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Game News The New World Update #24: The Wasteland

Fenix

Arcane
Vatnik
Joined
Jul 18, 2015
Messages
6,458
Location
Russia atchoum!
It makes me think of a wound in the fabric of reality but not of gutted decks inside a spaceship.

it's going to be part of the industrial, patchwork, scavenger lingo.

I think inhabitants of the ship have no understanding - very different from our at least wht does "industrial" mean.
They don't know anything different that metall, they see metal everywhere, and for them its as natural as for inhabitants of Amazonian jungles trees and lianas.
So, industrial isn't the word they could use, at best they can differ organic sector of the ship - there are places with trees or something like tht right? - from non-organic.
Also, if they didn't degrade to the level of caveman, they understand that they totally dependent on the ship and its systems and its working condition - they need air, need air circulation, heating, cooling, and if anything goes wrong even in slightest they they'll die a terrible death.
And the ship is as big and complex that they can count it as living organism.
That was my logic.


But the Deadfall sounds good too.

PS Also, how about MULTIPLE names for that sector?
Like different groups call it different - some who feel the Ship like or almost living being can call it The Wound, other with different point of view can give it another name. Thus you can utilize a few good names for it. )

PPS That was Mission Control right? Brains or spine of the ship.
 

Tigranes

Arcane
Joined
Jan 8, 2009
Messages
10,350
Wound & Deadfall are decent, yes - treads the line so it's not too pretentious.

The multiple names, I would support - have the game use its 'official' name most widely in use, then have various folk pop out with the colloquial nicknames - 'mission control', references found deep within, can even be one of those competing secondary names.
 

Vault Dweller

Commissar, Red Star Studio
Developer
Joined
Jan 7, 2003
Messages
28,024
It occurred to me that I've been looking at it the wrong way. The center was gutted and all but destroyed a 100 years ago or so. Now there's nothing but a gaping hole there, a hole that's been avoided for a better part of a century.

Then scavs explore it a bit out of curiosity, find some mummified corpses and set up shop there, start going deeper and deeper. So one of the key concepts there is depth or deep. It's not some ruins to them or mission control or wreckage or wasteland. It's depth that can be mined, sorta like an inverted mountain. Or the Mariana Trench. So something like [Name]'s Deep, that would be commonly referred as the Deep.

Alternatively, it's depth containing dead bodies. Abode of the dead, that sorta thing. Graveyard? Necropolis? Barrow?
 

Daedalos

Arcane
The Real Fanboy
Joined
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5,559
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Denmark
Why not The Void, then? It's big and empty, or just deep and big and mysterious. A gaping hole = a void. Like space is. Dark and big and scary.

Or the abyss? Or The Expanse? The blank waste?
 
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Vault Dweller

Commissar, Red Star Studio
Developer
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Messages
28,024
Void means unoccupied area and thus more suitable for space and certain fantasy realms. Abyss was used in AoD.
 

Tigranes

Arcane
Joined
Jan 8, 2009
Messages
10,350
I think avoiding direct references to death, etc. helps give it more nuance - the Trench, Deadfall, etc. will do just fine, a name that could just as easily refer to a geographical area and not necessarily a disaster. (After all, the Glow was literally 'big hole nobody goes into), as well.)

Please no void, abyss, hell, and other direct grimdark words - after all wasteland is problematic because while it's supposed to just be a bleak and barren area, it has acquired all sorts of apocalyptic connotations.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
I keep thinking a dungeon name with the word "Authority" in it might sound interesting.
 

Bohr

Arcane
Joined
Nov 20, 2012
Messages
1,878
2020: In an effort to finally nail down a replacement name, nominations were solicited on shoutbox and a Codex poll held to determine the popular choice. Unfortunately, it resulted in a dead heat between The Gash, The Axe Wound, kingcomrade and The Slit. The area was later scrapped and replaced by a pocket plane.

Felipepepe's Illustrated History of RPGS, pp 1823
 

MF

The Boar Studio
Patron
Developer
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Dec 8, 2002
Messages
892
Location
Amsterdam
I don't think it's that big of a deal, but 'The Wasteland' feels weird because it's an obvious writer insert.

Colloquialism doesn't really work that way. People don't start calling something by another name unless it's shorter, more descriptive or somehow cathartic. The Wasteland is, arguably, none of those things compared to Mission Control. People would much sooner just call it 'The Shithole' or something. Biblical reasons for polite naming conventions might be in play here, but even then I would pick something like The Cemetery. You could even have people who are unwilling to be recycled for religious reasons go there to die instead, in an ersatz burial ritual.

