Brian Crick

Story Outline

This entire section is spoilers. Proceed with caution!

The story is nonlinear and involves the main character Robin at 3 stages in her life; I will refer to them as Civilian Robin, Officer Robin and Captain Robin.

Main Menu

  • Main menu shows title card, falling bits of glass in space.
  • Player clicks on Start Story Mode (or somesuch) button.
  • Title fades out, camera zooms around bits of glass & other debris, settles on Captain Arroway stereoscope game.
  • Robin: I got this for my birthday. Wanna play?
  • Fade to white as stereoscope drifts towards camera.

Tutorial, Part 1

The Captain Arroway game of Robin’s serves the following purposes:

  • It introduces the player to the basic movement, interaction & combat (but not wiring) mechanics of the game.
  • It gives the player a sense of how Robin engages with the world, as she guides the player through the game.
  • As a game-within-a-game, it will reappear every now and then, between scenes, as a counterpoint to the game story proper.

Outline:

  • Captain Arroway title card.
  • Captain Arroway and old wise mentor type traveling towards dark, spooky alien ship with forest inside.
  • It is explained that Arroway and mentor are there to pick up diplomat and ferry them to peace conference.
  • Player lands in alien shuttle bay. Is greeted by tree person.
  • Movement controls are explained via signs in airlock, integrated into environment.
  • Player follows tree person to room with diplomat. Introductions are made.
  • Alien ship is attacked.
  • When player goes back to forest area, it is in shambles. Player must complete simple jumping puzzles to get back to shuttle bay.
  • Mentor cannot jump; have to jump to places and then create safe paths mentor can run over.
  • Combat controls are explained on doors/walls of tomb.
  • Tomb is filled with monsters to fight way through.
  • Monsters don’t stay dead long; goal is to protect mentor long enough to have mentor decipher writings on walls.
  • It is discovered that activating device requires one person’s consciousness to be locked into device, acting as mediator indefinitely.
  • Mentor punches Arroway out.
  • Arroway awakes to find mentor activating device.
  • Device is pretty and glowing.
  • Arroway tries to convince mentor not to go through with activation.
  • Various movie cliches are exchanged about mentor giving up life for this, knowing the whole time he’d never come back.
  • Device is activated.
  • Arroway runs back to ship.
  • Fade to ship model on Robin’s desk.

Prologue

Structural Purpose

  • Introduce player to era switching
  • Set up Robin as optimistic, enthusiastic, dreamer

Player Goal

  • Child Robin: get to shipyard ferry w/ Sam
  • Civilian Robin: get to work at restaurant
  • Lieutenant Robin: get to ship

Outline

  • Fade from Captain Arroway ship to model ship on desk in Child Robin’s room.
  • Quick cuts between Robin’s room in different eras as she gets ready in the morning.
  • Child Robin picks up model ship
    • Ship is held in front of her; she tilts the craft and makes whooshing sounds as you move around.
  • Sam meets Robin outside of door.
  • Follow Sam
  • Object passes in front of camera; Civilian Robin now
  • Get to trolley station at end of street
  • Press call trolley button; Lieutenant Robin now
  • Get on trolley
  • Get off trolley; back to Child Robin
  • Run along docks, jumping on shipping containers
  • More switches, see small children jumping on small boxes, not shipping containers
  • Get to restaurant
  • See holographic tour guide
  • As Lieutenant Robin, show papers to get on ship
  • Switch to Captain Robin — everything looks bleak, ruined
  • Get on hollow ship

Robin’s Childhood

Structural Purpose

  • Introduce player to character of Civilian Robin
    • She dreams about joining navy
    • She’s an engineer
  • Introduce player to Proserpina
    • Proserpina is a gas giant
    • Proserpina is home to, among other life, tinselflies
    • Tinselfly silk is used in creation of ship reactors
  • Introduce player to engineering glasses/wiring puzzles

Player Goal

  • Fix broken wind turbine
  • Follow navy officers to ship when storm breaks

Not sure about the exact order of these:

