Risking life and limb I decided it was time to follow Sir Trevor McDonald and dip my toes into the murky underworld of crime. However unlike Sir Trevor, my visit was to a virtual crime location, namely Gravesend Bay in Second Life.

This is underworld roleplay Second Life style and as in many roleplaying sims in Second Life, a lot of work has gone into the storyline. In this case it revolves around two main families, The Gianni’s and The Morella’s.

The Gianni’s have been involved in an internal power struggle which tore the family apart and allowed their enemies to take advantage. The current storyline leaves The Gianni’s in this situation :

Left with a dilapidated neighborhood, the Gianni Family feels the pressure for the Morella’s to the south and is at the point where they’re willing to do whatever it takes to not only keep what they have but to reclaim what the considered theirs.

However when it comes to The Morella’s, there’s a slightly different story.

The Morella’s watched The Gianni’s tear themselves apart and took their chances. Now the head of The Morella family finds himself in this situation :

The Morella’s gain power, prestige and wealth quickly and continue to use their political connections to push the Gianni’s further north. If they prevail, they plan on finally gaining control of the region and wiping the Gianni’s off the map.

Beyond that there are factions. The Drifters and Ava’s Angels.

The Drifters are described as :

The Drifters are the group of misfits, meaning doesn’t fit in to a family. This group is mostly composed of bikers, drug dealers, addicts, and homeless people. The drifter are lead by nether family, they answer to a faceless figure. He’s known to most simply as the Kingpin.

Ava’s Angels on the other hand are ladies of the night who are still controlled by The Gianni family. This is an adult region, so adult activities can be expected but it’s not a region that encourages adult activities in plain sight.

Then there are the good guys, you can roleplay with The Police Department, The Fire Department or The Medical Centre.

Beyond this there is a bar, a club, shops, a petrol station and more. Many of these business locations are fronts for unsavoury activities or in some cases, pretty honest activities, you can roleplay in those locations too. However, like many roleplaying sims, you will have to apply for a position.

This is an urban roleplay sim and the build is very urban indeed. The streets are surrounded by buildings for the most part, run down apartment blocks in some areas as well as more industrial style factory units elsewhere.

As with a lot of roleplaying sims there are rules, and Gravesend Bay is no exception. However the rules are rather light. If you want to go as an OOC visitor, then there’s an OOC tag you can wear but you must dress as an adult human. This pained me somewhat being as I’m a Dwarfin King, but I was told that someone called Don would not be happy if I didn’t comply with these rules and I could end up being made an offer I couldn’t refuse. I did try and insist that I was King, but they told me rules were rules!

Whereas I can’t comment on the roleplay or the dynamics of how well they play out, this is an interesting concept. The sim, despite the theme, is an interesting place to visit just to see how congested Second Life regions can get with buildings. There aren’t many green spaces here.

The brains behind this roleplay are :

• Bubbles Courtois (Trinity Ermintrood) – Owner
• Nick Courtois (Nichollas Courtois) – Owner
• Alisaundra Andel – Admin
• Asher (Swectre Resident) – Admin

The video embedded below gives a brief glimpse of the region.

This is an interesting angle to roleplay that I thought I’d see more of in Second Life. People interested in this sort of theme may very well like to at least pay a visit.

Whereas I didn’t find any horse’s heads in people’s beds, I did find an interesting region and I lived to tell the story too!

Website : http://gravesendbay.webs.com/

SLURL To Gravesend Bay : http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Purple%20Sky/59/77/1999/

Tweet