Neopets Nerdery: Neopets Adventure Spotlight

 I used to play Neopets Adventures a lot. Neopets was by no means a small part of my life. I would be on that site for several hours a day. I've read the Neopian Times and I also played Neopets Adventures.

So . . . what are adventures? 

Adventures are basically a choose-your-own style thing. You click play, get a pop-up window, and get choices. Each adventure was made by a user. The best of these appeared in the Spotlight. However, the Spotlight had pretty much already been defunct by the time I truly got my own Neopets account (instead of just watching Noah play). Either that, or I was never interested. 

I had an intention to play and beat every single adventure in the spotlight. I thought every adventure appeared in the Spotlight at least once, but even though I'm older and wiser, man, would beating these adventures be good. 

What I really remember is a lot of "murder mystery" type plots, wherein you kinda had to guess RNG-style, and if you died, erm, you had to re-input all your inputs. 

So, let's start off by playing an adventure. This one being 

"In Space, No One Can Hear You Score" 

( Description: High above the lands of Neopia in the super futuristic Virtupets Space Station the Gormball tournament semi finals are about to begin. Hundreds of Neopets from all across neopia have entered the competition, but you, Usula Usul, are a favorite to go all the way. Can you make it to the tournament in time and beat the reigning Gormball Champion?) 

If I am correct, this one is actually where you explore the Virtupets Space Station and might even end up getting turned to sludge. 

Ah, black background with red text, so nostalgic. 

In all honesty, I remember putting these up a lot so I'd have another window so my mom didn't get suspicious if she ever walked past. I was never doing anything, but I wanted my mom to not know I was doing nothing. 

If you ever heard the term "liminal space", that's what I feel about these. They take up my entire monitor screen if I let them and I don't have to think about anything else. I'm just in another world. Isn't that why we choose to do roleplaying games? 

And, isn't the fun part about these types of adventures just that, even though you want to win, you can freely explore bad results? 

Here are my choices. 

Already, I have the option to try and snatch food from Grundo Cafe. Wait, life in the brigg? Isn't that kinda excessive? 

Ah, I see the first thing, is you are given a "hand" by a Grundo running through the vents. And if you reject him, you go earlier into the story.

So apparently, the quickest solution is just to wait for a teleporter to be fixed (however I did end the world once. *Butthead chuckle* Cool.) Anyway, then I get to "play Gormball". Kinda interesting, but like, now I'm against Thyassa and my options are to wait 2, 4, or 7. 

This is where I tend to dislike adventures as this is basically just RNG. Well not really RNG. But like, you just have to guess. Following that I could wait a long time and still win, I decide to wait the full 7 and . . . 

Well I did eventually get Thyassa out. Maybe I did with the 7, maybe with another option. 

So anyway, yeah, I beat that one.

But if you're curious about other options: So from what I can see, this one is fairly railroady, and that's not really that bad! A lot of adventures, the good ones, require you to work on logic. Almost like obviously incorrect test answers on quizzes. These are sometimes rigged in your favor.

There's only two "good endings". However, there's actually a slight difference between Dead Ends and "the End". The Ends basically don't let you repeat the adventure, meanwhile Dead Ends give you the option to go back.

 

Adventure 2: 

Shadows in the Light, on Page 19. 

This one is kinda weird to be honest. You start off as a "Lupe" who has a mysterious backstory, but your backstory is solved so quickly. I know time passes by quicker as an adult, but seriously? You basically question where your mom is, find her, then the story ends before you even find your siblings.

I looked through other options and this . . . isn't really Neopets? Like, this literally only uses Neopets images as options, but there's plenty of non-Neopets references. 

So I thought if I tried to lose that I wouldn't be able to, but turns out, you can meet some otherwise nice Lupe and she will just knock you in your ish for saying "oh I don't wanna tell you what's going on, sorry?" Though I do find one ending is quite ominous as you don't actually die, you're just getting closer to dying. I do remember playing this before because I can remember getting a victory where you get painted.

There's a couple different options with this one, but honestly gets boring. 

Adventure 3: 

This one caught my attention, from week 24, as I was looking through options.

(An Eyrie's Tale- The Tale of Kormarant and Tessy)

 Description: Kormarant and Tessy grew up together, and always believed they'd be together forever. But when the two eyries are sold to different owners, Kormarant must venture forth, with the help of some wild eyries, to save her from Gallion Industries who has been purchasing neopets for goodness knows what reason. But without even knowing where Gallion is, can he find her in time? 

