is dumb and he looks stupid, and he only became popular cause a bunch of people tried scraping the bucket for 'the next slenderman'. He's not interesting nor scary, and his story/premise sounds like something an 8 year old came up with...

For real, there is so much better stuff out there than chubby skrillex with a joker smile.

 

[Broderick]

I would say the overuse of blood and gore instead of actual horror. I mean it got so bad with the creepypasta community that one guy made the famous "The day of all the blood" story.

I am also a bit annoyed of the "guy buys an old game at a garage sale and it turns out it was haunted!" shtick. Also, one that goes hand in hand with the last one, is the good ol' "good guy character in a video game is bad in the haunted video game!!!111!". Seriously, go watch some of Yuriofwind's videos on some of these video game creepypastas; it is like watching ms3tk for creepypasta(ish I guess, mostly the making fun of them part).

I would mention others, but I think most everyone here has covered them.

 

[Broderick]

Hyper realism.

My pasta-fu is not strong. Could you explain what "hyper-realism" means in this context?

Sorry to butt in, but Hyper-Realism just basically means that it looked "realistic". Think of spongebob, now think of what spongebob would look like in real life. That is hyper-realism. Most people get annoyed at the use of hyper realism because it, like blood and gore, tends to be used as an alternative to actual horror. Oh no I saw a hyper-realistic spongebob without eyes! The horror!

 

[William Fleming]

I love watching Yuriofwind's Bullshit Creepypasta Storytime videos where he just reads creepypastas and makes fun of them every time. A common thing he says to make fun of them is the phrase "red, LIKE BLOOD". Here's one of his videos which covers one of the most well known gaming creepypasta.

 

[EMWISE94]

While most of my creepy readings come from the SCP Foundation site, I've read and listened to some creepypasta here and there and the one thing for me that ruins any good scary story is the (what i feel is lazy) tie in to hell/satanic ritual. I remember watching the Courage the Cowardly Dog Lost Episode creepypasta and thought it was actually kinda creepy... until "Then a pentagram appeared on screen" and I was like uuuuuuuugh, ruined! Like seriously, one of the essence of a good horror story is the mystery to the cause of whatever scary happenings are being recounted, the moment you attach it to something it kinda loses that edge, especially if its something as boring as a satanic ritual.

Well to be fair, I've read some entries tied to satanic rituals and they were scary, but thats mainly cause they took a different route than the usual demonic possession or whatever.

 

[Wolf Hagen]

I think the biggest problem, with most creepypasta stuff, is that some are either trying way to hard, or the simple fact, that (by now) we are overexposed to it.

Like slenderman, seriously, he got pushed down so many throats, he ain't scary, he's just like what Chuthulu nowaday is thanks to some obnoctious Fanboys, Chthulu is by now just a big Dude thats supposed to be a god, but since we all got the image of the Gozilla sized Squidface pushed down our throats, it becomes not scary, but totally mundane.

Slendermen is nothing creepy by now anymore, he's just a sleek tall dude in a boring suit, that likes to watch people and make then disappear, by whatever meanings though. The most thing he's be by now famous for, is a flood of "done that, been there" stile of Horror games on steam, and the fact that two (veeeery creepy) Girls killed to please him.
Those girls are creepier then Slenderman.

Glitchy Game Catrige? Try make it scary by messing with it, other then the graphics and Characters, cause honestly, thats not scary, thats a glitch. Wanna make it scary? Make it corrupt something without you noticing while you play it, and clearly cant track it back.



SCP Foundation Sites where mostly better as well, but since they slowly run out ob Objects, people and the like, that somehow are scary or threatening, it becomes mundane as well.
And SCP was nontheless more scary, because you had to read all that stuff from an emotionless file, rather then read about every darn hearthbeat that goes through the characters mind in the "my Pokemon Cadrige had bloody Pikachu! I was so scared, I pooped my pants" stuff. because the mind had some dots to connect.

But even that stuff had to be moderated by now, because some SCP writers tent to go "Mary Sue" on their SCP's, or are just slightly altered Expys from classical ones.

Well done Horror gets harder and harder, because by this point, we get more jadet towards it.

