Grand Qwasa

Grand Qwasa
The Grand Qwasa in the center of Festival Plaza.
Type	Power Source
Effects	Turns Music into Energy Decides whether the contestant wins or not in the Lights-Up Audition
Scource	Festival Plaza

The Grand Qwasa (commonly simplified as the Qwasa) is the central power source in No Straight Roads, which is powered up by music and maintains electrical flow in Vinyl City.

Appearance

It is a giant, glowing golden orb surrounded by golden rings that orbit in various directions. The innermost ring is whole and just a little wider than the orb, while the three outer rings are thin and C-shaped. It floats just above a slightly concave, purple marble platform with golden accents and a wide, wavy guard rail. In the center of the platform is a circle cut into sections towards the inner circle with a purple half-circle bordering it on one side. When powered up at the Lights-Up Audition, it glows red.

Significance

The Qwasa is the central power source of Vinyl City and owned by the No Straight Roads company, intended to fix the power crisis and supply power from now on. The Qwasa turns music into energy, able to supply power for the entire city, prioritizing NSR-controlled districts. The energy can also be stored and distributed inside tiny canisters called Mini-Qwasas, which can be used to power up small areas and equipment around the city.

It also serves a secondary function: the goal of the Lights-Up Audition, where the main objective is to power up the Grand Qwasa as much as possible with the contestants' music. However, even when near full power, NSR gets the final say whether or not they pass.

Despite everything and everyone, the city still experiences occasional black-outs due to the Qwasa having a maximum power output of 47%, regardless of who is performing. It appears, however, that only music made with a strong purpose or conviction is enough to power up the Qwasa past this threshold, which enables it to do incredible feats that can manipulate the entire infrastructure of the city to the will of all artists involved.

Location

The Qwasa is located at the Festival Plaza in front of the theatre house, where the Lights-Up Auditions take place. It is surrounded by tiny fountains and accompanied by a big NSR neon logo.

During the Light's-Up Audition, it's positioned at the top of the giant arch where contestants enter from.

Trivia

• The fictional term "Qwasa" derives from the word "kuasa", meaning "power" in Malay.
• The shape of the Grand Qwasa resembles an over-simplified depiction of an atom. Particularly, a plutonium atom, with some depictions having at least 4 electron levels, or "rings" in its simplest depiction.
  • This draws parallels to nuclear power plants, where plutonium isotopes are used as fuel in some plants, depending on the reactor.

Sources

• Geek Culture - No Straight Roads | 80 Minutes of PC Gameplay - No Commentary