Either Needed Superstar Showdown Slaughter: A High-Stakes Sci-Fi Idol RP

[dispatch99]

Superstar Showdown Slaughter

A High Stakes, Sci-Fi Idol RP

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Welcome to the Unific: an intergalactic, multispecies empire spanning the Milky Way, and your new master and overlord.

Exactly twenty years ago, they arrived on Earth and promptly conquered the planet. Between the Unific's nearly godlike technology, their functionally limitless resources, and their vicious and aggressive drive to conquer, humankind didn't stand a chance: they killed billions and left the remainder on their knees, begging for mercy. After five world-shatteringly horrific days, the Unific accepted humanity's surrender, though at a terrible cost: the entire species was enslaved, reduced to objects for trade, and scattered across the galaxy. While some humans are luckier than others—being roughly evenly into slave laborers, living sumptuary articles, or cattle—conditions of life across the board are so bleak that many living humans envy the dead.



This story of subjugation and terror from the stars comes with a strange wrinkle, however: it turns out that the only thing that matches the Unific's technological supremacy and their cruelty is their love for spectacle and music.



While they despise almost everything else about us, the species of the Unific fell in love with the culture of human musical concerts, especially idols and stage performances. For the entertainment and edification of the populace, the extraterrestrial empire has established a sort of musical game show to be broadcast live across their domain: Superstar Showdown Slaughter (known variously as the SSS, S3, the Grand Show, or simply "the Showdown" or "the Slaughter"). It's a fairly "standard" show that's shockingly similar to many old human broadcasts, recorded live every five days, where contestants perform songs (both original works and covers) and where alien viewers can submit votes for their favorite performance of the night. It's created specifically to show off interesting and creative work by the humans that the Unific now possesses—however, it was also created to be bloody propaganda for the galactic empire. As such, this show comes with a few twists:

1. The loser of each round, i.e. the one who gets the least votes, is eliminated from the contest by summary public execution—right there, on the stage, in front of both the audience and the performers. This, the titular Slaughter, is usually done in a creative and gruesome manner meant to please the alien crowd, whose bloodlust against humanity seems to be just as limitless as their hunger for bigger and better shows. After being brutally murdered on stage, the loser is replaced by a new contestant, ensuring the show never ends and that even seasoned performers have to stay on their toes in case they get outshone by an upstart.

2. If you manage to win the top spot for five rounds without being killed—the fabled Five Days Mercy, an intentional humiliating dig at humanity's bloody defeat—you are released from the game. All previous claims to ownership or exploitation over you are rendered void by the Unific, you're paid a reasonable allowance for the remainder of your life, and you're given a (very limited and highly surveilled) interstellar travel pass: as much freedom and comfort as a human is allowed in this universe. Likewise, if someone wins the Five Days Mercy, their spot is filled by a newbie as well.

One way or another, Unific agents from the show have managed to track you down, ripped you from your previous situation (with or without your master's consent or compensation), and have drafted you into participating in the Showdown, providing you with all the instruments, costumes, equipment and crew you need to stage a dazzling performance. The show is a widespread hit, with even large human audiences watching, so new talent is always welcome and a lot of money and fame is riding on how things go. Along with the other captive performing humans at your side, your only choices are to sing and perform your heart out to win the love of the alien crowd and potentially your freedom, or to face a terrible fate at the bloody hands of the Unific.

Torn from the certainty of a life of miserable servitude and despair, a million questions race through your head:

-What will you do now that you're part of the performance?
-How far will you go for stardom and survival?
-Can you use your music to hold onto your humanity in the face of this twisted game, or has this horror twisted your art forever?
-What sort of human are you trying to be: a mere survivor, an inspiration for what's left of mankind, or a willing collaborator with the Unific?

-And, most importantly… is there any way to escape the Slaughter, or maybe end it altogether?

Whatever you answer, the crowd doesn't care. You're up next: go out there and break a leg, so they don't break your neck. Good luck!

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Hi there folks, I'm dispatch! I've been inspired by the concept of the anime series Alien Stage (which I will admit to not having actually watched, just read about) to make a large group roleplay for a dark but potentially fun and interesting story in that vein: a mix of science fiction, thriller, horror, and music/idol stuff.

A few important notes:

-This RP will 100% feature violence, and may feature some mild sexual content, depending on the direction people want to take it—my intention however is to keep things R-rated at worst.

