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THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS SECTION IS CONSIDERED OOC KNOWLEDGE! Do not reference information on this page without speaking to staff first. |
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Let's Get More Specific: The Skies Above Twisted
Issue 005: August 17th, 2019
Greetings folks, welcome to another issue of Spoiler Alert. I haven't done a proper one of these in awhile and I should probably do so since we're about to reopen and all. This one might not need that big red 'OOC KNOWLEDGE' but let's err on the side of caution. Today's subject is...
SKIES
Popular Theories and Explanations
Up until this point we've always hand-waved the skies above Twisted as a simulation. It was hinted at in a few scenes where a single panel of the sky might break or someone flew too high and saw darkness. Officially we've always viewed it in our minds as Twisted having this big magical screen-like barrier (not too different from the sky in the Truman Show) which Gegoshi used to give the illusion of day and night by projecting it above the city. But, this explanation only really went so far towards explaining things because it couldn't explain situations where the sun and moon where in the sky at the same time or inconsistent time of day across the cities. For that explanation we have to dig a little deeper...
Twisted's world has always been a creature of chaos. It was originally described as a place where colors could be sentient and basic directions like up and down could randomly swap places. This obviously doesn't work well with the idea of a stable world but it was something that was brought back several times in later scenes. The most realistic concept to explain this is that since Twisted was made from chaos, it was only fitting that chaos affects things around the cities. Chaos, much like the previous article about time, is also a sort of immeasurable source on Twisted which all people and places sort of absorb over time. Also viable is the concept that large enough pieces of a world would bleed the horizons from that world into the skies above.
I thought this was about specifics?
We could sit down and write specific guidelines about the rules governing the skies above Twisted, but would that be any fun? It's meant to be a game fueled by imagination and creativity and not one singular vision that people are allowed to run around in. Thus it really doesn't matter how you describe the skies in a scene. Whatever your excuse have a sky! Maybe it's a simulation. Maybe it's chaos. Maybe it's just a trick of the eyes. Blackness is boring and no one wants that.
But really, what are the specifics?
If you must know, because this is a Spoiler Alert article after all, here's the real deal intended explanation for Twisted. A lot of this has come up recently in the changes being implemented across the grid and setting. This is the part where that big notice up top is important because WHERE Twisted is isn't really common knowledge. But you came here for this so let's go. This is the information we used when designing plots and when figuring out what's going on with Twisted itself. That doesn't make this set in stone. As always RP comes first and if a better idea comes along it's going to take precedence over whatever we may have considered before coming to it.
As mentioned elsewhere, Twisted was originally created when a character named Trinune had an over abundance of power due to trying to restore the Dragonmaster, Cale Charis. This power was gathered at a huge cost and was released to create the Twisted Street. Of course, none of this really appeared in any scenes because none of this was information anyone needed to know. It's safe to write this off as no-longer canon even if it was the actual origins of Twisted. It's literally only buried on the official timeline because it was intended to be the complete history.
Moving on from this comes Twisted's connection to the game that preceded it, ChronoMUCK. When Twisted began to grow we came up with a scenario where being connected to Chronos caused Twisted to essentially age backwards. In the span of a few days it had thousands of years of history. It was effectively born old. This is why we can say things about the history of Twisted and why we go on about settlers and all that in that history. This is also why it's not brought up often as it pretty much retcons it's own IC creation regardless of what scenes inspired what.
As things developed from this point we started throwing around the idea that Trinune created Twisted within a black hole. It's the only place where you can have overlapping realities, people being pulled from various places in the multiverse, and yet no one could just get up and leave. It's a bit extreme, we realized, which is why it wasn't made public knowledge. Yet, in the 12+ years we've been open as one game or another, we've always maintained this. Twisted rests in the center of a black hole. The AI Synth that maintains the world of Twisted keeps up the illusion of skies with or without the influence of the chaos that surrounds the world to protect the sanity of those who live here. Outside the illusion of skies is an infinite inescapable void. Surely there is a 'mouth' and an outside universe. Characters such as Yoiko Hax have sly references to this in their backstories. The specifics of THAT world aren't important. Besides, if you take everything we've ever done as canon and view a certain world which has come up often enough, we'd probably have to tweak things and say we're located specifically inside a Florpus Hole and not a black hole. Bonus points if you even know what that means!
But yes, that is how we as staff tackle the skies above Twisted. Do whatever is best for your scenes and don't worry about any of this. Whatever feels right is usually the right way to go. If you do take anything from this article, however, drop us a line and let us know.
