 The SCP Wiki has a very definitive format for SCP articles. This is pretty much common knowledge, it's one of the first things that people get taught. A lot of success on the SCP Wiki is predicated on how predictable certain elements of articles are, and a lot of success of the Wiki is predicated on the exact same basis. Item number, object class, special containment procedures, description. Then maybe an interview log or an experiment log. If you have something that's different than that, call it an addendum and then you're done. No. Today, we're going to talk about how you're wrong about the SCP format. So really there's three elements that we should talk about when we're talking about the SCP format. First is the importance of sticking to the format. Second is the importance of not sticking to the format. And lastly, how themes can really help shape your article. Now one of the very first pieces of advice you're often going to get on the SCP Wiki is simple. Stick to the format. That means all the standard elements that we've mentioned and nothing too fancy. And this is good advice for a new writer. After all, the SCP format is tried and true. It is successful. It does work. On the other hand, if you follow it too closely, you don't have really much room to experiment and creative works tend to thrive when experimentation is a common thing. And frankly, if we don't change things up every once in a while, the SCP Wiki will eventually fade out and die as a whole. So let's revise that advice just a little bit. I'd say your best bet is to stick with the SCP format until you've mastered it. And that might take you three articles or it might take you several dozen. But once you have a firm grasp of what the audience wants, you can then take that knowledge and subvert their expectations. But how do you subvert expectations? Well, that's one of the other two elements that we talked about earlier. It's colloquially known as a format screw. And this is where you literally take some part of the SCP format and you turn it on its head. Perhaps you just create an SCP where the data can only be accessed by playing a working video game that you upload as a file of the page after you created it in RPG Maker. Or perhaps you allow interaction with the article in a way that drives the plot forward. Or maybe you use audio in a novel way to really mess with the reader's head. Or maybe you literally just turn the whole article upside down. And by the way, that's just a few of the format screws that I personally have written for the SCP wiki. There are dozens and dozens more from other authors and more coming in the future, I'm sure. It's an interesting way to make your article stand out amongst the crowd and it really grabs a reader's attention from the start. But beyond just messing with the format that way, there's also custom themes. Now custom themes are pretty old. Some of the first ones that really got traction were the GOI pages, the groups of interest pages, which I'll tell you right now. One of my favorite themes on the site will always be the MCND theme. Marshall Carter and Dark is really good. But I'd say there's probably at least 100 themes on the side at this point. And some of them are just subtle changes and some of them are very obvious changes. Some are great. Some aren't. But never underestimate the power of a fresh coat of paint on your article. If it's done well, it can end up turning something that's pretty mediocre into something good. And something good into something great. Now beyond a number of custom themes I use on a few of my articles, such as the straight on to morning theme, which was co-created by myself and von Pinzier, though Pinzier did most of the work and the coding. And the ACEs and 8th theme I co-created with Rounder House, who again did most of the work while I just offered feedback and suggestions on the design. In fact, most of the work I do with themes is basically going, I don't like that color. No, I think you should move that over there. That kind of stuff. But design help is still important when it comes to a theme. I just don't think it's as important as the actual coding required to, say, move that thing over there, which I absolutely can't do. But there is a theme that I use in almost all of my other works and that was created by a user called Wodenaz. When I was putting this video together, I decided to sit down with him and have a short conversation about the standard format themes and format screws. And if you're wondering, well, this is just somebody who makes themes, what do they have to offer on format screws? Well, he wrote an article this year in January, actually, that's already rated at plus 900 and it's a format screw. So here's that interview. So I'm going to be talking today to Wodenaz. I believe I pronounced your name correctly. That is correct. Yes, Wodenaz is an SCP author. You've got about what, 15 articles up on the wiki right now? I have five SCPs and then two tales. Yeah, but you also got some other system pages as well, right? Themes and that kind of thing? Well, just recently, I