RPG Soapbox

Reviews and discussion of Original Sin a chat set in Tokyo, Japan.

Setting: Tokyo
Venues: Mortal, Vampire, Werewolf
Chat Platform: IRC
Age Requirement: Unknown

Original Sin

Gave it a try. Thought it might be promising.

Short review: Sandbox chat, rules don't apply to the owner, Luca, who flagrantly ignores them while huffing at everyone else. Small group of players who have a really odd-seeming dynamic where they all publicly praise her, and one another, while privately trashing all concerned.

Also, seems more than anything else to be devoted to sex play. If that's your thing, you won't go wrong there.

On the plus side, it's a different and potentially really interesting setting, Tokyo, asia without the anime/manga overlay. A lot of work has clearly gone into it, too, most of it pretty good.

Edit: Might want to correct the summary, above. Mage no longer offered.

Edited to remove adjectival phrase ~Star

Any Screen Shots? Any sort of backup for such claims. You don't have to like a chat, and you can have a poor time there but accusing them of smut seems to be pushing it without a lick of proof, man.

Edited for relevance due to prior post being edited ~Star
And apparently, I missed a word I thought I edited out the first time...yeesh ~Star

Go to the character list on the wiki. Read some of the character histories. There are a number of young (14-16) teenage female characters who are in relationships with much older men, or who, if older, have a history of having relationships since that age. Most have very sexualized histories. It does walk a line.

When I briefly played on the OWoD version of Original Sin, there was an elder Silver Fang with a 14 year old Kinfolk mate. I am not as familiar with the NWoD version, but I wouldn't be surprised if the same sorts of relationships are played out, since a number of the characters on that list seem to be reinventions of characters from the old chat, including said Silver Fang and said Kinfolk, unless I'm misremembering names.

I know the players of these characters, and they are nice people, and they are also adults. Though I found the situation a little squicky, it wasn't what caused me to stop playing. On the other hand, if the idea of seeing sexualized teenage characters bothers you, it might not be a good chat for you.


BW, I'm just editing out the stuff specifically referring to what I'd edited out before (or thought I had - I missed a word in Perris' post) and leaving the rest. I think I know what Perris was alluding to, and the question arises of whether the people running the game are using it for the illegal purpose, or not. As you said, these folks probably aren't, but it is a very fine line to walk. It's the reason that most chats these days don't allow younger characters at all, nor do they allow even the whiff of children and sex onto the game. ~Star

Apparently many of the underaged PCs (and NPCs) aforementioned belong to the owner, and more than a couple of players mentioned that it's a common trait there.

I'm not implying it's up to anything illegal. Just seems to be the most common form of RP there. And yeah, the character Wikis seem to focus on that.

Just noted Star censored my post to remove a relevant, and fully-supported (by the site's own character Wiki) bit of information.

When someone is not making a personal attack, or libeling (it can't be libel when it's true), censoring them is kind of defeating the purpose of providing a review board, Star.

I'll refrain from further discussion here. Anyone who's come late to the party who wants to know what she edited out, AIM me or something.

Ciao.

Oh, one last comment. Anyone who knows me would get a real giggle out of the idea that I am any kind of prude about cyber. It's not why I play, but I admit I do it when the mood strikes. So no, I wasn't trying to "accuse" them of anything.

Fact is, in my time there, it seemed to be the predominant theme of the chat (hooking up, underaged or not) and it was suggested to me that the owner had a thing for playing younger female PCs with older male lovers, and from what I observed, seems to, whether sexing or just interacting socially, take it poorly if they're not the focus of all attention.

Hence, Sandbox chat, which I consider a hella lot more damning than chat-where-smut-happens.

(Find me a chat where smut DOESN'T happen, after all...)

