In an alternate future where cityRP supports firemod and molotov roostertails
Another day, another dollar. That is, if days were ten minutes long. And your paycheck is a lot larger than a dollar. Surburbia. Such a funny name. A once great city, now reduced to its decrepit state. I walk down the streets of a metropolis long forgotten by her people. She sheltered them, cared for them, and in return they spat in her face. It all happened a month ago. That’s when the whole thing went to stuff.
A normal day dawned. People connected, went about their business. I spawned in my small apartment, after a two-minute load cycle. Not off to a good start. I quickly ate breakfast, and ran downstairs to check my mail. A couple of bills, and one request for a loan. All trash. Before I leave for my shop, my doorbell rings. That’s odd. I wasn’t expecting anybody.
I open the game menu and go the bathroom. The city role play could wait. You see, I wasn’t describing my life. I was describing my game. The purpose of the game was to build a city and make a living, all while competing with other players. I return to my computer, and find that the person is still at my door.
I figure that if this guy is that committed to talking to me, I might as well see what he has to say. I open the door, and immediately regret my decision. It turns out this guy, “Blueblur”, is wanted by the cops. He is also holding a gun to my face. Fantastic.
“Alright cigarette, let me in,” he says. I honestly don’t see what’s stopping him, he’s got a gun. For the sake of not wanting to deal with him, I comply. Bad choice. He shoots me in my own apartment, and begins to go through my cabinets. I watch him go through my things as I wait to respawn. Just before he leaves, a police car pulls up to the complex and three officers come out. He somehow misses the flashing blue lights and uniformed men, and announce that he is a criminal. The police arrest him immediately, and I hit the respawn button. Let’s try that again. I go outside, and get my car.
My office, which I run a small chain of stores out of. It’s only a two minute drive, but a five minute walk. Since I have reality, and more importantly, school to get to, I have to minimize my travel time. I check my bank the moment I arrive. Since I have the most items for sale, and I sell for the lowest prices, my store is the most popular on the server. Not an easy feat, I promise. After depositing my sales from the day and night before, I notice it’s one o’ clock in the morning. I can come back tomorrow.
The next day. That’s the day it all went to hell. A normal morning, only a few people on the server. I do my “morning” routine and hurry to work. Once I arrive at the office, I check my bank account. Something was wrong. The day before, I was topping the scores at $300,000. Now I only had $200,000. With only ten other people on the server, I figured that it would take people a little while to notice that their money was disappearing.
“Hey guys, I only have 5,000 dollars!” A guy named “Lil Homie G” announced.
“What does that matter, is it suddenly ‘Announce How Much Money You Have’ day?”, A guy named Ethan replies, with no lack of sarcasm.
“No, I had 7,500 last night!” A couple of moments of silence filled the server. And then, the panic as everyone rushed the bank to check on their savings. Luckily I had already withdrawn my assets. However, this left me dangerously vulnerable to robbery; If I were to be mugged, or killed, all my money would be in the hands of some brain-addled twelve-year-old with the attention span of a housefly. I decided now would be a good time to go to school. I disconnected, and planned on coming back later.
The whole idea of the City Role-Play (CRP) add-on to Blockland was to provide a simulation of life in a developing city. A player starts the game with 100 dollars and basic tools for construction. Over time, you can improve your education, which can give you more access to better jobs. Of course, there is crime. Crime in CRP is often considered behind the driving force behind the economy, in the so-called “Triangle of Hate”. The first element is the criminal. They purchase weapons at player-run stores, which leads to the next element; the weapons. These items are often the most expensive in the CRP. The final element, the police, are the icing on the cake. They are paid bonuses for every arrest they make. The more wanted a criminal, the higher the bonus. The only problem with this theory s that there are more jobs which don’t involve combat or violence in any form or fashion, and guns aren’t the only items sold in the CRP. However, it does bring to light the issues posed by crime ingame. People need to be careful with how they carry money, and how they act in dangerous, or neighborhoods with low-income populations.
After school, I quickly rushed onto the server. As I suspected, the bank was still draining people of their cash. Admins were already there, trying to keep order as chaos took hold. Law enforcement was forced into the police station as a hideout. People were throwing molotovs into buildings, hoping they could salvage money out of the burnt wreckage. I was walking down the street when a guy with a gun stopped me. Again.
“Look, I just want your cash.” Elitehoser said.
“I, uh, I don’t have any,” I quickly managed to say. “I lost it all at the bank.”
“Bull-stuff. You’re an admin, that means you can grant cash. Just give me some money for a car.” At this point I knew I was in trouble. If this kid attacked me, there was nothing I could do to stop him. Law enforcement was holed up at the police station. There was no way they were retaking the city anytime soon.
“Alright, this is all I have.” I give him $1000, and start to back away. This guy had his finger on the trigger, and destruction on his mind.
He shot me anyway.
Eventually, people left, and what was once a beautiful and pristine skyline was nothing more than a burnt cinder. Occasionally, someone would be walking down the street, looking for something to salvage, or steal. The entire concept had been raped, just because of an a line of mis-typed code.
At this point, most of the population had entered more lucrative businesses. PMCs had taken over the streets, hassling people for money just to pass their checkpoints. Luckily, the route between my house and store were not intercepted by any of these checkpoints. Sooner or later, everyone left. I was one of the few people left who actually joined on a regular basis.
There were other CRP servers on the list. I joined most, just to compare them. They were pretty good. Many of them were almost exactly like Surburbia. A bunch of people with good intentions, with a stable mod. We later found out that what had happened to the bank was that one of the coders had deleted a 1, and replaced it with a minus. This had caused the bank to subtract from people’s accounts. The reason I had noticed so quickly was that the more money a person had, the amount subtracted increased exponentially.
On sunday the server was restarted. The code was fixed, and the mod was stable again. The city had been restored to her former glory, before the collapse. However, nobody wanted to join. The city was abandoned. I joined the server to look around. I spawned in my house, found a letter in the mail. It was from the server host. He apologized for everything that had happened, and swore it would never happen again. After reading through his sloppily-written apology, I got my car and drove through the city. It was eerie. I could only compare it to walking through New York City with no people in it. This world was mine.
I decided it was time to go. I put my store up for sale at twenty-five dollars, and demolished my house. As I was just finishing destroying my house, a person joined. It was blueblur. And as quickly as he had joined, he left. I realized this city had nothing left to offer people. I knew that nobody could ever bring her back. I decided I would take one more drive around the city. As I looked at the empty shops, the abandoned park which once held at least twenty people, selling crops they had grown on outskirts outside the city, I felt a moment of sadness. So I said goodbye. I left my money to whoever bought the house, and disconnected.
Earlier this week I was browsing the server lists, and found another CRP. I join, and find a small town, with a stable economy in place. I smile, and take a step into my tomorrow.
