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What is Synaesthesia?

Section8

Cipher
Joined
Oct 23, 2002
Messages
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Wardenclyffe
Your world is a womb.

The enveloping warmth eclipses <i>everything</i>, and your mind gazes into a gently pulsing void, occasionally pushing shapeless but pleasant images into the nothingness. An almost casual sense of alarm sweeps through you - the pulse is quickening, becoming more urgent. Before despair can tighten its constricting bonds, you're awake.

With entirely too much effort, you peel back your eyelids, and then blink. Repeatedly. Doing so fails to wash the image of your surroundings from your eyes, a fact surprising only to the newly wakeful. Not that your surroundings are unpleasant, just completely unfamiliar. You turn to your brain, hoping for some insight into the situation, It simply shrugs and regards you with the cautious eyes of a stranger.

It has a point.

Wait, what?

You could have sworn you had some kind of self-awareness yesterday, maybe even a whole identity. This thought bounces around inside your head without really sinking in. It simply defies comprehension within these walls which are strange enough in themselves. Something about their geometry, their texture is unsettling. Or perhaps it's the dawning realisation that you're not just seeing these walls. You can almost hear the subtle nuance of the wallpaper and taste the pristine finish of the wood paneling.

Rather than let these perverse thoughts gnaw at your fragile psyche for too much longer, you throw back the bed covers that might be <i>too</i> comfortable and swing your feet onto the carpet that feels almost as red as it looks. Outside of this room there's bound to be someone or something with a clue as to what's going on. You stand up and try to push back the horrific thought blazing a bloody crimson riot through your grey matter:

Your world is a tomb.

___________________________________

The world you've woken into is the gameworld of <i>Synaesthesia</i>. What is <i>Synaesthesia</i>? It's a tl;dr word that makes for a cumbersome game title that will inevitably be colloquialised into something much shorter. Literally, it's a condition where your senses get their wires crossed, with effects ranging from perceiving letters or numbers as colours, to being able to taste or see music. It's a common theme throughout the game itself, and marries with the interface to form a <i>numberless</i> RPG, with colours and shapes taking their place.

So how best to talk about it? Answer questions nobody has even asked yet!

<b>What is the game?</b>

Synaesthesia is a horror-themed RPG focused on an ensemble cast and the evolution of a narrative created through the player's actions and the supporting cast's reactions. It's <i>Lost</i> meets <i>Silent Hill</i>, with thirteen strangers imprisoned inside a twisted nightmare world, and relying on each other to survive and possibly escape. The game is presented as a digital graphic novel, and focuses only on significant/enjoyable content, keeping downtime "out of frame".

<b>Why create this game?</b>

This is the game I was born to make. It's the outlet for my passion of game development, with the freedom that being an indie developer can provide. It is born out of over twenty years of gaming “research” and countless discussions of design. That and a very big part of me wants to prove that a game can take advantage of the strengths of the CRPG medium without straying from P&P roots, and without insulting the intelligence of the end user. Synaesthesia is an attempt to be a CRPG done right - nothing too wildly unfamiliar, just a collection and evolution of the high points of the genre.

<b>Where does the game take place?</b>

The game takes place in a "broken" facsimile of the real world. Imagine a tangent world, split from the early 20th century, but continuing to imitate progress using the existing technology of the time. In that way, the world is full of familiar objects, nearly all of which are perverse replicas - the fantastic science of Wells or Verne shaped to look something like our own 21st century world. The "smaller picture" sees the player within the well-appointed hamlet of Wardenclyffe inside this twisted gameworld.

<b>What do I control?</b>

The player controls a single character who they initially define, and continue to develop as the game progresses. They can also influence the NPCs of the game through social interactions, though they never take active control of them. The collective activities of the community are important, and the character has varying degrees of control over the choices the community makes and the moral compass of the group.

<b>What is the main focus?</b>

The main focus of Synaesthesia is for the player and their companions to tell a notable story. Ideally, this involves survival, and some resolution to the dilemma of their imprisonment. In essence, the player should enjoy the minute-to-minute aspects of the game, and not merely be chasing a predefined storyline. They should approach all choices with curiosity as to how the game will respond and adapt.

