Because I never stop worldbuilding.

[gridlore]

Playing a little Civ IV this afternoon, and I had one of those events that set me off on a chain of thought creating a story to go with an in-game happening.

One of the wonders you can build is Hollywood; which along with a nice boost in Culture for the host city, gives your five Hit Movies to use in trade. Aside from that, there is a random event that states that maverick film makers have snagged a piece of the lucrative independent film market. This gives the city a small boost in income and culture.

I got that event today, here:



Ostia, as you can see, is a small city which is in the middle of a howling Antarctic wilderness. The people there work the nearby oilfields and iron mines. But every year, the town is flooded by entertainment moguls for a two week film festival known as Icedance. The biggest names mingle with the local roughnecks as the best in independent film is shown where ever a screen can be hung. It has, of course, become a big art and food thing as well, with ice everything... hotels, bars, sculpture, even the awards are based on the local landscape.

So why here? About 20 years ago a studio head loudly proclaimed he was go to the "far ends of the world" to find a decent, original film. A documentary maker, who was putting the finishing touches on a film about the oilmen and their crazy existence, bought an ad in the trades inviting the studio head to come to the end of the world to see the film. Other struggling filmmakers quickly jumped on the bandwagon, and that first festical produces three award-winning films. Now Icedance is a must for anyone in the industry.

Comments

[nodrog]

Well, certainly things just as unlikely have actually happened. You might want to add in that Icedance coordinators are as conscious as the Burning Man people of what kind of impact this could have on the surrounding, relatively pristine environment (you're tripling, quadrupling the population of Ostia overnight, with accompanying logistics; that's gonna generate a lot of garbage, for one thing!) so there are some fairly strict regulations on polluting, crossing the event perimeter; &c. Plus, the local Churchianity factions are a constant aggravation, protesting the influx of sin (and sinful spending) on what they want to be a Little Jerusalem (which of course such never actually are). They're trying to outlaw the sale of alcohol during the festival! “For safety reasons,” to be sure.

Interesting idea.