Excerpt on Main Street
~New Author Spotlight~
Pajamas on a Sun Stained Beach
(A story somewhat supposedly based upon a true tale…)
Manuscript synopsis
Paul Jones Palin is a deeply depressed, severely stressed, self-medicating dysphoric agoraphobic on the verge of suicide. He’s made and lost fortunes, married and divorced three times and is terminally ill. Alone in a post 9-11 New York City P.J. struggles through the not-so-great recession with neither health insurance nor hope. Just when things couldn’t get any worse…
But it’s not just his disease that’s killing him – it’s the irony!
“Pajamas On A Sun Stained Beach” is a work of fiction that chronicles the dying thoughts of a drowning man and not only explores biological death but also the death of our dreams. Within 112 pages the manuscript covers 50+ years of the character’s life (1954-2010) and uses the death of the American dream as a basic subtext. This book is intended to not only work in published form but is also adaptable to film as well as a blueprint for video/computer gaming.
Chapter IV/Excerpt #2 of 3: Weedville Gaming, Inc (WVG, Inc.)
www.MyFaceBucket.com not only had the largest user/subscriber network but it also attracted the demographic most likely to play computer and/or console games. MyFaceBucket generated revenue by selling advertising space instead of charging user fees. Its primary goal was not only maintaining a large subscriber base but cultivating it for growth. Like the other major social networking sites they did this by “freeing” (giving away for free) applications (a.k.a.: apps) to their subscribers.
P.J. had a plan. Whatever would be the next game he and his gaming artists developed he wouldn’t distribute it through the usual method of using a game publisher. Instead he’d lease it to a social networking site and grant them the rights to be the sole distributor of the game, in exchange for a sizable advance and a small royalty per user fee.
A game like this would be advantageous for a site like www.MyFaceBucket.com. It would keep their subscribers on their site longer where they would see the ads run by the ad servers. As well as perhaps luring new subscribers from other social networking sites to subscribe to www.MyFaceBucket.com and increase their total network size. For advertisers it was always about the numbers.
All he needed to do was come up with a game that would be multi-user friendly and attract all the gamers, slackers and stoners who spent most of their loser lives on the Internet. It had to be fun and easy to play in addition to be so on-going that there really was no end or finish when playing it. You could play it yesterday, continue playing today then go back and pick up from where you left off tomorrow. That game of course was called the now world famous: World of Weedville™.
World of Weedville™ was a work of art. It was all about growing, buying and selling marijuana, a common commodity that most web surfers had some exposure to and experience with. It was fun to play and best of all, once someone started playing the game they were hooked. They’d even tell their friends about how cool it was, get their friends to try it and then the friends would be hooked and tell their friends about it, get hooked and tell their… If you didn’t immediately get the picture then you must be stoned out of your mind, my friend.
Here’s a brief synopsis of the Weedville™ game plan. Every player would begin with a set amount of virtual money called “Seed Money™”. The purpose of this money would be to use it to set up “Grow Houses™” to grow pot, to buy pot, pay off crooked cops, DEA officers, FBI agents, CIA operatives and corrupt customs officials, bribe dirty politicians or pay tribute to the various mobs. Growers would make money by growing, then selling, the weed to dealers. Dealers would make money by selling weed to buyers. Buyers would make money by reselling the weed to other buyers, or selling grow house and seller information to cops or the mobs.
Seed Money™ was broken down into three denominations. You could have “Dope Dollars™” or “Kush Coins™” (which were worth one-half of a Dope Dollar™ each) or “Cannabis Coins™” (a Cannabis Coin™ was worth one-quarter of a Dope Dollar™).
If a player wanted to set up a Grow House™, they’d use their Seed Money™, for example, to buy the Grow House™, “Grow Lights™”, “Growth-alizer Chemicals™”, “Grow Soil™”, “Grow House Alarms™” or even “Pot Plane Tickets™” so they could fly to Amsterdam and buy “Starter Seeds™” to start up their “Grow House Crops™”.
Since all of this took a considerable investment, much more than was affordable using only the allotted Seed Money™, it required that you would have to partner with other Weedville™ players and combine your Dope Dollars™”, Kush Coins™ and Cannabis Coins™. This could be done as an investment or a loan and gamers were free to negotiate this on a case by case basis.
Participants were permitted to choose from various avatar identities available in the Weedville™ game structure. Players were allowed to either keep the same identity in perpetuity or they could trade identities with other participants. These identity trades were negotiable and were usually traded based upon mutual need, weed, Dope Dollars™”, Kush Coins™ or Cannabis Coins™.
The following identities were available to Weedville™ players: A “Grower™” was someone who had a Grow House™ and, of course grew pot. A “Distributor™” was the one who had bought the pot from a Grower™ but was not necessarily a “Seller™”. The difference between the two is that while a Distributor™ could buy weed from a Grower™ and sell it to either a Seller™ or a “Buyer™” (a player who could buy it from either the Seller™ or the Distributor™) a Seller™ could not buy from a Grower™ and could only sell to a Buyer™.
Then there were the “Narcs™”. Narcs™ were the cops and customs officials, DEA, CIA or FBI agents, and they could either be crooked or straight, and sometimes switched it up so it was hard to determine their operation and motives. Like the crooked Narcs™ there were the “Politicians™” who always had their hand out for a bribe but could be handy when it came to dealing with the Narcs™.
Other World of Weedville™ characters included “Money Men™” (rich investors), “Clebs™” (film, TV, literary or socialite celebrities who were usually glorified investors or Buyers™), “Welebs™” (celebrities who were solely an Internet phenomenon), “Jocks™” (sports celebrities), “Stoners™” (who were more likely to bum weed off of you or steal it rather than buy it) and “Mobsters™” (members of mobs you had to pay bribes or tributes to in order to remain in business when you were offered a deal you couldn’t refuse, even though, this still didn’t guarantee they wouldn’t rip you off, beat you up, burn your Grow House™ down or kill you).
As with most efforts used to trace crime the Narcs™ would follow the money trails to help make a bust or make their cases in “Cannabis Court ™” (the legal venues where cases were tried of the unlucky ones who had been busted). These money trails had designated names derived from the character group they originated from. For instance the Dope Dollars™”, Kush Coins™ and Cannabis Coins™ from Growers™, Distributors™, Dealers™ or Buyers™ was known as “Smoke Money™”. The Celebrities ™ and the Webleberties™ provided “Star Bucks™”. The Narcs™ circulated “Dirty Dollars™”. “Beaucoup Bat Bucks™” was currency coming from Money Men™. Politicians™, of course, dealt out “Political Currency™”.
Finally, funds from the Mobsters™ were labeled according to which mobs they worked for. Italian and Jewish Mobsters™ made off with “Mafia Money™”. Russian or East European Mobsters™ traded in “Weed Rubles™ while the Jamaican Mobsters™ rocked the jerk sauce with “Serious Change, Mon™”. And holy Haile Selassie, you Babylonians don’t wanna be a’messing round with and the Jamaican Mobsters™ if you know what’s good for I and I. Jah help you if you do. You could always tell when the Jamaican Mobsters™ where about to go to war with the other mobs because the spliff would get passed around counterclockwise fashion at their Reasoning ceremonies!
By Stevie B © 2011
To be continued on February 7, 2011
