After pondering it for a while, I think that some of my perception of the similarity of these series comes from the fact that I've mainly been reading the same type of fanfiction for both: time travel or game interface stories where the main character gets to redo life in a smarter and more efficient way, righting tragedies that took place in canon. I think the "fixfic" pattern overwrites some of the aspects of canon that I'm less interested in. This isn't really a direct response to the thoughtful replies you all have written here, which I've enjoyed reading; but I just wanted to share what I'd been thinking about today and yesterday. I think that, while time travel isn't essential, I do very much want to give the main character some kind of inside source of information not available to the other characters. Besides time travel, precognition, empathy, or non-human/magical senses could fill the role of a special ability the main character has that gives them this kind of extra info.

With the premise of a teenager who's particularly gifted with some special power and leaves family to be trained and/or to use it, the most important element is the teenager's attitude, for which there are many traditional patterns:

• Harry Potter has inherited a war, and he prepares for ending it with an heroic, self-destructive showdown; given his low power level he needs many allies and intermediate steps, and he doesn't make any significant plans about growing up and fitting into society.
• The male protagonist in Infinite Stratos is just an idiot; although much more exceptional than Harry Potter, his only discernible purpose is being a decent student, which only incidentally involves fighting in earnest during a few emergencies. (Compare and contrast with Harry Potter's many genuine enemies, duels, murder attempts, etc.)
  What's "special" is the school itself: an academy for gifted pilots of T&A combat mecha is certainly more spectacular than, say, an academy for gifted fashion designers.
• Naruto appears focused on developing into a powerful and mature ninja, and caring for his companions and his quests and missions is a large part of this lifestyle.
  How much he's gifted and exceptional has only a relative importance, since most of his challenges are about insight and force of will, not about power.
• In Kill la Kill the main characters are very powerful from the outset, the protagonist begins as a lonely transhuman orphan with a mission and becomes progressively more normal, and plot advances mostly by revealing secrets, increasing power and raising the stakes.
  There's so little training and so little character formation compared to the development of strong ties between characters that it should be considered a borderline example of the genre.
• In Gunbuster, Mobile Suit Gundam and many other similar series, protagonists aren't particularly special, but merely skilled; they are placed in tough responsibility positions by necessity or by coincidence, which naturally leads to themes like disgust for war and violence, accepting risks and sacrifices, occasionally drifting into madness, etc.

Those are some good examples to fuel discussion. They get me asking myself, what pattern do I want my story to have? I've got two somewhat contradictory ideas:

- The main character takes the role of the mecha/gundam/dragon/jedi/whatever, looking at the current crop of students for a pilot/rider/padawan/etc. This character must be smart, but might not actually be the protagonist, since they are not prone to taking direct action. Having a viewpoint character who isn't the protagonist would be ok. This character isn't human, and their special abilities come from whatever species they are instead. Their role can't completely be that of a student; more likely their role is split between student, teacher, and other.

- The main character is a time traveler who must take direct action to prevent various undesirable futures. Again, this character must be smart. Many of the actions the main character takes are probably secret, so although this character seems like a protagonist from their own point of view, they may not seem that way to the other characters. Possibly they are the protagonist of a subplot but not the main plot. Again their role can't be completely that of a student, because they would learn a lot of things on their first time living through any time segment, but on subsequent passes through the same time segment they would be running low on additional things to learn. They don't necessarily have to take a teaching role, unless this is required to avoid specific bad futures resulting from another character being undereducated. Assuming other characters are unaware of the time travel, it would be difficult for this character to get any kind of official teaching role, unlike the above scenario, so they would probably be limited to tutoring. This character probably has at least one special ability in addition to time traveling, though it might be underpowered compared to other characters, requiring the character to be clever to get the most effect out of a relatively weak ability.

Coming back to the hero's journey, the key difference here is that the 'hero' isn't the main character. Instead if there is a hero they are likely to be the main character's love interest or the leader the main character decides to loyally support. The main character is instead someone manipulating things from the background, and relevant themes to this would be deception, ethical use of force, ethical use of persuasion, protecting others, testing others, taking preventative action to avoid future problems, and a final goal of a safe situation where the main character can relax from this stressful guardianship and instead focus on things like enjoying romantic and family relationships. Looked at from one point of view, the main character's self-appointed job is to shepherd the other characters through their own bildungsroman stories. But the main character does also follow their own journey of starting lonely and uneducated, putting a lot of work into study, training, and experimentation, slowly gaining relationships, and eventually attaining a safe position in society.