The editing occurred before someone came along and provided a means for people to find the proof (something which you didn't provide) - the problem with the specifics of what you'd originally posted was that in these days, you don't lightly accuse someone of child porn or anything that could be construed as solicitation of a minor, and you especially don't say such things without offering some sort of corroboration. Perris' post that came after yours made it quite clear that's what he thought you were intimating, and given that, my decision to edit. In other words, what you posted could have been grounds for you (and these forums) to have been accused of libel. Frankly, I didn't particularly want to get slapped with a lawsuit, and I suspect you didn't, either, and so since there was no proof here on the forums at the time and I didn't really want to go digging for proof myself (because I don't particularly want to get into sites that deal in sexual encounters between teenagers), I made the decision to edit. Had you offered some proof of what you'd stated when you made the original post, you wouldn't have been edited. It's fairly logical that if you're going to state that a place is into sex between minors, you can't just leave that opinion/thought hanging. It's too serious an issue these days.

Hope what I said didn't fuck you guys over.

Not hardly, Perris. I was writing a short, capsule review, not waging a vendetta, so I didn't put up lengthy logs/screencaps or whatever.

Had I seen your question before Star came in (and then others added their small change) I'd have offered "proof" if you wanted it. No harm done.

But to be utterly, positively clear, I was not suggesting that the chat was soliciting IRL minors for sex, or anything like that. And am kind of confused that anyone familiar with online RP chats (ie, a reader here) might think so, when I made reference to underaged cyber. To me that means adult players fantasizing/cybering being teens. I didn't even suggest that was shocking/horrible. To each their own kinks, whether I share them or not. It was just a single line in a review.

I'm sorry, but I find this rather ironic to see what is said about a game I have played for 2 years in.

It is wholly and utterly wrong at times; however, for clarification, I'll talk first about the game itself.

Genre: New World of Darkness: Vampire, Werewolf, Second Sight, Changing Breeds

This game is set to be a social interacting and often you will find many different types of characters in any given scene. it is a setting that is rich in culture and setting alike, many places to RP for all ages, and then other settings for only older characters.

The Storytellers are fair in their rulings, from my experience, and I have to say that I have been in a few nWoD games and this is the only one that is not cyber-centric.

Personal thoughts on the Thread so far:

Now, there are Younger characters, but characters can be no younger than 16 for most purposes. There are younger NPCs that are primarily used for storylines but are rarely used in the manner in which things are being spoken of.

As for the Sex issue...

I will refer you to an entire page on this issue

http://original-sin.net/myos/notes/realism.php

This outlines all that can go on with the sexual side and what should go on.

I find it rather redundant that a player that was banned for being an abusive player is writing a negative review on the game.

Yes, there are always issues with players, but there are not many that have been banned in the two years I have played here. In fact, I've seen 2 bannings. One is Roslyn's the other was a temp ban on a player who took a character's death too hard.

Edit: I also forgot to add that I know Luca and Amokk and the claims that were erased, if I'm reading it correctly, are false. That's not how they are.

From the site Saraphin linked to:

Second, sex happens. We're adults, we're role-playing various types of characters, and some of those would have sex. This does not mean we are a cyber-sex server or we encourage sex based role-play. This means that, like a good movie might include a sex scene, a good storyline might include one as well. You can play as little or as much of the actual scene as you want. You can choose for this to be a downtime activity, or choose to fade to black, or you can role-play it out. We're not going to look down on you for any of these choices, and they are your options as long as sexual role-play is a small part of your story line and not the major part. You are adults: behave in a mature fashion, don't force people into scenes they are not interested in, don't force them to role-play out sexual scenes, don't make characters who are here to do nothing but have sex IC, don't be hypocrites and talk down to people for doing the same sort of scenes you do and that is all we need from you.

As someone who has similar thoughts written into chat documents, I think this is perfectly A-OK and a sensible attitude to take. I don't necessarily agree with the age allowed - 16 is stretching it, in my opinion (yes, we know teens have sex, that's not the point. The point is the danger of getting into serious legal trouble if someone starts crying "solicitation of a minor!" because you have a minor playing a minor on the site and they got embroiled in such scenes.) Frankly, I'm not sure why people care so much about the subject. It doesn't hurt Person A one iota if Person B and Person C are in a locked room engaging in such scenes. Person A isn't being exposed to it, and has nothing whatsoever to do with it. If you don't like it, don't participate in it. Pretty simple.

The server restructured to be a NYC setting. Sadly many of the players all left because of the ST's there and lack of player influence.