Outline

  • Start on transport to Proserpina
  • Exposition in background about this being new, largest shipbuilding facility
  • Transport goes to tinselfly farm
  • Robin in grade school
    • Storm drill (like tornado drill), everybody in small shelter with heads down
      • Robin has head up
      • Look around, see other student (Sam) with head up
      • Sam is reading Captain Arroway comic
      • Sam slides comic to you on floor
      • Take comic
      • Put tutorial here?
  • After school, follow mom to work at shipyard, building Hortensia
  • Need puzzle whose solution is getting Sam to join you after school, share in wonder of shipbuilding
  • Repeated runs from school to shipyard
    • At first, Sam runs with you
    • Button for calling trolley/crossing street/something like that at some point in journey
    • Convoluted path over office
    • Third time through, pressing button causes area to get old suddenly
    • Sam is not with you this time
    • As you move, everything decays
    • As you go over convoluted path, hear about how this is the last ship; nobody wants them anymore because of the wormholes
    • Objects pass in front of camera, Robin gets older, ship gets more done
    • By the time you get to ship, Sam is in uniform, ready to board
    • Festival going on — ticker tape, banners, balloons
    • Say goodbye to Sam
    • Ship launches
    • Turn around, as you walk (slowly) back home people are taking down decorations
  • Robin as teenager
    • Once off transport, co-worker alerts you to broken wind turbine on other side of farm.
    • Route to farm takes Robin by all steps of tinsel production process, in order
      • Tinselfly pen w/ships collecting tinsel
      • Loading area w/ships unloading tinsel
      • Tinsel being spooled up
      • Spools being loaded onto transport
      • Transport taking off
    • Robin gets to turbine
    • Turbine is fixed
    • Storm sirens go off

Tutorial, Part 2

During the second part of the tutorial, the player will be introduced to the concept of gaining volatile Traits and knowing a character to solve puzzles. Captain Arroway has found himself in a villain’s lair filled with Captain Arroway clones run amok. Captain Arroway has found his way to his ship, but needs to prove to his first officer that he’s the real Captain Arroway. Details. TBD, but should involve:

  • Captain Arroway demonstrating his flaws, as well as his strengths
  • Some goofy space opera tropes
  • Some exploration into the relationship between Captain Arroway and his first officer

Once Captain Arroway makes it onboard his ship, the tutorial ends. Robin comments: This is where the story really begins.

Introduction

The Introduction proper will involve all 3 versions of Robin getting to a ship, just like Captain Arroway.

  • Civilian Robin delivering supplies to the Hortensia, new flagship being built on Alcyone, her home world.
  • Rachel making her way to the Wisteria, current flagship which she is the captain of. Wisteria is currently at Alcyone.
  • Sam making his way to the Iris, former flagship but now spinning restaurant on Kora Lissa.

It might be cool if Robin and Rachel are traveling in opposite directions and cross paths at some point. These sequences should be reasonably emotionally charged and thematically related; I don’t want to start with something neutral or grindy. However, I’m not sure what makes each of them personal, except that maybe Sam is meeting a date and desperately needs to be on time and maybe buy a gift on the way or something.

Launch preparations

Sam wants Robin to help with grunt work at launch festivities. Navy is short staffed. Robin reluctant to go, but Sam promises something super-special will be revealed as part of the festivities. Puzzle involving Robin psyching herself up to go; player introduced to concept of imagined experiences having lasting benefits in the real world. Details TBD, but will involve a situation where Robin cannot say yes to Sam without a certain volatile Trait, but can only get said Trait by indulging in an absurd fantasy about how fun the grunt work will be.

Liverpool Rum

Might be interesting to have a bit with learning to play an abstract card game like Liverpool Rum with her dad / grandparent. Robin will complain that she doesn’t like abstract games, and the player will be plopped into a world made of cards (must try to make this feel non-Alice-in-Wonderland-y). In general, it might be good to explore relationships through how people play with each other.

Through the Wormhole

Not sure how we get to this scene really. Sam blindfolds Robin. Screen goes dark. Sam asks Robin to follow him. By this point, it should be established that Sam creates gems Robin can use and at first this is all she can see; every time Sam speaks, a gem appears. We hear various odd sounds and new gems start appearing; Robin can collect light gems to peek at surroundings a little bit but Sam will chastise her, no peeking. They reach destination; Robin opens eyes. Nice view of Kora Lissa, obvious we’re not on Alcyone anymore. Sam explains that Robin can simply walk to just about any planet in the empire via wormhole hub; she has x amount of time to get ingredients from various worlds for tonight’s feast. Any time leftover she can spend in Kora Lissa, but she absolutely has to be back to Alcyone by the time some easily visible event on Kora Lissa occurs (should have some sort of pretty, fairy tale quality to it, like ‘when the ‘ or something).

Fetch Quests

Direct continuation of last. Robin has to go to various world and pick up exotic ingredients for feast. Each ingredient’s quest will involve the same structure:

  • Walk through right wormhole.
  • Find market.
  • See some distinctive characters in the background who have just received the proverbial Call.
  • Dive into vignette (below) involving characters physically similar to characters in market.
  • Finish vignette.
  • Recieve ingredient.

Each vignette tells a little story about the history of this world.