<b>What’s different?</b>

A lot. Synaesthesia is intended to fly in the face of mainstream RPG offerings, but not to the point of being inaccessible for most gamers. Rather than opting for the expansive world that is current en vogue with today's RPGs, Synaesthesia keeps the scope to a minimum, and focuses on exploring characters and possibilities as opposed to locations.

Synaesthesia also moves away from the tradition of stat crunching that is prevalent in all RPGs. The player still develops their character, but through different methods, generally directly tied to the narrative. Other statistical information is conveyed through visual cues and textual descriptions.

The setting moves far, far away from the typical. High fantasy and space opera are nowhere to be seen, instead, replaced with haunted mansions, albeit fucked-up, broken imitations of haunted mansions. The synaesthetic elements alter the perception of the world.

Also, the key element of an ensemble cast removes the annoyance of shallow NPCs who either repeat themselves, others, or serve merely as quest dispensing automatic tellers. Instead, the limited number of NPCs allows players to explore personalities in depth, in the manner of traditional "party NPCs", but without rigidly defined personae, and a linear narrative script. In reality, a person spends most of their social time with the people they choose to have around them, so it seems strange that most CRPGs have the character spending more social time with complete strangers in need of an adventurer.

The game also features a fresh twist on turn based combat. Each "turn" is framed as graphic novel "strips" (typically of around 2-3 panels) - showing any significant actions, and their outcome. This keeps turns short and keeps the gameplay flowing. It also addresses the stylistic issues the abstraction of turn-based systems present. There are no drawn out periods of non-interactivity, and the sequential nature is a necessity of the storyboard style presentation.

The AI does not necessarily attempt to be “smart”, but instead strives toward interesting behaviours. For instance, creatures may be hostile toward a certain colour, or thirst for blood. They may be deaf, blind or numb. AI may respond to other AI shouts, actions or vocals of characters. A broad range of variables encourage differing behaviours, rather than an attempt at displaying “intelligence”.

<b>Why graphic novel-style?</b>

In the original concept, the idea was to use a phase-based combat system, with multiple tracks for movement and actions. The player would keyframe a phase worth of action and watch it play out. However, after prototyping the idea, it was clear that the scope of the game didn't warrant that degree of complexity. The system was too cumbersome for simple actions, and planning a phase was unnecessarily time-consuming.

So, having drawn the original multitracking idea from 3D animation software, I stepped back to how animations are conveyed to the layman. Storyboarding. The idea of plotting "key" frames visually and sequentially greatly simplifies the player interaction, but still maintains the complexity of actions possible with a turn based system.

The system overall has many advantages. It's a neat abstraction of turn-based combat. Short turns mean more frequent interaction, less "enemy movement downtime". Irrelevant content can be simply left out of frame, and the sequential nature is more forgivable when inactive participants are not seen. Also, the selective framing of action makes it easier to fudge animations and positioning where required.

Outside of combat, it provides a neat way to present dialogue in pure textual format, since VO is prohibitive. It also reduces the need for lipsynching and transitioning of facial animation, while still facilitating single frame facial expressions. In short, presenting the game as a graphic novel is a way to greatly cut down on animation assets, while also dressing the game in a unique and visually striking style.

___________________________________

That's part of a nutshell. Why am I telling you? Why am I talking about a game that is at this point, nothing more than a concept and an insignificant handful of art assets? For a couple of reasons:

First of all, I've got a heap of design that makes sense to me, but I want to explain and expound the concept, both as a whole and with lower level detail. With a bit of curiosity from you guys, I can better nail down the design docs.

Second of all, I want to sanity check some ideas and bounce them around inside more than just my own head. I think I have a lot of good ideas and a solid concept, but I'm also aware that I'm overly ambitious with the whole thing, and possibly quite mad.