 

[Pieturli]

some SCP writers tent to go "Mary Sue" on their SCP's, or are just slightly altered Expys from classical ones.

Oh god yes, I thought I was the only one!

There are some really scary SCP's but a lot of them also become so absurd and samey that it just becomes annoying. Particularly when you look at the Keter class SCP's. Everything makes you go insane/commit suicide, everything is inexplicably indestructible, and everything has unexplainable instakill abilities, even ones where it is totally unnecessary and stupid, like SCP-1000. Why couldn't they just let it be bigfoot goddamnit?! Mary Sue is absolutely right.


Also, am I the only one who wasn't scared by "Treats"? I just don't get it. I've been scared shitless by stuff on the Foundation page but that one just never hit any buttons on me. As far as I can tell, it's just gore. So yeah, it's gross, but I don't get how it's frightening.

 

[Therumancer]

While most of my creepy readings come from the SCP Foundation site, I've read and listened to some creepypasta here and there and the one thing for me that ruins any good scary story is the (what i feel is lazy) tie in to hell/satanic ritual. I remember watching the Courage the Cowardly Dog Lost Episode creepypasta and thought it was actually kinda creepy... until "Then a pentagram appeared on screen" and I was like uuuuuuuugh, ruined! Like seriously, one of the essence of a good horror story is the mystery to the cause of whatever scary happenings are being recounted, the moment you attach it to something it kinda loses that edge, especially if its something as boring as a satanic ritual.

Well to be fair, I've read some entries tied to satanic rituals and they were scary, but thats mainly cause they took a different route than the usual demonic possession or whatever.

Well, I tend to think that when done right well known potential culprits like the devil/devil worshippers and the like can add to a story. Consider for example that as I'm typing this there are still organizations that perform exorcisms and the like, and of course cults, whether dedicated to the Christian devil, some variant of Christianity, or other various religions do get up to some weird stuff, and in some cases even believe so strongly that they are willing to kill themselves.

The two things that tend to ruin Creepypastas for me is when they make no sense within their logic. Like with the Sonic.EXE thing above, I see no real motivation for why the devil, demons, or whatever else, would come up with a creepy way of delivering a plushy. Furthermore if a pasta is intended to be a warning, or a plea for help, being evasive about what is going on doesn't make much sense, again like with the Sonic.EXE story which is really famous above, why would you bother to want to conceal Kyle's identity or your own for that matter? Finally of course there is always the question of how the person recording this could possibly know, or have survived the experience. An example of this would be something like "The Keepers" series, where by definition to know what the threats and challenges are you would have had to have been blocked into the whole thing, and then if you presumably fsiled your no more... unless of course your claiming you challenged The Keepers and won (there is a separate list of supposedly defeated Keepers) at which point in some cases you would wind up with some evidence of the feat, while the "prize" in many cases is useless in of itself, in some cases it's a sort of "super power lottery" where some of them would be quite useful. Not to mention the bottom line of why anyone would bother with something like that given that The Keepers by definition bother nobody, and are basically defending a bunch of objects that need to be kept apart or something really bad happens... and if your in theory acknowledging this as real to challenge the keepers, again, why would you bother?

Now in some cases Creepypastas can sort of explain themselves. With a lot of the "lost episode" stuff it's possible guys at a studio might have been goofing off, people tend to do that. If someone say found a lost episode of Seseme Street where one of the characters runs around and murders everyone, I could potentially see some bored people on set doing something like that for fun, and some of the gag-tapes getting out. Why would anyone do anything that sick? Well people have been making malevolent gags out of friendly things, and producing horror movies/stories long before Creepypastas ever existed. So in theory in some cases there is no needed justification for explaining why something might exist, especially if it has no particular supernatural associations other than being freaky. Many on the other hand do not. This is why I don't put much faith in the conspiracy theories I mentioned in my last post, as anyone reporting a real incident would likely be very specific, even if they are a bad writer. Such a conspiracy would work
by investigation and debunking false positives (so to speak). Found footages movies are a little easier to buy as being part of something like that.

