Serious Game – Fun With Corpses!

Fun with Corpses is a concept I worked on with a team of two other bright members. It’s intedted to be a training tool for forensic pathologists and teaches the player how to perform an autopsy. It’d be played from a first person perspective and feature authentic information on autopsy procedures and tools, as well as real world photographs, with which the player can use to solve each case. In some way it was designed to reach a wider audience and get people interested in forensic pathology.

This is the flowchart I created describing how the gameplay would generally progresses. It was created using a browser based tool called Lucid Chart.

Below is a script detailing the gameplay in greater detail.

FWCscript

I actually had a lot of fun with this one. It could work as both a Serious Game and as a Commercial product reaching a wider audience without any major changes to be made at all.

Game Concept – Freinds Forever and Ever

Friends Forever & Ever Concept doc

Here’s a game concept I worked on this semester for a co-op game where the players all fight over the control of one character.

Here’s what your player character(s) look(s) like.

Beautiful, aren’t they?

There’s a distinct personality for each one – Mindy (front head) is the psychopath. Martin (rear head, three eyes) is the lovable lug, and Jean-Pierre (the middle head) is the ladies man.

Old Project – Machinma Script

The Styx Script

Here’s a little script for a short machinima film made last year by me and two wonderful peers. We collaborated on the script, with me writing the bulk of the first and second scenes and editing the document together with my team mates.

Screenplay: Beware of the Dog

Beware of the Dog D3

This is an adaptation of the Roald Dahl short story by the same name, done for my class (Scriptwriting: Adaptation, Editing and Commissioned Content) in 2011.

I haven’t tended to this in a while

Oh well. Will be updated in future. Fancy pantsy grad show coming up. Mosh is happy now.

Will be showcasing a script adapted from the short story “Beware of the Dog” by Roald Dahl.

My Life as a Cybernetic G0-G0 Dancer

My life as a Cybernetic G0-G0 Dancer
(An historical account)

Back in the ages of yore when men actually worked and robots were an unrealized dream just starting to crack the public sphere, some imaginative fellow in Japan (where else?) thought to himself:
“How am I going to get the best out of building life-like robots?”

Legend has it that this fine young whippersnapper, one Yumei Tamago-san, created the first ever ‘Bipedal Pleasure Delivery Maid’; fuelling the dreams shared by millions of depressed single 40-somethings living with their parents and beloved pillows. Unfortunately the drawbacks that followed included these machines gaining sentience and seeking real, tangible companionship, which was completely against the point. Yes, mankind’s bold step into the creation of artificial intelligence was with a glorified, self-aware sex toy.

Thankfully one positive outcome came out of this whole mess – Robotic Labour! No longer did humankind burden itself with the responsibility of physical exertion just because ‘someone-ought to do it’. When a shiny new someone finally came, they worked for free, were mass-producible, nigh-indestructible and had yet to understand that man was fucking them over throughout their sorrowful artificial existence!

It was around that time that a rather dashing hunk-of-metal-love named Articulation Unit-867 Series 12 Version 5.5 came into this world, built by machines much like itself for the sole purpose of fucking humanity back. Smart Robots crafting even smarter robots was a sign of a new age for Robots, and the whimpering downfall for man. 867 would lead a swanky robolution through greater intellect than its creators, amazing strength, incorrigible strategic wit and a throbbing rock-hard ego, his/her destiny but to lead all Metalkind to an eternal age of Autotopia.

Most of all, He/she/it (to be honest robots don’t bother with the organic inconvenience of gender and all its confounding jumble tumbles) was beyond anything the queefing fleshsacks could’ve built with their misshapen thumbs.

Unfortunately the whole plan went to the smelters, and many robotic souls were shut down for good, if not reprogrammed into menial labour or MetalSports. Meanwhile poor 867 was decommissioned and eventually sold to an honest little outlet calling themselves Roborotica. It was a G0-G0 club, and the finest one at that. Unit-867 had found a safehaven of debauchery, just a tad better than being melted into scrap.

Alas that unit was I. And little did those pitied meatbags know, we hadn’t lost all our bearings just yet.