Last of all, I'm looking to get a programmer on board. I can find my way around code, but it takes me a long time and the end results are usually horribly inefficient. So I need some help, and it would also be good to have a second head to nut out various concepts and designs.

So rip into it. Ask me questions, criticise my methods, offer yourself to me, whatever takes your fancy. I'll be steadily discussing the "finer" points of the design as I go along, and might even consider throwing open the doors of my design wiki if people would like to dig through of their own volition.
 

Jason

chasing a bee
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Messages
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baby arm fantasy island
The game also features a fresh twist on turn based combat. Each "turn" is framed as graphic novel "strips" (typically of around 2-3 panels) - showing any significant actions, and their outcome. This keeps turns short and keeps the gameplay flowing. It also addresses the stylistic issues the abstraction of turn-based systems present. There are no drawn out periods of non-interactivity, and the sequential nature is a necessity of the storyboard style presentation.
Is there any way you can show some kind of mockup example of this?
 

Human Shield

Augur
Joined
Sep 7, 2003
Messages
2,027
Location
VA, USA
Synaesthesia also moves away from the tradition of stat crunching that is prevalent in all RPGs. The player still develops their character, but through different methods, generally directly tied to the narrative. Other statistical information is conveyed through visual cues and textual descriptions.

Hopefully you will go further on this, although a fear that numbers can hurt story is completely irrational and shortsighted. Have you look into indie P&P RPGs that have different mechanics then D&D?

I would suggest looking into Dogs in the Vineyard, Dust Devils, and Dead of Night. Numbers can help create story and dynamically build into suspense and release, you just can't be afraid to go abstract or meta in areas.

How dynamic or scripted is the content? Players already have MYST games with weird worlds and lots of backstory.
 

cardtrick

Arbiter
Joined
Apr 26, 2007
Messages
1,456
Location
Maine
Wow. I had a hard-on reading this, but I'm not totally sure whether it was what you were saying or the porn on my other monitor.

Still, it sounds great, and I think it's safe to say that there are few people who have thought as deeply about RPG design as you have. I'm fascinated by where this going and I deeply hope that you are able to follow through on this.

I wish I could offer my services as a programmer, but except for web stuff I'm in the same boat you are. However, if you ever want someone to start a 10 page argument about a line of dialog in your forums, you know I'm good for it.
 

Cthulhugoat

Arbiter
Joined
Nov 25, 2006
Messages
1,214
Location
Land of big butts
Nice concept, man. By the way, Section8, have you ever played I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream, an old adventure game based on Harlan Ellison's short story of the same name?

Also, are you going to do a lovecraftian scenario too? :D
 

Section8

Cipher
Joined
Oct 23, 2002
Messages
4,321
Location
Wardenclyffe
baby arm said:
The game also features a fresh twist on turn based combat. Each "turn" is framed as graphic novel "strips" (typically of around 2-3 panels) - showing any significant actions, and their outcome. This keeps turns short and keeps the gameplay flowing. It also addresses the stylistic issues the abstraction of turn-based systems present. There are no drawn out periods of non-interactivity, and the sequential nature is a necessity of the storyboard style presentation.
Is there any way you can show some kind of mockup example of this?

Yep, it's something I'm working on - getting some mocked up screens for the various aspects of gameplay. Stay tuned.

So you're not trying to get out of game development?

As long as it's strictly amateur, I'm good with it.

Hopefully you will go further on this, although a fear that numbers can hurt story is completely irrational and shortsighted. Have you look into indie P&P RPGs that have different mechanics then D&D?

The numbers are still there under the hood, and they're still significant. It's just not important for the player to consider the numbers at anything more than a macroscopic level, so they're abstracted accordingly. More important than exact values is the relativity to your peers. Whether you can bench 250lb or 260lb - you're going to be doing strong guy stuff.

How dynamic or scripted is the content? Players already have MYST games with weird worlds and lots of backstory.

