Our Verdict
Creating compelling characters for a work of fiction is n’t an easy undertaking : They have to be recognizable as people and avoid the ambuscade of cliché . It ’s sluttish to see how a writer would receive a dick like Mariner Software’sPersona , which aim to help make such a task easier . Unfortunately , while I had high promise for the app , its aim pass away far all-embracing of the mark , turning a creative exercise into a rote one , pregnant with trouble .
At its antecedent , Persona is a variety of database for characters . The program divides its functions into three toolbar tabs : Create , where you make your characters ; Interact , which tells you how unlike characters interact ; and Learn , which consist of information about the types of graphic symbol you could create .
Under the Create subdivision , you make an launching for each character , much as you might enter a person ’s selective information in Contacts . You fill in a character ’s name , choose an archetype ( as well as a style of that archetype ) , and other biographical information : eld , stature , weighting , sexual practice , optic vividness , hair semblance , occupation , hobbies , background , etc . you could even drag in a picture if you have one handy , or sum tags that will then autocomplete in other disk . character reference can be get up into grouping , or even Smart Groups that you create by trickle for sure criterion . ( Handy , I suppose , if you require to know who all the blue - eyed , chocolate-brown - hirsute lineament in a account are . )
There ’s a sure amount of utility here . As a writer , it can definitely be challenge to recall each detail of a particular grapheme — especially a minor one — and believe me , if you accidentally change a character ’s eye colour from green to blue halfway through the script , someone ’s become to notice . But while that capacity is valuable , it can be accomplished by any bit of other tools from a simple-minded database created using a programme like Bento , to a spreadsheet , or a plainly old text file .
Persona attempt to up the ante on its offering by tying in the estimation of archetypes . The thought that mass — and thus , characters — fall into certain archetype has been put forth by no less than Carl Jung , Joseph Campbell , and W.B. Yeats , among others . It ’s this idea of profound , all important type of characters that drive Persona , and yet it ’s lamentably lead astray .
The app offers 32 archetypes , dissever into champion , heroine , villain , and villainesses . you may plunk one for your character , and then generally choose from two dissimilar subtypes , called dash . For example , the Action Figure might be a Voyager or a Cage Fighter , while the Evil Queen offers the Diva or Disciplinarian styles .
It ’s hard to have intercourse where to begin with the misapprehensions of these archetypes , which do n’t conform to any have it off literary theories of which I ’m aware . The problem is that pilot and clichés are two side of the same coin , and Persona ’s options seem to veer much more towards the latter than the former . It ’s ill-defined to me who wrote these descriptions , but there ’s a problem of authorization : Why should I trust this unnamed , unknown source ?
It ’s also unclear to me why the archetypes need to be divided by grammatical gender — while I can understand why trouble Mother might be a type of villainess , why must a Misguided Visionary be a presumptively male baddie ?
The public utility of the archetypes themselves are circumscribe at well . Each is describe in a sidebar in the Create fiber , as well as again in the Learn tab . panache are broken out , and there are lists of calibre , defect , desktop suggestions , and potential occupation . Once you attribute an archetype to a character , you ’re told which other pilot are similar , synonymous , completing , and invert , but while those appear as keepsake , you ca n’t tap them or do anything with them .
There are also a list of examples pulled from popular fiction , but these are sometimes more headland - scraping than anything else : Indiana Jones and Tony Stark are listed under the Expert category … but I ’d qualify them both as Action Figures , too . Sometimes example are only listed — other meter they get lengthy paragraph explaining why they purportedly fit a particular character type .
The Learn subdivision also includes diagrams for each of the various sets of archetypes , showing — presumably — which are complementary and which are opposed . But the whole arrangement seems odd , and less than useful . The app seeks to line some comparisons to a color wheel , with the idea of complementary color . But some of the comparisons do n’t make logical sense : I fail to see how can the Playboy be synonymous with both the Teammate and the Rotten Friend ? It seems mostly arbitrary .
The Interact tablet , where Persona clearly hopes you ’ll gain much of the program ’s utility , has the same issue of authority . It talk about how various pilot clash , engage , and change . My big trouble here is that the information is so very electrostatic . You could easy scan these sections and believe that there ’s only one agency for two archetypes to interact . And yet the very ground of interesting characters is that even if they draw from archetypes , they do n’t alwaysactexactly along those lines . Otherwise you stop up with a story that ’s the combining weight of a paint - by - number draught , and that ’s not very interesting .
As if all of that were not enough , Persona feels like a programme that is n’t ready for the light of daylight . The extensive schoolbook is rife with misspellings , typos , and format errors . ( One particular suspiration - have mistake consult to the cleaning lady who help Theseus endure the labyrinth as “ Adriane . ” ) All of these factor just reinforce my disinclination to commit any content this app has to propose .
The linen setting on the master windowpane is pulled from Apple ’s own textures and , combined with the shabby formatting , gives the entire app an appearance of being unfinished . The rag field in the disk does n’t aright wrap up entries to its breadth , so they pop to exceed the size of the corner if you enter more than a couple .
There ’s a Names Database , which is a nice touch , but it ’s undercut by its moderately bizarre attribution of name calling ( “ Arthur ” is notable because it ’s a hurricane name ; “ Decatur ” is listed under Greek Mythology , but linked to a 19th - century naval hero ) , as well as the lackluster Lookup Name Meaning push ( it just spread your web browser app with a Google search for “ [ name ] name meaning ” ) .
Bottom line
At best , Persona is a exercise set of training wheels for writer looking to sheer their teeth , but you’re able to see much better sources of information on original and writing elsewhere online or at your local library . Those who already have some experience may appreciate the character logging features , but since there ’s no way to get selective information out of the app , you might repent locking yourself in to a proprietary programme .
Moreover , at $ 50 , Persona strikes me as simply too expensive for its limited functionality . It ’s a lot to pay for an app that , if all goes well , you will outgrow pretty apace .
