Vaudevillain

Chapter 23: Interlude: John

It was release day for World of Supers and John eagerly awaited the new game. He felt like a kid again, waiting on the armchair in front of his window, peering out through the blinds to see if the mailman had come. The adult in John knew the mailman came around three in the afternoon each day but that didn't stop him from checking earlier. Maybe the mailman would come early.

To pass the time John kept going on forums and news sites to scrounge up every bit of information he could on the game. Over the past week, Vert had stepped up their marketing for the VIS and the game that came with it. John had seen multiple advertisements online and almost every news site was talking about it. Mostly they were talking about the realistic graphics and large world.

John was more interested in the specific mechanics of the game. He wanted to know how both the reputation and power systems worked. So while waiting for his new system to arrive he zeroed in on posts about reputation and powers. Luckily plenty of people were online to speculate.

John joined in with how reputation would work in-game. His view on the mechanic was that each quest would give experience to level up a player's rank. Harder missions would give more experience. Though someone quickly asked how this mechanic could give the game "true freedom" like Vert advertised.

As John was thinking up an answer to this his doorbell rang. He jumped out of his seat and snapped a look out of the window. He saw a box sitting near his front porch and the postman walking back towards his truck. Giddy, John flung open the door and grabbed the cardboard case.

He brought the box inside and set it down on the living room floor. Grabbing his keys from his pocket John stripped off the packaging tape and almost ripped the top off. He removed the VIS headset and accompanying materials and placed them on his coffee table. John spent the next few minutes hooking his new headset up to his living room computer.

As soon as John had finished setting up he sat down on his couch and pulled the VIS over his head. He went through the beginning; creating his name and character. He didn't do much to change the character from the default, only adding some colored highlights in his eyes and hair to reflect his elemental powers. Afterward, he went through the process of selecting his morality and if he was going solo or with a group.

He went with the safe pick of going hero as part of a faction. From there he was forced to play through the multiple hours of the obstacle course. But finally, finally, after forty hours of running around a course, John could get into the game. A popup appeared to show him his power.

You have been granted the powers of elemental emission!

As an Elementalist, you control the natural forces around you; that of air, earth, fire, and water. Unleash the might of elemental fury on your foes!

Those with emission powers are given a stamina bar that depletes as a player activates their power. In addition, the player must make a simple hand symbol to designate which element they want to use. Combine your elements for even greater power and revel in your elemental prowess!

Note: Powers are still in beta and subject to change at any moment.

John took a look at the description of his power. Underneath a video played showing the specific hand signs for each element. Earth was straightforward, John only needed to ball his fist with his thumb in his palm. Water wasn't complicated either, all it required was crossing his fingers. It was air and fire that were more difficult, mostly because they were similar signs. Air required John to connect the tips of his fingers together while fire had him connect all but his thumb and tuck that appendage underneath.

After playing around with it a bit John realized with a bit of practice he could go from earth, to fire, to air, and finally to water in quick succession. He spent his time traveling to his starting city practicing the cycle, only looking once at the magnificent view before him. Once he landed in his starting city John immediately went to an open area to test his power.

From the look of it his stamina bar started at a hundred points and decreased by five every time he fired a quick burst. If he held the sign for longer a HUD would appear that highlighted elements he could control. By focusing on an area and moving his hand he could lift the element and control it. This drained around one stamina for every few seconds of control.

There were many more things he wanted to test, like damage and crowd control, but he couldn't until he fought an enemy. It was time to find his first quest. But first, he should take a look at his character.

He brought up his character sheet and looked at the information listed. It was the standard RPG fare of health and stamina, listed as a percentile and in their generic red and green hues. Underneath his health and stamina was a picture of his character with slots listed next to his arms and legs for clothing. Sitting under that was the inventory tab, a 20x20 set of boxes that could hold almost anything for quick access.

At the top was the hero name he'd chosen, Primordial with his current rank sitting next to it. He noticed a blinking question mark sitting above the reputation tab. Clicking it brought up a box listing each rank of reputation. John found he could select each rank in reputation and it would describe the perks and requirements.

He compiled a list for easy recall:

Reputation ranks:

F - a protector of a neighborhood. At this rank, you are only starting out as a hero. No one knows your name and it only takes 2 successes to rank up.

E - a protector of a city. At this rank, the general populace has heard your name. Local law enforcement might help you during quests. But you are still relatively unknown and 3 successes will rank you up.

D - a protector of a large city. At this rank, most everyone in the city knows your name and will help you if asked. It requires 5 successes to rank up.

C - a protector of a small nation. At this rank, your reputation has grown past the city and into the countryside. Major figures know your name and might be contacted for favors. At this point, players can find ways to leave the city and explore the entire world. It requires 10 successes to rank up.

B - a protector of a large nation. At this rank, your reputation is great enough that even the most secretive heroes might be willing to listen to you. It requires 20 successes to rank up.

A - a protector of nations around the world. At this rank, you are a pinnacle of heroism and almost everyone will be available to contact. Ranking up requires 50 successes.

S - a true protector of all around the world. The highest rank one can achieve. At this rank, your name is whispered by everyone in the world and no one would ever think to refuse your contact.

