RP Haven - Hall of Fame - Void of Illusions II: Shadows of the Heart

When Miko and Kuro find a young girl named Ai in the forest, they quickly figure out that she is lost, and decide to take her home. Little do they know that there is much more to Ai than meets the eye, and that the search for her home isn't so cut-and-dried... Started by GeminiSaint on the VGMusic forums on Wednesday, December 01, 2004, and finished on Friday, February 10, 2006, this became the longest adventure RP on the boards.

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. [Warning: the zip file is 2.6 MB big.]

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
GeminiSaint	Well, what can I say? The life and history of Void of Illusions 2 was a long and agitated one; that's for sure. It's no secret that there were many ups and downs along the (long) way. The making of this RP had its good share of conflicts and arguments, BUT, somehow, we still managed to complete it. THAT is a grand accomplishment on its own, given the circumstances. No wonder Void of Illusions 2 was, truly, a most ambitious project, and a straining one at that. Still, looking at all of this in retrospect, I'm glad to say I can smile and say -in all honesty- that it was all worth it. I truly believe that the end result (that is the story as a finished product that's beyond its more or less problematic making-of history) managed to surpass the original Void of Illusions in all respects, setting a new standard for me in the process. Void of Illusions 2 was a collaborative effort, and all people involved have to be acknowledged. It would have definitely not been the same without their input. Thank you, thank you, thank you very much, to all of you, VGRPers that were crazy enough to jump in and accompany me on that unique ride that was Void of Illusions 2. Thank you. GeminiSaint started Void of Illusions II: Shadows of the Heart, and was thus the first person to join. He wrote 38.85% of the story, doing so in one hundred and twenty five posts.
Ricky	Well, this RP took over an entire year, and I need to somehow make a comment that isn't a page long and avoids dragging some people through the mud. Hmm. Well, being a player in this RP was a very wild ride, and, in retrospect, part of me feels I should have dropped out when I was inclined to six weeks after it started. However, another part of me feels that my role in this RP was one of my greater accomplishments on these boards... though, in the end, it doesn't seem to amount to much when you take certain things into account... things that leave me with a bitter taste in my mouth and a new category of certain plotlines and, to be honest, certain RPers, to avoid. Void of Illusions 2 proved that RPs should not take longer than six months, otherwise you face a major decrease in interest, drive, and even likeability. Things had gone relatively fine at first... yeah, there were problems with subplots getting out of hand, and with people not posting- your standard RP experience- but things went really downhill in July (when the RP was seven months old). I honestly do not know what happened with me... in the space of three weeks I went from really-interested-in-this-story to I-don't-care-can-we-just-get-on-with-it. Part of it may have been a phase of writer's block I had at the time, but I got over the writer's block... I don't know. What I do know is that at about the same time, we crossed a line of the RP- we went from the "here's the basic concept" section to the "this has been thoroughly planned" section, and there it became quite apparent that our ideas and opinions were worth basically nothing, and we were only "allowed" to creatively contribute when things went awry- for example, the original plan stated there were going to be only three test rooms in the circus tent, and those test rooms were going to be written by one person; it was only because that one person failed to follow-through that we were given clearance to make our own test rooms. That didn't help my opinion of things at all. It wasn't until the very end, when working on the wishes and the epilogues, that I got one last taste of the collaboration feeling that had been so vacant during the final six months of the RP... so I'd have to say that working on Fabreanne's wishes and the beginning of the epilogues was one of my favorite parts of the RP- I enjoyed it so much. Regardless of all that, though... the story of this RP is really good, in my opinion, and I am really proud of being part of it (self-appreciation goes a long way ). I am definitely proud of the Pawn and Xion subplot- I put a lot of energy into making that work without conflicting with the RP's main story, and I'm happy to say I pulled it off. I'm also proud of the Atlantis chapter- it took place during a low point in general activity and during the peak of my activity, resulting in over half of that chapter being written by me; and, of course, I'm proud of how Fabreanne turned out, and her relationship with Ai, and the happy ending she got and fully deserved. Ricky was the third person to join the role-play. He wrote 17.25% of the story with ninety-seven posts.
CtrlAltDestroy	In Void of Illusions 2, I found myself working with a pretty weird set of characters. I was in charge of Gale, an antisocial college girl Elec created for me; Eric, a kid with a major identity crisis; and Xain, a parasite with no identity to call his own. My main goal was to develop these three characters to their fullest extents, and I think I succeeded there. However, it turned out to be a long, hard road... I kept forgetting that, unlike the original Void of Illusions, this was not my story. It was GeminiSaint's. I regret that I got in the way so much, trying to turn the story in my own direction instead of just letting GS direct it. With my continual hijacking of the story's elements, my brutal, early-on hijacking of Kuro with Xain, and my 2-month leave of absence, I must have gotten on everyone's nerves. I even had Ricky and Elec hating my guts at some point along the line, and probably had GS extremely annoyed at me (and, clearly, at himself) as well. As for the story itself, it turned out