MarinaNova OOC

Hello, Marinanites.

After careful consideration, we the mods have come to the decision that it's time to shut down the game. It's been running for well over eight years, passed through five sets of hands and seen a lot of changes. We feel that it's time to let it go out with a bang rather than fizzle. We'd like to thank you for this time and all the wonderful memories we've made in this little corner of the internet.

But before all that, we have a big four-week long endgame event that I hope will bring some closure to the whole ordeal. If you've played a character here before that you've since dropped, you're of course welcome to bring them in for one final bash! Either way, the game will shut down for good on September 4.

( Timeline of events )

Questions, comments, concerns? Put them here. Otherwise you're welcome to use this post to plot for the end of the world.

Hey guys! As you may have noticed, we've been fiddling away at the game for the past two weeks and it looks like we're mostly done by now! In the spirit of transparency, here's a run-down of what's been done. Some of these are really important so I'd suggest you read through the whole thing.

• NEW PAGE FOR APPLICATIONS/HIATUS/AC - already announced, but here's a reminder in case you missed it. It's very important that you fill out the form for your character/s there if you haven't already! The old taken page will be removed shortly, with the new one serving as intent to stay in the game. Not filling it out will count as an assumed drop and your character risk being removed from the game!

• NEW MOD CONTACT POST - including a new email; marinamodcontact@gmail.com

• GAME CALENDAR REMOVED - will be replaced by a monthly event post, the first one coming up on Monday!

• OOC RULES UPDATED - Please take a moment to review them!

• Adding new tags to the main comm is now open to every journal that is a member. Please do this as it makes it easier for you or other players to find old threads.

• FAQ UPDATED - Includes new information on arrival, as well as tweaks to the game.

• LOCALE UPDATED - Most importantly, there is no sentinel presence anymore. Maintenance bots are still around.

• NEW LAYOUTS - on marinanova and marinanova_ooc!

• NEW PROFILES - on marinanova and marinanova_ooc!

• NEW PLAYER RUN POST - Fill it out if your character runs a business, holds a class or organises an activity! This is not mandatory, but makes it easier for everyone.

• Haunt's departure has been added to the history of Marina.

• Lots of old obsolete pages removed, including IC crimes and the arrival post.

We'll continue to tweak and polish as we find things that need tweaking and polishing, but for now the big, functional things should be done. Please let us know if you find a broken link, a typo or a sentence that doesn't make any sense! We appreciate your help immensely!

Hey guys, Rica here! As you probably know by now, Haunt has stepped away from the game but you have nothing to worry about because I'll keep this underwater adventure going for as long as I'm able!

However, given the size of the game and how busy my meatspace life is these days, some changes will be made. Some of them are things me and Haunt talked about awhile back, while others are more spur of the moment. Bear with me as I try to work out some details - I've already started working on some things and intend to get the rest done in this coming week. Here's what I got so far:

• MarinaNova will evolve into a pseudo-sandbox game. We will still run events and plot like before but some of the more administrative things will be scaled down or removed completely.

• Activity checks are no longer a monthly thing. There will be a check in post every three months starting in June, where you can voice your intent to stay in the game. No minimum activity requirements, I just need to know you're still around.

• Applications are no longer in effect. Instead, I'm converting the taken list into a player-character directory that relies on you filling in the info yourselves. It's a little experimental but I hope it's going to make for a more relaxed environment with more freedom to test out characters without the pressure of applications and activity checks. Please fill out the form for yourselves and your current characters! This will count as showing intent to stay in the game and make things easier on all of us in the coming week!

• On that note, a million thanks to the application assistant team! You guys have been so great and you've really made processing apps so much easier. Thank you so much for the time and effort you've put into this game!

• Tomorrow will be the very last Sunday Speakeasy! I will instead be doing monthly event/plot posts starting in May. You are very much encouraged to use marinanova_ooc to plot amongst yourselves or post memes.

• The marinanova_lol comm is officially retired. Please use marinanova_ooc for any meme needs you may have!

• The mod contact email has changed to marinamodcontact@gmail.com. I'm still working on changing all the links but if you find the wrong email anywhere in about a week, please let me know so I can change it!