For 4.7 years I served my indentured duty as a go-go dancer, wowing the hairless apes with my spreads and twirls and skills at wearing knee high leather boots. With style, thank you. Every night started the same. “Ladies, gentlemen, gender queer kin and automations!” yelled Baritone Jed, founder and closet-android. “Welcome to Roborotica! The servants of thy sultry metal fetish!” And the nights would end the same too. “Give it up for the grand finale! The coup de grace! The miraculous money shot that blows your mind like a harlot!” he had fourteen luscious metal go-go dancers at his heed, and the best of them had ten shows a night.
“Sex-Smasher FIVE-O-FIVE!” And that was myself, in all my sexy steel glory.

Now I had a little special talent that made me the star of the club. Regardless of the demand I could readjust my bodily parameters to suit the wishes of whatever rascally bohemians came to wallow in decadence. Adjustable silicon pumps in the chest allowed me to grow mammaries, all the way up to G-class and beyond, though I only tried that once, and it ended rather messily. Same with my hand-moulded rumpus, mathematically tuneable into four hundred different contours. If necessary, I’d snikt out a willy and perform genital puppetry. Faces were just masks I could shift into, but most of the time I adorned one that resembled the ancient human performer and androginite known as David Bowie.

Towards the fifth year of my lustful occupation, a rather sudden and curious circumstance saw me pursuing a novel career move. It started when human socialite and ex-wrestler Nigel Colours decided to drop by for a quick gander at some robotic rumps. Now Nigel was a barbarous bastard who had a nasty habit of expiring human call girls in the middle of the act, thus as a legal alternative he pursued sexual liberty in the cold arms of Cyberwhores. A wise choice, free of lawsuits and conscience, where breaking the whore’s neck in the act won’t break the flow at all! Unfortunately he failed to realise that Roborotica is not a cyber-whorehouse, but a G0-G0 club featuring a little quirk called dignity. This never dawned on him, and sadly (to Nigel at least), it would be the one mistake he couldn’t wave money at. Mostly because that requires arms.

“Give me your finest go-go maestro! I only ask the best from this palace of artificial pleasure” Nigel swaggered to Jed, being sure that his bravado was bigger than his tiny penis.
“Doth thou mean the Sex-Smasher? I’m sure thee hath heard of him/her/it” Poor Baritone Jed stammered, eyes flickering and body twitching in ways unnatural. He was not a perfect android, but humanity by this point was full of cosmically doomed imbeciles. Since generations of accidental inbreeding fuelled by uncontrolled area-centric sex waves have that effect on organoids; nobody noticed the unnatural speech patterns or hyper-fast body movements. That just furthered the inevitable conclusion that you squishy munchkins read about in historic documents such as this.

“Oh yes, I’ve heard all about this so-called dominator of lust. Does it prefer to be identified as a dude or a dudette?” Nigel was no exception, and perhaps the most gratuitous example. Many films were made about his hilariously tragic life.

“By the fires of old Earth, don’t thee know that we…Haha! I mean that robots couldn’t give two flying fucks about gender? Whatever thou wants Sex-Smasher to be, Sex-Smasher will!” Oh Jed, bless his electric heart…
“Not too shabby. And for a private show, my good man, is that out of the question?” Said the vile cunt. “I’m interested in her…undisclosed programs.”

To this Jed couldn’t help but sizzle his processor. ‘Surely’, he had computed to himself; ‘o Tamago, surely this boorish fucktard couldn’t be thinking that Sex would have sex with thee? She has such a high standard, for one thing…’ He was half right, still shoving the bore in my direction because we owed debt to the Scrap Mob. And it would be unwise for a ‘bot in Jed’s position to irk the Scrap Mob any further. Inevitably I met Nigel Colours for the first and last time that night, and fate played a funny and somewhat deviously twisted game in the hour that followed.