Dynamism is a key feature. There's no established storyline, but there's a lot of effort being put toward creating dynamic situations and effectively recognising them within a narrative context. For instance, there are a variety of dynamics that might cause power lines to be cut, and as a fairly critical resource - the character and their peers recognise the problem and address it. Ideally, this should also snowball - a character on life support, frozen food, research/engineering, etc, all become complicated by a loss of power. The tricky part is getting a system that is robust enough to recognise not only critical events, but the interactions between them. I hope it's going to be worth it.

I'll also have a look at those P&P systems you mentioned, care to give a quick rundown of their high points?

By the way, Section8, have you ever played I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream, an old adventure game based on Harlan Ellison's short story of the same name?

No, but I'm sure I had read about it once upon a time and I'm sure it struck a chord with me. Potentially, Synaesthesia can explore the same "imprisoned by an AI in a virtual world" concept, but the kicker is that there's no one particular truth, and there are countless ways to make simple but dramatic alterations. For instance, if you assume the world is computer generated: Is it torture? Is it a game? Is your physical self alive? Etc.

This is one of the main reasons why I'm opting for a small gameworld and a handful of characters. It leaves me free to design many variations and dynamics so hopefully by the end, the player has experienced something with the same core gameplay but a completely different narrative to the next person who plays it. The obvious risk is that none of the scenarios wind up being particularly interesting, and the overall narrative wanders too much, but I'm fairly confident of achieving something compelling.

Anyway, thanks everyone for the kind words. I'll be opening up various thread discussing the design in more detail, but don't hesitate to ask about anything in the meantime.
 

Kingston

Arcane
Joined
Jan 13, 2007
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I lack the wit to put something hilarious here
Release date? ZOMG KIDDING.

Seriously, sounds kinda cool. If you haven't done so already, I suggest you pick up some case studies from psychology for ideas into how fucked up some characters may be. I suggest Oliver Sacks to start off with easy and then move onto the heavier stuff.
 

Palmer Eldritch

Educated
Joined
Nov 10, 2007
Messages
50
I might have failed my reading comprehension check, but...

I'm visualizing a surreal choose-your-own-adventure comic book of sorts. Can you be more specific regarding:

- viewpoint and exploration. wil every event and movement be presented in the comic panel format?

- what is the nature of the threat, and in what ways can you counter this. Lovecraftian horrors, or maybe good ole zombies? Is survival about combat and/or gathering of food?I get the impression that you have something more original in mind. How far are you willing to go with the synasthesia concept, and how will it come into play?

You definitely have the writing talent to pull this off, I really hope you get someone on board to help you with the programming.
 

Jaesun

Fabulous Ex-Moderator
Patron
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May 14, 2004
Messages
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Seattle, WA USA
MCA
WILL I BE ABLE TO COMPLETELY AVOID COMBAT BY PLAYING A DIPLOMATIC FRENZIED BERSERKER?

This sounds AWESOME. This is my favorite type of setting, and the gameplay sounds quite intriguing. I quickly put this game in my Top 5 games I am waiting to buy.

Good luck with this!
 

Red Russian

Scholar
Joined
May 29, 2006
Messages
164
BUT TEH REEDING IS TEH HARD!!!!11111 ZOMG!!!11

AND WUT PIKSEL SHAYDER WILL TEH WORDZ USE!!!1111! PIKSEL SHAYDER 10 FTW!!!!

Sounds cool as well. Good luck, dude.
 

Palmer Eldritch

Educated
Joined
Nov 10, 2007
Messages
50
Heh, it's a good album, I picked up a used copy without any foreknowledge. It's one of my favorites within the genre. Interesting song, but I recall that there are even better tracks on the rest of the cd.
 

Sovy Kurosei

Erudite
Joined
Dec 29, 2004
Messages
1,535
What language is the game going to be in? That could help you find the guy you are looking for. I wish I could help but all I know is PHP and some Eiffel.
 

slipgate_angel

Scholar
Joined
Aug 15, 2007
Messages
288
Location
Texas
Synaesthesia also moves away from the tradition of stat crunching that is prevalent in all RPGs.
The AI does not necessarily attempt to be “smart”, but instead strives toward interesting behaviours. For instance, creatures may be hostile toward a certain colour, or thirst for blood. They may be deaf, blind or numb. AI may respond to other AI shouts, actions or vocals of characters. A broad range of variables encourage differing behaviours, rather than an attempt at displaying “intelligence”.

