Runners, put on your headsets and make sure they're tuned into the right frequency. from the heights: five letters from life after death will be available on all streaming platforms on Thursday, Oct. 30 at 12:00 am EST.
Presave or pre-order on my linktree. The EP will be available on your streaming platform of choice, but bandcamp is always best for artists :)
My deepest thanks for following along with all my updates and caring about this project. I hope you all enjoy listening as much as I've enjoyed creating it.
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humbly asking that you post more ZR content please <3333 but also please have spoiler warnings, I'm in the middle of S2 lol
Hmmm
Here, Iâm sorry itâs bad, I never finished/fixed it because I couldnât be satisfied at the time, but I donât have anything newer because I havenât run in a while! đŤ
but you may see this failure because I appreciate our shared love for Sam Yao
Happy one year #runiversary to me! I canât believe it was a year today that I first tried to jog, signed up for #zombiesrunvirtualrace in feb and started their #zr5ktraining app in March and now Iâm 40lbs lighter, 2 pants sizes smaller and more importantly feel so much better emotionally and physically understanding the joy and freedom of running every day! So thankful for my ZR family and for #sixtostart for helping me get here! On to the next goal! #iamrunner5 #raisethegates #runninggoals2017 #zombiesrun
Did an app ever change your life? Did an app ever make you laugh, cry, yell - while making you healthier? Did an app ever get you so caught up in a story that you forgot the world around you while listening to it?
The app âZombies, Run!â does all of those things for me on a weekly basis.
Seeing how my favorite app ever is currently celebrating its fifth anniversary, I thought I would tell you once again just why you should try âZombies, Run!â
I have been running on and off for ten years. Back in early 2007, I think, I began because I wanted to lose weight. It did help. And I did get in much better shape. But I never really made it past 5 km runs. I got bored.
Soon to be three years ago, in May 2014, I saw a Tumblr post describing an app in which you ran from zombies while being a part of an awesome story line. Having been more off than on running for a couple of years at the time, I decided to give it a try.
I have never regretted it.
I remember it vividly. The first time I played âZombies, Run!â. It was May 29, 2014, at 10.06 AM. I pressed that âStart missionâ button, and then I wasnât in Copenhagen anymore. I was on a helicopter, making my way over an apocalyptic England towards a small settlement called Abel Township.
Only before I reached the township, my helicopter was shot down by an unknown party. Having survived the crash, I had to run through a zombie-infested area to get to safety, with a stranger named Sam talking to me in my headset, guiding my way.
âIâm gonna call you Runner 5,â he told me. I have been Runner 5 ever since. And now I have even managed to finish a 25 km run. Thatâs quite a bit more than the 5 km ones I began with.
The glory of this app is that YOU are Runner 5, and Runner 5 can be ANYONE. The characters talk to you, but they never indicate gender, age, or looks. It also doesnât matter whether you go on short or long runs, or even whether you run or not - you can also walk the missions, if you want. What the characters do tell you, however, is how important you are to Abel Township. That what you do matter. You become a hero.
As you run, you make your way through an amazing story line: Each mission is an episode in a season, as if youâre running a tv show. There are currently five seasons. The writers are working on a sixth. I am continuously amazed at the twist and turns of the story, the character development, the âohfuckingshitthatdidnotjusthappenâ moments ⌠And thatâs saying something, because I can be a picky skeptic.
You can use your own music playlist for your runs. Every mission has music breaks between the sound clips. During these breaks, you also pick up items to expand your base in the app. And (if you choose to put that setting on) you can get zombie chases - which means that when the app tells you that zombies are approaching, you have to speed up to get away from them. Itâs great for interval training, and itâs completely optional; you can turn it on and off.
All in all, I want to recommend this app to anyone who needs motivation to get out there and move your body - or to anyone who wants to listen to a well-written and exciting post-apocalypse story with zombies and lovable people. And if youâre just starting out and would like a training program to follow, you can also check out their âZombies, Run! 5kâ app, which guides you through eight weeks of training, from couch to 5 km runs. The story line is not as âon the edge of your seatâ as the original app, but still very captivating.