-In case you haven't been paying attention or think I am bluffing, I will reiterate: there WILL be player character death. If you will be catatonic over your OC losing the contest and therefore losing their head, probably don't send that particular character here.

-I'm not entirely sure how the loser would be selected: however I will make sure to consult with everyone in the OOC beforehand. Ideas include random dice rolls, rotating player judges, actual small-scale contests of music taste / lyric writing / scene writing, author consensus, public voting, or a mix. Don't worry, however: musical skill or good taste, while it would be awesome to have, is not a prerequisite to having your character survive the contest: IF we even do skill based rounds, and that is a very big "if", I will make sure everyone has an even chance.

-Vague Spoilers: There MAY be more than one way to get out of the game, but you'll have to figure that out IC.

With that out of the way, let me know what you all think, and if I get enough interest I will post a character application and we can begin the story of these Superstars!

 

[dispatch99]

CONTESTANT
APPLICATION

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Name: (Include any aliases if applicable.)
Stage Name: (If applicable.)
Gender: (What gender do they present as?)
Age: (18+ only, obviously. NB - keep in mind the fall of humanity was 20 years ago: anyone younger than ~23 probably won't remember much of a world before the Unific or the Showdown.)
Appearance: (Written description or non-real life face claim will work fine. Include any signature costumes if you'd like!)

Voice: (What does your character sound like? Technical terms like alto/soprano or broad descriptions like raspy or low are both good. Mute characters are allowed!)
Primary Talent: (What do you associate most with your character? Are they a great guitar player? Can they dance—if so, how? Do they have an especially powerful or beautiful voice? What's the main thing that draws the crowds in for you?)
Secondary Talents: (What other instruments or types of performance is your character familiar with? What else could they break out on the stage that's not their immediate, obvious draw?)
Favored Style: (Does your character have a genre or method they prefer? If applicable.)

Personality: (What is YC like? How does YC work under pressure? Do they play along well with aliens or other humans? What are their likes and dislikes? Are they upbeat or moody, thoughtful or airheaded? Tell us what makes them tick!)
Sexuality: (If applicable. NB - Human x alien can be a possibility within site rules, so if there's any attraction on that front, it might be worth mentioning here.)
Hobbies and Skills: (What does your character dabble in and like to do outside of their new role? Do they have any skills that aren't obviously applicable to the stage?)

Biography: (What is your character's life story? What were they doing under the Unific before they were brought on: were they made a lab rat, a servant, a human pet, a slave laborer, or cattle? Or were they able to live in the margins, fighting as a rebel, living as a criminal, traveling as a nomadic exile, surviving as a collaborator, or something else? If they were born before the Unific invasion, what was their life like back then? Do they have friends or family they still care about?)

End Goal: (Does your character see a light at the end of the tunnel? If so, what is it? How do they plan on getting there?)

 

[dispatch99]

GMPCs and NPCs

Spoiler: <Alien, Robotic> Interpreter Type-Z "Zip"

Under Construction

Spoiler: <Alien, Biological> Producer-Prefect Marrsion

Under Construction

Spoiler: <Alien, Biological> Chief Stylist Zaralana

Under Construction

Spoiler: <Alien, ???> THE ONE LEADER, The Grand Justiciar

Under Construction

Spoiler: <Human>Talent Director Adaoma Orjey

Under Construction

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Spoiler: <Human>Natasha - "Glacier Queen"

Under Construction

Name: Natasha McKinsey
Stage Name: |Glacier Queen|
Gender: Feminine-Androgynous, She/They (AFAB)
Age: 25
Appearance: TBD

Voice: (What does your character sound like? Technical terms like alto/soprano or broad descriptions like raspy or low are both good. Mute characters are allowed!)
Primary Talent: (What do you associate most with your character? Are they a great guitar player? Can they dance—if so, how? Do they have an especially powerful or beautiful voice? What's the main thing that draws the crowds in for you?)
Secondary Talents: (What other instruments or types of performance is your character familiar with? What else could they break out on the stage that's not their immediate, obvious draw?)
Favored Style: (Does your character have a genre or method they prefer? If applicable.)

