I'll be playing Joar Varnes a Norwegian exchange student studying animal husbandry to become a vet

Hey, guys -- looking forward to gaming with y'all.

Hannah is from Texas, hardscrabble background. She's a scholarship girl: Athletics and Academics. Pre-Med -- going to be a forensic anthropologist -- just like Bones on the TV! I'll be thinking of Clarice Starling and Temperance Brennan to inform her character.

So we have the two broad sides of anthro since Alyona is definitely cultural with a bit of archeology.

In reply to Hannah Bradford (msg # 7):

If I'm processing the timeline right, Bones isn't going to premiere for nine years (in 2005).

Pablo's from El Paso, a point guard, and his parents raised him right (i.e., he is a total, rule-abiding square). He is, to his parents' chagrin, majoring in literature.

So is the year 1995?

I was a sophomore in high school that year. The music, the fashion, I don't miss a good bit of it.

Should be fall of '96. A long way from smartphones. Hotmail just launched in July. AOL is still absolutely a thing. Dial-up home internet, ethernet cables in the dorms (maybe).

The Macarena is topping the Billboard charts. The first Space Jam came out. So did Independence Day.

Ah, the 90s.

Yikes! Even the books haven't been written yet. [Offstage sounds of keyboard and Google thinking] Looks like her hero will have to be Dr. Kay Scarpetta, created in 1990 by Patricia Cornwell. Noted. Thanks for the temporal reset.

I had tickets to Oasis and they didn't make it to the third stop because of a fight. I was really into a lot of the Riot Grrrl bands, especially Babes in Toyland.

I did have a pager and a Motorola StarTAC 85.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:51, Wed 13 Oct 2021.

In reply to Pablo Pachicano (msg # 11):

Tim Burton just directed a Batman. The Monica Lewinsky scandal hasn't happened yet. Alanis Morissette's Jagged Little Pill is going to be album of the year.

Upper middle class households are likely to have a computer in the house, though graphics cards with 3D accelerators are both pretty expensive and not yet mandatory. AOL Instant Messenger, the stand alone IM app, won't be released until 1997, ICQ won't release until November 15, 1996. IRC is the only existing, popular instant messenger app and even then only among tech enthusiasts.

Mobile phones look like this
https://assets.hongkiat.com/up...nokia9000-(1996).jpg

@Alyona Volkov: (Hopefully I don't come off as a dick here) The Motorola StarTAC 85 won't be released until 1997. You probably got it later in high school.
https://fdn2.gsmarena.com/vv/bigpic/most85b.gif

And the Nokia candy bar phones won't come out until 1999.


Much more likely to have a pager, which is at the peak of popularity and technology now.
https://helios-i.mashable.com/...000x.v1611702101.jpg
Including two way pagers in 1995
https://miro.medium.com/max/14...K-EBtuos0uwBR0rA.png
This message was last edited by the player at 16:35, Wed 13 Oct 2021.

No problem, I don't recall when I got which phone I had, it was a long time ago. I just remembered that as one of them. I had one of those brick ones as a hand me down first. My mother worked for Bell in the cell phone division so we got crazy discounts.

Now, those Nokia candy bar phones were like magic. I had one in 2002 that I dropped from the roof of a 4 story building and it didn't even drop the call.

Can you shrink the pagers, please? It makes it really hard to read posts on the phone.

Oh, I guess I should do introductions.

I am playing Malice, a trad goth with a famous boxer father (the kind of person that would have fought Tyson) and substance abuse issues (alcohol and cigarettes). She's majoring in History, hoping to get a masters in Library Sciences to become an archivist. I will do my best to direct her snark and 90s sarcasm at the group's enemies and mall goths, unless some of y'all explicitly want to get into it with her.
This message was last edited by the player at 16:36, Wed 13 Oct 2021.

In reply to Alyona Volkov (msg # 16):

I changed them to just links. It looks like RPOL doesn't have the ability to adjust picture sizing.

Sadly it doesn't. I usually use imgur to do that.

I'll get more details about alyona up soon.

Part of Pablo's concept is "secret nerd." He'd really like to play D&D, but has never had the opportunity. He's also, of course, a little terrified of the guys on the basketball team finding out.

Alyona's been around the world, her mother's a well regarded diplomat and her father's a professor. Her mother went to ETU and wanted her to come so that's why she's there. She tends to be a little more shy, or maybe it's just that she doesn't really do small talk.

I'd nearly got blown up 3 years earlier when the IRA set off a bomb inthe natwest tower that was 93.....I'd been in london only for a year when that happened.

Sadly I remember life before internet and the best computer you could get was the commodore 64.....now that date me.

As for Joar he is 19 just starting his first year in Texas after doing his 12 month national service in the Norwegian armed forces. Yes he knows how to shoot a gun (d4) but he is also a minor pacifist. He is driven to work with animals and wants to qualify as a vet

I had a C64 back in the day, too

And, Pacifists unite. ;)

Any one want to be roommates?

Given Alyona's position I think she may have a private room. I have her mother as a diplomat but I'm thinking she may be running (and winning) a senate race for Texas for the US Senate.

I will be clarifying things about the timeline for the game and some other stuff, like dorm assignments when I get home from work.

Howdy folks, happy to be here.

Okay, I am still sorting some stuff out but here is what I have so far.

DORM ASSIGNMENTS:

Alice - Stanbury Hall - #121
Alyona - Halloway Suites- #3 (Her mother's old room).
Hannah - Manuel Travis Athletics Dormitory - #111
Pablo - Manual Travis Athletics Dormitory - #313
Joar - Whitehall Dormitory - #201
XiaoRui Qi - Whitehall Dormitory - #201

- Hannah and Pablo are both in the sports dormitory but on different floors.
- Joar and XiaoRui are room mates.


TIMELINE

As has been discussed it is Fall of 1996. While I would like to do our best to portray that time period, I am not expecting 100% historical accuracy in regards to things like phone models, pc models, fashion trends etc. As long as we do our best to capture the mid-late nineties feel. The main reason for choosing this time frame is to limit how easy it would be to simply Google everything and that sort of thing.

I'm thinking I may make up some macabre stories Malice has gathered with minimal credulity about all the supposed deaths and hauntings at Whitehall to inevitably tell the two living there, since it's supposedly super haunted.

Love the detail stuff you just added. I may have to print out my ID card!

I see Hannah will be sharing with others -- two in each bedroom, four altogether in the suite, right?

Do you have roommates in mind or do you need help? Happy to assist with the churn.