Resources: Drama Queen

January 22, 2019 marks the end of Adobe Story. Apparently the powers that be at Adobe decided that it wasn’t worth the time, effort, and energy to continue to maintain it since it didn’t integrate itself into other areas of Creative Cloud. It was seen as a stand alone tool that was used by a “handful” of people so they decided to discontinue it. Translated: It was a stand alone program that had a niche user base and they couldn’t overcharge for.

Thank’s Adobe. It must suck for you that you failed to make Adobe Story the number one go to software for screenwriting. Maybe if you hadn’t gone to a web only program with a cloud save things would have worked out better. Not everyone wants to save everything on a cloud. Clouds are good for backups, but not as your main save option. Not only that, not everyone wants a web only application. You guys had a good program and you blew it big time.

I loved Adobe Story for writing scripts. It made formatting to industry standards easy, was easy to use, you could export your files to PDF, you could even set it up where you could collaborate with others. It was seriously everything you could want in script writing software. It was available on line and off, and come Jan. 22, the offline edition will cease to work, so the Adobe Story users don’t have anything to fall back on.

I considered going to Final Draft, as I have heard a lot of good things about it, but for a hobby, I’m not forking out the $250 for it. Honestly, I became spoilt by Adobe Story, and really didn’t want to use Word or Open Office. To The Googles!

I came across a list of 10 free programs for screenwriters. I haven’t looked at everything on that list, and probably won’t because I found what I need in Drama Queen. In fact, Drama Queen is the only one I’ve looked at. I picked it off the list because I liked the name. I’m not going to lie about that.

I picked well.

I couldn’t be more happy with Drama Queen. It works just like Adobe Story! That means I don’t have to learn new software! You can even export all of your projects into a PDF file, just like Adobe Story! Unlike Adobe Story it downloads to your computer and you aren’t required to save anything on a cloud.

Drama Queen is brought to us by  Konrad Wolf of the University of Film and Television in Potsdam-Babelsberg, Germany and being supported by a business network in Germany who appreciate the arts more than Adobe. This may be a German program but it does support English very well for both screenplays and novels. 

I know what everyone is thinking, “You found this program on a list of free programs, that means it has a free trial that is going to expire in 30 days and I’m going to have to buy it.” Well, yes and no.

Yes, there is a free trial. You get 30 days (or more if you don’t open it much) to trying out all the features of the three different versions. There is a free version, a Plus version, and a Pro version. The Plus and Pro versions come with extra features. If, after your trial period, you don’t buy it, you automatically get the free version. For you film majors out there, they even have a student price for it.

If you’ve used Adobe Story in the past, the transition will be nearly seamless. If you are looking for something other than Word or Open Office to use, Drama Queen is place to start looking. 

Visit the Drama Queen website and check out the program. I, for one, am happy to have proper screenwriting software again.