About the Game
Jigoku Apts. is a multifandom game inspired by J-Horror (those scary Japanese movies) and survival horror. Welcome to a real "ghost town". And nowhere is more haunted than the only place you have to live. There's a piece of candy in your mouth when you wake up and that's supposed to make up for any pain and fear that's inflicted on you. More importantly, you're left a roll of red tape. When used to tape up the doors and windows, it keeps the ghosts on the other side of the door on the other side.
But sooner or later you're gonna have to open the door.
Important Places in the Apartment
+The Apartments.
The apartments, otherwise known as where you will be staying. Nine stories high with 100 rooms (give or take) per floor. Some of the rooms unoccupied are easy to break into, giving insight into who might have lived in them before, while others remain oddly barred at all times. The 8th and 9th floors are unoccupied by tenants, and treading there (especially after dark) is dangerous to say the least. The squeak of rusting wheels will follow you, the grunts and whispers of someone close by, but always just out of sight. The feeling of malice and hunger here is more than tangible, and few can stand it for more than a few moments at a time. Still, it is the only way to get the the roof, where the potential for gardens, or a swimming pool exist.
+Apartment Setup
Each apartment is a two-bedroom suite set up in the manner indicated in the link. Decor is different in each apartment, sometimes eerily suited to it's new owner, and sometimes painfully opposite. [This is something left up to player discretion within reason. Ask us if you're uncertain!]
+The Tape
Tape will become your saving grace many times. Often, it will take more than you think to close up every small patch and crevice, but in the end, that seems to be the only way to keep out many of the dangerous creatures that seem intent on haunting you. Tape is scarce at best for the most part, so use it carefully.
+The Laundry Room
The horrors of a laundry room are usually limited to faded colors and dingy whites. But a laundry in the basement of a haunted apartment is another story. Yellowed newspapers found throughout the apartments have a front page story about a missing girl, age seven. Her sundress was found in one of the washing machines, still stained with blood after several cycles. Exactly what happened to her and the location of her remains is unknown. While in the laundry room, one can expect flickering lights, water turning a strange rust color, the occasional garment coming out with a blood stain, or the image of a little girl standing behind you reflected in the glass while loading or unloading the machines.
Common NPC's
+The Crow
Many cultures believe that crows accompany the dead. But what happens when the dead don't go anywhere? The Crow appears randomly, but it's always important to heed its caw.
+The Scarecrow
Not a ghost itself, but becomes possessed by one when the living get too close to it. Fortunately it seems scared of The Crow, who will swoop in to keep it confined to the garden.
Apartment Ghosts:
+Yurei
The dozens of nameless who share the same white skin, long black hair, and jerky movements. If there's any real danger to them, it hasn't been discovered yet. Even so, who wants them looming over the bed while you're trying to sleep?
Wicked Girl -- Named for "Something wicked this way comes," because when she's spotted, it does. She appears at a distance wearing some sort of school uniform. Nothing is known about her, except that bad things happen when she shows up. And she's not restricted to the apartments.
Plumber's Nightmare -- Finding strands of long black hair in the drains is a common (almost daily) occurrence. Fill the tub or sink too full of water and you'll realize why. A female ghost who looks like countless others in the apartment with white skin and long black hair. She won't go away until the water that she crawled out of is drained. She'll try to drown you in the water if she gets her claws into you. Use caution.
+The Woman Under the bed
The ghost of a former apartment tenant who was murdered but tried to hide from her abusive lover underneath the bed. Her spirit is trapped in those terrifying last moments. She can appear in any apartment, but always late at night, shaking the bed from underneath and waking the sleeper. She sees the face of her murderer in anyone brave enough to peek under the bed, and will attempt to claw at their faces in an attempt to protect herself.
+Ryo
One of the few ghosts who won't seek to hurt you. Ryo is the spirit of a Japanese boy, around the age of six. He'll never try to enter an apartment uninvited, but he will follow you through the hallways. Whenever he passes a window, he'll pause and look in the direction of the hospital. It's believed that he died there, but chose to return to the apartments where he and his family once lived. He has a fondness for females and "Nee-san" is one of the few words that he ever actually speaks.