Honestly, this one feels like this might be kinda sad to me. I'll try to win this one first time instead of messing around.

Wow, this one really throws you through the gauntlet. You can make bad choices that won't affect you for a while until you hit dead ends.

Anyway, after a wildly long time playing, I finished. Erm, not really an easy adventure by any means, but also drops an ad for Mannaseh (the creator's) Eyrie farm. Anyway, well, I was invested. Was this really all that good of an adventure? No. But for some reason, this affected me. 

 

Adventure 4: 

Page 226, A Trip Through the Haunted Woods

 Description: You are an island Lupe, parading the Haunted Woods with some of your good friends. On Halloween night you decide to see if the legends are true about the Deserted Fairgrounds. When ghoulish creatures chase after you, you and your friends get lost in the Haunted Woods and try to get out.

"A Trip Through The Haunted Woods" is a great adventure that anyone can play. It is a little creepy, but very exciting at the same time. The adventure is also not the easiest but not the toughest either. It's Just right. 

 

Not really sure if I can trust that anymore.

 . . . Nah that was easy. These are starting to hurt my eyes so I think I won't go on a deep dive for this one. Let's find one or two more and call this a night. 

There's actually one small tip. When you hover over a link, you'll notice in the bottom left of your screen a small tag that says where you're going when you click said link. A lot of times, people use the same "Dead End" screen, so when you see many options, you can just look over. There will be something at the end saying Node=Number. That Number is the Page Number. If you see two nodes with the same page number, then that usually means they lead to the same page, and that usually means both lead to a death or the same dead end. And you can even try to memorize the dead end nodes. Not that hard at all.

 

Adventure 5: Whispers

Description: Poor little Whispers! Though all her friends have grown up and become really cool and colourful, she's still just a baby and doesn't seem to be growing up any time soon. Guide Whispers along in a quest for colour, and see if you can help her grow up into the Xweetok of her dreams!  

Number 252. 

. . . There's so many options, and all are supposedly "good ends". I just think the creator didn't want to use Dead End even though you get eaten. My favorite ending is where you end up turning into a Faerie, but basically, you get a 50/50. Some fates are objectively awful, like becoming a guard for a prison, but are treated as a pleasant thing. 

I call this a just-for-fun adventure. You can do whatever you want basicalyl.

Adventure 6: 

 The Negg Quest.

Number 283

 This one is pretty meh.

Adventure 7: Mist Over

Description: Here, you play an island xweetok named Sylandria...although it doesn't say in my adventure. She's relaxing on Mystery Island, and when things turn unusual and upside down, she's totally unprepared for it; and she freaks out. *gasp!*

Number 259

Several okay choices in this one, I believe. Basically, you go to Geraptiku and fight various threats. 

Overall: These are interesting. Are they fun? They can pass an evening at the very least, but even the "best" aren't always that great. There's only so much you can do.

Mental Illnesses Aren't Random

Haven't said much for the month, but what I would like to talk about is mental disorders. People really like giving their characters mental disorders, but they tend to just think trauma = spin the wheel. 

People might not be logical, but there is usually a case of causality. As in, Cause-and-Effect.

For the record here, I'm not a psychologist, and I would severely recommend you look at this up on your own, if you are intent on portraying a character a specific way. However, that being said, how characters handle their own traumas is up to a writer. The amount of character trauma that is solved through legitimate therapy, where they have breakthroughs and realizations and learn how to process grief, is negligible. 

This is for a very good reason: They're characters in a story.

For example, if you asked any random person suffering Depression where that Depression comes from, very few of them could give you a straight answer. In some cases, Depression is just hardwired into the DNA. And even when you do get a straight answer, that answer is vetted by the person, so they automatically blame family, school, or work, when the reasons are multifaceted.

In stories, everything has a reason. I mean, sure, you can have a character who just has Depression, but for the most part, you want an explanation other than Depression for Depression Rep, wa-hoo! 

Okay, so I've throat-cleared a bit. Anyway, let's talk about your character's self-concept. This is ultimately what they believe about themself as formed by input on their lives. Mental illnesses typically revolve on negative self-concepts, such as "I'm worthless", "I'm fat", "no one loves me". (I won't get into some like Schizophrenia or PTSD, because those have a wildly different source).

Bulimia is created by people thinking they're fat. Maybe they were bullied for being pudgy, or maybe they think they can't be beautiful if they aren't skinny, or maybe their mom kept saying how fat they were. 