great. Every little element fell into place at the very end, creating a beautiful, epic story which I'm sure is a great read. However, I fear that the process of creating this story has permanently affected the relationships of the authors for the worse, who, in the end, were writing the story out of a sense of obligation rather than inspiration. Don't get me wrong, I think we should be proud of this masterpiece and all the hard work we put into it, but we should also learn from the things that went wrong. Once the shortened and improved Director's Cut gets finished, I'd recommend Void of Illusions 2 to many people. It's hard to choose what was my favorite part, since the story is just too huge to remember all at one time. The Atlantis sequence was really fun to read, the circus tower post where Xain saves everyone's life was fun to write... However, I think I can speak for all of us when I say that our favorite part of this story was finally getting to add the big THE END, not in a bad way, but just out of the fact that we finally finished something so huge and great, something that took so long to accomplish. Great job, guys! CtrlAltDestroy was the fourth person to join Void of Illusions II: Shadows of the Heart. He wrote 16.10% of the story in sixty-three posts.
Elec	I was rather surprised when it turned out that when we got to the Circus Tower, the RP was nowhere near being over as no-one had told me that the exploration of the tower would take as many posts as a miniature RP. As for Raika's relationship with Rude (in which she was kind of like an older sibling to him), it was something I'd never originally planned on doing but it was kind of interesting. Finally, although there have been some complaints about the clichés in the final battle, you have to admit that the concept for the final villain was really fairly interesting. Elec was the second person to join the role-play. She wrote 8.20% of the story with one hundred and fifty two posts.
Sojiro	Sojiro was unavailable for comment. He was the fifth person to join the role-play, and wrote 7.51% of the story, doing so in eighty-nine posts before disappearing.
Thalzon	I joined Void of Illusions 2 the latest, and so wasn't fully acquainted with all that happened during the first half of the story. The second half, however, I found to be plodding, padded, and mostly unnecessary fetching. I am glad I managed to wrest what little control I had over events in the story into something manageable and enjoyable, but there were times when I really felt like I wasn't allowed to do thing A or execute plan B. GeminiSaint would often say, "Okay, you can do whatever you like as long as you don't do this." "This" was usually progressing the plot. So, what he basically said boiled down to, "I have this planned and I don't want anyone to change it, so you can post within these confines as it's not going to affect anything anyway." GS is a great storyteller, I make no qualms about that, but as a director he really needs to loosen the leash on the other members if he doesn't want to get bitten next time. Thalzon was the thirteenth person to join the role-play. He wrote 5.07% of the story, doing so in thirty-nine posts.
Nerikuro Shino	Nerikuro Shino was unavailable for comment. He was the twelfth person to join the role-play, and wrote 3.26% of the story, making twenty-four posts before departing from it.
Horn	Well, then... once again, I'm shamed to say that I didn't follow up to the end. It's just the way I've become, I suppose... and I do regret it, since the story seemed to take a turn for the best. I'm glad I was allowed to be part of it for a while at least, and that my character got a fitting death and burial, all perfectly woven in story-wise. An honor to see such a grand event during my RPer time! Horn was the eighth person to join Void of Illusions II: Shadows of the Heart. He wrote 1.52% of the story in fourteen posts before disappearing.
Nick	So... this thing finally ended huh? The thing that made me leave in the first place? The thing I was kicked out of, along with Lamur? The thing that sometimes haunts me so? [sarcasm]It ended already?[/sarcasm] Well, what was I in, about 1/8th of this thing? 1/10th? 1/12th? I'll go with the third one. I still wonder today, why did GS kick me out anyway? Wasn't it like, an unwritten rule that regardless of skill, people shouldn't be kicked out because they suck? Meh. I had it coming anyway, from that, to the time I ended a little thing early, when some girl impersonated Fabreanne, I think, and then when Ricky somehow mistook one of Sojiro's posts as mine, even though that's like, what? Impossible? Almost impossible? Meh. After I came back, I tried to hint that I wanted to get back in Void of Illusions 2. I wanted another chance to try, since, hell, THALZON got in right after the move from VGMusic. Good thing I didn't try to actually come straight out and ASK. Well, it's happened to me before, so I guess I didn't feel surprised then. Anyway, I applaud for this RP's success. I hope to see other RPs that are as good as this one. So yea, kthxby. Nick was the ninth person to join the role-play. He wrote 0.74% of the story, doing so in twenty-two posts, before being asked to depart from it.
Spyder	FireMario always wanted the story to go in the direction he wanted, even if sometimes he didn't know what direction that was. However it was fun, and I am sorry that I wasn't around to finish it up with everyone. Spyder was the sixth person to join the role-play. He wrote 0.53% of the story, doing so in eight posts before disappearing.
Lamur	Lamur was unavailable for comment. He was the tenth person to join Void of Illusions II: Shadows of the Heart, and wrote 0.49% of the story, making ten posts before being asked to depart from it.
Maniacal Gruntling	Maniacal Gruntling was unavailable for comment. He was seventh person to join the role-play, and wrote 0.40% of the story, doing so in eight posts before disappearing. He now goes by the username MG.
ShadowSword	ShadowSword was unavailable for comment. He was the eleventh person to join the role-play, and wrote 0.02% of the story, making only one post before disappearing.

