Forums » RP Discussion » ‘Slice of Life’ Community

Is it just slice of life only or something else added into it like fantasy or anything else?

Slice of life tends to be real-world/modern day. I suppose it could have supernatural elements, but then to me, that's a fantasy game. Harry Potter is basically a fantasy theme that exists in the real world, but not in plain sight. Slice of life is more about roleplaying daily life in a small town, high school, or college usually. Sometimes, they might have a drama element like a mystery along the lines of Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew. A lot of them are just about normal day-to-day with characters that are regular humans and don't have powers, which doesn't have to be boring. Real-life is filled with problems and challenges that can be fun to play out.

TBF you can have slice-of-life in fantasy.

Slice-of-life is just a short story or self-contained episode that focuses more on the characters, where everything returns to the status quo by the end of it. Nothing monumental changes and the 'episodes' are overall pretty comfortable. That's how it's defined in TV and anime, anyway.

I think when you start getting into mystery stories or things that have a lot of plot threads that need resolving, it stops being slice-of-life, focusing more on the overarching mystery than the characters.

It's most common to set slice-of-life stories in the real world because fantasy/sci-fi stories want to deal with a lot more worldbuilding and grand scales, but that isn't actually a hard rule either. Many Ghibli films feature fantasy elements but are ultimately slice-of-life. (Totoro and Ponyo come to mind.)

The wikipedia article on slice of life: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slice_of_life

"Masayuki Nishida writes that slice of life anime and manga can still involve elements of fantasy or a fantastical world: "Fantasy is sometimes used as a means to express the “reality” of human beings under certain possible conditions."[16]"

I'm not sure the thing a couple of the posters in this thread are looking for is strictly slice-of-life.

What things would not like in it? Just checking to see if might work or not so that way I won't waste your time.

While I've never been someone who was avidly drawn to slice of life rp, recently I've garnered some interest in the theme since I've brought my character Cyr and her family to rpr.

I don't generally enjoy modern day earth slice of life...you know basically the life I'm living right now. What I would enjoy is slice of life with sci fi themes (or possibly fantasy but Cyr isn't a fantasy character). Seeing different aliens coexisting and how their differences could effect a casual lifestyle would be quite interesting, as well as personally educational for races I've created myself.

Heck yeah! While high-fantasy settings are my jam I'm recently enjoying a mix of slice of life and action plots/prompts alike. One of my groups is heavily centered around slice of life among ye olde school life with a focus on character development for members and longer term plot if they seek it out themselves, whereas another group of mine is a classic adventure DnD-esq campaign. Similarly, I have some longer 1x1 stories in PM and one-off scenes as well. It really takes the pressure off to sit back and roleplay out an "easier" scene and also helps me to find inspiration again for plots that are more challenging. Like you said, the mix is where it's at!

I had a fairly good browse of groups that came up when I searched ‘Modern’ and didn’t really find anything publicly active that focuses on modern slice-of-life genre. I went ahead and created a group for this purpose, and is clearly a work in progress. It’s called This Modern World and anyone 18+ is free to join if real human non-magic, non supernatural non-anime modern roleplay is in your interest.

Also, if there is a group out there that does focus on modern slice-of-life, I would love to find it! Modern characters and stories are sort of my thing as I like pretending to be somebody else in this world.

A friend of mine on RPR had a Slice of Life group at one time but it seemed other members who had joined soon lost interest and the group closed a month after it had begun. I have groups of my own but they involve fantasy and/ or supernatural.
I would like to discover a group that's purely contemporary/ slice of life, but sadly I find many 'slice of life' stories are hosted in private messages or on Discord.

Edit. As for the Slice of Life Community, I've seen very little on RPR, they all seem to be Discord related.

Slice of Life has and always probably will be my absolute favorite. I guess it might be because my life is pretty wilin' or maybe I'm just an oddball -- I really don't know! The majority of my roleplays are heavily, heavily slice-of-lifey inspired though. I do not mind in the least the supernatural, the fantastical, the magical, the take-me-away-to-another-world where anything and everything can happen. Low-tech, high-tech, no-tech -- it's all good for sure, and I can participate in those scenarios when the mood is just right.

But I suppose my inklings for slice of life stem from the fact that it challenges me more. To take a mundane character and find ways to make them interesting and appealing while creating compelling storylines in what everyone else would consider average or boring settings is engaging for me!

I would love to be a part of a slice of life community though. As of right now, my job is all-consuming. I rarely get to participate in anything but the Forum Games here and there, but I'm still grateful for that at the very least. I hope you find one though and maybe I'll get to join in the shenanigans as well! I suppose it also all depends on how people feel about canons -- another fun preference of mine! All the best!

Shenanigans. The Magic word.

'Canons' in a Modern Slice of Life roleplay? Would that be like... your actual self? I'm puzzled and my curiosity has me asking.

Though I tend not to participate in anime based roleplays, my favorite slice of life anime of all time -- Natsume Yuujinchou -- takes place in modern day Japan. A young boy has acquired his grandmother's book of names belonging to demons, demi-gods, ghosts, and other such fantastical beings. While it may seem a whole other genre in and of itself, this particular series has been officially declared slice of life due to the fact that this young, clairvoyant boy is still trying to go to school, make friends, have time for his hobbies, adapt to life with his new family, and plan for his future all the while juggling his newly acquired supernatural responsibilities. He also has to deal with his mouthy 'cat' guardian when he would rather just have a normal, teenage life.

So to play a canon in a slice of life role-play would be, for example, me taking up the role of Natsume. In assuming his role, I would then have to face his issues and encounter his daily struggles. Does that answer your question sufficiently?

There are a lot of slice of life films, shows, games, etc. At the moment I am privy to Sherlock Holmes which is in the genre of both mystery as well as slice of life. 😊

Ah, yes it does. My genre niche definition is a bit more narrow than that.