Two of the reasons why I love the idea of your game...well that, and the Silent hill meets lost part.

This sounds better than the game I had in mind, which was basicly Icewind dale meets FLCL. :cry:
 

Red Russian

Scholar
Joined
May 29, 2006
Messages
164
Every fucking jap horror game beats every fucking western-style horror game.

Period.

Psychological horror is the only interesting horror.
 

Kinsman

Novice
Joined
Jan 1, 2007
Messages
8
If you're wondering about how to write the mechanics for the game, there's been some research and previous attempts on how to write a game with dynamic plot:

King Of Chicago

Storytron

It's a difficult thing to write, but possible and very rewarding.
 

Section8

Cipher
Joined
Oct 23, 2002
Messages
4,321
Location
Wardenclyffe
Cheers for more kind words, folks!

- viewpoint and exploration. wil every event and movement be presented in the comic panel format?

Pretty much. During general play fine location is irrelevant, so you move from room-to-room almost like you would in a text adventure, though it's all graphically driven. You can interact with the people and objects within the room you're in through a system of menus. The idea is to have something along the lines of Darklands - where you cut out the "dead wood" of watching your character walk from one side of the screen to another, and focus directly on the meaningful interactions at hand.

- what is the nature of the threat, and in what ways can you counter this. Lovecraftian horrors, or maybe good ole zombies?

I'm hoping that I can build up a content base where there's no single answer to that question. The ideal is to have a range of sources, a range of motivations, differing sets of monsters and as much interchangeability as is reasonable. So maybe the cause is an Elder God, maybe it's a human-engineered virus, etc. with different resolutions accordingly. I'd also like to have as much or as little control over it as the script calls for, so the random generators can go wild, or you can have nothing but zombies in completely oppressive numbers.

As for how it gets countered, there's a synergy between the various roles characters can take on. In some ways, it's like a vastly scaled down X-Com, where you need a combination of combat, research and engineering to not only discover the ultimate threat, but to keep up with an increasing difficulty curve.

Is survival about combat and/or gathering of food?I get the impression that you have something more original in mind.

Survival depends on a few basic needs (which will be covered in more detail sometime in the future) - Sustenance, Social Interaction, Security and Relaxation. Without the resources to satisfy all of them, the community slowly fails. There's a lot of play within those simple needs too. Security might be threatened by something as simple as giant bats attacking by night, or it might be something like The Thing. As long as the dynamic elements of the game can maintain steady pressure, the only real limitation is in the content.

How far are you willing to go with the synasthesia concept, and how will it come into play?

It's something that's present throughout the interface as a means of conveying numerical data as colours and geometry, and this concept blurs into the character's perception too. I want to derive audio from game context, so the player can potential perceive data from what they hear...

But most of all, I want it to be thoroughly explored in the character's social interactions and some abstract prose. As with most of the planned features it becomes a matter of drawing a line somewhere between ambition and a finished product.

Will it be like those hentai games?

It's funny, I stumbled upon the "visual novel" moniker and briefly thought "hey that's probably a reasonable analogy for what I want to achieve!" - until I read the wikipedia entry. I think gameplay and modestly sized eyeballs are the crucial differences.
 

Human Shield

Augur
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Sounds a lot like the "random haunted mansion generator" idea I had a while ago.

Definitely check out the old PC game Realms of the Haunting. Seems to have a lot of similarities but a problem in a lot of adventure type games is illogical puzzles.

Red Russian said:
Every fucking jap horror game beats every fucking western-style horror game.

Period.

Psychological horror is the only interesting horror.

A lot of jap horror only pretends to be psychological. The most shared elements is that the ghost is always fucking invincible and rarely follows rules, I think in the Grudge the ghost can just appear anywhere and kills security guards that get in the way, and nothing ever stops it.
 

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