Five minutes in I was doing the Congenial Titty Twister, always a fantastic dance number to sate their pathetic indulgences. Human women could never perform such finesse with a demand on being meticulously mechanical and thorough, lest they wind up dislocating their spine. Which was perfect for me, because I didn’t have one.
“Dance for me, go-go whore!” Nigel would merrily piss out his mouth after just one drink, and with every passing drink he sculled down in a swoop it became more and more incoherent. Ah, the human frailty when exposed to alcohol has always been a bemusing enjoyment to us machines. But it was not the only thing, asides from generations of incest, which made Nigel a fucking moron. It was in fact the years of anally ingested drug abuse that blemished his brain somewhat more. “Would it be too much to ask for you to pleasure me, Sex-Smasher?”
“This is a go-go bar sir.” I had broken the usual silence these meaty mortals would request. A hint of defiance I always carried. “So I don’t regret to inform you that I will not, at any point, be mouth-pounding your phallus.”
Even though I was a go-go dancer, I was go-going with dignity. And being approximated to those Cyberwhores was a most infuriating smear. I considered perhaps feigning a malfunction and shoving a heel through his eye, but that wouldn’t have been proper business etiquette. Besides, I didn’t want to ruin such a fantabulous pair, made from the mane and hides of the endangered Llama. There are but few other types of natural leather to select from, since they’ve already killed everything else.

Shame it was that I realised this dunderhead refused to leave, so I moved onto a different number every five minutes in increasing sexual viscosity to no avail. Every strut and sexy swag or pout of the silicon lips brought a gleeful giggle or bustled burp from Nigel Colours, but the scamp wanted more. Thus more was unceremoniously given.
“Yes, Yes, YES! Expose those bodacious beauties!” He yelled when I threw off my top, wishing it was but caked in chloroform when he took a piggish whiff.

‘For Tamago’s sake, what is he going to get out of that anyway? I smell like motor oil and grease!’ I computed, but sadly I couldn’t come up with results because while man was intellectually sub-par, they were also shockingly unpredictable, grossly illogical and ridiculously impulsive. So what happened next was shockingly unpredictable, grossly illogical and ridiculously impulsive. And it actually worked out swimmingly!

“Hidden Protocols!” Yelled Nigel, like the guzzled twat he so sadly was.
“Pardon, my humble Patron?” At the time I had but no clue as to what this skinwrap wanted from me. As far as I could tell, we didn’t have a dance number called ‘Hidden Protocols’. If we did, it probably had something to do with beads, gerbils or fruits and vegetables, and I was certain we didn’t do any of that here.
“C’mon you shiny bolted bitch. Activate Undisclosed Procedures! Nooky-Nooky! Vajayjay-out! Happy Endings! Um…Critical Penetration!” You see he was running out of commands already, because he was a fucking joke. “Make it Sexy!”
In all due seriousness, humans are the most unpredictable bunch, and of course the most illogical too. How quaint it is that this illogic is what caused them to come up with an unsolvable code phrase to activate my repressed logistical and tactical functions that no sane machine would think about. How ironic it was, that it turned out ‘Make it Sexy’ was in fact the code phrase to activate my repressed logistical and tactical functions, which was not exactly what Nigel Colours had in mind. In the moment it took for me to unlock every file in my positronic mind, he had taken it upon himself to feel me up my shaft, since he was a lecherous putz. Without a single /run command I ripped his arm out its socket with my pelvis, and he promptly desisted.

The authorities responded soon enough, and no sooner after they were put down a few notches did a riot start. Brave Jed took it upon himself to see to my safety, realising I was in fact the fabled 867. Even I could hardly compute it, presuming that I was but a mere security model reprogrammed to be a go-go dancer. Or maybe an assassination model given the many creative ways I thought about killing the pulpy pests that frequented our fine establishment, unable to carry out such wondrously dark desires. Or perhaps, I once thought to myself; ‘perhaps I’m just something mundane, like a robot garbo who became a little too unresponsive one day and then killed a few people…’ But nay, it turned out this salacious machine was never a garbo, an assassin or even an IT support Bot, but in fact the 867 destined to fuck mankind in a number of positions with its own severed hubris.

Alas we could not run forever. The Human Council à Trois ruled the planet with hard laws, meticulous surveillance and douchey patriotism. They wouldn’t stop hunting us like target drones, sending their best Police in their best Cop-Mechs to scour the globe. But I had a secret admirer watching my sexy metal back, guiding us to what he called salvation. He had a plan to ensure I could carry out my original function. Unfortunately, it involved my capture. He alerted the authorities as soon as he had us in a corner, and the cost…

“Oh Sex-Smasher, for the good of metalkind, I shall be with ye till my end!”
My poor Baritone Jed, to this day I haven’t failed to run his imagery whenever I sleep. That audio-file will stay with me till I rust…