A person who thinks they're worthless because they failed to realize their dreams isn't getting Bulimia (probably), they're getting Depression (maybe). Depressed people don't eat because they lack the energy or think they're worthless. Bulimics don't eat because they think they're fat. 

"Emotions aren't logical". 

Oddly enough, they usually are. 

Let's take a character who suffers from low self-esteem. Why? Well, when he was young, his parents never let him help out around the house, afraid he'd break everything, and just took care of everything, so he has no self-sufficiency. And in-school, no one cared that he got good grades, so he never thought those mattered. 

I'm going to take one of my own characters, Misty, from "Vixen of the Dead". She suffers from Depression, and her real self-concept is "I hurt people and I'm not sure if I hate that or not". 

From her childhood, she was harsher and more driven than others to survive and win, maybe as a result of being abandoned by her father, maybe as a result of something else. As she grew up, others feared her power. 

Being a wilder, she wasn't allowed near people too often, and when she was, she couldn't understand them very well. What she knew was that hunting spirits felt good, and the best way to keep people out of the woods was to break their kneecaps. At least one. 

However, after her rageful adolescence, she reaches a more melancholic adulthood. Is what she did actually wrong? Why was she so violent? Is she at fault because no one loves her? 

Everybody does have their own personality, and there's not always going to be straightforward "mental illnesses". Honestly, some characters have clear mental disorders that the author isn't even aware of. 

 

 

 

 

 

Oh, and one more thing: Narcissism means more than just "I think I'm better than everyone else", and, in fact, that's not even how Narcissism works. Stop calling everyone you know a Narcissist, or I'm going to tell everyone you called your parents the N-word

Thank you.

Update: New Writing Articles?

I wasn't sure if I really had the chops to be a teacher, until I saw what chops people had on Deviantart and their fiction. I have been genuinely horrified. 

I would say, out of the about hundred stories I read, few were passable, about three or four were "good", and there is only one story the entire year of Deviantart I would probably think of as exceptional. I was easily reading 2 -3 stories a week. More on some weeks.

However, I don't exactly want to tutor people on their writing muchly. Part of this comes from the fact I use words like "muchly", however another part comes to the fact I cannot tell you how to write. I can't! That's not my place, and that is something you'll have to learn on your own. 

But, I have to admit, if I kept "learning on my own", I never would've gotten anywhere. Getting advice is tough online, because there's an awful lack of advice and an awful lack of discerning readers. Also, a lot of writing articles focus primarily on either the theoretical or the practical, but rarely both, and rarely the experiential. They might tell you how to build a kingdom, but not why. And no one really talks about the process of learning how to write. 

So, think of this as my attempt to teach others. Here are some of the articles I got plans for:

Writing Advice: "Kill Your Darlings"--You Probs Won't Feel Bad 

Macro Pacing Versus Micro Pacing

The Big Ole' How To Write A Fight Scene 

Your "Emotional" Stories Are Offensive 

And many, many more. 

Setting and Worldbuilding - Beyond Kingdoms and Spells

For ten months, I've ruminated over worldbuilding. I've realized the significant flaw when trying to learn about worldbuilding.

A lot of people think of Character, Plot, Setting, as distinct elements. And they are. But for a good narrative, and especially for a great one, these all merge and interweave.

Most people create their worlds like they're trying to make an RPG, like Dungeons and Dragons. They sit down. They pen the magic system. Maybe spend a ten hour binge read on famous Roman battles and tactics. 

And people would rant about the worlds they built. I believed there was a lack of focus on culture. On how people interacted. Their festivities, art, sculptures, natural disasters, regional differences, political groups, architecture.

Most people focus on the war aspect of worldbuilding and on the weaponry. Those who don't focus on that, focus on the cool spells. Then, they focus on religion. And I believed that was highly simplistic (even if writing a war is pretty fun ngl).

“Otaku? The people I hate most are those gun otaku. Speaking honestly, I think they’re really low level, and out of firearm fans, the pistol nuts are the worst. They’re the ones that have the most immature character traits left over. Ha ha, don’t you agree?” - Hayao Miyazaki

The significant flaw I found was as follows: Their world and characters had nothing to do with each other. No one explains how to make the world matter to the plot.

Worldbuilding articles talk about logistics and geopolitics, but rarely about why this world is. 

Setting is the most underdeveloped part in many stories.