Wallfaders: Appear to be nothing more than a water stain on the wall or ceiling that wasn't there before. But the stain spreads. Walk too close to it and a pair of chalk white arms will manifest and pull you against the wall, holding you there until someone breaks you free of them or you're able to break free on your own. Having red tape on your doors and windows won't keep them out.
+Shadow People
Ghosts that take the shape of apartment tenants, but only the shape. They're like a solid black silhouette, making them sometimes unrecognizable. The only features they posses are their eyes, which they will open wide and suddenly. To look into one's eyes will make you feel ice cold, terrified, and sick at your stomach. They're the most potent at night, when everything is in shadow.
Places of interest about town
Note: While the majority of your roleplay should take place inside the apartments, there will be several plots and opportunities for characters to venture elsewhere. You can also do open or closed logs in any of the following locations in moderation (at least every other log that your character takes part in. You may include any of the reported phenomena in your logs (ex: If you're in the Convenience Mart, you can have cans flying about the place) or ask a mod to play them for you.
Map
+The Hedge Maze
A large, sprawling hedge maze in evident disrepair. It's overgrown in some places and slightly bare in others. Once inside, there are numerous paths to choose the way to the center. (Sometimes a prize awaits you there, but at other times, you will find nothing at all. It's a gamble every time.)
A word of warning for the maze. Don't go in too close to sunset. At nightfall the gate swings closed and there's no getting out until morning. Strange noises and footfalls may follow you as well. you aren't the only thing there, after all.
+The Garden
Contains several fruit-bearing trees and rows of carefully-tended vegetables. These fruits and vegetables may well be a lifesaver in dire situations, but try not to wake up the Scarecrow.
+Grocery Store.
It has the appearance of a normal convenience store...perhaps a little too normal. The interior is the brightest place in the city, and that and the shelves stocked with necessities and goodies definitely entices. But once the automatic doors slide closed behind you, there's no way of knowing what might happen. Lights flicker on and off. Cans fly from the shelves by an unseen force. Pallet jacks zoom around in the back room. Sometimes the doors won't open for you, and you're left with the choice of navigating the aisles and stock rooms for another way out, or wait for your friends to come and rescue you.
Sometimes the experience is worth it if you manage to make it out and back to the apartments with a loaf of bread and a gallon of juice. Or you may open up that can of tomato soup and find it replaced with blood. A package of ham and cheese that looked fine in the store will be half-consumed by maggots when you pull it out of the bag. And don't even ask what falls out of the cracked eggs...
+The Hospital
Located at the western edge of town, where the sun always seems to be setting. While it's a safe bet that supplies for injury and sickness can be found there, that's not all. Visitors are forced to enter at the basement level and have to decide between the seemingly functioning elevators or the pitch black stairwells. This is also where the hospital morgue is located. You'll find nothing but stainless steel tables with sheets and toe tags laying on them, as if the bodies just stood up and walked out.
Disembodied voices randomly call out over the loudspeakers on the First Floor, alerting hospital staff of emergencies. The ghosts of patients roam the hall, but they ignore you. The ghosts of doctors is another story. They rush at you suddenly, grabbing you and trying to pin you to a hospital gurney. But the spirits of nurses, pristine white angels of mercy, might save you from a gruesome surgery behind the blood-splattered doors of the ER.
The Second Floor is obviously the children's ward, which is probably the reason for the overwhelming sadness that's felt there. Sometimes the feeling is enough to drive away those who got past the horrors of the first floor. Ghosts seen here are naturally the ghosts of children, mischievous but not harmful. They play their own brand of hide-n-seek, appearing and disappearing suddenly in front of you. They laugh along with their game, but eventually the laughter turns into crying. Then the crying turns into screaming. The hallways become filled with cries of fear and pain of children that you can't even see, much less help.
The third floor is where you'll find what you were looking for. It's stocked with medication and first-aid supplies, and the Chapel that's located on this floor may be the reason that you're left alone by the nasties of the other floors.
But you do still have to get out.