• In regards to the IC plot, something fun is coming up really soon and I hope you trust me with the new direction the game is going in!

• I'd also like to welcome Oli onboard the mod team - she'll mainly be helping me with NPC's and plot planning going forward. With Haunt's departure, Veridical and Smith are no longer involved in the running of the prison so look forward to some fun new NPC's in the near future.

I have a long long list of things I want to work on over the next week or so, both with cleaning and tightening info posts as well as working on the changes to the game plot. I appreciate your patience during this time of transition and if you have any questions, concerns or suggestions, don't hesitate to comment here or email me at marinamodcontact@gmail.com and I'll get to it as soon as I'm able!

I love you guys.

As previously mentioned, there's been reports of characters not being able to add their tag to posts as a result of the server downtime we experienced a few weeks ago. Since this is the main structure to our activity check system, it's kind of a problem!

We've now made an attempt to fix it by removing all members of the main community (marinanova) and then manually sending out invites to those of you who are still supposed to be here. You need to manually accept the invite in order to regain posting and tagging access. You can find this in Asylum Invitations that looks like this if you're using the sidebar layout:



Let us know if you didn't get an invitation or if you're still having problems and we'll see what we can do. This was a lot of copying and pasta'ing and removing dead journals from five years ago, so there's a big risk something fell in the cracks!

EDIT: You can remove yourself and then rejoin marinanova_ooc and marinanova_lol to fix the problem there. They don't require mod approval.

It seems that some people are having trouble adding character tags to posts following the IJ server change. Since this is the core of our activity check and organizational systems, we wanted to learn more about how it was affecting everyone to better decide how to deal with it!

Please fill out the poll with one of your existing game character's journals. And if you are having problems please fill out a support ticket.

If you need more room to explain anything please feel to comment on this post. Questions here.

Poll #7878 Character Tag Technical Issues
Open to: All, results viewable to: All

I CAN add my character tag...

I CAN add my character tag... (other)

Where does the problem occur?

Where does the problem occur? (other)

What browser are you using? Check all that apply.

Browser (other)

What system are you using? Check all that apply.

System (other)

What device are you using? Check all that apply.

Device (other)

Welcome back, everyone! We have some notes on the things that would have been going on while IJ was taking a nap.

[ INSANE JOURNAL ]
If you're reading this then you know the site is back up after we killed the server with our glitch event! We might have a bumpy ride in store as issues are noticed and resolved. Keep your eye on the IJ facebook page for the latest news.

• Please note that members of a community can't currently add your tag to a post, so please return to do that once it's been fixed.

[ GLITCHSTRAVAGANZA EVENT ]
There will be no additional daypost this week so have at it! Please feel free to utilize the event mingle or make your own posts. You can label the posts Day 417. If there is more downtime or issues with the site remember that you can backdate posts to this date even once the game moves forward.

Next Monday (March 13) the daypost will say Day 419, so observant characters will notice that a day was seemingly skipped. Please enjoy your IC mystery. Feel free to ask the wardens questions and/or discuss among yourselves.

[ APPLICATIONS ]
Our application period is just going to be a little shorter this month ending on Sunday, March 12 at noon EST like it normally would, but you are welcome to app now! Applications!

[ ACTIVITY CHECK ]
Activity check opens today, March 7 and will close March 14. February Activity Check

[ GAME ANNIVERSARY ]
March 1st was our 8th anniversary! Feel free to celebrate in comments.

[ QUESTIONS ]
Ask away on any topic above or anything we might not have covered coming back from the down time.

The inmates running the following shops are gone. If anyone is interested in taking over these or any other locations you can comment on this post or consult a warden ICly on any daypost. The cafes will be swept if not claimed. Others will be bot run for now. If you do claim a business you can change the name and adjust the write up for it (within reason).

• Cat's Eye Café [Food] founded by Fai d Flourite
• Rakuen Café [Food] founded by Kazuki Makabe
• Plush Rump [Adult toys and pornography] recently run by Hak
• Nine White Orchids [Flowers] founded by Yuuki Kuran

These organizations have been claimed, but the information links to former inmates. Let us know if you have new links here or on the page.