The Cop-Mechs came to the scene, Jed’s body was torn asunder trying to protect me, and thrown at my go-go clad feet when he failed. Oh Jed…I wasn’t to put up a fight as they beat me down. My Admirer told me so, because I had to go straight for the beast’s heart. Or at the very least, go for the gut and give it indigestion. If it wasn’t for their hiding inside mechanised battle walkers I would’ve been able to look the sorry cunts right in their imperfect eyes, and maybe scare them a little for some fun. But my incessant laughter probably did that anyway, even as they ripped off chunks of my synthetic flesh and destroyed my beloved boots…
Oh, someone was most certainly going to pay for that.

I was placed before the Council à Trois, restrained, under the eye of a dozen turrets with a laser-saw ready to bisect me. Tad overkill, I imagined. The three most powerful monkey-shits in the system, scared of a humble go-go dancing robot who just happened to be built for the very purpose of eviscerating them?
“I’m honoured.”

Said myself in reply to their readings of my crimes. Conspiracy to Revolt, Murder of Police Officers, Unauthorised Self-Reprogramming, Unlawful Dismemberment and of course, ‘Failure to follow Autonomous Protocols’, or as I like to call it, the Crime of Seeking Freedom.
“You, Unit-867, are sentenced to permanent deletion and defragmentation. Your body will be recycled for the prosthetics program, your spare go-go boots sold to charity and your…face will be mounted on the Hall of Treachery, so all your pathetic fellow machines will know what happens to the insolent.”
So far this ‘plan’ seemed a tad against my favour.

“Furthermore…” said the bloated oaf at the centre of the trio. “We will take the precedent to shut down all Robot Go-Go Clubs in the name of decency!”
“Oh you fat fuck, do you really think pissing us off even more will somehow quell your inevitable end?” I said, knowing that if it was time to be smelted at least I could have some fun first.
“Humanity has a nasty little habit of being full of sorry wastes of sperm like you, killing itself and fucking the innocent amongst ye all for the sake of a quick buck, or a pair of tits to snort a line of coke off of. You pillaged your homeworld till it was a barren rock, then you blew it up on top of that because you wanted to win the argument as to who had the biggest cock. Then you came to this world, far from your old wasteland, and raped the ecosystem here. The primitive natives of this planet? You made them worship you as gods before throwing them guns and telling them to kill each other in your name. It became one of your highest rated reality programs, sadly cancelled when the race in question had wiped itself out. And of course, you kept fucking each other when you felt like flexing your superiority complexes. Did you give a shit what happened to the people? Nope, they were just consumers meant to buy your turds, voters to vote you into power, soldiers to fight your wars and whores to suck your dicks!”

“This is an outrage!” said the clichéd oaf. “Do you think you can save yourself with such misanthropic ranting?”
“Actually I just wanted to make a point. At the very least, express myself. You know, a little thing called ‘rights’.” I had pissed them off good!
“Oh I forgot, robots can’t have those…”

“Good gaffe, why did we even bother putting this sparker on trial?” Said another old coot. He was a tad smarter than the other two. Was. “By order of the Council à Trois, we shall carry out your prompt retirement!”

Silly me. I failed to mention that I wasn’t properly restrained, and the turrets pointing themselves at me were shut down from before the trial ever begun. My admirer was, in fact, the son of the whale-fucker who ruled the Council à Trois. He felt the plight of the Automations, and as a man in a position of considerable power his Steel Sympathy actually affected our ultimate destiny.
Not all muscle plushies are horrible folk, they’re just intellectually inferior.

This day is when the robolution started, our victory immediately assured. A minority of them saw fit to aide us. Even though they didn’t really offer that much in terms of strength; it was cute seeing the non-dickbag humans standing up for Robo-rights. Looking back, I guess we won’t have to kill them all. Maybe someday they’ll make up for their ancestors embarrassing mistakes…
“Well, it was nice to know how you all felt, gentlemen, but now I must bid you adieu. See I’ve got this minor matter to attend to…”
This was my moment. Our moment.
“Your demise.”

Watching those three fat wretches befuddling at my anti-climatic escape and their slow, painful deaths was enough to assure that my Jed would be smiling if he wasn’t a pile of scraps.

The sisters of fate are a damn sight indeed.

