The Evening Racket

The Evening Racket is Vesper City's newspaper, and it is written about you. Open it from Social → The Evening Racket.

What is in the paper

A masthead, an illustrated lead story, columns of news and a few boxes: In brief, Most wanted (the biggest names on the bounty board), a Market report and the Classifieds. Stories are filed under the sections City, Crime, Gangs, Markets, Fights and Opinion; older ones move to the Archive. You can applaud or boo a story.

Where the stories come from

Most stories write themselves: the paper's Wire Desk prints what happens in the city, in your own language.

• Every morning: a "City in Numbers" round-up of the day before, plus 4 Wire Desk stories.
• As it happens: gangs being founded, levelling up, destroyed or getting a new Don; gang wars declared and ended; a big bounty; the Fence's weekly hot list; the weekly Shipment docking; a union strike; the stock market closing. City crises take the lead as breaking news.
• On Sundays: a weekly feature about a person of the city, and the City Honours: the top three Fighter, Crook, Hunter, Iron (training) and Grafter (jobs) of the week.

Single crimes and fights are not reported one by one: they only show up in the numbers and the honours. Some stories are written by the staff journalists and artists of the newsroom; those may be in English only for now.

Classifieds

A small ad in the paper, from level 5:

• Pick a heading: for sale, wanted, recruiting, services or personal. The text is 10 to 160 characters, and links and contact details are not allowed.
• An ad costs $500 a day in cash and runs up to 7 days. You can have 2 at a time.
• Every ad waits for approval by the ad desk. The days start when it is approved. If it is refused you get your money back with a reason, and you can withdraw an ad that is still waiting for a full refund.
• Players can report any ad that breaks the rules (see Staying safe and reporting).

Gangs that want members can also use the recruiting board at the Social Club: see Gangs.

Display adverts

From level 5 you can also book a bigger, illustrated advert from Social → Advertise, in one of ten styles. It is printed at the foot of the paper, on every page of it (front page, sections, stories, classifieds and back issues), one advert at a time, and labelled "In-game ad · placed by a player". You see a preview on a computer and on a phone before you pay. Every advert is checked by the ad desk first, and you get your money back if it is refused. When the ad desk is closed, the Advertise page says so and nothing can be booked.

Your name in the paper

Stories name real players. If you would rather not be named, go to Account → Privacy → The newspaper and choose Keep my name out of the paper: stories then say "a player" instead, and you have no press clippings. Players who are suspended or banned are never named. See Your profile and privacy for what else others can see.

The Evening Star career

A newspaper career in Actions → Jobs unlocks two favours at its top rank: a friendly story that lifts another player's reputation for a while, and burying an unflattering story on their profile. See Jobs.

Your front page

When you are number one on any leaderboard, a Make my front page button appears on that board; and when a recent story names you, you can put it on a card from Share cards. The Front Page is the Racket's front page with your headline and your portrait, in two sizes (wide and tall) for you to download or share from your phone. It never shows money or another player's name: a story that names someone else gets the card's own headline instead. Players who keep their name out of the paper don't get front-page cards at all. In the Graphical view, the front-page proofs at the newsstand open your cards.

Tips

• Read the Markets box before you trade: the Fence's hot list is printed there first.
• Use a classified to find a gang or sell a rarity, but keep contact details out of it.
• Check the Sunday honours to see who is on top this week.