• Inmate-run Clinic, founded by Helen Magnus, taken over by Ton Phanan and Alex Karev
• Welcome Baskets, founded by Euphemia li Britannia, taken over by Lelouch vi Britannia

Sharing this Facebook post from InsaneJournal so you all know what's up in case the site goes down. Stay safe if you're in the area!

Hello Marinanites!

We've just completed the annual post-4th wall party cleanup and all journals who are not currently registered as in the game have been removed. We are only human, so if you should have posting access to the main community (marinanova) and don't, let us know here so we can let you back in!

Carry on!

We have revamped the application page! Please give it a look and if you apply for a new character be sure to read it over carefully and use the correct, updated application form.

CHANGES:
• Most of the adjustments are just updating and reformatting the wording. Simplifying where possible and giving extra explanations in places where we've noticed misunderstandings.
• Adding "age" as a field to fill out which will help us monitor when characters aren't meeting our guidelines.
• Breaking up the questions concerning reapps so they are filled out more accurately and completely.
• We removed the temporary characters notes. They haven't been used, but you can always bring us your ideas for that or anything else.
• Separating out the AU and CRAU apps and adding in some new fields specific to them as well as removing some that are less relevant.

If you have any questions or concerns or you see a typo, please feel free to respond here or contact us privately!

We just wanted to thank everyone for their feedback on our test-drive memes (TDM). We used some of the input to retool our current TDM! It gives a few very grounded scenarios that fit well into the game's theme as well as the opportunity to pick from any event we've ever done.

All ideas were considered, but some won't be implemented and we wanted to explain our overarching reasoning. Our main priority is always to the game itself, so as much as we would like for those with the time and inclination to tag potential appers on the TDM, we want the focus and encouragement to remain on in-game interaction. Our mission with the TDM is as a way for people to test drive the setting of MarinaNova first and foremost. Ideally, it's for people who have never played in the game, but might be interested. (New blood!) We are, of course, happy for anyone to use it for voice testing, AU scenarios, or anything really! There were some good suggestions for driving interest in the TDM, but we felt they would pull too much focus from the game which is always our first priority.

We did debate allowing threads to be optional canon for some time, but ultimately decided against it. We want all game canon to exist within marinanova for the ease and access of all players. It also creates a conflict with the game structure, since newcomers go through processing on a specific day and specific circumstances. The TDM allows the players to voice test scenarios that won't match with what's happening in game, such as events, and we feel like it's more important to have a wide variety of TDM circumstances rather than try to shoehorn it into game canon. This way players are also free to duplicate past events, should they wish to.

We want to thank all those who responded. Input is very important to us even if we won't always incorporate it. We do always consider it! It's good to know what is useful and motivating to you. We will likely have more pointed discussion questions in the future, but please know that you can contact us about absolutely anything at any time. If you have a question about why we aren't currently implementing something specific that was mentioned, please feel free to ask. Thanks!

By now it's common knowledge that the prison is a virtual reality and on day 352 the Wardens finally decide to have some good natured gaming fun with this knowledge — welcome to Marinacraft.

Throughout the day, the inhabitants of Marina will discover that some areas are not what they seemed yesterday. The trees of Sector 0 are easy to break into perfectly square pieces and if you can get enough different materials you might be able to craft yourself a pickaxe, or even a brand new (perfectly square) bed! The maze in sector 2 has grown a scattering of cherries and apples — follow the dots, watch out for ghosts and you might get yourself a tasty treat! In some areas there are colorful boxes dropping gently from the sky, just begging to be stacked. Get a clean line and they'll blip out of existence.

These are some suggestions for what your character can encounter, but you're of course free to think up more that fit within the theme! Want a game of Candy Crush in the grocery store? Go for it! As long as the games fall on the side of casual fun (Marinacraft does not feature creepers) it's free game!

Don't want to play games? That's fine! The effects will only be in some areas, so you can easily go about your day without Angry Birds ruining it.

Questions? Comments? Ask us here!

Marinanites, we need your help! Our app team is growing thinner and we could really use some fresh blood. Interested? Check out THIS POST for more information and the application form! You are the actual best! Go team!

Hello Marinanites!

