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riverviewmod) wrote2017-02-05 03:50 pm
riverview: premise/world
Whether it's a persistent ache or a fleeting thought, everyone has felt displaced, like they didn't belong where they are. Like they want out of the life they're living, the place they're in, the world they inhabit.
Sometimes, that's all it takes to change the very course of a life. Sometimes, the old adage 'be careful what you wish for' applies.
Fact: Alternate universes exist.
A lot of people have theories about alternate realities and how they are created, whether it's for the purpose of fiction, writing stories, or as a neat thought experiment, playing around with concepts on how the world might have been if they or someone else made a different choice. Some people don't believe in them at all, chalking the concept up to a derivative trope. Very few people devote their scientific knowledge to exploring the concept of other places that are similar but not quite, separated by a thin membrane of chance.
The truth is that there are a nearly infinite number of alternate realities, which were all born at the same time, from the same point of origin, containing the same things. Each reality is normally its own enclosed space that can only be affected by the people inside it, people who can only make the best of what they have in their own reality.
The inhabitants of reality 5561A have really screwed things up.
After discovering a small, naturally-occurring portal on an insignificant moon orbiting the Capital World, they studied it closely and learned how to replicate it scientifically. At first they were only interested in exploring, contacting other realities and learning about what might exist outside their own universe. Of course, altruism only lasts for a while, and it wasn't long before the inhabitants of reality 5561A started turning their attention to the resources available in other realities for the less noble purpose of enriching themselves.
Before long, they set their sights on a formidable and short-tempered neighboring universe, one rich in natural resources, advanced technology, and worth the risk of invading. It was even less time before the resulting retaliation decimated reality 5561A. This was the Great War, a brutal conflict between universes - long and protracted, it employed biological and chemical weapons, monsters and viruses and anything else that could destroy a sentient person in the most messy way possible. The attacks on 5561A continued without pause and without mercy until its reality was thoroughly devastated, leaving only a few stragglers remaining on each planet. And those remaining inhabitants needed help. A lot of it.
By the war's end, all of 5561A's created portals were destroyed, leaving behind only the first, naturally-occurring portal in the small, lushly forested moon of the Capital World. It was on that portal that the remaining population of reality 5561A hung their hope for recovery.
Thus was founded Riverview Quarantine.
Riverview Quarantine is a vast city nestled in a valley on an unnamed moon orbiting the Capital World. It is the home of the only remaining portal, the first stop for the displaced, a group of people pulled in by the portal when they have that feeling that they just don't belong where they are. The displaced are pulled in through the portal and offered a new home, one they can help build for themselves - after a pleasant 5-year stay in Riverview Quarantine to ensure that they aren't going to pose a threat to the fragile remains of life in reality 5561A. Here, they have the opportunity to invest in a community and make it their own. Displaced are strongly encouraged to contribute to the rebuilding of Riverview Quarantine by whatever means suit them best. They can get a job, open a business, plan social events, or even simply focus on forming bonds with others - found family and romantic relationships are highly valued in the Quarantine.
The Quarantine is a futuristic city, large and sprawling and inconsistent, with technologies and architectural styles contributed by dozens of different worlds. Large swaths of it are empty and abandoned, grown over by the forest after an outbreak of an otherworldly virus brought in by a displaced a decade ago. The portal has been reaching out with a growing urgency over the past year or so, as the Capital World tries desperately to draw in enough people to make the reality functional again.
Characters who enter Riverview Quarantine are invited to join the community already in place on the moon, to help make more of the abandoned parts of the city livable, to help defend the walls from the predators that live in the forest, and help maintain civilization in the city. If they feel a mistake has been made and they want to go home, the powers that be are more than willing to send them back - it's not an easy task to make the portal send people to precise places, though, so characters who wish to go home will need to stick around for a bit and contribute before the resources can be made available for such a trip.
Riverview is a relaxed choose-your-own-pace panfandom city game, with options for involvement in an easygoing plot that includes elements of exploration, fighting, and moderate worldbuilding. Characters may simply live their lives in the comfort of the inhabited city and develop friendships and romances, but they also have the option to explore and rebuild the abandoned parts of the city, join the city guard to help protect the city from alien predators, or go forging through the jungle looking for new areas to inhabit. The government is genuinely interested in the characters' well-being. Characters are not trapped forever, and if they were brought by mistake, the Government will do everything in its power to send them home - but it is not an easy task, picking where the portal manifests is something like steering a cyclone, and they ask that characters be patient and try to make the best of their time in the Quarantine until they can.
The game is sex-positive, and very flexible regarding world-building when it comes to the exploration mechanics. It features an AC reward system offering various incentives both ICly and OOCly for participation in the game, with extra points for threads featuring exploration, romantic content, fighting monsters, or creating mingle posts for other characters to enjoy.