MUP Ep 352 – How to Start a Scenario

This episode, Keepers Bridgett & Evan unpack the best ways to begin a scenario! We’re going to define what the means, things to consider, best practices, worst practices, and even provide you with some recommendations on authors who truly stuck the landing on a strong opener!

Patreon Plug & Update

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“Dr Weir’s Optometry and Travel Agency: Where you’re going, you won’t need eyes to see.” Submitted by iPwned

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The Discord Plug

Our MUP Discord and we are all there! We invite all of our listeners to come and enjoy the community of horror gaming and cute pet pics. Link in the show notes: MU Discord server invite link: https://discord.gg/vNjEv9D 

And thank you to our editor NATE for editing this episode. 

Bridgett’s Pet Pick Shout Out

Tonight, I’d like to shout out friend of the show, GroucyLenny and their cats, Lily and Camille, who are captured here with the caption– nefarious plan is to absorb all of the sun’s energy to destroy humankind.

Wait. You guys are getting sun? I’m in Ohio. I haven’t seen the sun since October 2025. Can I join this plan??

Thanks for sharing with us, GroucyLenny!

Main Topic

Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Main Topic!

Tonight, we’re going to unpack the best ways to begin a scenario! We’re going to define what the means, things to consider, best practices, worst practices, and even provide you with some recommendations on authors who truly stuck the landing on a strong opener! 

From a storytelling perspective and from a game design standpoint, this is such an important topic that I don’t believe it is getting enough affection. It needs some love, so I’m happy that we’re slowing down to really explore the impact that introductory scenes and onboarding have on the rest of your game and storytelling experience!

What is the beginning of the scenario?

Is this… a roundtable of character introductions? What do you look like, name, occupation?

Is this an opening scene?

Is this worldbuilding?

Why do we care about this topic?

Arguably, the introduction, climax, and conclusion are the most essential and vital points of storytelling