Topic idea proposed by Adriel.RB
Tankers! You may have played this game for years, and the Tanki Online community may have been very important in your life. However, like all good things, your tenure as a player of this game must come to an end at some point. Rather than slipping out quietly, make sure you leave with a bang - that is, a nice, juicy leaving topic on the forum (bonus points if you manage to write multiple of these).
As this is clearly the most important part of your TO career (yes, even more important than that time you got the coveted Russia paint), it can be quite a daunting task to start to write one of these potentially incredible forum topics. Well, never fear; I’m here to initiate you into the secrets of writing a good leaving article! Let’s jump right into it with the first portion of your leaving topic: the introduction.
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Part I: The Introduction
While opinions differ on the exact placement, experts agree that your introduction is absolutely among the top three most important portions of your leaving topic. Thus, it is important that you execute this piece flawlessly.
The first thing to do when writing the introduction for your leaving topic is to establish precisely who you are. Nobody will care when they see that an unknown tanker is leaving the game, and so whether or not it was truly the case, you have to make your readers think that you were influential. The easiest way to do this is to quickly summarize your Tanki journey, and scatter subtle references to famous events and players, to indicate that you were somehow involved in the events or were instrumental in the tanker’s rise to fame. Implying that you helped with certain Tanki Helper programs is also quite useful, as it makes readers feel indebted to you for your selfless service (which, if it actually happened, was probably not entirely selfless, as you were no doubt amply rewarded with crystals… but we helpers don’t talk about that...).
For inspiration, check out the sample introduction below:
Part II: The Thank Yous
Writing your “thank yous” is certainly tied for the position of the most important part of your leaving topic. This is the section in which your emotional pleading really wrenches the hearts of your readers and makes them feel crushed that you - glorious, magnanimous, brilliant you! - are leaving the game. For the sake of being nice, if there is anyone who has truly played a big part in your Tanki journey, do include them. However, regardless of who they are, never thank someone with a cheesy name, as it makes you seem undignified (so, for instance, no one with a rip-off of a YouTuber’s name, and no Xx[name]xX!).
Once you thank the people who really played a role in your experience with TO, make sure to also thank some random helpers or famous players. This makes your readers think that those helpers/players are your buddies, which is another crushing blow to any claims of obscurity that people may throw at you. This is very important - no leaving topic is complete without thanking Kaisdf and Maf for something or other. And now, having thanked specific players for either real or slightly exaggerated reasons, you can move on to thanking the TO community as a whole for all of the various ways in which they have assisted you. All really important players relied on Tanki at one point to help them through a rough time (at least, I get that sense from the many leaving topics here on the forum), and so it is imperative to mention that time in 2013 when you lost your favourite mug and Tanki helped you through the ensuing grief. Try to write at least 300 words in this part; don’t worry, we’ll bear with some hyperbole here for the sake of the emotional aspect of your topic.
Once again, if you need some inspiration, check out the spoiler below for a great sample of some good thank yous!
Part III: The Conclusion
The conclusion is where your topic gets real. Having discussed the past, it’s time for you and your extremely important future. Of course, leaving a video game is really not that amazing, but the goal in your conclusion is to make it seem like a very noble deed. The trick here is to mysteriously and ambiguously refer to difficulties you are experiencing in the real world and indicate that you have moved on from trivial things like games (even though we all know that you will simply post the topic and immediately sign-in on CS:GO). Perhaps you could indicate that you are very busy with school and you need to focus on that; perhaps you can discuss how you need more time for work because you spent all your savings buying 400 ultra containers; you could also discuss how a vine keeps growing over your window every year and you need to focus more on cutting it back. Regardless of the reason, stress the selflessness of the decision to leave this game and focus on more important things.
Once you establish that you are an amazing, noble person and that leaving this game is really an incredible thing to do, you have to recap what you said previously - by this time, you should be well over 2,000 words (I apologize, my sample came up a bit short), and it’ll be hard for readers to remember what you wrote at the start. And so, once again, reference your most significant achievement as well as the tanker that helped you the most (similar to before, make this portion as emotional as possible). Feel free to add in a little part here about how deeply you will miss the game, the friends, and everything you have worked towards in the Tankiverse. If your reader isn’t crying at this point, you’ve done something wrong!
Finally, to wrap up the topic, finish off with a TO classic: “That’s all for today, tankers - see you all next time!” Because of course, you’ll officially come back to the game in a week or less, and so you’ll get the joy of writing, once more, an entirely new, original leaving topic at some point in the future!
You know the drill - see the spoiler below for a good example conclusion!
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And now, that’s all for today, Tankers; I hope to see some good leaving topics from you all soon! Let me know in the comments below: Which of the many leaving topics that you’ve written and posted is your favourite?
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