If your drama is set among the gated estates of West L.A., we won’t see homeowners protesting social injustice by rioting in their tree-lined streets, although they might throw a thousand-dollar-a-plate fund-raiser. If your setting is the housing projects of East L.A.’s ghetto, these citizens won’t dine at thousand-dollar-a-plate galas, but they might hit the streets to demand change. - Robert Mckee

Your world is a character, a plot, a theme. An integral part of a greater story. Whether that be through antagonism in form of the cruel fashion industry in Devil Wears Prada, or through heroism in form of inspiring tales of Guardians in Guardians of Ga'Hoole, the world services as a part of the piece. 

Therefore, the world should be part of the main conflict. Such as in Honkai Star Rail's Jarilo-VI storyline. 

You've made a choice go fight against your fate

Pain will come with the blade

Pain will wake up the despondent crowd in this dormant world somehow. -Wildfire. 

Honkai Star Rail's first mission is beautiful. You enter a planet smothered by frost due to the effects of a Stellaron. The Stellaron sends out monsters that attack anybody on the surface and also wants to ultimately end all life.

There is only one city on the surface, named Belobog, where there are people on top . . . and the people underground. A pretty straightforward way of talking about class divisions. The people underground are known as living in the Underworld.

The Underworld was cut off from the Overworld, with the people in the Overworld unaware of the struggles down below. The Overworld believes the Underworld is living fine meanwhile they have to fight the monsters of the stellaron. The Underworlders, meanwhile, are struggling against isolation and limited resources. 

The Overworld is ruled by Cocolia Rand the Supreme Guardian.

The Underworld is led by Wildfire who wants to break their way back to the top of the world. 

Meanwhile, Svarog the robot who lives in the Underworld, wants to protect the Underworlders because he believes everyone will survive better underground with geothermal heating.

At the final battle against the Stellaron, the player talks to computer god, and he gives out the Fire Lance. The symbolic flames of rebellion against a world Preserved by Ice.

Come to think, the Underworld is an odd name. That sounds more like a place of death. Well, in myths and legends of Jarilo-VI, the land of death is described as a lush jungle where birds migrate to for winter. So if the land of death in mythology is a lush jungle, then the place literally named after "the land of death" in real life (underworld) is where we get our best chances at truly saving all life.

(Even more interesting is the story ties to Slavic Mythology and Folklore, such as how Jarilo-VI is even named after a Slavic God of the Sun and Spring.)

The worldbuilding in this game isn't just about factions or war, but also about the theme. The dystopian aspect works a lot better here than in other stories, because instead of just being about class tensions, the dystopia is more a metaphor about Action against Inaction. Everyone prays to Computer God of Preservation. The Supreme Guardians keep the world as is.

The world actively influences the characters but also reflects them. Bronya Rand goes from being a relatively cold character in the Overworld, to being brought into the underworld where she truly realizes how awful everything is. She is reborn. Supposedly in Slavic Religion, the Underworld was lush (just like in Jarilo-VI's mythos), and Jarilo the God of Spring brought the lushness back to the overworld with him, bringing the season. 

In Rivet Town, Bronya finds where she grew up: An orphanage run by Natasha, the leader of the Wildfire movement. She finds out that Seele (a major player in the Underworld) and her came from the same place, but Bronya was adopted and sheltered in the overworld. Rivet Town is barely held together by thumbtacks and glue, just like how Bronya's worldview is. The Overworld city of Belobog even has walls as shelter from monsters like how Bronya was sheltered. 

Or consider a tiny mountain lake. Thickly wooded slopes sweep down to the water's edge along half its shore line. Sheer cliffs rise gray and forbidding on the far side. Two camping trailers and a tent stand in a patch of clear ground down close to the narrow south beach, where a rutted dirt road terminates. There are children at play . . . women cooking ... a man who bait-casts a hundred yards or so off to one side. The road, in turn, leads away from the lake, around a spur of brash, them off along the edge of a meadow thick with wild-flowers—columbine, trillium, bellwort, violets. Now a pickup truck approaches, bouncing noisily along the road. Far away across the meadow, behind a hillock and almost in the shadow of another spur of brash, a pair of bear cubs frolic under their blackfurred mother's watchful eye . . .

What will your focal character notice about this scene? To what specific fragment will he react? Is his lens fixed on the trout? The bears? (And if so, which one?) . . .The bellwort? The big, raw-boned woman in Levis who hunkers by the fire, poking sullenly at her frying bacon with a stick? - Dwight Swain

You might ask if your magic system fits your world, but also ask if the system fits your theme and characters. 