So what are you waiting for? Go find it where you usually buy your apps! The first season is free, the rest costs less than 200 DKK a year, and it is money well spent.
And then let me know how much you enjoyed it!
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Iâve been using Zombies Run! for almost 2 months now. I hate running, but Iâve loved this app, and itâs really motivated me.
I did the same route today as I did the very first time I ran with the app (minus 0.20km apparently) and compared it to the stats in my first run.
Iâm so surprised and pleased with my progress. Thank you @zombiesrungame for such an awesome app and for helping with the positive changes Iâm making in my life âĽď¸
Hello hello I have very big and complicated questions that started out broad and complex but got more and more specific and more and more personal like my questions to my family and friends always do. Whoops lol. Buckle up.
I wanted to ask about fanfiction. I've really been thinking about that post you made about how a lot of fanfiction can be just used as a form of escapism, and not in a good way like Tolkien described it, but as a 'I hate life so I'm gonna read and write extensively about fictional characters rather than working hard/trying to improve my own life' Which I really want to avoid and not do. In the past I've certainly fallen into that trap- I would get so caught up in writing Marvel or Percy Jackson or Harry Potter fanfiction (not to toot my own horn, but was objectively good and I do think grew my skills a lot as a writer and character analyzer) that I would spend every free moment and many of ones when I really should've been working on school or chores or spending time with my actual family reading and writing it. I was probably doing that 5-8 hours a day when I was 11/12. (Yikes) Thankfully, my parents smacked some sense into me lol. It really just goes to show you how, for lack of a better term, soul-consuming, that these kind of fantasy pursuits can really be. Thankfully, I don't do that any more. I actively limit myself to a max of 3 hours of reading and writing fanfiction over the course of a week, which is a big improvement.
So yay! Now I have a definte separation from writing fanfiction to improve my writing and writing it to waste time because all of my energy is focused on it to the point where it is in my every thought. Good! Growth!
But now my new thing is this- I want to make sure that any and all fanfiction I write has a definite point. I want it to point to good things and have clear messages and blue flowers and point to Jesus, even if it isn't specifically a 'Christian' fanfiction.
For example, let's just point at that Voice in the Dark one shot I wrote, which is one of, if not the, best singular fiction piece that I've written. I think the reasons why it was so good was that A) I expanded on the story in a way that was intriguing, and got inside my characters heads and accurately depicted their thought processes through it B) Made it pleasant to read with details and action and emotion and everything, C) set everything up for a part 2 conclusion of Sam and Five really connecting and talking about what they both said/thought, and becoming friends (which after procrastinating for months, I'm finally working on), but most importantly, D) Had clear themes of hope, perseverance, connection, trust, and encouragement. Which is really what I think made it so much more excellent than other fanfiction pieces I've written. I had a clear point and intention going into it that was more than just 'Have it be something I love and just for my entertainment' although that was one of the reasons I did decide to write it I will say- you do have to love what you want to write in order to write it well after all. But this is absolutely what I want the point of all my fanfiction writing to be like from here on out, being morally great, as well as well-written.
So now, because I really enjoy ZR and its really is kinda perfect for a fanfiction format, I want to turn it into more of an ongoing piece with my favorite missions and Five's relationships with the characters. But how do I go about this trying to intentionally bring in blue flowers and good messages and beautiful themes, and not just only write it for my entertainment because its a piece of media I love? How to I make sure to firstly know what themes I can bring in, and then do it in such a way that's well-written, while also being able to have those fun moments and situations that are both in the game and I've thought up?