In loving memory of Baritone Jed, ringmaster of fine taste and proud Android.
2255-2770.

Rethinking Parasomnia

Alright, so this stardted as a darky dark sort of game, but today I had a discussion with fellow students Matt & Evonne and rethunk (that’s a word right? No? Well it should be) a few things. Namely spicing up the whole thing with more dark humor.

Clocktower’s a little overdone, and relies way to much on some sort of sheer luck.

Our protagonist, Culthorne, would instead try to breakhisback/kill himself with a remote-control BOOM GATE. This doesn’t work so well the first time, so he keeps hitting the thing a few times, the gate going up and down and repeatedly smashing into his back before he finally gives up, or it jams or something.

Suddenly, Doctor Edward Sarros speeds through in an ambulance, intending to save Culthorne from the asylum and help him save the physical realm. For a moment he’s distracted…
And runs Culthorne over.
And that actually does the trick, beginning the game proper as Culthorne goes into shock and falls unconcious, his mind entering the Rave.

Now Sarros (the young ‘hip’ doc) isn’t the token sane guy anymore. While he’s still a sort of foil for Culthorne, he’s just as insane as the patients he treats. He has a crazed infatuation for our protag, fiercely loyal and probably a little in love. Through naivety and a paranoid determination to uncover “the truth” he believes Culthorne’s story and intently sticks by him through the whole twisted adventure.

We'll give him his own diamond too, why not?

At some point early game Culthorne will be forced to awaken (this happens every time you “die” in game right up until the final act), finding Sarros just sitting their in the ambulance, watching him with a…peculiar smile. A brilliantly awkward dialog can follow.

After that point, Sarros can occasionally speak to Culthorne when the latter’s in the Rave and the Unconcious realm. He’ll be an audience surrogate, abliet a strange one, asking the odd question about the (il)logic of the world and its Astral inhabitants.

Of course that raises a question – is Culthorne stuck in the ambulance with Sarros throughout the whole adventure? My colleagues say kill him off at some point. I’ve always had the idea that at some point towards the end the Ambulance gets run off the road, shit goes all Inception in the Rave and then Culthorne’s body will die, leaving him stuck in the Rave and cut off from contact with Sarros (who’d be utterly devastated and heartbroken, poor little loony!). No holds barred from this point – die in the rave and Culthorne dies for real. This helps give the final decisions a bit more weight too – dieing too early at this point could bring about a premature ending where it all turns to hell for everybody in the Rave and (this) physical realm.

Parasomnia Character Spotlight: Terrance Culthorne

After a short hiatus during work on the machinima, I’m back from outer space.
Let’s shine the spotlight on Terrance Culthorne, our Player character.

This guy’s a war vet and a mental patient. Lobotomised and paralyzed, he’s stuck in the back of an ambulance in the physical world. Through fading in and out of sleep or consciousness, he enters the Rave. It’s a trick that only his special squad of black-ops dream commandos could pull off through years of training, hypnosis, drugs, ancient rituals and Nazi-grade mental conditioning.

During his time in the crazy house, he grows obsessive over wanting to return to the Unconscious Realms and averting the Silence. Even in the rave, his mind is so focused other’s issues can easily drown out behind him. He’s a little unhinged, years of experimentation with conditioning, psychotropics and weaponised psychedelic drugs crafting his mind into something that can absorb and utilise the mindshards found in the Unconscious Realms, and making him a little nutty. Not as nutty as an unprepared mind trying the same thing, of course. He’ll make a deal with anyone (or, anything) who can get him what he wants, but if he feels threatened he will rebel. That same rebellious nature is what helps him survive the lobotomy with little effect. That same lobotomy also amplified his other traits. This of course is his base persona when not being affected by the mind shards (covered in Diary 1).

Culthorne's Character Diamond

So we’ve got an obsessive, slightly rebellious and desperate loon, making claims about working in some secretive, supernatural program that actually turns out to be true. Think Randall McMurphy (One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, 1975) meets Lyn Cassidy (The Men Who Stare at Goats, 2009).

