Cartridges

A Cartridge is a reusable story world packaged with its engine. Think of it like a game cartridge: it carries the world, the cast, the tone, and the configuration so you don't have to set any of that up yourself. You drop it into the console and start writing.

What's inside a cartridge

• Canon source — the starting facts of the world: setting, history, the rules that make it feel real.
• Cast — the characters that exist at the start, with their traits and relationships.
• Tone & style — how chapters should read.
• Configuration — the engine settings that shape generation and routing, so every save file behaves consistently.

Cartridges carry configuration so users do not have to.

Original worlds and fanfic use the same engine

An original novel and a fanfic are both just cartridges — they only differ in where their canon source comes from. The writing engine underneath is identical.

One cartridge, many save files

A cartridge is a template, not your story. When you start writing you create a Save File — your own private timeline in that world. Share a cartridge and everyone who opens it writes their own save file from the same starting canon.

Share the cartridge. Everyone writes their own save file.

Free and premium cartridges

Most cartridges are free to start. Some premium cartridges are unlocked with credits — a one-time unlock that adds the cartridge to your library permanently. Unlocking is always a fixed credit cost, never a random pull, and some premium cartridges come with extra production value beyond the base world.

Public cartridge pages

Every published cartridge has a public landing page at alcove.fi/c/<slug> so people can discover it and start their own save file. These pages show the world and cast — never anyone's private save file or chapter content.

Next: Save Files — the timeline you actually write in.