And finally, last thing, is I'm wrestling through if I should continue writing fanfiction to 'fix' a story (which is why I started a Percy Jackson and Marvel fanfictions, I wanted to take the parts of each story I didn't like and were poorly done and make them better) rather than make my own point with it. For most of the fanfiction writing I've ever done, my goal was to improve it, to act like a ghostwriting editor the author hired to fix their fundamentally flawed story. But now I'm realizing that I was spending so much time and effort (which don't get me wrong, I do not fully regret, I really do think that I've gotten far better at fiction writing through this) and I didn't even add any more goodness or morals to the story in a way that made it more soul-sustaining and truly good. I wanted to add a lot of bits that made be as a reader squeal and get happy over which... I don't think is bad per say, but its not what I want my fanfiction to be like any more. With my writing, I absolutely do want to improve on the source material, yes, but I also want to figure out what sort of themes and goodness I'm going for with it. So should I continue writing these large projects (cause each piece covers several books/movies) for improvement and also try to expand on the good ideas and themes the authors had, even bringing in my own, or should I just set it aside as that was great, but now I need to focus on making writing morally good and not just for entertainment?
I know a big part of this is wisdom and descretion- things that God has blessed me with but I know I always can pursue more of. So I know a absolute perfect answer to this question will require time and experience. But after sorting through my word-vomiting (sorry lol), what would you say to all of this? Thank you!! <3
Hey! First of all, I love getting questions from you, and I especially love it because you take enough time to read the previous things I say that we can have a very level conversation, and a deep back-and-forth, which is not always the case with everybody who sends me questions (I like those questions too, Iâm just saying.) So thanks for typing all that up!
Second of all, Iâm no expert on fanfiction writing. Youâve read what I have to say about making sure the âTone & Styleâ and âThemesâ of any âContinued Workâ stay true to their source material when it comes to like, sequels and expansions? Well, I guess I would apply that philosophy, generally, to fanfiction, too.
But the point of my âsecond of allâ is actually, there are better people to ask about this than me. I can answer you in a broad âhereâs how I apply my storytelling philosophy to this hypothetical scenarioâ sense, but other people have more experience actually doing what youâre talking about with fanfiction. Specifically, @doverstar, who, if you donât follow her or read her stuff, I seriously think youâre missing out.
So in summary, talk to Doverstar. Sheâll answer this better. But if I had to try and succinctly respond, Iâd say: âIntentionality is always better than doing something by accident. But if you genuinely value goodness, beauty, and truth, in your own personal worldview, in a way that is genuine, and you cultivate thatâŚitâll come out in your writing on accident.â So in a way, even when youâre being intentional, as long as you remember that, you donât have to be too militant whether youâre writing fanfiction or fiction.
(Thatâs a thought Iâm still learning to put into practice, myself. I err on the side of âcontrol everything to a T, outline everything, everything has to have a tie-in to the themeâif it doesnât youâre failingââ and I donât recommend that mindset đ )
Thatâs the âshortâ answer to your ask. Iâve got a deep-dive below the cut if youâre interested, though.
How do I make sure to firstly know what themes I can bring in?
This has to do with knowing the source-story.
ZR unfortunately gets very political and social in further seasons, but to do it credit, the main, recurring, broad theme of Zombies, Run continues to be âSomething greater than yourself is all thatâs worth living and dying for.â
They keep coming back to it with literally every villain, and every hero, from multiple angles. Youâll see. They say, âthe pursuit of pure happiness alone is bad because itâs selfishâthe pursuit of immortality is bad because itâs selfishâthe pursuit of everyoneâs affections is bad because itâs selfish; but sacrificing for others is the real happiness, the real immortality, the real love, etc.â
So any fanfictionâeven if, surface-read, it appears to be about Five falling in love with Sam or Janine learning to communicate, etcâthat comes back to âSomething greater than yourself is all thatâs worth living and dying for.â is a success. Because it carried on the Main Point of ZR. Or it carried on a point that could be tied to the main point, whatevs.
But your question (for other fandoms) is âHow do I know what themes I can bring in?â
Okay, well, thatâs actually not so hard. Lots of âsub-themesâ fit under the umbrella of the main theme. âSomething greater than yourself,â well, that entails âself-sacrifice, gaining a broader perspective, finding empathy,â etc. (something you can see they do with sheltered characters or brittle, mission-focused miopic characters like Janine.)
But how did I find the main theme to begin with? This post. In summary:
Take in the Story, With the Single Expectation that Theyâre Trying to Tell You Something.
Take Note of Where You Felt Something. Then Figure Out Why You Felt It.