Again, this character must be smart

so although this character seems like a protagonist from their own point of view, they may not seem that way to the other characters

Maybe you should start with narrowing what kind of game are you making? Like if action game then go with the gundam pilot plot.

Again, this character must be smart

Why? I could think of unlimited number of scenarios whe smartness is not required (coincidence, accident, rare gift, etc, etc) and still met all the requirements other you listed. Or you meant you want the hero to be smart?

Well, I do definitely want the character to be smart, but my reasoning was that manipulation, whether benevolent or not, works best when the manipulator is smarter than the ones being manipulated. Being smarter than others is actually a half-decent motivation for a person to become manipulative as they are growing up - because it's frustrating to see people making stupid choices, the smart person may experiment with methods of making others make different choices.

so although this character seems like a protagonist from their own point of view, they may not seem that way to the other characters

"Everyone is the hero of his own story/life" Other "characters" (actually should be "people") will not see anyone as protagonists, only reader thinks in terms of protagonist/antagonist. For characters these words have no meaning (each character *is* the protagonist in his/her own eyes: like you think of me as some side character in your story where you are the hero and I just pop up when you visit this forum; similarly I see myself as the protagonist with you being just some side character in my exciting journey to the abbys of the net ).


Maybe you should start with narrowing what kind of game are you making? Like if action game then go with the gundam pilot plot.

I don't actually agree that everyone sees themself as a protagonist. Protagonist has a pretty firm technical definition, it only applies to characters who are strongly proactive or reactive. Either way they must be an engine of the story by repeatedly taking action, and it has to be action thatmakes the other characters react, not hidden action. Protagonists are also typically leaders (or loners), but a character might see themselves as a follower, and the person they follow as the protagonist. Or, protagonists are generally "do-ers", so a character who preferred to observe might consider themself not an actor within a story, but rather the audience or narrator of the story of the characters they observe.

As far as type of game, I was actually thinking about a work of fiction that incorporated game mechanics like The Gamer. I'd go for a novel rather than a manga. But as a game I imagine it would be a single player interactive story RPG. Not a particularly actiony one. Of the fanfictions I was inspired by, the ones that incorporated game mechanics generally focused on the player performing in-game actions to gain stat points or skill points associated with that action, plus a lot of interacting with NPCs via dialogue, and also earning or stealing money and using it to shop for items which could be used to solve puzzle-like situations. Meh, I can imagine the blend of features I'd want it to have, but I haven't played a game substantially similar to what I'm imagining. The Longest Journey's dialogue system + an interactive world like the Way Of The Samurai series + the mechanics of a looping newgame+ RPG like BOF: Dragon Quarter... something like that.

I don't actually agree that everyone sees themself as a protagonist.

Anoyone who is not considering himself the protagonist in his personal story (aka 'life') should immediatelly consult a therapist We are talking here about some *very* heavy schizophrenia case

OK, maybe some advanced hermits might, just might, reach the enlightement level to not see the themselves as the center of their life, but for the rest of us, *we* the the heroes of our lives.

Protagonist has a pretty firm technical definition, it only applies to characters who are strongly proactive or reactive. Either way they must be an engine of the story by repeatedly taking action, and it has to be action thatmakes the other characters react, not hidden action. Protagonists are also typically leaders (or loners), but a character might see themselves as a follower, and the person they follow as the protagonist. Or, protagonists are generally "do-ers", so a character who preferred to observe might consider themself not an actor within a story, but rather the audience or narrator of the story of the characters they observe.

There are no characters, there are no actors, there is no audience, there is no story. Thery is only you, others and life.

I think you should distance yourself from those "bookish" terms and instead perceive the story the same way you perceive life. It would also allow you to avoid cardboard characters people and cliche.

Life doesn't have story - that's how I perceive it. The whole point of writing fiction, IMO, is to create something that's more satisfying than real life. I'm quite disgusted by the real world, and the real people I meet are mostly uninteresting. If the starting situation is that there's only me, others, and life, I'd definitely want to leave that unpleasant situation in favor of fiction.

and the real people I meet are mostly uninteresting

In Poland we have one writer (fantasy) that modelled his story on what he heard from some village people, his writer friends laugh at him that he has not invented anything and that his main character is an actual person that lives in that village :) The story is about vampires, zombies and the like :D