Been a while

So I went to ScareLA early August and man it was incredibly fun.  The Tension Experience panel was suffice to say...tense.

Rather than going into a bunch of details I'll refer to you to my friends podcast, they do an excellent job summarizing.  To make a long story short, a bunch of Tension Participants were invited to an exclusive panel at ScareLA where we were primed with the idea that we were all going to meet Ellis Gordon.  "Ellis" told us all that the Tension Experience is based off some old documents he found in a hidden compartment of  a desk.  At that point people from the audience that were not participants told us all that the OOA is not a game, it's very real.  Others warned us all that it's a cult.  So, kinda neat that this out of game panel became in game very quickly.  Near the end the panel was hijacked once again by the rival faction Brothers of Seraph and then we were kicked out.  I got to talk to a person who ran out of the room screaming "I didn't sign up for this, what the fuck is wrong with you guys" after she got a taste of Ascension.  She was obviously an actress (she said so) and claimed she was taken to a Red Room where she saw a bunch of photographs of herself in her own apartment.  I gave her my contact information hoping something story-wise would sprout from it but  it didn't.  I tried.

Lately story-wise things have been rather dull in my opinion.  Gatekeeper 2 or "Two" or "Addison" (all the same person) has been basically on the run from people that want to shut her down.  Occasionally there's been Periscopes (it's an app) of Two reading from the sacred Book of Anoch from various locations.  A participant that lives somewhere not in California even got a message from a man from the Oracles Security and Data Management (OSDM) that 'time is running out'.  Get this though, this man showed up at the participant's DOOR STEP.  I would have shit my pants if Tension showed up at my house and I'll have to say, VERY COOL for her.

Unfortunately shortly there after Tension took advantage of an out of game situation and turned it to in-game play that really, really rubbed me the wrong way.  I'll talk about this once Indoctrination is over (which is most likely Sept 7th, the day before Ascension starts) but suffice to say it really wrecked my experience to the point where I had no issues calling out The Creator on forum.  Many personal friends chirped back that trust hasn't been lost, which is fine, their opinion.  However I will not resort to lying about how I personally feel at this point, even if it means not having anymore creepy phone calls/promises made by Tension/OOA that will be broken.  

Back to the OSDM, basically they want to stop Gatekeeper 2 from bringing in Gatekeeper ONE (personally theory of mine is that Gatekeeper 1 is also the very first Gatekeeper from long ago, also known as Gatekeeper 242, possibly the Vessel of Anoch.  She also mentioned not too long ago that we have met One before....so who is One? 

It's the final countdown!!!

Now why is OSDM trying to stop this from happening?  Well, Gatekeeper Two also mentioned not long ago that the OOA is corrupt.  Worse than BoS.  A working theory that many of us on forum have is that when One shows up, this Gatekeeper is going to wipe out all the corruption, probably the OSDM.  On the flip side of the same coin, some people believe that this is all a ruse and that everybody is One.  Too hokey in my opinion to go down that route IMHO.  Others believe that Addison has a God complex and is going to destroy us all.  Who knows what will happen.

Meanwhile the LA Times, LAist, and other media have been advertising Ascension (just google it) and while I'm very excited about going through Ascension I'll have to say that it's taking the winds out my sails a bit.  It's been long rumored due to an information leak that Darren Bousman is behind all of this and these articles confirm that.  However, in game, characters are basically telling participants not to buy into it and that it's all smoke and mirrors.  While it's an interesting attempt, I just can't buy into it at all.  It's like me seeing who is Santa the night before Christmas (thanks Mom and Dad) and then trying to tell me Santa is really, really REAL and those present came from a jolly fat man who actually made it down the chimney.  

Riiiiiight.  I'm sure Santa ate those cookies too.