The RP Value of Social Media
Real social media drives enormous amounts of drama, community-building, and information flow. A FiveM server with an in-character social network generates storylines that wouldn't happen otherwise — gang beefs via post, businesses advertising events, politicians campaigning, celebrities gaining followers. Agency-LifeInvader brings that layer to your server.
Posts, Comments, DMs
Core features are deliberately familiar: post text and images, comment on others' posts, direct message any character, follow and unfollow. Players don't need a tutorial because they already know how to use social media. That instant familiarity is a feature, not a limitation.
Hashtags and Trends
A lightweight trending algorithm surfaces the most-mentioned hashtags of the last 24 hours on everyone's feed. This drives emergent information flow: when something big happens at a club, the hashtag surfaces, players who weren't there see it and show up. Trending was not an accident — we explicitly wanted social media to be a distribution mechanism for in-world events.
Reporting and Moderation
Every post has a report button that routes directly into Agency-Reports. Moderation hooks are baked in because social media without moderation becomes toxic fast. Admins can delete posts, shadowban accounts, or temporarily freeze posting for specific characters.
Privacy Controls
Public, followers-only, and private-account modes are standard. Characters who want a private roleplay life can have one. This mirrors real-world expectations and prevents the "everyone sees everything" trap that flattens RP.
Installation & Setup
Agency-LifeInvader requires oxmysql for post, comment, and DM persistence. After downloading from Tebex, import the included SQL schema (lifeinvader.sql) into your database, drop the resource folder into your server, and add ensure agency-lifeinvader to server.cfg. Character linking is handled automatically using the player identifier from your framework.
On first startup the resource creates the database tables and seeds the trending algorithm with empty state. No manual database setup is needed beyond running the SQL import.
Configuration Options
The config.lua controls the social mechanics:
- Post character limit — default 280, configurable up to 2000 for long-form posts.
- Image upload mode — CDN URL input (default), or direct upload to your configured storage endpoint.
- Trending window — how many hours the trending algorithm looks back. Default 24 hours.
- Trending hashtag count — how many hashtags show in the trending sidebar. Default 10.
- DM encryption — enable end-to-end DM encryption simulation for RP (visual only, no actual crypto).
- Report routing — whether post reports go to Agency-Reports (if installed) or to a Discord webhook.
- Admin verified badge — grant a verification checkmark to specific character IDs or job types.
Framework Compatibility
Agency-LifeInvader uses character identifiers from your framework to link posts to players. QBCore and ESX adapters ship in the package. For standalone, implement Config.GetCharacterId(src) and Config.GetCharacterName(src). The social layer itself (posts, comments, DMs, trending) is entirely framework-agnostic.
Why This Matters for Roleplay
The most memorable server events are the ones that have consequences beyond the moment they happened. A gang shootout is forgotten after a session unless people talked about it. When a shootout happens and fifteen players post about it on LifeInvader, add their takes, argue in the comments, and DM each other about retaliation — the event has an afterlife that drives the next session's storylines.
Businesses that advertise events on LifeInvader see better turnout because players who weren't online when the event was planned still see it in their feed. Politicians who campaign on LifeInvader between sessions maintain character presence even when they're not logged in. The platform extends your server's social layer beyond its online hours.
The moderation integration is non-optional for servers with high player counts. Social media without admin tools becomes a harassment vector. The report-to-Agency-Reports pipeline means your mod team handles in-character social media violations through the same workflow as any other player report.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can characters have multiple LifeInvader accounts?
Each character (not player) gets one account by default. If your server uses multi-character systems, each character slot gets its own LifeInvader identity automatically. A player with three characters has three separate feeds, followers, and DM inboxes.
Can admins see private DMs for moderation purposes?
Yes. Admin-level access includes a DM viewer that requires a separate permission flag. This is disabled by default and must be explicitly granted. All admin DM reads are logged in the audit trail. This capability exists specifically for handling harassment reports — use it responsibly and disclose it to your community in your server rules.
How do I seed initial content so new players aren't joining a ghost town?
The resource includes a seed script that generates placeholder posts from named NPC accounts. Enable it in config.lua and set the post frequency. NPC accounts don't interact with real players but they populate the feed with relevant in-world content while the player base grows.
Is LifeInvader integrated with Agency-Phone?
Yes. If Agency-Phone is installed, LifeInvader appears as a native phone app. Players can post, browse their feed, and read DMs from within the phone UI. The tablet version (Agency-Pad) also includes a LifeInvader app with a wider layout suited to the bigger screen.
Requirements
- FiveM server (QBCore, ESX, or standalone)
- oxmysql
- cfx.re account with valid Agency-LifeInvader license
- Optional: Agency-Reports (for in-game post moderation routing)
- Optional: Agency-Phone or Agency-Pad (for native app integration)
Running LifeInvader as a Server Story Engine
The most effective use of Agency-LifeInvader isn't passive — it's active server storytelling between sessions. Staff characters (NPCs or played by server team members) who post regular in-world content give players something to react to when they're not in-game.
A sheriff's department posting about a recent arrest. A gang posting a provocation. A news outlet posting about a fire in a neighborhood. A business advertising a grand opening. Each of these is a scene seed. Players who see the post in the hours before a session arrive with context and motivation that organically leads to RP without any scripted events.
This is the "living world" effect that high-quality RP servers cultivate. Agency-LifeInvader is infrastructure for that effect — the platform that makes between-session world-building easy enough to actually happen.