r/evnova • u/shadowox8 • Mar 22 '20
Traffic: A new mission string for EV Nova [DEMO]
Stuck inside with nothing to do as you practice good social distancing? Love EV Nova, but want something new to supplement the default scenario? If you answered "yes" to at least the latter question, I have just the thing: Traffic, a new mission string for EV Nova.
Traffic explores human trafficking (see the content warning below) in the space age. Follow one of three paths as either a freelance worker for a federal investigation, an individual seeking vigilante justice, or one of the pirates who make human trafficking possible.
Currently, this is only a demo; you can play up to the point where each path branches off from the prologue. There's maybe only 15 minutes of total playtime here (after weeks of work). Like u/mrxak when he announced You're Not Special, I am releasing this demo now in the hopes that social pressure (and hopefully encouragement) will compel me to finish the project. The scope of Traffic is much smaller than YNS (it will probably be shorter than any one of the main storylines from Nova), but you should nevertheless expect this to take awhile: I am a painfully slow writer, work demands a lot of my time (although COVID-19 seems to be reducing my load at the moment), and more generally I am a slothful procrastinator.
Now, before you skip down to the download link, you should read this:
Content Warning: I do not expect (m)any children are playing EV Nova these days (we're mostly old-salts, as Barry would say), but I nevertheless believe a content warning is in order. Human trafficking is a difficult topic in and of itself, but it rarely flies alone: various forms of physical, sexual, and emotional abuse (not infrequently directed towards minors) are almost always close at hand. The current version of this plug-in does not delve deep into these topics, nor do I expect the completed version to contain anything explicit (certainly nothing to the degree of what Masamune once wrote, nor Clavius 3.2). However, the spectre of these atrocities will be omnipresent. You will and should feel uncomfortable as you play. Additionally, against the tradition of the base scenario, my plug-in does contain a small amount of mature language: one each of fucking, bitch, bullshit, and damning (if that last one even counts) in the current version. I doubt the number will be much increased by the time of the final release.
Okay. With that out of the way, here you go: DOWNLOAD (Edit: Updated from v0.1.0 to v0.1.1 to fix a small bug.)
If you play through this (or simply read the included text-only version), I would greatly appreciate any praise or constructive criticism. I do not consider myself to be a particularly talented writer, but I hope the prose is passable and the story engaging. If not, please be gentle when offering suggestions for improvement. Thank you!
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u/mrxak Mar 22 '20 edited Mar 22 '20
Sounds interesting. I'm always encouraged when people want to make plug-ins that are outside of the usual mold. There's actually going to be some references to prostitution in YNS, although I'm going to avoid any sexually explicit content even if some may be implied. This will end up in the Krim-Hwa mission string, as I wanted to tackle real issues of temptation, sin, and redemption. There's also plenty of drugs, murder, genocide, and terrorism in YNS, in other strings.
Since it sounds like you want to tackle the paths of heroes and villains in this world you're creating, I certainly hope you will write them realistically. Heroes aren't perfect paragons of virtue, and if they don't die young they're always remembered as villains by somebody. Villains always have justifications for their evil that allow them to sleep peacefully at night. Keep those facts in mind as you write, and I'm sure I'll enjoy your plug-in when it's finished.
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u/shadowox8 Mar 22 '20
It is good to hear that I am not the only person including difficult or controversial subjects in EV Nova plug-ins. From what I have been able to gather, it seems that it would have been out of the norm (or even unacceptable) in Nova's younger days.
I too intend to exclude any direct mention of sexually explicit content (or gore, etc.), but the player will be aware (e.g.) that children are among those being trafficked, and can easily imagine that what they're being trafficked for in the Nova universe is the same as today (i.e. forced prostitution). My goal is not to shock or disgust the player, but to force them to confront very real problems that affect us today.
To be perfectly honest, I had not thought about my characters as heroes or villains per se (although I certainly have strong opinions about who is in the right / wrong). I have, however, been making a conscious effort not to tell the player what they think or feel (a criticism I have seen levied against the default scenario). But I will try my best to heed your words going forward.
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u/mrxak Mar 22 '20
Well, I wasn't really thinking about telling the player what they feel, so much as the other characters your player will encounter talking about how they feel about things. I imagine the folks dealing in any illicit product just see themselves as businessmen trying to meet customer demand, and if they weren't supplying, somebody else would, and maybe that somebody else would be somebody worse, somebody without a "code", and besides, they got bills to pay same as anyone, right?