Figure Out What Each Character Wants, and If They Have a Moment of Change.
Look at What Decisions the Storytellers Reward, and What Decisions They Punish.
You can apply this to Marvel, to Percy Jackson, to anything. Once you figure out the main theme, itâs not so hard to break that down into little supporting ideas. And inject those into your own story. And you can even figure out where the storytellers dropped the ball, or lost their theme and did something totally out-of-character, and then fix that with your fanfiction.
Or, galaxy-brain, is when you figure out what the story was trying to sayâand it was saying something bad or wrong, but you liked some of the setting or characterizations, you can fix that. Like Iâve always wanted to do with A Streetcar Named Desire.
What you donât want to do is try to make the story about a theme that has nothing to do with any good or true thingâitâs just gratuitous. For example, I see about sixty fanfics for Twisters (one of my new favorite movies, you may recall) and theyâre all about Tyler (the main guy) needing to be defended from his abusive alcoholic dad.
There is no mention of his dad, or alcohol, or Tyler having any emotional trauma, at all, in Twisters. Because the point of the movie Twisters is the girl characterâs trauma (and her best friendâs,) and Tylerâs role in all of that is to be the guy who pushes her past that. Because heâs lived a lifestyle of âyou ride your fears, you donât run from them, you donât even just face them.â
So why would a character whoâs whole conception, who was created to say that, be curled up in a sad little miserable ball because his out-of-nowhere made-up father is back in town? He wouldnât do that. His lifestyle is âride your fears.â Heâd be the guy reaching out and inviting his dad to lunch to see if something he does can make the outcome different, even though his dad never shows up, or always makes a scene, or whatever, because that would be âriding his fears.â Thatâs Tylerâs character. So why would you have him curl into a little ball and need his 126-lb girlfriend to defend him?
Iâll tell you why, itâs because the point of your story was not the point of Twisters, or anything good. The point of your story was, âI have a thing for emotional scenes where a man gets all weak and vulnerable and needs his love interest to take care of him,â and it shows. So you just hung skin-puppets and names of established characters on âyour thingâ and thatâs trash storytelling. The characters are supposed to serve the story, and the story is supposed to serve the audience, not serve you.
That would be an extreme example of what not to do.
And then do it in such a way that's well-written, while also being able to have those fun moments and situations that are both in the game and I've thought up?
If my fanfic is all about Sam and Five coming clean about their feelings together, thatâs fineâbut they should be driven to do that because not doing that is selfish. And selfishness is the opposite of âsomething greater than yourself is all thatâs worth living and dying for.â So Iâd have Sam avoid admitting to himself that Five means so much to him because if he does, he opens himself up to crippling worry after what happened to Alice. So out of fear, which is ultimately self-protection, he doesnât admit that he has feelings for her. But then eventually he comes to realize that caring about someone else actually drives him to work harder for the Greater Good, etc.
See what I mean? Your fanfic can be a string of scenes of will-they-wonât-they, romcom popcorn, as long as the thread holding them together is that character arc that points back to the gameâs main theme.
To make it well-written, you just have to be genuine. I know everyone has lots of good tips like âshow donât tellâ but books like Jane Eyre tell much more than they show. Some people say, âbreak up the pace with dialogue,â or âcut the tension with comedy, then ramp it back up,â etc., but thereâs no cut to the tension in Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde. Thereâs breaks to every rule. Thereâs an audience for every style. Just do what C. S. Lewis says and âtell the truth, without caring two pence if itâs original.â
If you know your source material and love the loveable parts for what it is, and then you marry that with what you really believe and value in the real world, youâll get it.
Know what youâre trying to say, love what youâre trying to say, and sacrifice to say it.
I think now that youâre thinking about this stuff, youâre going to have a hard time not writing something morally good, with entertainment as a supporting pillar.
What are songs that remind you of different ZR characters and why?
I like âWaitingâ by The Morning Of for Sam and Five!
I donât typically assign songs to the other characters because as time goes on I like each of them less and less. Like the story eats away at most of them like the ocean corroding a rock. But Sam remains good, for the most part!