As always in the wake of the 4th wall, we decided to do a clean-up of the main comm and remove all journals not currently in the game. This will not only ensure that we got all the 4th wall journals out, but also make it easier for us to keep track of new characters coming in. It's a whole mod system thing.

This shouldn't affect any of you, but if you find yourself unable to post to the main comm with a character that really is in the game, let us know and we'll let them back in! We're only human, mistakes happen!

Gather round, let's talk about the sex wrist bands. We did suspend punishments for IC sex crimes during the strange relations event, so no one got any punishments or black bands for their extracurricular fun.

However, if your character had an orgasm or gave it a really good attempt then you can expect the following if:

They had no band: Now they have a red one!
They had a red or blue band: Nothing has changed!

This would have simply appeared on your character's wrist this dayweek (Day 332.)

The link above has more details on what it means to have a red band, but please feel free to ask if you have any questions.

Day 324 (May 18-24) brings the Power Play event. The wardens or maybe the engineers are tinkering and that means trouble.

Just a normal Joe? Not today! You can suddenly shoot explosive rainbows from your hands or sing on a frequency that summons dogs or read people's minds. These aren't the only possibilities of course. The new power could be silly, serious, dangerous, tragic, ironic, beautiful, or some other exciting adjective!

Did you already have a power? Maybe it's gone or maybe it has morphed into another form or maybe you just have an extra one. Maybe nothing happened to you at all, but it's still going to be an interesting day.

You can have as many or as few powers as you want during this event and the nature of them is up to you. The powers can even exceed our normal limitations applied at app time with just a few exceptions:

1. You can NOT escape the dome or the virtual environment.
2. No use of powers that violates another player's consent whether it's killing or mind reading or whatever. (Violate character consent with player permission all you want.)

Keep in mind any IC rule breaking done will still be punishable even if it was accidental (so feel free to use that to your benefit/detriment.) Powers will all be back to normal at the start of business on Day 325, so smoke 'em while you've got 'em.

Questions? Plotting goes on this post!

Hey guys! This is bound to be a pretty lengthy update so get yourself some coffee and strap in for the ride.

Remember that door event we had last fall, where a bunch of you fell into the real MarinaNova and things got kind of brainbreaky? Remember the two guys that lurked around not too long after, asking nosy questions and then disappearing without a trace? Remember how we promised more changes to the game in the future?

The day has come for all of this to reach its conclusion.

Your intrepid mods spent the last few weeks tweaking, mashing and chopping the game into a better, slimmer shape. We've cleaned out long overdue cobwebs, sliced off a lot of dead meat and overall made an effort to make the game a lot easier to play in. Some of these changes are cosmetic, some you probably wouldn't have noticed unless we told you and some will have a big effect on gameplay. We're going to be helpful and list all of them below, regardless of importance.

• The Premise has been changed to Greeting - Arrival and got a facelift to better fit the atmosphere of the game.
• The Profiles got a cleanup to match!
• The main FAQ got a serious overhaul to cut out unnecessary text.
• The intranet description in the FAQ was edited to include an additional type of post available in the game if IC steps are taken.
• A lot of pages got deleted because they were superfluous or had been assimilated by the main FAQ. Blame the borg. Or, if you're missing necessary info, blame us and then let us know what you're missing so we can add it! Though we are trying to make things less regimented so you can use more of your own interpretations!
• The limit on number of pets a character can have has been lifted! Time to get that second cat or tiny army of gerbils!
• The IC rules have been severely cut down and revised to reflect upcoming game changes.
• A Navigation page has been added to collect all the necessary information about the game, both for new and existing players. If you find something you think should be on there but isn't, tell us!
• Death is no longer permanent

You heard us. Death is no longer permanent. This is the biggest change in the game and also something that brings us back to the metaplot we mentioned at the beginning of this post. The inmates of MarinaNova asylum were never meant to know that this is all virtual, so stepping through the doors and into the real prison launched an investigation. Liam and Francisco were tasked with estimating whether the prison could be salvaged, or if it should be slated for termination much like the original Marina. What they found was that although the illusion had been broken, the inmates didn't seem to be too badly affected by it... and if the illusion is broken, why bother with keeping up the guise that this is totally not at all just in your heads?