did an unusual incidence unit theme. And then before that, I did a run theme, which was ridiculous, but I made it just because I wanted to. I have no idea if anyone's going to use it. Outrun theme? Yeah, like the 80s retro style. Right, okay. I know what you're talking about. I know what you're talking about. I've seen it, but for the audience. And then before I did that, I did the old money theme, which I made for cactus, DJ cactus, but anything that I make when I make it, it's for anyone to use. I don't care if I make it for just one person. I put it up there for anyone to use it. Oh, so you don't include a little note that says, please don't use my theme? No, I don't. Who would do that? I can't imagine anybody would do that. You know, I'm talking about someone specific, right? Yes. Anyway, the reason why you're on mostly is because one of your articles in particular, besides your work with themes, the visual format of an SCP article is very distinctive naturally. But you've done a lot of work in modifying either the theme and changing the way the format kind of looks or modifying. What's the best way to put this? You have an article. It's SCP 4205 and I still haven't gotten all the way through it yet, but just from initial looking, it's a and there's going to be on the screen right now for our viewers, but it is a complete and total format screw. So talk a little bit about how important you think it is to not only understand the format, but also to be able to play with it in this way. Right. I don't think that because before I did 4205, I made two totally normal looking articles. I mean, they don't do anything crazy, not quite as crazy as 4205, that's for sure. But before I even tried to do anything that crazy, I did regular ones because I think it's important to know what an SCP looks and feels like before you take a hammer to it. Like you can't go crazy like that right off the bat. Can't subvert expectations till you know what the audience is expecting. And even then, I know that you said you haven't gotten to the end of 4205 yet, but when you get to the end of it, there is a totally normal SCP at the end. It's the journey up to the SCP. That's the unique part. So the actual format is still there. You just don't get to it until the very end, but there's still kind of the format while it's happening. It's like by betrayals that you give to the reader that's kind of like, here's something familiar to you to keep you going while all this other crazy shit's happening. If you just throw a bunch of crazy shit at them, it's probably going to be confused. Right. And I've done format screws myself, so I can definitely recognize the value of it. I mean, I've done, I think I did an, well, I'm not think. I did an SCP as a video game, like an actual video game, an SCP-245. I've done upside down SCPs, SCPs with audio elements that are integrated into the article. So I can kind of understand where there's a novelty factor to it, right? Like, regardless, not to say that the article is bad. I'd have, you know, I'm not making judgments on your article here, but regardless of the quality of the article, if your approach to it, your format screw is novel and interesting enough, sometimes that can overcome a poor quality of work. Would that be accurate to say? I think it can be a mix of two. Like, I think if you have something that's super unique looking in the forefront, it's going to grab people, but it still needs to be good to get them to them to the end. Like, I don't think you can have a total piece of crap format screw. So, yeah, it's a union of two things, but. Right. I do think that, like, I'm sure I'm not conceited enough to think that there's not people that just voted up on 4205 just because of how it looked. I'm sure people didn't. Who knows? Maybe most of them, I don't know, but I don't think that it would have done nearly as good as if it did if it was total crap. I'm sure there's been format screws in the back that. And the other thing that I think is important to know about format screws is that when they're bad, they're really bad. Like, they're really, really bad. If you see a bad format screw, they usually get downvoted and deleted off the wiki within like a couple of days. They don't last very long. So, it's kind of a right or die thing, I suppose. See, I recall, there's a couple of incidents that I'm reminded of. One of them is where I picked up the autoplay audio code from, which was somebody's author page who hadn't actually written any articles about four years ago. And I just saw it and it autoplayed some really obnoxious audio like right at the outset. And of course, that got downvoted and deleted off the site. But I was like, I could use this and I've used it in multiple articles at this point. So, it's like, yeah, if it's not done well, definitely can disappear. But that doesn't mean that the elements of the format screw itself are bad. You can use those in a way later and find out, you know, that it can work in a different kind of article. Right. When it comes to format screws, you basically have two parts to it. It's a