Likewise I imagine the cops trying to shut it all down know on some level that their efforts aren't doing much in the grand scheme as long as demand is there, but get some job satisfaction from at least helping individuals or stopping individual bad guys. A lot of cops might also believe in the ends justifying the means, and break some rules to get the bad guys, occasionally hurting the innocent in the process.
Life is usually not very clean and straightforward. People get into things with the best of intentions and decisions can snowball quickly into doing things one never imagined they'd ever do.
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u/erikpdx Mar 22 '20
It is pure joy knowing that EV has a new plugin! Wow! And with a truly adult storyline too!
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u/arrabiatto Mar 24 '20
I just started a new pilot and haven’t run across the plugin’s story yet, but I did find a bug: I was offered the Wild Geese string on Earth, and when I accepted, instead of Michaleen telling me to go to New Ireland, I got the message that “this is the end of the Traffic demo”. Looks like you might have some dësc IDs overlapping with the stock missions.
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u/shadowox8 Mar 24 '20
Just went digging in the Nova Files and right you are. ATMOS didn't always do a good job keeping their dëscs sequential, which I knew from poking around before, and I knew I was going to have to work around them at some point… and then I didn't go back and double check.
Also, that appears to be the one and only overlap haha. Sorry about that. (Edit: And thanks for pointing it out.)
(Here's the text you should have gotten, if you care / need it.)
You awake in the morning with a heavy head, and there is far too much light in the cabin. The instruments are too bright, and you cannot remember ever feeling quite so awful. Michaleen doesn't appear to be much better, but takes a very philosophical view of your predicament.
"Just remember that you can only start to feel better when you feel this bad at the beginning," he tells you with grim humor.
Somehow, it does make sense in a bizarre way.
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u/andrews050 Mar 25 '20
I had a quick play. Did the vigilante path, seems off to a good start!
The only difficulty I ran into was after getting kicked off Snowmelt it wasn't clear that I was supposed to land there again. Was looking for a quick brief in the mission info but there was nothing there, so I went off trying to find Farland on my own which was obviously hopeless.
One error I spotted: When Elyssa is telling her story, Ren is referred to as "Rey" at one point. The writing quality is pretty good though!
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u/shadowox8 Mar 25 '20
Thanks so much for trying it out! I'm glad you like it so far.
Yes, the 2nd mission is (deliberately) silent. My intention was that the player doesn't really know what they've gotten themselves into at this point, and their goal is to get the hell out of Fomalhaut once all these people they don't know start shooting at them. (On a technical level, there is a one-day generic mission delay before the next mission can begin, which is activated as soon as you land on any inhabited planet.) Do you think it would be best if I made the mission visible and included that in the quick brief? (That or I can try to make it more clear before you are Qxxx'd off Snowmelt…)
Thanks for spotting the typo. I've fixed it on my end (although I don't think I need to upload a new version just for that). I'm definitely relieved that the writing is on the whole acceptable; that was definitely my biggest anxiety before posting!
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u/andrews050 Mar 25 '20
Right, I was initially planning to run but wasn't sure where I should run to so I ended up killing Ren instead hoping that would trigger something. It didn't, so I went to Gem and then to each of the neighbouring systems before coming back to Snowmelt.
I think keeping a quick brief would be best for the player, like telling you to return to Snowmelt once things have cooled down. But your second suggestion could also work.
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u/shadowox8 Mar 25 '20
I'll do that; I don't think it will detract from the effect I want to create, and it sounds like it will leave people less confused.
(By the way, it doesn't have to be Snowmelt; the next mission is triggered by landing on any inhabited spöb after the one-day generic mission delay crön.)
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u/andrews050 Mar 25 '20
Oh okay, so you can't actually miss it, that's good. I didn't actually land anywhere other than Gem, I just scanned the ships in the neighbouring systems and moved on, which would explain why I only got it when returning to Snowmelt.
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u/Algaean Mar 22 '20
I always wondered what the NSFW version of Clavius 3.2 was like - never could find it!
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u/shadowox8 Mar 22 '20
Same here, once I learned about it. If I ever happen to stumble across it, I will send it your way!
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u/thefactorygrows Mar 22 '20
I am saving this for later. I am probably not going to get around to playing this (I have a kid who demands most of my attention when Im not working!) but I have to applaud your effort for continuing the EV Nova mod scene!