It seemed simple. John was expecting a more concrete list of experience, not this simple pass-fail system. And as John explored the reputation system it seemed people could lose reputation for failing their quests. He definitely didn't like that part at all.

John decided to put the issue of reputation to the side for now and went to complete his first quest. The quest log said he should meet up with his mentor at the hero's guild in Sentinel City. A map with GPS function appeared after he closed the window. At the top sat a search box for him to type suggestions.

The hero's guild was already marked on John's map and he spent no time waiting. He walked towards the hero's guild, following the arrow that had appeared above him. The arrow went away as John arrived in front of a flat, hexagonal building. He walked inside and was immediately greeted by a man in military garb.

"You the new recruit? Primordial?"

John looked at the man. "Uh, yeah?"

"Good. My name is Shrike, I'll be your mentor until deemed otherwise. Now come on, we have our first mission."

Shrike walked away, not even bothering to check if John followed. Surprised, John jogged forwards to catch up with the NPC. The way they talked and moved was so lifelike! In fact, the entire world seemed ridiculously lifelike.

Shrike led John over to the wall surrounding Sentinel City. Along the way, he gave a short history similar to the prompt John had gotten when arriving. "Sentinel City was founded to protect a very important object resting below us and as such it is our duty to stand firm against any villains looking to steal it. For some reason, the object in question calls monsters and war machines from across worlds. They assault our fair city which is why your first task today will be to eliminate some of these threats."

John frowned. That dialogue was just awful. It sounded clunky and out of place compared to the steely resolve of the character. "Can you give me a second?"

John logged out of the game and opened up the forums on his laptop. He searched around posts looking to see what others had found and finally landed on a giant multi-thread of all the workings of the game. It turned out that the NPCs had been created with the use of neural networks. However, the AI hadn't completely worked out how to combine the scripted portions of the game with the freedom each NPC had. Thus certain pieces of dialogue didn't fit the characters and sometimes turned out completely terrible.

There was a lot more on the thread as well, about the reputation system and how contacts worked. Apparently, Vert had truly wanted a video-game with free choice and had done their best to enable that in the world. The company had compiled a gigantic list of real-life examples in heroism and villainy and fed the options into the game. It had been too complicated to rank each action on a scale so it had been made that each success would gain a point in reputation. But this brought up the problem of ranking up.

Early testers had found that a traditional leveling system didn't work if every villainous crime or heroic action gave the same amount of experience. However, when Vert made the simple reputation system all the testers had been able to reach A rank in around a month of dedicated play. Neither option seemed to work well until someone added the ability to lose reputation when failing. This option seemed to solve the reputation cap problem as players interfered with each other at higher ranks. Vert had been happy with the choice because it reflected the constantly changing power levels in comic books.

To supplement the reputation system Vert had added the contact system as a reward for players who consistently stayed in high ranks. Those with higher reputation could ask store owners or NPCs in guilds on where to find better gear. There was even a chance for players to get in contact with secretive scientists to test their experimental tech. The best part was that once you were able to contact an NPC they could be contacted again no matter your reputation.

John still thought the reputation system might be too simple. What was to stop players from performing small tasks to increase their rank? He just had to hope that Vert would realize the issue and fix it along the way. The company was creating an entirely new genre of videogame after all.

Satisfied he had found an answer to his question, John logged back into the game. He reappeared back into the hero's guild and saw Shrike standing a distance away. The military man walked over. "Good, you're back. Now follow me."

John followed the man again, listening to the terrible description again. "What is this object we have to protect anyways?"

"A new recruit like you isn't privy to that information."

Ah, so he needed a higher rank if he wanted to know what it was.

Shrike brought John up to the ramparts of the wall. Below sat destroyed weaponry and decaying monsters straight out of some Lovecraftian horror. Shrike turned to John. "A new wave is coming in ten seconds. Get ready."

Nodding, John readied himself as a glowing blue portal appeared on the ground. A wave of twisted cyborgs stepped out of the portal and immediately started blasting at the wall. John watched as blue lasers carved sections off the barricade only for the wall to seal closed seconds afterward.

Shrike yelled in John's ear. "Don't just stand there gawking. Fire!" Taking his own advice the hero spread his arms wide and jumped. The hero fell off the ramparts and soared into the air. An image of a bird appeared around him as he flew.

As Shrike passed over the group of cyborgs he flapped once. John saw an illusory set of spikes shoot out from below the man. The spikes fell to the ground, shearing through the cyborg's protective armor and leaving them stuck to the ground. The cyborgs turned as one to fire on the hero.

John took his chance and activated earth control. He grabbed the area of stone underneath the cyborgs and heaved it upward. The rock under the machine's feet exploded, knocking the cyborgs to the ground in a heap. John followed up by creating the sign for fire in his other hand and launching it down.

To his amazement the two elements seemed to fuse together, creating a patch of lava. At the same time, his stamina was draining by ten points a second. Of course, a few seconds was all that was needed for the lava to do its work. Cyborgs melted and burned as the lava roiled, leaving only charred corpses after a few seconds.

"Holy sh*t," John said.

Shrike landed next to John, his bird shape dissolving as he did. "Good work recruit. Looks like we got ourselves a solid attacker. I'll be counting on you to have my back during the next wave. But for now, our shift is over. Let me take you out to see the city."

John eagerly agreed.

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