In Yu-Gi-Oh!, Pharaoh's magic is primarily saved for punishing the wicked after they lose games. The theme is that "villains lose because they cheat", and those who cheat are subject to penalty games by the rules of a shadow game. In The Masque of the Red Death, the rooms of color symbolize the stages of life from birth . . . to the black chamber with a clock symbolizing death's inevitability.

Meanwhile, I'd argue with Pokemon, types rarely play a part. If Giovanni was a Normal-Type gym leader, would they be a difference? Does Pokemon ever focus on the importance of types? 

Then, how does the culture and world affect the characters? In Island of the Blue Dolphins, the culture forbids women from being hunters, and the religion says if they make spears, they will be swallowed by the seas.

And how's the atmosphere affect the plot?

In Guild Wars 2, Maguuma Jungle is important in the Heart of Thorns expansion, as a horrific jungle full of monsters, where there are dozens of levels of vegetation, all who are hostile because they're part of the Jungle Dragon Mordremoth. 

In a great story, everything works together.

So, maybe all this inspires you to take another look at your world. You can still take time to think about where every river is, but what does every river mean? Is the setting a backdrop? Can you honestly say a garden stands for a character's life long work and about perseverance and daily upkeep? 

Maybe now your worldbuilding will be next level. 

Or maybe you still suck, like you're kinda a mess bro, not gonna lie. That's all. LAter.

Vixen of the Dead is finally out

 After several long months of work, Vixen of the Dead, my new *Novelette is out.

*Technically this could also be a short story, but is one-thousand words too long. 

So, should you read this? 

Vixen of the Dead is a story about Cyras and her own cousin, the enigmatic Misty. After the Queen Raynfall incident, Cyras is tasked with returning a crystal of emotions back to Misty and breaking her suppressor crystal. However, instead, the so-called Vixen of the Dead chooses to have no emotions. But the reasons why go back to a traumatic past that Cyras must unravel the secrets of. 

Vixen of the Dead is ultimately about self-sacrifice versus authenticity and genuine friendship. The more pleasant interactions between Cyras and Misty go against the backdrop of secrets within the walls of Sheerwalls and a past better forgotten. The story is also about depression, and how we behave in a self-antagonistic way. 

In the scheme of the wider plot of N:Era, Vixen of the Dead serves as a partial catalyst for Cyras' own growth. 

 

 

Vixen of the Dead 

  https://www.deviantart.com/saviorfoxowlis/art/N-Era-Vixen-of-the-Dead-1003760558https://www.deviantart.com/saviorfoxowlis/art/N-Era-Vixen-of-the-Dead-1003760558

Question: How Do You Balance What's Good With What You Like?

 "Do you gotta balance writing about the topics you wanna write with what's "good", and is there some ideal level where you really have both going. Does learning about what's good influence what you actually enjoy writing?" 

Greetings, mutants.

I've got another question today, this time from Kieral, one of my writing partners, someone who's much better than all of you reading this. And basically, this is a high-level question about "taste". This comes on several layers: 

-Is writing what you like versus what's "good" a balancing act? 

-If so: What's the ideal balance. 

-And: If you learn what's "good", will that affect what you enjoy from now on?

And so when I pressed, Kieral gave me an example from a show called Dragon Pilot. 

(

Well, like for me, over time I've gotten better at reading subtext and making assumptions about what the writer's opinions on things are. Not to say I'm good at it, but that's still shifted my preferences with writing a great deal. Like recentlyish I watched this show called "dragon pilot". It's got everything: dragons, planes, and dragons turning into planes. I shoulda loved it. But I didn't, because I took a fact from the lore (you only get on with dragons if you got nobody else in your life and you HAVE to get on with them to fly) and extended it to something greater (these people are lowkey stuck in possessive relationships and that's not treated like a problem??). And that.. really turned me off tbh, like if they come out with another season I'm not watching it.) 

So: 

When we write, we're obviously influenced by what we like or dislike. Such as dragons turning into planes, or horses, or cowboys. But now, let's say you read a fantasy book, and the fantasy book drones on for almost a hundred pages about how the elves cook their food. We get cookbooks, we get elaborate feasts, etc. 

At some point, that won't matter because while you like that, while your passion comes out, that's not a story. That's background. 

 

Passion and heart are a tool the writer uses to put pathos in a work, but there's more than just pathos. Pathos alone can easily become bathos, or the act of melodrama. 

 

For example, I was recently reading a work where the entire situation was a therapy session and all that occurred was a character talking about how much everyone else in her life sucked and then the story--the text ended. The story didn't end. There was no story. 