+The Train Tunnel
Some believe that the train tunnel is the ticket out of the city. Light can be seen on the other end, bright and promising. The tunnel is long, and at some point you'll lose sight of the mouth. The tunnel becomes pitch black. You're forced to feel along the walls for navigation, walls that are unpleasantly slick and have deep gouges in them. Any light source that you bring with you can only do so much to combat such a complete darkness. There's what's to be expected inside a train tunnel: worms, cockroaches, albino snakes. And a train. The sound of the whistle is distant at first, giving the impression that you'll be out of the tunnel before you have to share it. But it catches up with you quickly. The sound is deafening and fills the tunnel, giving the impression that even if you press yourself against the wall, it may still strike you. You wouldn't be the first to think this. There are fingernails embedded in the tunnel walls.
The train is never seen but it's definitely felt. It races through the tunnel and seems to take the oxygen with it. Many will pass out. The tunnel is freezing when you come to, but the light on the other end of the tunnel looks closer than ever. Run towards it...
And you'll find yourself back where you started.
+The Hardware store
The store is well-stocked with ammo and the materials needed for repairs. Oddly enough, it's the one spot in the entire city where no ghosts have ever been seen.
+The Well
Older than the city itself. There are several stories connected to the well, but the most popular is that of a young girl who claimed to see ghosts all around her. Taking this to be a sign of evil, her mother sewed several heavy stones into her dress and dropped her into the well. There's no proof that the story is actually true, which may be a small comfort to anyone who's forced to go there for water when the apartment's plumbing isn't working.
+The Mall
The sole source of clothing, shoes, and a few luxuries in the city. Even so, the distance between it and the apartments plus the condemnable state of the building make it a place not to be visited frequently. And if that doesn't deter you from the promise of designer labels, maybe the dozens of moving mannequins will.
+The Townhouses
Though they look like they'd be far more comfortable to live in than the apartments, the sheer numbers and strength of the spirits inside make it impossible. There is plenty to loot, but use caution: sometimes you bring back more than you bargained for.
+The Carnival Grounds
Opened for the summer, the carnival is a wonderfully simplistic place to escape, located in a smaller canyon twisting away from the town itself. When open, it contains every sort of ride and attraction imaginable, but in its off-season, one will find nothing but the broken, rusted remains of rides and buildings.
But sooner or later you're gonna have to open the door.
Important Places in the Apartment
+The Apartments.
The apartments, otherwise known as where you will be staying. Nine stories high with 100 rooms (give or take) per floor. Some of the rooms unoccupied are easy to break into, giving insight into who might have lived in them before, while others remain oddly barred at all times. The 8th and 9th floors are unoccupied by tenants, and treading there (especially after dark) is dangerous to say the least. The squeak of rusting wheels will follow you, the grunts and whispers of someone close by, but always just out of sight. The feeling of malice and hunger here is more than tangible, and few can stand it for more than a few moments at a time. Still, it is the only way to get the the roof, where the potential for gardens, or a swimming pool exist.
+Apartment Setup
Each apartment is a two-bedroom suite set up in the manner indicated in the link. Decor is different in each apartment, sometimes eerily suited to it's new owner, and sometimes painfully opposite. [This is something left up to player discretion within reason. Ask us if you're uncertain!]
+The Tape
Tape will become your saving grace many times. Often, it will take more than you think to close up every small patch and crevice, but in the end, that seems to be the only way to keep out many of the dangerous creatures that seem intent on haunting you. Tape is scarce at best for the most part, so use it carefully.
+The Laundry Room
The horrors of a laundry room are usually limited to faded colors and dingy whites. But a laundry in the basement of a haunted apartment is another story. Yellowed newspapers found throughout the apartments have a front page story about a missing girl, age seven. Her sundress was found in one of the washing machines, still stained with blood after several cycles. Exactly what happened to her and the location of her remains is unknown. While in the laundry room, one can expect flickering lights, water turning a strange rust color, the occasional garment coming out with a blood stain, or the image of a little girl standing behind you reflected in the glass while loading or unloading the machines.
