Housepets!

generally speaking, a spinoff is usually only used to refer to when the work in question is official in some capacity. Fan fiction is written by fans, spin offs are developed by people involved with the original work or at least endorsed by the original creator. Torchwood was a spin-off of Doctor Who. fan fiction about the Doctor is not a spin off.

So Rick's Housepets: An Infinitesimally Brief History of the World is a spin off. anything in the fan projects section is not, unless it was written as a spin off of another fan project.

Argent wrote:Are y'all sure that "PG" is what you mean?

We moved away from a movie-style rating and the current version of forum rules is more based on the concept of "family friendliness," if you will. Actually, even if it is in direct contravention of your will, this is still the case. *chuckles* Basically, keep in mind we do have children (some of whom are fewer than 10 years old) on the forums. We're happy to answer any questions you have regarding the appropriateness of material you'd like to post, but frown on blindly pushing limits.

And by frown, he means i'll do bad things to you with my stick.

Um, so may I ask some questions?

1. What would you consider "inappropriate content"? (for PG)

2. And would it still be acceptable if the said inappropriate content is talked about in the fan fic but not really shown?

Depends on what topic you're looking at.

Death and violence are real parts of life and may appear in your fic, but you don't really need to go into all the gory details just to tell us what happened.
Relationships can be very sweet, but they don't need to get creepy.
Basically, we want you to enjoy writing a story, and we also want others to enjoy reading it.
By the time you're going over rating, you should probably be aware that you're treading the line.

If you have any specific questions, you can always PM a mod to get confirmation.

I search a little of information about PG-13, and I found that some books that I read are rated this way like:

The Hunger Games = A lot of people die and one gets tortured by mutants dogs before get killed just by mercy.
Looking For Alaska = Use of alcohol, a little scene with ***** and another whit a *****, use of the private body parts and some swear words.
Divergent = Use of weapons and guns, fights until KO, the fears scenes where one this is going to die drowned or incinerated.

Can I use this examples as the line that stops PG-13 to become R/M rated?
I mean that if I can use this as an example of how far I can go at writing and still be PG-13 rated.


Mod Edit: Don't just partially star out things. PMing a mod is a good solution when you think what you are talking about is over he forum limit

See, this is why we moved away from just using "PG" and "PG13" as our descriptor. Your second example is right out. It has themes beyond what we are going to cover here.
Allow me to quote the forum rules here:

Forum Rules wrote:

• Housepets! is a family-friendly comic. Please do not post material that would be inappropriate for children. As an example, pregnancy is fine, but pornography is not. Likewise, graphic violence, politics, religion, drug use, illegal activity, profanity, and other potentially controversial topics are not allowed.

These rules still apply here. We don't want you to feel limited to exactly what the comic does, but we also want you to remember the "family friendly" spirit of the comic. So your first and third examples sound like they would be okay just from what you have mentioned, but depending on how graphic the violence that they describe is, it might push the limits too far. It's a balance of degrees. I think you can usually feel from the comic where about the "grey area" is, and that's a good indicator of when you're toeing the line. But if you are ever uncertain about anything in particular that you are writing, you can always PM a mod for their opinion.

i'm sorry but i need to ask.. so i can't make like for example peanut and tarot breaking up and paired them with someone else or something like that?

AldyBilly wrote:i'm sorry but i need to ask.. so i can't make like for example peanut and tarot breaking up and paired them with someone else or something like that?

Of course you can. It's Fan fiction. It happens all the time. it won't make a blind bit of difference to the strip and is 99% certain to be totally irrelevant to how Rick is going to continue his story. He's the only canonical writer for Housepets!

AldyBilly wrote:i'm sorry but i need to ask.. so i can't make like for example peanut and tarot breaking up and paired them with someone else or something like that?

Let's see, I recall a one-shot fic where Grape and Max ended up breaking up, one long fic includes Peanut being with Grape instead of Tarot and Joey and Squeak calling it off, and another where it seemed that King meeting Bailey was undone. You can get creative with these things. The main thing to keep in mind is, of course, the family-friendly use of the site. Drama is allowed, explicit content and language is not.

If you feel like making your own fic, keep this in mind, and have fun.

Hey, I posted a fic a long while ago - like, two years, at least - and I don't want it pulled back to the active forum; rather, I want to rewrite a majority of it now that I have much more practice with writing. Can I do that, or do I have to pull back the original thread?

If you're going to do a major overhaul and not bring up the old one, you can go ahead and make a new thread for it, and I can move the old one to the Abandoned Fics forum when I can. What was it called?

It's actually been in the Abandoned Fics places for a while now. Don't worry about it.

Oh. Well that's convenient.

uhm sorry i need to ask something... we can't change sexual preference from the original character right?

It would make an interesting self - discovery thread for a character within your plot. You certainly could point to the evolution of Keene and Breel's relationship as one model for depicting such a personal awareness development. Follow Dissension's guidance.

sorry i need to ask again, many writer have many style but there's something that catch my eyes.. for example
King was greeted by a high piece screaming that pierced through his sensitive ears.
"We are such big fans of yours. We love you so much," Lisa said
and this one
King was greeted by a high piece screaming that pierced through his sensitive ears. "We are such big fans of yours. We love you so much," Lisa said
the difference is when the direct and indirect speech become one and the other in the new lines..
which one is better so that the reader could enjoy?
ps.
sorry fenrirblack for using your story...

New speaker or new point of view? New line.

The first line is King and he's the focus.

The second, spoken, line is Lisa. The focus has shifted from Kings point of view so a new line is needed. If it was "they greeted King with a scream of such high pitch she could see it pierced his sensitive ears" then it's all her and one line is accepted.

wha..?!! it was different meaning? rather than writer style?