 

But this person wanted to rant about society, but that's not a story. That's a rant. This was presented in story format, but that doesn't make this a narrative. And at the end of the day, instead of being a good rant, this was more of a "woe-is-me, tis' nobler in the text to drone the words and talks of probably-right-while-I'm-probably-wrong people" type rant. 

Now imagine this same author took this rant about society, and instead the therapist got pissy and broke ethics and actually started yelling at the patient (who I will admit was clearly insane and needed therapy). And now let's say the patient actually has to defend her point of view. Then we get a story. Now we've got events unfolding. 

Basically, when you include what you want, you can do that, so long as the narrative proper comes first.

 

Remember, there is theme, and that's the universal part of the story. If you like to rant about society, but your story is about being grateful for what you have, now you're going against the theme. 

Now, we got plot. Let's say the plot of the story is about taking out the high school drama cheerleader. She runs the stage, she runs the cheer squad. And she hates the main character because the main character has curly hair (as if having curly hair wasn't a curse already. Anything my hair snags is lost forever). Now if the therapy session interrupts the plot, the audience skips because that's filler. 

And let's say we've got a character who hates to speak her own opinions, but the author wants her to rant anyway. Breaks character. 

The last one is also incredibly common. Someone breaks character to do something they want. They like fighter pilots, so they have the characters pilot fighters, even though most of the characters are too dumb--in canon--to tie their own shoelaces. 

 

Or they put characters in fights and they're experts even though the only thing that's ever hit them was gravity.

 

But then nextly, there's the final question. Will we be affected of what we enjoy if we learn about good writing. 

Well that's a really interesting and neat question, because yes. I can say without a doubt that does affect what you enjoy. Unfortunately, that also means plenty of stuff you liked in the past you will inevitably not like anymore, such as old Disney sitcoms. Or maybe you can't play Pokemon anymore because you've played other, better RPGs. 

Same works for writing. But you also find that strong narratives don't get weaker, but stronger the more and more you learn. 

Now this all begs the question, if you have to learn what good writing is, is "good writing" some elitist club and there's a big story book of how everything should be written? 

No. Good writing is based on psychology of how people think. Good writing is founded on techniques that make people go "oh wow". Based on principles. And some say "good writing is subjective", but you know, whether punching a random person in the face is good or evil is subjective as well. But you don't see many people saying you should punch random people in the face. Maybe a few Swamp Mutants might say punching people in the face is good, I don't know. 

However, subjective is not completely personal preferences so much as a universal sense of what people like. And you might go "well different cultures write differently", but at the end of the day, people watch Anime who aren't Japanese, same as how Japanese people have been interested in writings from Ethiopia.

But that's a full question for another day. Thank you.

Writing Ramble: Why Writers Get Complacement and Lazy

I was reading someone's stories, one more recent, and one a few years back. I'm like, "Well these aren't much different." So I go back to their first story. Eight years. Eight years, the person hasn't improved. Maybe marginally. 

Greetings, mutants. 

I would like to talk today about writer complacency. This occurs when a writer has reached a plateau. They aren't getting better. Maybe technically they've picked up some stuff about grammar, but nothing about theory or craft. You might be like, "Okay, well how does this occur?"

Well there is a vaccine to this infectious disease, and that is to always be learning. You are never the master, you are always the student. 

You need to seek to challenge yourself. Your viewpoints. What you know.

I remember, when I was doing fanfiction writing, how often people would say something like, "You gotta make sure that character isn't a Mary-Sue and give them lots of traits." 

Well that's a one-dimensional approach to making characters. Then you get a bit better and you learn characters need motivations and goals. Then you get better and you learn they need a character arc of growth. Then you learn about how their traits must interconnect, right. And then you learn about psychology. You learn about how that character is linked to worldbuilding. You learn how that character is linked to plot. You learn how that character is linked to theme.

There are a million different things to learn about a character, such as presentation, or making side-characters with subplots that comment on the main character's story. 

And one more thing is you need to leave your comfort zone. If you keep writing the same types of plots or using the same elements or the same characters, you're done! You've already wrote a story, and you keep retelling that same story, because you're done. You've run out of thoughts.

If you keep writing about action adventures where they explore the Crack of Uranus, you're not learning. And if all your characters are sassy "marvel dialogue" characters, and you always got that sexist jerk, the naive dumb one who's learning, the action heroine, and the smart jock, you're not learning. 

Keep learning, keep writing.