Me, if I was to sit down and put out a cry for help on the internet for whatever reason (which might actually be a forum like this due to having an account and knowing my posts would be noticed), I would be as specific as possible.

I'll also say that in cases where your going out to poke something, like say "hey, let's go hang out in this haunted house everyone else is freaked out by" I have the same problem as I do with horror movies, which is to say most real people are cautious even when they don't want to be seen as overreacting. I frequently joke in horror movies "whelp, we went into a dangerous place, found what was supposed to be here and make it dangerous, and none of us brought a gun...". Not that guns might be effective mind you, but the point is that in most cases it seems like such stories rely on an unrealistic lack of preparedness when something is being sought out rather than catching people by surprise.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Hyper realism.

My pasta-fu is not strong. Could you explain what "hyper-realism" means in this context?

Sorry to butt in, but Hyper-Realism just basically means that it looked "realistic". Think of spongebob, now think of what spongebob would look like in real life. That is hyper-realism. Most people get annoyed at the use of hyper realism because it, like blood and gore, tends to be used as an alternative to actual horror. Oh no I saw a hyper-realistic spongebob without eyes! The horror!

Ahhh, gotcha. Don't think I've ever seen that, but it does sound pretty uninteresting.

 

[Cid Silverwing]

My pasta-fu is not strong. Could you explain what "hyper-realism" means in this context?

Self-explanatory. "Hyper-realism" is when a game/video/whatever looks so incredibly realistic that it's indistinguishable from reality.

 

[Pink Gregory]

Off topic, but I hope that nobody else has ever referred to the moon as 'gibbous'. Because Lovecraft ran that into the ground.

Also, suicide in the face of horror, not that scary.

 

[Pink Gregory]

Not sure if you'd consider this a real cliche, but the constant name-dropping of Pokemon even in stories unrelated to it. Those piss me off more than just about anything because they kill any chance the story has of being spooky.

...what now?

I don't read creepypastas, but...what now?

Also can someone explain to me the difference between a creepypasta and just short fiction? Is it quality and meme potential?

 

[YuberNeclord]

I'm in the middle of a Creepypasta kick recently and have been reading a lot of them, though it's really hard to find good ones on the wiki. A lot of them will be overwritten and try to hard, or it'll lack any kind of subtlety whatsoever.

Here's a creepypasta for you to look at:

http://someordinarygamers.wikia.com/wiki/Metroid_2:_Secret_Worlds

Yes I wrote the story, and yes, this is shameless self promotion.

But yeah the reason why I wrote a creepypasta, especially a haunted gaming creepypasta, was because I was so sick of all of the cliches and was trying to come up with something that was at least decent.

Anyway, back on topic, there's a lot I find annoying about creepypasta writing, but I think there are two things that stand out the most.

The first is when the writer puts extraneous information into the story or information that you can already figure out for yourself.

Like when they start off by talking about how much of a gamer they are. Saying things such as "I'm a huge a sonic fan" or "I've always been a gamer." It's like they think they need to show some gamer cred or something.

But who gives a fuck? Just tell your story. I already know that you are a gamer, and that you like Sonic games, because the story is about you buying and playing a Sonic game.

And they don't just mention it once either, they keep repeating the same line throughout the whole story.

The other thing that really bugs me are characters who don't act or react realistically.

Here's an example:

In the creepypasta 'Jeff the Killer" there are two brothers. They are waiting at a bus stop when they are attacked by a gang of three youths with knifes. One of the brothers, Jeff, fights them off, seriously injuring one of them. Now for some stupid reason I can't remember the police end up blaming the whole thing on the other brother and he gets taken away to juvie or jail or something.
Anyway, less than a day later Jeff is forced to go to a kids party, because his mother wants him to go.

Ok, I'm sorry, what?

A mother has just had one of her sons taken away by the authorities and she says, "Oh well, let's go to a party."

Um, no. Right now she is hysterical, she's not letting Jeff go to party, let alone anywhere else for that matter.

It's like the author isn't even human. He's like some alien that has just arrived on earth and after observing humans for two minutes he then proceeds to write a story about them.

I feel bad for this author because I think that there may be something horribly wrong with them.