little format screw itself and the actual story it's telling, I suppose you'd say. And I think the difference between a good format screw and a bad format screw is whether or not those two parts get together if they like feed off each other. If you have a format screw where the format of it and the story just don't seem to get along with each other, just seems totally arbitrary and bullshit, then those are the bad ones. Those are the ones that they can look nice at first. But if it just seems pointless, then what's the point? Like, why did you do something crazy with this? But if they're tied together in a way that makes sense, then that's that's what makes a good format screw for me at least. Well, let's take a step back from format screws now and start talking about the standard scp format. What about it attracts people in the first place? I know for me, it's just it's the kind of dry government document this to it. That's what that's what grabbed me at first when I when I first got it scp was just like these crazy, these crazy awful things being described in such a such a formulaic clinical way. It was unique and strange. And for a time, I think the other thing that grabbed me and probably other people was just how consistent it is. Like you if you can go from article to article and it didn't you always see that sort of thing. I do think after a certain period of time, I personally got sick of it. I mean, obviously, right? Right, yeah. With all the themes and all the format and now the format screws that you've actually done. So it's like, yeah. So I think I think that's the draw for me and probably for other people. I'm not going to say everyone was just the familiarity of it and the dryness of it. It's just interesting, you know, really seeing it anywhere. So a lot of my subscribers are new writers. What would you say is the most important part of the standard format? Most important part. I guess I'd say probably the clinical tone. That's probably the most important part because that's the hardest part for me at least, like getting getting that clinical tone. Like, right, because that kind of yeah, that kind of sets the tone literally sets the tone for what the articles communicate. And there's a very certain feel to it to like it's not if the clinical tone feels off, that everything feels off like it's there's there's very, very good scbs out there that I still don't really like because the clinical tone in them feels off. Can't really think of any at the top of my head right now. My memory's awful. Oh, that's a shame. I know they you should name something that you dislike on this channel so everyone can hear about it. I can't think of any right now. I'm sorry. Of course, you can't. I legitimately can't. But all right. So thank you very much. This is Wodenaz on the scp wiki. He's got about 15 articles going. It's probably most popular one and I'm betting the one he'd like to plug the most is probably scp 4205. Unless you have something else. No, you're probably right. All right. What was nice talking to you. Go read my other stuff though. It's also good. Yes, of course. Go read the other stuff. But read the one that's almost plus 1000 at this point. Yeah, it's got about 100 to go. But like it was posted in January. So yeah, it's going to happen eventually. Yeah, there's no way it won't happen. Eventually, like your other article was posted 2014. And it's like I'm talking about the very first one was posted in 2014. Yeah, and that's that's been slowly creeping up to 143 right now, which four or five year old scp is not that great, but still pretty good. Like I've got an old one that's about that old that's an old one that's about that old. I've got one that's that old that is only a plus literally plus 43. So you know, whatever. I was very, very happy with that before 4205. Now you're chasing the now you're chasing the you're like, I got to get it. I got to be able to do it again. Right. Basically, yeah, have a lot to live up to now. I've been blessed with never having like a true runaway hit like that. Like I've had some popular stuff. I've got something that's probably going to cross plus 500 before the end of the year. But like that's not the same as plus 1000 in a year. Yeah. I mean, I'm not going to complain at all. I'm happy about it. But it is it is definitely a little bit of a curse also. Anyway, it was great talking to you. You have anything else you want to plug before you go? No, no, that's it. All right. Thank you very much. Anyway, thanks for watching. And again, big thanks to what it is for sitting down and having a conversation with me. A link to his plus 900 article will be near the top of the description. So check it out for me. And if you enjoyed the content and you want to see more, hit the subscribe button and then the notification bell next to that. So you're notified when new videos come out. And beyond that a special thank you to Colin Weyland who recently pledged at $10. Thank you so much for the pledge and hope you'll be around for a long, long time. 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