Rather, your second example will likely confuse readers into assuming that King is speaking (until they get to the end and read "Lisa said"). Avoid "styles" that may confuse your reader. If you are changing the speaker or changing the focus character, add a break so that it's easy to understand.

AldyBilly wrote:wha..?!! it was different meaning? rather than writer style?

The writer has to help the reader to understand. It just helps make it clearer it's a character switch. I'll include a very short section from the Mark Billingham Crime Novel "the bones beneath" (Sphere books, 2014) as I'm reading it now and it's right here.

<indent for paragraph>

Holland sat back, shaking his head. "Jeez, I know we're talking about people who've done some awful things, but these prisoners do have basic human rights, you know?"
"You're hilarious," Thorne said He was stoney-faced but, in truth, he was enjoying the back and forth. What might be their last chance to laugh for a while.
Holland helped himself to a last biscuit. He put the lid back on the tin and set it down in the footwell. He looked at Thorne.

See how he did it? The change of character focus brings a change of line (and an indent which is trouble to do here which is why we use the break in lines) even if they're not speaking.

Here it is again with the line breaks.

Holland sat back, shaking his head. "Jeez, I know we're talking about people who've done some awful things, but these prisoners do have basic human rights, you know?"

"You're hilarious," Thorne said He was stoney-faced but, in truth, he was enjoying the back and forth. What might be their last chance to laugh for a while.

Holland helped himself to a last biscuit. He put the lid back on the tin and set it down in the footwell. He looked at Thorne.

thank you so much !!! Welsh Halfwit and Obbl

So I have a question that I hope isn't too confusing: What if the fan fic takes place within the Housepets universe and the characters from it do exist within the fan fic, but the story itself revolves around a different cast of characters that are of my creation? Would that go in FanFic of Media Median?

We've always accepted Housepets! universe stories regardless of whether the actual Housepets! characters appear in the story

Obbl wrote:We've always accepted Housepets! universe stories regardless of whether the actual Housepets! characters appear in the story

Ok...I ask because I was thinking about resurrecting an old webcomic I was going to do that was set within the universe (kind of) and make it a written story instead.

A good rule of thumb is if it is in the same exact universe like the comic is set in, it goes in FanFic. If it has a different premise to the comic even though it uses the same characters, it goes in Media Main.

Amazee Dayzee wrote:A good rule of thumb is if it is in the same exact universe like the comic is set in, it goes in FanFic. If it has a different premise to the comic even though it uses the same characters, it goes in Media Main.

Hmmm...then mine is a odd one, as it's set within the HP universe, revolves around a new set of characters, but they interact with the cast of Housepets (specifically the Celestials)...might hold off on that one and go with the other FanFic I had in mind then.

Then it should be in Fan Works if the new focus characters at least interacts and takes place in the same world. Housepets 1X took quite some time to get to the canon characters and it was in Fan Works while it was ongoing.

D-Rock wrote:Then it should be in Fan Works if the new focus characters at least interacts and takes place in the same world. Housepets 1X took quite some time to get to the canon characters and it was in Fan Works while it was ongoing.

Ah. OK.

I have a stupid idea. What if an end of the world mad max styled apocalypse was caused by Fat Daryl eating any "Doomsday Dish" that will guarantee him the dishonor of ripping "the fart that ended of the world." A dish such as a "Seven Layer Quessarito Chipotle Beefy Nacho Supreme."

I know, it's stupid, immature and i have been afraid of stating it outright on the forums.

JamesTCat wrote:I have a stupid idea. What if an end of the world mad max styled apocalypse was caused by Fat Daryl eating any "Doomsday Dish" that will guarantee him the dishonor of ripping "the fart that ended of the world." A dish such as a "Seven Layer Quessarito Chipotle Beefy Nacho Supreme."

I know, it's stupid, immature and i have been afraid of stating it outright on the forums.

Dude...that sounds awesome!

Hope nobody was near him when that happened then.

Hi! I am very new here, and wanted to write a fic about what could've happened if PETA were a little more violent in kidnapping Fox,

now dont get me wrong, I plan no gorefest, nor do I plan to kill any of the characters, i was just wondering how far the PG13 rule will allow me to go in terms of using violence to make Him be quiet

i was thinking something as simple as a punch, though seeing as it is a human punching a pet, I just want to get the all clear before I started to write it up.

how's it sound?

Gore is the main thing we ask that you shy away from. Describing violence in more broad strokes is probably the best way to go about it. Feel free to give us the psychological toll, but gloss over the physical results of the violence. Sort of a "tell; don't show" rather than the usual advice.

Thank you kindly for the advice!

I'll get on it right away!

I look forward to seeing what you come up with! ^_^

Is there some limitations as of what you can & can't do when it comes to robotic doubles? (In regards to the previous question*)

I'll provide some clarification as of what I mean by robotic double (I mean nothing that is human/pet-like internally) It'll just have robotic insides (So no gore/blood) with a metallic casing but it'll have a fake outside (A synthetic covering/Fur)

Was asking this just so it is on the record so I (Or anyone else*) doesn't write themselves into a corner when it comes to a reveal or a twist...

Thanks in advance!

Like violence toward robots? Characters in several fan works have met violent ends. Even fairly extreme violence toward a robot would probably pale in comparison to one specific scene I can think of in one fanfic around here
Again, it's not dark themes that are the problem (within reason). It's that the comic (and by extension the forum) targets a wide audience, and certain content (like gore and sex) just doesn't fit into the community we're trying to build. We only ask that you take some care when exploring dark themes (thus "within reason"), as we would prefer a fan work be reasonably accessible to all our members, but you can always PM a mod if you are unsure about something specific you are writing (so that you don't write yourself into a corner).