Common NPC's
+The Crow
Many cultures believe that crows accompany the dead. But what happens when the dead don't go anywhere? The Crow appears randomly, but it's always important to heed its caw.
+The Scarecrow
Not a ghost itself, but becomes possessed by one when the living get too close to it. Fortunately it seems scared of The Crow, who will swoop in to keep it confined to the garden.
Apartment Ghosts:
+Yurei
The dozens of nameless who share the same white skin, long black hair, and jerky movements. If there's any real danger to them, it hasn't been discovered yet. Even so, who wants them looming over the bed while you're trying to sleep?
Wicked Girl -- Named for "Something wicked this way comes," because when she's spotted, it does. She appears at a distance wearing some sort of school uniform. Nothing is known about her, except that bad things happen when she shows up. And she's not restricted to the apartments.
Plumber's Nightmare -- Finding strands of long black hair in the drains is a common (almost daily) occurrence. Fill the tub or sink too full of water and you'll realize why. A female ghost who looks like countless others in the apartment with white skin and long black hair. She won't go away until the water that she crawled out of is drained. She'll try to drown you in the water if she gets her claws into you. Use caution.
+The Woman Under the bed
The ghost of a former apartment tenant who was murdered but tried to hide from her abusive lover underneath the bed. Her spirit is trapped in those terrifying last moments. She can appear in any apartment, but always late at night, shaking the bed from underneath and waking the sleeper. She sees the face of her murderer in anyone brave enough to peek under the bed, and will attempt to claw at their faces in an attempt to protect herself.
+Ryo
One of the few ghosts who won't seek to hurt you. Ryo is the spirit of a Japanese boy, around the age of six. He'll never try to enter an apartment uninvited, but he will follow you through the hallways. Whenever he passes a window, he'll pause and look in the direction of the hospital. It's believed that he died there, but chose to return to the apartments where he and his family once lived. He has a fondness for females and "Nee-san" is one of the few words that he ever actually speaks.
Wallfaders: Appear to be nothing more than a water stain on the wall or ceiling that wasn't there before. But the stain spreads. Walk too close to it and a pair of chalk white arms will manifest and pull you against the wall, holding you there until someone breaks you free of them or you're able to break free on your own. Having red tape on your doors and windows won't keep them out.
+Shadow People
Ghosts that take the shape of apartment tenants, but only the shape. They're like a solid black silhouette, making them sometimes unrecognizable. The only features they posses are their eyes, which they will open wide and suddenly. To look into one's eyes will make you feel ice cold, terrified, and sick at your stomach. They're the most potent at night, when everything is in shadow.
Places of interest about town
Note: While the majority of your roleplay should take place inside the apartments, there will be several plots and opportunities for characters to venture elsewhere. You can also do open or closed logs in any of the following locations in moderation (at least every other log that your character takes part in. You may include any of the reported phenomena in your logs (ex: If you're in the Convenience Mart, you can have cans flying about the place) or ask a mod to play them for you.
Map
+The Hedge Maze
A large, sprawling hedge maze in evident disrepair. It's overgrown in some places and slightly bare in others. Once inside, there are numerous paths to choose the way to the center. (Sometimes a prize awaits you there, but at other times, you will find nothing at all. It's a gamble every time.)
A word of warning for the maze. Don't go in too close to sunset. At nightfall the gate swings closed and there's no getting out until morning. Strange noises and footfalls may follow you as well. you aren't the only thing there, after all.
+The Garden
Contains several fruit-bearing trees and rows of carefully-tended vegetables. These fruits and vegetables may well be a lifesaver in dire situations, but try not to wake up the Scarecrow.
+Grocery Store.
It has the appearance of a normal convenience store...perhaps a little too normal. The interior is the brightest place in the city, and that and the shelves stocked with necessities and goodies definitely entices. But once the automatic doors slide closed behind you, there's no way of knowing what might happen. Lights flicker on and off. Cans fly from the shelves by an unseen force. Pallet jacks zoom around in the back room. Sometimes the doors won't open for you, and you're left with the choice of navigating the aisles and stock rooms for another way out, or wait for your friends to come and rescue you.
