RP Haven - Hall of Fame - Void of Illusions

Void of Illusions is the story of a young girl who is suddenly forgotten by everyone, and, on her journey to discover what happened, she makes several new friends and uncovers the earth-shattering truth about her world. Started by Elec on Sunday, January 25, 2004, and finished nearly twenty-nine weeks later on Saturday, August 14, 2004, this RP has formed something of a cult following!

Do you want to read the role-play? Come on, you know you do! You can download it here, and read it at your own leisure.

Feel free to comment on the story, and tell us what you liked, didn't like, and your overall opinion of the story! To comment, simply send me a private message. You'll have to register at the RP Haven forums to do so, but is that really a bad thing? Didn't think so.
You may also send me an e-mail with your comments, if you prefer.

Here we have comments from the people who wrote the story, as well as how much they wrote of it. They are listed in order of contribution percentage. Warning, there are spoilers here!

Name	Comment
FireMario	Well, it's no secret I hold Void of Illusions in high esteem. I'm not sure how it turned out so good. I guess it just did. Many things went naturally right, and the luck factor helped a lot. Anyway, this is what happened: Elec invited me to join. At first I was reluctant to join, because the first few pages had the characters drifting aimlessly. Eventually I said "Oh, what the hell, let's join", and I joined, dragging CtrlAltDestroy along with me, might I add! :P Of course, I declare myself guilty of shamelessly hijacking Void of Illusions. Consciously or not, the fact is that CtrlAltDestroy and I literally took full control of the RP. This led to some major problems toward the end of the story. Especially intense was the day some of us had a heated argument over the ending. I still have all the PMs and MSN logs of that critical day. Believe it or not, that's the Void of Illusions-related moment I remember the most! It was that intense. Finally, I must say I compiled the whole RP and subjected it to a careful editing process to get rid of a few inconsistencies as well as to enhance the flow of the story. CtrlAltDestroy and Ricky helped me a lot with proof-reading. I called it Void of Illusions: FireMario's Cut. FireMario was the tenth person to join the role-play, and yet he wrote more than anyone else, contributing 43.92% of the story himself, doing so in ninety posts. He now goes by the name GeminiSaint.
CtrlAltDestroy	I loved that story. All the problems we had were resolved flawlessly, and everything just seemed to fall into place at the very end. It was a lot of fun. I'm happy to have contributed to it. My favorite part was definitely the final Sacrifice scene (although Kuro was originally supposed to die there instead of Raika... you can thank Elec for that :) ) That post was masterfully written, exciting and sad at the same time, a perfect culmination of such an epic story. CtrlAltDestroy was the eleventh and last person to join the role-play. He wrote 24.63% of the story with sixty posts.
Kaiba	I loved this story. Developing Teefa is always a thrill, especially when it came to alluding to one of her first loves (unlike most of the other men whose hearts she's crushed, she truly liked Ardent, a character from another story). Granted, my experience with romantic subplots is sorely limited, but I winged it. The end result is that no one really knows what her answer to DM would've been. This also allowed me a fresh start with one of my newest characters, the gene-spliced cat-girl ninja by the name of Felina. Initially created before the VGMusic Forum Apocalypse of September 2003, Felina's first story had abruptly ended and left an unfinished character on my drawing board. While keeping what was left of her origin intact, I added the ninja background that followed and revived/revamped her character. And I don't regret it. One of the best parts, for me, was my chosen method of storytelling...by letting my own characters type out the story. This led to some "behind-the-scenes" commentary that was pulled directly from my storyboard. Rejected ideas, "what if" thoughts, and randomness that I probably couldn't fit into the story (not that this stopped other people). Kaiba was the fifth person to join the role-play. He wrote 12.75% of the story with thirty-one posts. He now goes by the name Hwoarang.
Elec	Though Miko was more or less the main character, Void of Illusions did for adult Raika what Destiny Dreams 5: The Programmers Tower did for young Raika. It fleshed her out and made her seem less like simply the token hothead in the group and made her seem more believable. Originally, I had created Raika in reaction to all the stereotypical female characters that dominate fiction. However, I wanted to make her more than just another archetype. I think I pretty much succeeded. I hope so. Elec started Void of Illusions, and was thus the first person to join. She wrote 7.40% of the story, doing so in sixty-four posts.
Lamur	Lamur was unavailable for comment. He was the sixth person to join Void of Illusions. He wrote 6.30% of the story in thirty posts.
Maniacal Gruntling	I liked the Void. It was wicked, especially the end (partially because I technically managed to make my first non-rubbish post there in the end of Void of Illusions). And you can't deny the greatness of the final battle. I mean, all heroes but two die? Seriously, that kicks major- Eh, I'm rambling. Everyone in Void of Illusions, I take my hat off for you. Maniacal Gruntling was the eighth person to join the role-play. He wrote 3.81% of the story, doing so in thirty-one posts. He now goes by the name MG.
Vash	Vash was unavailable for comment. He was seventh person to join the role-play. He wrote 0.88% of the story, doing so in four posts before real-life obligations forced him to depart. He now goes by the name Vash the Stampede.
Ingram	Ingram was unavailable for comment. He was the fourth person to join Void of Illusions. He wrote 0.49% of the story in two posts before disappearing.
Nuttera	Nuttera was unavailable for comment. He was the ninth person to join the role-play. He wrote 0.20% of the story, doing so in two posts, before disappearing.
Fgdtdtdtdr	Fgdtdtdtdr was unavailable for comment. He was the third person to join Void of Illusions. He wrote 0.12% of the story, making only one post before disappearing.
Hayden	Hayden was unavailable for comment. He was the second person to join the role-play. He wrote 0.09% of the story, making only one post before disappearing.

        · Void of Illusions was started and completed on the VGMusic forums. When we made the move from VGMusic to VGRP, some of the players changed their names. FireMario became GeminiSaint, Kaiba became Hwoarang, and Vash became Vash the Stampede.
        · GeminiSaint made a "VoI: Behind the Scenes" post in the RP Board Breakroom Complex, with detailed information on everything that happened behind the scenes.
        · GeminiSaint enjoyed the story so much he made a parody of it called The Void of Delusions: The Blade of Fake II, started a sequel for it, entitled Void of Illusions 2: Shadows of the Heart, and created a GeminiSaint's Cut of the story (which can be downloaded via the link provided at the top of the entry).
        · In mid-March 2005, Chibi Acelie decided to make a game based on one of the RPs. The two choices were Void of Illusions and The Saga of the Stars: The Mystical Clock. However, Mystical Clock got more votes.
        · In the March 2005 edition of the biannual RP Awards (that took place on VGMusic), Void of Illusions won an award for Best Original Character.

Some general information regarding Void of Illusions
This role-play was started by Elec.	The story is a fantasy.
This role-play was started on Sunday, January 25, 2004	This role-play was finished on Saturday, August 14, 2004
This role-play was 316 posts long.	The story is 189,104 words long.
This story took 202 days to complete.	On average, this role-play received 1.56 posts per day.