Another route is if people would, for example, refer to it as the site for the 'Battle for Mission Control', which would be abbreviated to 'Bamco' or even 'Bam' or something within a decade. "Stay out of The Bam" actually sounds something people would say. Being an explosion onomatopoeia helps. Alternative shorthands: The Mole, Mish, or Miscon like Jack mentioned above.
 

Thonius

Arcane
Joined
Sep 18, 2014
Messages
6,495
Location
Pro-Tip Corporation.
I'm personally partial to "Names that stuck out of sheer accident". Something like how the "No Vacancy" sign in Fallout New Vegas lead to the town of "Novac".

So how about something ominous like "Miscon" or some shit like that? The only intact sign in the entrance to the area took so much damage and gunfire, and only these letters remained.
"Miscon" or "con/miss" or "control" sounds like something scavenger would actually use to name it, without being branded as edgy...
 

Saduj

Arcane
Joined
Aug 26, 2012
Messages
2,547
n0GRHmU.jpg

He's not changing it anyway.
 

AbounI

Colonist
Patron
Joined
Dec 2, 2012
Messages
1,050
(New) Sheol? as in the Old Testament, the downhole of the dead.
Proverbs 27:20 ;)
 
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Unwanted

Pequod

Unwanted
Joined
Jan 22, 2018
Messages
75
Hollows
Guts
Gorge
Well
Gap
Breach
 
Last edited:
Joined
Jan 18, 2018
Messages
1,301
Grab the Codex by the pussy
Another route is if people would, for example, refer to it as the site for the 'Battle for Mission Control', which would be abbreviated to 'Bamco' or even 'Bam' or something within a decade. "Stay out of The Bam" actually sounds something people would say. Being an explosion onomatopoeia helps. Alternative shorthands: The Mole, Mish, or Miscon like Jack mentioned above.
Spot on.
 

Au Ellai

Educated
Joined
Jan 18, 2017
Messages
40
I haven't been following the lore through every post so this might seem like a dumb question, but If the mutineers had access to the ship's admin center, why would there even be a months long battle? Couldn't they just pretty much shut any other place down and/or vent places at will? Seems kinda weird to be holed up and under siege and losing while essentially controlling the entire ship. If there were ways to limit the control of the central admin center externally, than it kinda implies that the features of the "central brain" would be available elsewhere on the ship as well making it a less valuable center, but if it really was the "central brain" of the ship, why didn't whoever held it have the rest of the ship at their whim? The area sounds totally awesome though, pretty hyped for the game. I've loved the colony ship idea since Phantasy Star III and surprised we haven't seen it used more often.
 

Vault Dweller

Commissar, Red Star Studio
Developer
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Messages
28,024
I haven't been following the lore through every post so this might seem like a dumb question, but If the mutineers had access to the ship's admin center...
They didn't. It was sealed from within and never breached, which is what makes it a top prize now. Anyway, as mentioned previously, it's an admin center (meaning the government) not the control center, which declared neutrality:

http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/index.php/topic,7520.0.html

John Miller was nearly seventy when he decided to step down and pass the Chief Technical Officer chevrons to his daughter Ava. When the Mutiny broke out, his grandfather promptly sealed the Environmental Control and Life Support System center, declaring that neither side will use the ECLSS in their war. Those who wished to leave were allowed to do so; the rest remained with CTO Miller, committed to supporting life on the Ship.

Fearing that the ECLSS will fall apart after his death, Miller reshaped it into a religious, monastic order, following the teaching of Ecclesiastes: “one generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever.” The struggles outside the hallowed halls of the ECLSS were meaningless squabbles of children who didn’t know better. There was no greater purpose than serving the Ship and supporting life.

Over the decades the conditions slowly worsened and by the time Ava Miller took over, most systems operated far below their capacity. The length of the voyage had exceeded the ECLSS capabilities a long time ago and it was a miracle that it was still operational.

Thus Ava faced a dilemma. The ECLSS needed help fast but requesting it, let alone accepting it, threatened everything her family built. She knew enough of the outside world to know that such help would come with strings attached, that whoever helps her will control the ECLSS whether she wants to or not. On the other hand, doing nothing like her father had done, will doom both the ECLSS and the Ship sooner rather than later.
The area sounds totally awesome though, pretty hyped for the game. I've loved the colony ship idea since Phantasy Star III and surprised we haven't seen it used more often.
Thanks!
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,228
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
So there's an Admin Center, a Control Center, and also a Bridge. Who controls the bridge, anyway? Is somebody piloting the ship?
 

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