Sometimes the experience is worth it if you manage to make it out and back to the apartments with a loaf of bread and a gallon of juice. Or you may open up that can of tomato soup and find it replaced with blood. A package of ham and cheese that looked fine in the store will be half-consumed by maggots when you pull it out of the bag. And don't even ask what falls out of the cracked eggs...
+The Hospital
Located at the western edge of town, where the sun always seems to be setting. While it's a safe bet that supplies for injury and sickness can be found there, that's not all. Visitors are forced to enter at the basement level and have to decide between the seemingly functioning elevators or the pitch black stairwells. This is also where the hospital morgue is located. You'll find nothing but stainless steel tables with sheets and toe tags laying on them, as if the bodies just stood up and walked out.
Disembodied voices randomly call out over the loudspeakers on the First Floor, alerting hospital staff of emergencies. The ghosts of patients roam the hall, but they ignore you. The ghosts of doctors is another story. They rush at you suddenly, grabbing you and trying to pin you to a hospital gurney. But the spirits of nurses, pristine white angels of mercy, might save you from a gruesome surgery behind the blood-splattered doors of the ER.
The Second Floor is obviously the children's ward, which is probably the reason for the overwhelming sadness that's felt there. Sometimes the feeling is enough to drive away those who got past the horrors of the first floor. Ghosts seen here are naturally the ghosts of children, mischievous but not harmful. They play their own brand of hide-n-seek, appearing and disappearing suddenly in front of you. They laugh along with their game, but eventually the laughter turns into crying. Then the crying turns into screaming. The hallways become filled with cries of fear and pain of children that you can't even see, much less help.
The third floor is where you'll find what you were looking for. It's stocked with medication and first-aid supplies, and the Chapel that's located on this floor may be the reason that you're left alone by the nasties of the other floors.
But you do still have to get out.
+The Train Tunnel
Some believe that the train tunnel is the ticket out of the city. Light can be seen on the other end, bright and promising. The tunnel is long, and at some point you'll lose sight of the mouth. The tunnel becomes pitch black. You're forced to feel along the walls for navigation, walls that are unpleasantly slick and have deep gouges in them. Any light source that you bring with you can only do so much to combat such a complete darkness. There's what's to be expected inside a train tunnel: worms, cockroaches, albino snakes. And a train. The sound of the whistle is distant at first, giving the impression that you'll be out of the tunnel before you have to share it. But it catches up with you quickly. The sound is deafening and fills the tunnel, giving the impression that even if you press yourself against the wall, it may still strike you. You wouldn't be the first to think this. There are fingernails embedded in the tunnel walls.
The train is never seen but it's definitely felt. It races through the tunnel and seems to take the oxygen with it. Many will pass out. The tunnel is freezing when you come to, but the light on the other end of the tunnel looks closer than ever. Run towards it...
And you'll find yourself back where you started.
+The Hardware store
The store is well-stocked with ammo and the materials needed for repairs. Oddly enough, it's the one spot in the entire city where no ghosts have ever been seen.
+The Well
Older than the city itself. There are several stories connected to the well, but the most popular is that of a young girl who claimed to see ghosts all around her. Taking this to be a sign of evil, her mother sewed several heavy stones into her dress and dropped her into the well. There's no proof that the story is actually true, which may be a small comfort to anyone who's forced to go there for water when the apartment's plumbing isn't working.
+The Mall
The sole source of clothing, shoes, and a few luxuries in the city. Even so, the distance between it and the apartments plus the condemnable state of the building make it a place not to be visited frequently. And if that doesn't deter you from the promise of designer labels, maybe the dozens of moving mannequins will.
+The Townhouses
Though they look like they'd be far more comfortable to live in than the apartments, the sheer numbers and strength of the spirits inside make it impossible. There is plenty to loot, but use caution: sometimes you bring back more than you bargained for.
+The Carnival Grounds
Opened for the summer, the carnival is a wonderfully simplistic place to escape, located in a smaller canyon twisting away from the town itself. When open, it contains every sort of ride and attraction imaginable, but in its off-season, one will find nothing but the broken, rusted remains of rides and buildings.