One’s allowance might be rather pitiful

September 29, 2017 2:45 AM

Learn Regency etiquette or indulge in scurrilous gossip in Jane Austen-themed MMO, Ever Jane.

"Gossip is our weapon of choice. Instead of raids, we will have grand balls. Instead of dungeons, we will have dinner parties."

posted by Stark (23 comments total)

Whoah.
posted by Literaryhero at 2:59 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

Funny, I just read Pride And Prejudice on a friend's recommendation, and summarized it as "pretty much Game Of Thrones, but with dinners and dances instead of open warfare". I shall send this to her.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 3:10 AM on September 29, 2017 [3 favorites]

This is fantastic. I'm glad someone did this. It makes me think of when the Internet first started to be a thing in the 90s.

And I discovered chat rooms. You had to quickly learn the etiquette.

ASL?

This seems to have that feel. It's about your manners and how you present yourself. I'll put this on my download list. Great share.
posted by Fizz at 4:14 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

Some balls are held for charity
And some for fancy dress
But when they're held for pleasure,
They're the balls that I like best.
And my balls are always bouncing,
To the left and to the right.
It's my belief that my big balls should be held every night
Angus Mckinnon Young, Esq.

From the Rules:

For any chat that is OOC, please enclose it in double parentheses so that the other players will know that your chat is not part of the roleplay scene.

Example: ((Is anyone else having trouble clicking Mrs. Hatch’s handkerchief?))

I can picture Mrs. Hatch's 'scandalized' bar creeping up to the rage threshold already. LFG
posted by quinndexter at 4:14 AM on September 29, 2017 [6 favorites]

Yes, you too can verbally smackdown Lady Catherine De Burgh (cuz that shit never gets old)!
posted by AlonzoMosleyFBI at 4:52 AM on September 29, 2017 [7 favorites]

Does it still have the ridiculous pricing scheme from the early beta?
posted by jacquilynne at 5:14 AM on September 29, 2017

Sigh... the internet will ruin this in 3...2...1...
posted by Nanukthedog at 6:18 AM on September 29, 2017

Honestly, if I were to play this, I would spend most of my time trying on gowns.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 6:32 AM on September 29, 2017 [7 favorites]

I love the concept of this, but have sadly found it so buggy as to be basically unplayable.
posted by corb at 6:35 AM on September 29, 2017 [4 favorites]

Surely it would be a cabriolet, not a mere buggy.
posted by GenjiandProust at 7:09 AM on September 29, 2017 [21 favorites]

Or a little phaeton, with ponies.
posted by mochapickle at 7:20 AM on September 29, 2017 [15 favorites]

Honestly, if I were to play this, I would spend most of my time trying on gowns.

I spend half of my time in Final Fantasy XIV doing just this.

“Hmmm, I could wear this armor, but it doesn't match? Ugh, why is being an Elf so difficult. Decisions, decisions...”
posted by Fizz at 7:44 AM on September 29, 2017 [2 favorites]

No lie, I have had someone who I was playing with in City of Heroes ask me if I was, in fact, a teenage girl after an extended break in one of the costume shops.
posted by Halloween Jack at 8:01 AM on September 29, 2017 [1 favorite]

(To answer the question: only on my better days.)
posted by Halloween Jack at 8:02 AM on September 29, 2017

Now I want all videogames to be given a literary makeover. I would totally play Batman: Austen Asylum.

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that a billionaire in possession of a secret identity must be in want of a sidekick."
posted by yankeefog at 8:54 AM on September 29, 2017 [29 favorites]

(Also, I was trying to come up with a Jane Austen version of "Call of Duty", and then I realized "Call of Duty" is already a perfect Jane Austen title.)
posted by yankeefog at 8:55 AM on September 29, 2017 [20 favorites]

Raise your hand if you regret the absence of references to Georgette Heyer in the OP.
posted by bq at 9:23 AM on September 29, 2017 [9 favorites]

The article is a bit buggy as well:

He has beautiful square blue eyes, like a polygonal Colin Firth.

Except Firth's eyes are brown.

What.
posted by mochapickle at 10:32 AM on September 29, 2017 [2 favorites]

The Watch + Play episode where they play this is delightful. It ends with them being banned from the game for trying to marry the gardener, which is the best of all possible endings and the purest imaginable expression of this game's concept.
posted by sourcequench at 11:48 AM on September 29, 2017 [5 favorites]

Oh, who am I kidding- I wouldn't get past choosing a name.

Hmmm...

Mrs. Catherine Eusebeia Whitlaugh?

or

Lady Honoria Calliope Covfefe-Smythe?
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 12:10 PM on September 29, 2017 [9 favorites]

I tried to play this yesterday, and there was a glitch that made me only able to put dress tops on my male character, which because of the empire waistlines would leave him with an invisible torso between his bodice and the top of his pants. Also, the font on the buttons was so small and swirl that I couldn't read it at all. I hope these are beta glitches in the Mac version (not that my gentleman didn't look lovely in his purple bodice with puffed sleeves), because other people seem to be able to play it just fine. Not being able to read any of the button text was a deal-breaker, though, even if I had embraced my cross-dressing no-torso guy, which I was prepared to do.
posted by Orlop at 12:20 PM on September 29, 2017 [4 favorites]

This seems like a good place to mention the excellent Marrying Mr. Darcy card game.
posted by BrashTech at 12:59 PM on September 29, 2017 [6 favorites]

Honestly, if I were to play this, I would spend most of my time trying on gowns.

Well, that would last you about an hour. I looked at the marketplace. There's only about 5 of them, and they're all pretty bad, even on the scale of video game clothes. On the scale of Regency period clothes they're positively awful.

If someone wanted to play a historically accurate MOO and virtual paper dolls, Second Life is still a thing and it has a ton of historical sims and clothing.
posted by loquacious at 3:32 PM on September 29, 2017