and when the fires came, the smell of cinders and rain perfumed almost everything

There are Chap Olympics? (Though I am highly amused by the concept of the lighting of the Olympic Pipe.)

This is going to be a very picture-heavy post.

I went to Sanitarium Island.



(The Genetic Circus.)

Currently the Repo sim is closed to the general public, but it will be open soon; it's finished.



(Change your face! Zydrate can help!)

Most of the circus tents will hold vendors to support the sim. Right now, only two of the tents are filled, and the Change Your Face tent...well, that's surgical, innit?



(Control your Zydrate intake. Join the Zydrate Support Network to learn how!)

That would be AmberSweet Swansong, I believe, if I remember correctly.



(The very imposing GeneCo headquarters.)

Sculpted and imposingly detailed.



(Follow shot of more of the sim.)

There are two of the adships floating, broadcasting advertising circulars, upcoming concerts...sim advertisements, for all I know, once the sim is open.



(Shot from the far side of the Genetic Circus.)

Complete with a (rusted, but oddly elegant) Ferris wheel, even.



(Empty building for now, but a lovely sculpture.)

Not many of the buildings have solid purposes, Dr. Wallace's home and the GeneCo headquarters aside. They will in time.



(The city relies on back alleys, skullduggery, looking the other way...there is little honesty and greater fear. Shining moments are few and far between.)

What fascinated me when I first saw this film is it seems very much as if this is the only city left on the planet. How many deaths would it take to achieve that? Mr. Azriel Demain, Repo's designer, billed it as "Sanitarium Island - an entire city built on the dead".

How many bodies does it take for a solid foundation? How many lives have to be lost before life itself loses meaning?



(Surgical addiction is the single greatest addiction the culture has to cope with...save for Zydrate, the drug used as combination anaesthetic and anti-rejection therapeutic. Both addictions feed on each other; reinforce each other; and are in many quarters considered fashionable.)

A culture devoted to medical fashion; to fashionable body modification; living in the shadow of organ failure and rejection. What changes would that make to society? What changes would that make to living our lives?

More pictures coming. And soon, the sim will open. Then...things could get really interesting.