        · Void of Illusions 2 is the sequel to Void of Illusions and Beyond the Village Walls. It is highly recommended you read those RPs first before reading this. It is also suggested you read The Saga of the Stars: The Mystical Clock for more background information on one of the subplots, but it's not that necessary.
        · This RP was started on the forums at VGMusic. When the RP Board was moved to VGRP, several RPs tried to resume, but most of them ultimately failed. Void of Illusions 2 is the fourth RP to successfully survive the move.
        · When the RP Board was moved to VGRP, several of the players changed their names. FireMario became GeminiSaint, Ricky St. Claire shortened his name to Ricky, Sojiro Seta The Tenken shortened his name to Sojiro, Nick8 shortened his name to Nick, NaokoYiran changed his name to NerikuroShino, and Spyder changed his name to Anno Umbra.
        · This is the first RP to have seen not one, but three years- it started in 2004, lasted through 2005, and was finished in 2006.
        · This RP holds the record for longest adventure RP ever, clocking at 652 posts! Most adventure RPs get clock in around 350, but Void of Illusions 2 managed to nearly double that! It is also the second-longest RP in general- VGMusic RPG Heroes Tournament 2: The Tournament of Legends beats it by about two hundred posts.
        · This RP also holds second-place for taking the most time, clocking in at one year, two months, and nine days. It breaks the record placed by the previous holder, The Tournament of Legends, by over two months. It was then beaten by Soul Twist 2: A Story of Infinity's End, which beat it by 107 days.
        · In the March 2005 edition of the RP Awards, this RP won awards in the categories of Best Supporting Female and Best Use of Video Game Music. In the August 2005 edition of the Awards, it won awards for Best Supporting Female again and Best Visual Description. In the February 2006 edition of the awards, it won awards for Best Supporting Female for the third consecutive time and Best Villainous Female.

Some general information regarding Void of Illusions II: Shadows of the Heart
This role-play was started by GeminiSaint.	The story is a fantasy.
This role-play was started on Wednesday, December 01, 2004	This role-play was finished on Friday, February 10, 2006
This role-play was 652 posts long.	The story is 470,809 words long.
This story took 435 days to complete.	On average, this role-play received 1.49 posts per day.

Name	Comment	Date
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