Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?

DarkDeleria

@Coin said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

@Ghost said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

Blood Drive....

Yuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuup.

I've never seen this movie. This clip makes me kick myself for not seeing this movie. I need to see this movie ASAP.

Coin

@DarkDeleria said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

@Coin said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

@Ghost said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

Blood Drive....

Yuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuup.

I've never seen this movie. This clip makes me kick myself for not seeing this movie. I need to see this movie ASAP.

It's not a movie. It's a TV show on SyFy. It recently aired its first season finale. We're still waiting for it to get renewed.

Ominous

@DarkDeleria It's a series on syfy.

DarkDeleria

@Ominous said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

@DarkDeleria It's a series on syfy.

Thanks! Gonna add that to my must watches for the weekend

Ominous

I have no idea if it's any good. I have a strong distaste for anything that turns dehumanizing slaughter into a spectacle.

surreality

@Ominous That is absolutely the actual point of what it does. It's meant to be a modern, snarky take on a grindhouse flick. It succeeds. It's dark as hell but it's got a lot of humor in it. Dark humor... but humor.

Coin

@Ominous said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

I have no idea if it's any good. I have a strong distaste for anything that turns dehumanizing slaughter into a spectacle.

Well, it does that, but it also subverts it by having a protagonist who rallies against it.

Like most Grindhouse-style things, it's steeped in the satire common of the era it's produced in.

Thenomain

@Coin

Yeah, but how do you sustain that for a Mu*?

Ominous

That's fine. It's not my cup of tea, though. Lord of War is about as darkly humorous as I can get with such themes.

Coin

@Thenomain said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

@Coin

Yeah, but how do you sustain that for a Mu*?

I don't really think you do. You just hope your players are aware of it. But satire is hit or miss to begin with anyway.

This thread has long devolved from "settings/properties that are actually, structurally well-suited for an online MU environment" and into "settings/properties we'd totes play in awyissss", and Blood Drive, like the majority of the other suggestions, is the latter.

Thenomain

@Coin

Hey, I can make a point on the OP even through thread drift. (Something something drift car through crowd of bodies blood gore etc. etc.)

DarkDeleria

I just thought of another canon that might make for a good MU* setting: Into The Badlands

Lithium

@DarkDeleria That one's been brought up before I believe

Coin

@Thenomain said in Which canon property/setting would be good for a MU* ?:

@Coin

Hey, I can make a point on the OP even through thread drift. (Something something drift car through crowd of bodies blood gore etc. etc.)

The problem with Blood Drive specifically as a MU setting, and the Grindhouse "genre" as a MU setting, is that they rely almost exclusively on two things: over the top sensationalism, often in the form of gore; and satire.

These are two things that cannot be centrail to a MU because of the overwhelming variety of players that inhabit any MU of a decent size (30-ish players).

"Space faring politics", "high fantasy quests", "gritty urban supernatural horror" are all things you can work with with a variety of players; but "gore-laden satire" just isn't. They're too subjective (far more than even the subjective "gritty" or "urban" or "horror").

Look no further than the polarizing views of the movie Starship Troopers. I see a scathing satire of the direction society is going; but I know people who just see "war movie with space marines being BAD ASS against da bugz!" To the point that when I point out the bugs are actually defending themselves, and a clear comparison to the Middle East and other locations where U.S. American imperialism has decided to land, they just nod and continue missing the point.

And I'm not saying I'm categorically right, nor am I going to debate the polarizing opinions about Starship Troopers in this thread--but it's a good way to exemplify how satire is far too complicated to form the backbone of a MU.

Coin

God dammit, and to answer the actual question:

My approval of Blood Drive as a setting for a MU is mostly because the idea of playing a character who feeds people to their car as fuel just fucking tickles my macabre fancy, not because I think its actual narrative infrastructure would make it a decent candidate for a MU.

In short: its superficial trappings (blood-fueled cars, orgy-making drugs, rage-inducing addictive candy bars, etc.) would be fine in a MU, but its narrative structure would not.

Coin

AND GOD DAMMIT, three:

Grindhouse as a genre survives on appealing superficially to an audience (like it does to me when I think 'a character that feeds people to their car as fuel') with its superficial sensationalist gore, while subtly delivering social commentary funneled through that sensationalist appeal. That's the entire point of Grindhouse in general, and those Grindhouse flicks that miss this and that eschew the social commentary are often the ones most forgotten by fans, because they lack the nuance that is hidden behind the blood and guts and gore.

GOD DAMMIT. THAT IS THE LAST ONE.

WildBaboons

It's been a long time since I've seen Starship Troopers... but didn't the Bugs start the war?

Lithium

@WildBaboons No. Humans invaded their territory, and they responded to the invasion in typical buglike fashion.

WildBaboons

Ah, okay. So they were in conflict before the asteroid hit. Like I said, been awhile

fatefan

@Coin Would/could Blood Drive as a theme work well with something like an Atomic Highway RPG framework?