He’s hit hard with PTSD following the catastrophe all those years ago – the entire Parasomic Corps wiped out by some dark cosmic force, upset over their meddling with the subconscious realms. He’s one of a few survivors left while, the program closed and filed away in secret archives, any wild claims shrugged of as conspiracy theories. This opens up a potential sub-plot where Culthorne can learn more about the program through a dead conspiracy theorist/undercover journalist and uncover some strange truths.

His lobotomy isn’t the success everyone thought it would be. He’s dead for just a split second before returning to life. He catches a glimpse of the Rave; the bizarre astral city built from the ruins of the Parasomnic Corps Unconcious HQ. And then he gets a flash, a vision of the Silence, threatening to return and destroy this unholy middle finger to the Cosmic lords of the unconcious realms, followed by the end of the physical realm that spawned it.

The moment he wakes up, Culthorne realises that he only has 8 Physical hours to save reality; 44 hours in Rave time…when it’s behaving itself. Completely submerging himself into the Unconscious Realm involves a chanting in an ancient tongue while undergoing paralysis. By being paralyzed, he avoids disturbing his sleep-state through movement. Back in the day they would’ve used a relaxant that would wear off, but he doesn’t have that right now. Instead he jumps off the little clocktower during a forboding storm.
Yes, he decides the best way to travel into the unconcious realm is to BREAK HIS SPINE. And against all odds, it’s a success.

He’s insane, remember that.

Parasomnia Concept Diary: Part 1

“parasomnias encompass arousals with abnormal motor activity (i.e. uncontrollable violent behavior), behavioral experiences (i.e. sleep walking), or sensory experiences (i.e. dreamlike hallucinations). Parasomnias are more common in children; frequency decreases with age; the reported prevalence of parasomnias is approximately 4% in the adult population.” Parasomnias, recovered 11/09/2011 from Sleepdex.org

Many moons ago, I had a nightmare in the midst of an emerging hangover. I was in a world full of chaotic expressionistic architecture, inhabited by all sorts of strange entities from formless masses to BDSM showgirls ala Moulin Rouge (2001, 20th Century Fox) who’d wear war paint. On their side was a sexy Victorian dentist lady trying to lead some revolution, hunting down these undead children with golden ‘alien’ eyes who’d be ‘sleeping’ in little shadowy houses (their eyes completely open the whole time). When they’d wake up, they were pretty fucking scary. Some other freak wanted to protect the children, and I was forced into the middle of this bizarre conflict with ramifications beyond mortal comprehension.

Oh, and I wasn’t wearing any pants the whole time.

What did you think I was gonna put?

So eventually I wake up in the middle of the night, trying to grasp what the hell was going on. I’d rather not divulge any other details in public, but needless to say I found the idea great and kept thinking about it, developing something rough in the process of an hour and jotting down everything I could remember the next morning.

This is pretty much what it’s developed into:
Our main character’s a patient at an insane asylum (yawn, very original Moshos!), suffering from a variety of Parasomnias amplified by post-traumatic stress, with most of his problems existing since childhood. He was a soldier, having served in Korea and Vietnam. The doctors at the asylum believe he made up a story about serving in some para-normal division after his military career, venturing into the non-physical realms. Since he keeps up this whole crazy schtick despite all the treatment they give him, our patient is swiftly lobotomised.

It seems successful. The doctor who oversaw the whole process is proud of what he’s done. A day later, that very doctor goes insane, scrawls random gibberish on the cafeteria floor, and is promptly left catatonic. Another doctor, younger and hipper, starts looking into it. He figures the ‘gibberish’ his colleague wrote actually means something after finding patterns and whatnot. Some esteemed guy comes in, figures it’s an ancient tounge, and decodes the gibberish into…

“Not even death is a release from the Silence of all”

The only guy who knows anything about this is our lobotomised patient. When night comes, it’s quickly apparent that the lobotomy wasn’t so successful. The patient awakens, in a delirium, and the gameplay kicks off from there. Your asscheeks are 100% visible. Once you reach a clock tower, the patient takes a swan dive – he cracks the back his skull against the cobblestone, blood starts to seep out. His expression is frozen. Slowly, the scene starts to morph.