Personality: (What is YC like? How does YC work under pressure? Do they play along well with aliens or other humans? What are their likes and dislikes? Are they upbeat or moody, thoughtful or airheaded? Tell us what makes them tick!)
Sexuality: Asexual.
Hobbies and Skills: (What does your character dabble in and like to do outside of their new role? Do they have any skills that aren't obviously applicable to the stage?)

Biography: Daughter of the United States ambassador to Russia prior to the Unific invasion.

End Goal: Wants to use the prestige and resources achieved by a potential win to assist her father and the other collaborators, with the goal of ensuring humanity's future survival and eventual equal standing within the Unific.

Spoiler: <Human>Luoyang - "Red Blossom"

Under Construction

Name: Luoyang "LuLu" Greene
Stage Name: Red Blossom
Gender: Feminine, she/her (Cisgender Female)
Age: 19
Appearance: TBD

Voice: Soprano, high and sweet but quite versatile, like quality cane sugar. Has a poppy tone that earns her favorable comparisons to songbirds and Hatsune Miku. Lowers to alto if she raps, which is rare but she has a lot of fun doing.
Primary Talent: LuLu's talent consists of mixing her vocals in with her keyboard playing, synchronizing the two melodies to make a sound that always works great, no matter the subject.
Secondary Talents: She has a talent for designing stage lights herself, as well as for more energetic dancing and acrobatics. She is a master of the esoteric electronica arts, and LuLu is also learning to branch out and play the bass—she tried to learn the violin, but Natasha calmly but firmly made it clear that would be a mistake, so she backed off.
Favored Style: Hyperpop, J-Pop—really, any bright and electronic pop music she can go into, with occasional forays into rap.

Personality: (What is YC like? How does YC work under pressure? Do they play along well with aliens or other humans? What are their likes and dislikes? Are they upbeat or moody, thoughtful or airheaded? Tell us what makes them tick!)
Sexuality: Straight - no word on alien preferences.
Hobbies and Skills: (What does your character dabble in and like to do outside of their new role? Do they have any skills that aren't obviously applicable to the stage?)

Biography: (What is your character's life story? What were they doing under the Unific before they were brought on: were they made a lab rat, a servant, a human pet, a slave laborer, or cattle? Or were they able to live in the margins, fighting as a rebel, living as a criminal, traveling as a nomadic exile, surviving as a collaborator, or something else? If they were born before the Unific invasion, what was their life like back then? Do they have friends or family they still care about?)

End Goal: Wants to win as many rounds as possible, as fast as possible, so she can get the Five Day's Mercy and return home without having to see too many people die.

Spoiler: <Human> Ishmael - "Jaguar"

Name: Ishmael "Ish, Izzy" Carrillo
Stage Name: //JAGUAR//
Gender: Masculine, he/him (Cisgender Male)
Age: 22
Appearance: TBD

Voice: Tenor, occasionally dipping into baritone - smooth and rich, but with an intoxicating heat, like a good whiskey. Youthful but with obvious gravity. Can do screaming, but only for a very limited amount of time before his vocals give out.
Primary Talent: Electric guitar - Izzy is genuinely a wizard with the amp, capable of both delicate microtones and of shredding until his fingers (and your ears) bleed.
Secondary Talents: World-class vocals that can stand up well on their own and play nice with others, very good at emoting on stage with his voice and body language and expressions, hip-hop dancing that doesn't get too technical, some talent with DJing and mixing, and passable at the drums.
Favored Style: Hard rock - orchestral, metal, glam, punk, whatever. If it's loud, aggressive, dramatic, and has electric guitar, Izzy is all for it.

Personality: Ishmael is a brooding, tempestuous young man, a romantic in the intellectual and in the social sense. Easily provoked to anger, he's not always the sharpest tool in the shed, but he's loyal and is proud that he wears his heart on his sleeve. Oddly, he seems to operate better under pressure than while relaxing, as though imminent threats help focus his mind and abilities. Izzy always tries to make friendships and personal connections with other humans, but he deeply despises all aliens and does not talk to them at all if he can help it—when he's forced to, he's as hostile as he can get away with.
+Likes: bread, warm sunny climates, action movies, lifting, alcohol, cats.
-Dislikes: prolonged darkness, aliens, agoraphobic spaces, smoking, sour foods, Natasha.
Sexuality: Bisexual - Humans only.
Hobbies and Skills: Enjoys baking, diving, and painting as his hobbies. Is a good boxer, and knows his way around life support systems.