Jennifer Ann Thing

~500 years before story proper. Player takes on role of princess in crappy relationship.

Memory Thing

~200 years before story proper. Player takes on role of old king fighting memory loss, and son trying to help him.

Waterbearer Thing

~50 years before story proper. Player takes on role of waterbearer for sports team playing in tournament on Alcyone. Kora Toralis has

Christening

Various minigames during launch festivities for Hortensia. Just some light character development & introduction to different ways gem collecting can be used in different situations. Possible activities:

  • Race around shipyard (Rachel reluctant race participant?)
  • Robin working as waitstaff at VIP dinner, frantically filling orders, busing, etc.
  • Carnival-like atmosphere with Sam running around trying to win enough tokens to get date prize; activities, which may be completed in any order or combination, might include:
    • Racing around shipyard
    • Dunk captain of Hortensia (target practice)
    • Shooting games showing off combat mechanics
    • Scavenger hunt

New Year’s Eve

Sam & date at New Year’s party on Kora Lissa. Things are a bit tense and awkward. Gravity goes out. Revelers start floating upward, Sam & date spinning and floating above rest of pack. Need to find something to hold on to; when you do, gravity returns. Other revelers fall out of frame. Screaming and shattering noises. We get glimpses of wispy things destroying parts of city; Sam & date run through city avoiding various dangers. Sam doesn’t make it; Wisteria launches

Searching for Survivors

Sam hunts for survivors of Kora Lissa attack. Jumping, lighting, gravity puzzles. Finds Iris at end of level, armor intact, housing lots of people.

Something about a Megastructure

Thematically, I think this has to be here but really fuzzy on the details. Crew of Wisteria discovers that cause of attacks is giant space-faring creatures far more intelligent than themselves. I hate the term ‘more advanced’, so here are some specifics:

  • Creatures have a writing system that involves dot-matrix-like printing from their hands; thing octopi emitting ink. They have a complex thought and slap something with their palms; their equivalent of a few paragraphs of our text appears on chosen surface.
  • Creatures can read a single palmprint as quickly as we could read a single word.
  • Creatures have similarly efficient visual communication (they live in space after all; no speaking) involving raising their hands and having different patterns flicker quickly across them.
  • Any devices the creatures use, any places the creatures go are covered in writings. One of these beings should be able to scan their surroundings in a few seconds and know exactly how to use a given device, how a structure is laid out or how to perform a specific task.

Crew finds themselves and their ship at home of creatures. There should be a puzzle involving characters trying to communicate with creatures; it may or may not be entirely successful. Crew discovers that they have been unwittingly providing creatures with materials to build moon-sized megastructure which is actually pretty cool, the same way the humans are using tinselflies to build spaceships. At first creatures keep poking and prodding at ship but one creature marks ship with palmprint and from that point forward everybody leaves it alone, except to look. Wisteria returns home.

Finale

Again, really not sure how I’m going to get here, and details are fuzzy. Robin has by this point been on various adventures trying to deliver some rare ? to ? near wormhole hub at Kora Lissa, having been led to believe (by Sam) that she is the only hope for this particular mission. But when Robin gets to ?, it turns out dozens of rare ?’s are needed. Robin is mortified. Robin looks to Sam for answers but gets a bit of a dressing down instead; does she really think the fate of the universe rested on her? Sam tried to tell her, but couldn’t bear to spoil Robin’s fun… Dwell on the bleakness of this for a moment. But, help is coming. Cue a couple dozen or so people pouring out of wormholes. The first few are the people we met during the fetch quests. (Can this be playable? Start with Robin, have her do something near a bridge and get a new companion; player controls both, they get another, etc, all the while Sam talking about how this is not about Robin) Action sequence involving all these different lone heroes marching on ?, in an almost dance-like fashion. I’d like to present it as something like, there are multiple platforming games happening simultaneously, with each character in a different plane, moving to the right, and at first you’re controlling Robin, but if/when Robin falls down, focus switches to another character, and if/when that character falls down you go back to Robin, and eventually all characters sort of sync up and they all jump when you press jump or all duck when you press duck, something like that, choreographed. Most everyone gets to the end, but Robin needs to be knocked unconscious in the process somehow.

Denouement

Robin wakes up. Her vision is seriously impaired; she’s been blinded somewhat. Everything looks like it did during the tutorial. Hortensia launches, full of refugees. Robin is not on board. Due to the destruction on Alcyone, part of the level now resembles the pattern described in Introduction. Player will walk through the pattern as before; the ship flying overhead this time is the Hortensia. Everything is still pixelly; Robin cannot see the launch well.

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Copyright © 2017 Brian Crick.