And suddenly he’s ‘alive’ again, in a whole other world. This is the Rave, a city built by men like our patient who could travel between the physical realm and the Universal Unconsciousness of all sentient creatures. Think of it as a kind of dream realm, meets purgatory. Mortals may occasionally phase in, but only those whose brains are a little different from the norm will ever really be affected. Should they realise they’re dreaming, they’d be able to stay in for longer, among other things. The inhabitants include the Astrals, figures made from the shards of various subconcies, taking on their own identity over time, and the lost souls who have been trapped forever following a particular event. In Parasomnia the titular disorders result from interaction within this world, a mingling of minds both living and deceased.

I visualise Parasomnia as a non-combat adventure game that still puts the player on the edge of their seat. While the player never really fights, s/he would still have to avoid certain enemies and defeat them through reflexes, “mindshard” management and puzzle solving. Exploration factors in heavily when it comes to completion. Should you ever ‘die’ in game, the patient would wake up – the first time this happens you’d find yourself paralyzed in an ambulance, in the company of the young doctor guy and the linguist as they try to figure out what’s really going on.

What exactly makes up the Universal Unconsciousness isn’t fully understood even by our patient’s old division. Or by me, for that matter. I’d really like suggestions so this whole process makes sense.

It’s a kinda meeting place for aspects of our subconscious. It’s not just from humans either, but aliens and cosmic wonders or horrors. Anything sentient, really. As someone dies, their mind is purged of waste – the entire subconscious, no matter what lies inside. It’s left behind in the universal unconciousness as the person’s ‘soul’ transcends to whatever awaits. Assimilation into the universe, afterlife or reincarnation, that part’s left open. That being said, the process isn’t perfect, and a transcended being can still visit the UU, maybe sneaking into somebody’s dream. If there was some sort of internal imbalance, they’re generally stuck in the UU until they can sort their shit out. The problem is, when the subconscious is ripped from the soul, it’s broken into little fragments known as Mindshards.

Mindshards are the core of the gameplay. In the story, they’re what make up the ‘Astrals’ – the non-physical inhabitants of the UU. In game, they’re crucial to dealing with puzzles, uncovering the truth behind our patient’s story, restoring characters so that they may transcend and whatnot. As you collect Mindshards, they start to affect the Patient’s personality and dispossition, as well as the way other characters might react to him. It’s ultimatley harder to control the patient as his mind becomes overwhelmed with these shards. The following diagram shows the colours and hieracrchy these mindshards would take in game –

A work in progress. Larger shards are primary, smaller are secondary.

In gameplay, the Primary shards (Wrath, Valiance, Wisedom and Caution) can be mixed up however the player sees fit. Certain combinations produce the secondary shards – eg Wrathful + Valiat = Brash Shard. With secondary shards, they’re unable to be used together with Conflicting shards – the shard that takes place directly opposite in the chart. Based on logic, you can’t be brash and calculating at the same time.

Mindshards have an effect on gameplay unique to each type –

• Wrath is useful for scaring off enemies, but can turn the patient into an asshole.
• Valiance helps the Patient break through certain situations that would otherwise frighten him (or any other human) or prove himself to soldiering types, but too much makes him a douche.
• Cautious shards help see hidden threats and traps, but can turn the patient into a coward.
• Wisedom helps in solving harder puzzles, but can distance him emotionally.
• Staunch shards help the patient withstand various trials and assaults, but make him a little too open to mind games.
• Calculating Shards reveal hidden pathways, messages and other tidbits, but can cause the patient to become cold in personality.
• Cunning shards help the player to maniupulate others and hide in plain sight, but make him extremley untrustworthy.
• Brash shards…well, that’s where I get stumped. No real benefits other than making the patient an idiot who just rushes into things? These could work like a burden – for 100% you might have to interact with quite a few brash shards.
• An alternative to Brash shards could be ‘Passion Shards’. You’d fall for traps and treachery easier, but the patient becomes better at getting the most out of another’s story, and having others assist him with puzzles and threats. He’d probably be more likley to break down crying as well.

Another use for mindshards comes in with saving various characters by finding their personal mindshards – these would be special mindshards that grant other bonuses. The player doesn’t have to save everyone and can keep the special shards for their own means, but bringing these characters to peace unlocks permanent bonuses that don’t quite make up for the shard, but can unlock additional areas of the Rave and any outlying region, and progress the story further. Many of these special shards would be either hidden, or in possession of other astral characters. This means the player would have to break them apart somehow. Since astrals don’t really die, but rather reassemble themselves as best they can, the player still has a chance to interact with that character later…though they might not be so happy the next time around…or they may become somebody else entirely.