By daypost tomorrow, Liam will be making an announcement explicitly confirming that yes, this is virtual. It's true. What are you going to do about it? Probably nothing, right? Of course you won't. Regardless of your plans, starting tomorrow it'll be icly known and confirmed that the prison is virtual. The wardens won't try to make you think otherwise. They're even adding it to the greeting for new arrivals. So, what you do with this information is up to you.

He will not be explicitly mentioning that death and prison rules and pet guidelines have all changed. However, anyone who wants a refresher on the rules can always pull that page up on any device and see that it's not what you remember. And you can find out about pets next time you visit the pet cafe. And death? Well, that's the kind of thing you have to see to believe.

We're very excited about this direction and would love to hear your feedback on it! If you have questions, please ask them HERE! Let us know if you find any broken links anywhere too.

Remember that game discussion post we had a while back? We've taken your opinions to heart and a machete to certain parts of the game, in an effort to make this easier on all of us.

This is still a work in progress and we have a lot of loose threads to tie up, but for the time being the following changes have been made:


HIATUS

Hiatuses are no more. No more hiatuses. Before you panic, let me tell you about our second change:


ACTIVITY CHECKS

Starting this month (kind of last month as it turns out), the activity check for MarinaNova will be check in only. That's right, all you have to do is raise a hand and say you're still here. Need a month off? No problem. Take the month off! No more counting comments, no more math with threads. Just say you're still here and you're golden.

That said, we still expect some activity and will be checking in through the character tags with some regularity to make sure you're actually playing at all and not just claiming characters without using them. You have to take them out of the package and get them dirty! No collector's sets here!

[ UPDATED AC/HIATUS INFORMATION ]


APPLICATIONS

We have cut back on some of the requirements in an effort to make the process go faster while still getting us the information we need for making good decisions. Most notably the personality and suitability sections are gone for canon characters and we ask for very brief descriptions for OCs, AUs, etc.

[ UPDATED APPLICATION INFORMATION ]


FUTURE CHANGES

More is on the way. We will need to update/check all of the game information to make sure these changes are accurately reflected. There are also some other areas of the game that are cumbersome/time-intensive that we are considering for revisions. Some aspects may also come with some IC changes, but these details haven't been worked out yet! When they are you'll get another post like this.

Change can be hard and scary, but we're here for you! Hopefully, we're all here for each other. Let us know what's on your mind as we update you on ours. You can respond here or contact us however you prefer.

Dearest marinanites.

As some of you might've noticed, the pace of Marina Nova has changed over the past year or so. We've gotten smaller and slower. Our newbiedays aren't the parade of fresh faces as it used to be and our mistletoe mingles no longer break the comment limit. In addition to this, both of your mods went and got themselves busier offline lives which, to be quite honest, is terribly rude but probably also inevitable.

Because of these changes, we thought it was time to sit you down and have a chat.

We would like to hear your thoughts on the game. Where you'd like to see it go and what changes you want to see. What would make it easier for you to be more active? What would make it smoother for new people to come in? Marina has always been built on player participation — how can we make this more accessible to you? Do you want to keep the game the way it is, or is it time to downsize it?

We're eager to hear your thoughts and have an honest, open discussion about the future of the game. One thing is certain — this isn't ending, only changing.

ACTIVITY CHECK REDUCTION
We have decided to reduce our full Activity Check from 30 comments to 20 comments. Our half AC will be going from 15 to (you guessed it!) 10! All other elements will remain the same. You still need to be showing threads from at least 2 different posts. You can use up to 6 threads total, etcetera, etcetera.

This will start with the current (August) AC. Merry August!

FEEDBACK
We have a few other additions and tweaks coming down the pipes so this is a good time for feedback! Let us know what we're doing right and wrong and what you want to see more and less of. Respond to this post or use any contact you're comfortable using!

PLAYER PLOTS
It's also time for us to schedule some awesome new events. Do you have any your character wants to create? For instance, we recently had the animal event thanks to gotvoodoo. Please let us know. We'd love to schedule you in! Also, it doesn't have to be an event to that extent. Any game-wide mingle can be added to the calendar just so people know it's coming up and it gets announced.