Biography: Ishmael was born to a young couple from what used to be California on Earth. Officially, they were hydroelectricity engineers who managed to transfer their employment from human nations and companies to the service of the Unific—however, unofficially, they were part of the human resistance movement that tried to wriggle the species out of imperial control in the chaotic early stages of the conquest, using their positions of proximity to critical Earth infrastructure to try and get the nascent human movement an advantage.

Ultimately, they failed: when Ishmael was seven, his parents' organization was discovered by Unific authorities and promptly destroyed. His mother and father were executed right in front of him, even as he cried and pleaded for their lives. While there was no saving his parents, a collaborator who was nearby—an energy company executive who herself was a childhood friend of Ishmael's father—interceded and managed to convince the Unific to spare the young boy's life. Instead, they shipped him the Saturnian moon Titan, where he spent the next fifteen years of his life enslaved as a worker in hydrocarbon extraction facilities, siphoning off the moon's atmosphere for Unific consumer goods.

However, despite the methane stench and bone-freezing chill of the planet, Ishmael had it relatively good: the harvesting equipment was mostly automated and wasn't important enough to the Unific for micromanagement, which left the workers with a lot of downtime. Ishmael spent this time in two ways—solidifying and shaping his radicalization against the alien empire (as though he needed to), and in learning how to play music. The extraction facilities had a surprisingly robust break room to prevent cabin fever among both human and alien workers alike, and that included an amp and an electric guitar—Izzy picked it up, and it's been a love story ever since.

Last year, however, things suddenly and dramatically changed. An unexplained explosion destroyed a large section of the Titan extraction facilities, killing many alien workers. In the subsequent investigation and sweep, Ishmael's private journal was found, chock full of angry thoughts and daydreams of action against the Unific. The young man was duly blamed for the incident and was slated to be tortured to death. It was his luck however—good or bad—that the Unific raid had occurred while he was playing an original song in the break room. Rather than crushing him and wasting that obvious talent, the Unific authorities sold their captive songbird to the Superstar Showdown Slaughter.

After months of preparation and training—encouraged by his alien handlers—Ishmael's first performance begins tonight… and he intends to make it one those bastards will never forget.

End Goal:
Current prospects - Attempting "suicide by cop" with a deliberately provocative, anti-alien Showdown performance.
Long term dreams - In decreasing order of likelihood: gain his freedom, avenge his family, liberate humanity, destroy the Unific.

 

[AlphaPremium]

Name: Ye-oh Naeun
Stage Name: Riara
Gender: Female
Age: 19
Appearance: Long pomegranate-colored hair, garnet-colored eyes, wears a white top, purple jacket, black pleated skirt and black stockings with white boots. Her signature costume, a modified school look with a blue blazer, and headband.

Voice: A soft but powerful and strong tone. Is a mezzo-soprano
Primary Talent: An ACE (someone who is a master in all skills), as many of her friends call her. She has a powerful and beautiful voice, can dance really well in freestyle. Also a great rapper and has oozing star presence.
Secondary Talents: Can play many musical instruments, such as the biwa and guzhang, a Chinese zither.
Favored Style: K-pop

Personality: A woman of impeccable grace, is a little soft-spoken, very friendly, very welcoming, but rather competitive at times. She doesn't hesitate to help anyone in need. Can be very polite and refined.
Sexuality: Straight
Hobbies & Skills: Hobbies are reading, cooking, writing and painting. Her non-musical skills are engineering, robotics and inventing. She is also considered a genius because she could solve any academics-related tasks and puzzles.

Biography: Born after one year in the Unific's reign over Earth, Naeun was born in Seoul, South Korea to a family of servants serving an aristocratic alien family. They were treated surprisingly well and even a few members of the family helped with caring Naeun. Naeun grew up into a lovable young lady thanks with the upbringing of her servant family. One day, scouts of the Superstar Showdown Slaughter barged into the mansion where Naeun's family were and demanded someone to participate. With no choice and her family's safety in mind, Naeun volunteered, and left with just a necklace of her younger sister. Naeun didn't mind about dying, because she knew anytime that could a mistake could be make, she would be crossed off.

End Goal: Do her best as long as possible, and even win the SSS.

(Hey, AlphaPremium here. Sad you couldn't continue the supernatural RP, but I'm excited about this one.