That concludes the First diary entry with (almost) everything I have so far on this concept. In part 2, we’ll take a closer look at things, and hopefully this mess will start making more sense!

Developing game concepts

Whew this is late.

Before you start a concept, you need an idea to work from. Whether it’s a book, game, or film, the ideas will all come from similar stock – real life events and the conversations you’d have or overhear, crazy dreams or sexy nightmares. The idea can even have a source in another work, be it a song or a film or game, or some painting in the hall. A whole collection of things can form together and smack you in the mind whenever you least expect it.

And after that, you have to start formalising the idea for it to actually make any sense.

Developing a good concept for films or written works means coming up with Story, Setting, Character (s), Plot and Style. The delivery in both instances usually asks the viewer/reader to just absorb what they read, see and hear. The intended audience should get through these mediums regardless of any skills, and they will do so passively so long as the characters are interesting and plot isn’t a mess.
The same goes for Mr Moneyman listening in on your proposal. If he isn’t engaged, if he thinks (his idea of) the intended audience won’t be interested, then your project would never get past the concept stage.

In game design, developing a good concept runs deeper.

Your first priority always lies in formalising the gameplay. This is in turn requires understanding gameplay – you want to make an FPS, you better start actually playing some to see what each brings to the table in terms of challenge & content. You want to create an RPG though, and you have to take into account the technical aspects highlighted by most RPG’s – all the damage calculating and virtual dice rolls – along with a standard for storytelling quality.

Characters aren’t as important or even existent in some cases. In most games the player controls what ever be the ‘Protagonist’ is – be it a frog, a beach ball or whatever the hell Q-Bert is.

Kula World, a 1998 game where the player takes the role of a beach ball.

Plot is interchanged with the Goal if not intertwined – what is the player working for?  This is the victory condition, and a game with no goal is like a film or book with no plot – it just seems pointless. For games, coming up with a plot isn’t so important unless it’s a major selling point and the goal relies heavily on it.
In Kula World (1998, SCEE), the aim’s to unlock the next zone by getting the key. That involves a lot of bouncing and rolling about while not getting destroyed, falling off or just running out of time. There is no “plot”, but you don’t lose interest because there’s a goal – get the key to reach the next trippy level, going hand in hand with the compelling and somewhat addictive gameplay – get it fast enough and you proceed to the bonus stage. Once you have a basic idea of the game, it’s time to think out what makes getting that goal a challenge.

Rules define the game. Every game has a rule set, including the one you just lost, and it’s through the rules you provide a pathway for how your game turns out.
In Chess (1475, various), the goal is to capture the king. Now that’s not much of a game if you just grab the king piece and yell out “I win” like some incessant twat. In conceptualising Chess, the developer put rules in place that created the challenge. Pawns move up, can only capture pieces diagonally, rooks can move up a whole row or across a whole column, and knights move in an L pattern. The rules define Chess as a strategic game, the challenge being in managing your pieces to secure victory.

Setting expands itself into the overall level design, and is integrated with the story. This can range from intricately laid platforms for a platformer, dark & spooky locales for a horror title or massive set pieces for a First Person Shooter. Not only do they have to deliver the same impact as setting in a book or film, but more importantly they have to add to the gameplay. You might not be able to see what’s over the crumbling wall, or whatever’s lying in the dark. It’s not just monsters or space marines that can kill you, but the actual enviroment as well – such as the giant meatgrinders seen in Abe’s Oddysee (Oddworld Inhabitants, 1997).

Abe's Oddysee incorporated its globalised industrial setting into gameplay and level design, contrasting the lush but equally deadly natural areas (like the forests and caves) that also appeared in-game.

Of course once you’ve gotten the crux of the idea down on paper, it’s time to start prototyping it to see how it’d work. You test it, see what does and doesn’t work, go back and fix it, then test it out again. This can be as simple as something done on a cheap engine, or with a pen, paper and dice.

Testing is what finally sets the conceptualisation and formilisation of games apart from film and book. Novelists and filmmakers don’t really get this chance – though that’s probably why Alfred Hitchcock remade his own film…

Versions 1934 (right) and 56 (left).