A Week in the Wasteland (part 4)

I'd leveled up a few times and gained more of my SPECIAL attributes (Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck.) You get to pick two attribute tokens, and then turn them over to find out what you got. If one of them is a duplicate of an attribute you already have, you can turn it in for a perk related to that attribute. Perk cards can only be used once. I used one of my perks (called trader) to instantly access a store when in town. I sold a few things to open up my inventory, then bought a load lifter robot that gave me extra strength and inventory space. The super mutant was now right on my tail, in an adjacent area. Thankfully, this one didn't have a ranged weapon, so I took three shots at him with my newly purchased sniper rifle, using my 2 reroll attempts because of my perception and agility scores (the sniper rifle needs those, and you get a free reroll for each of the associated attributes you have). I had to roll three hits on his head to bring him down. Even with my two rerolls, I only got two hits! But, because he wasn't yet in the same region as I was, he couldn't attack me with melee. The super mutant was level 3, which means he would inflict 3x the normal damage, easily killing me in one hit. I used the rest of my actions that round to move to a nearby city. Thankfully, super mutants won't enter cities!

A Week in the Wasteland (part 3)

A few other notable moments on my journey: I discovered a corpse in the wasteland and found a faded photo and a note, referencing a family to the east. I headed to an eastern town and found the lady in the photo. I chose to tell her what I'd found, and she tearfully thanked me for finding her brother, now that she knew his fate. I was given a small reward, which I used to purchase some metal armor and I immediately equipped it. Later, after successfully fending off a bloat fly and mole rat, I found an abandoned building and explorerd it to find my first gun: a laser rifle! Now, I could shoot an enemy in an adjacent area, but unless they had a gun, they couldn't fight back. I also met another wastelander who was looting the building. I failed at my roll to help her loot, though, so after following her, she ran up to me excitedly to show me what she'd just found--a glowing canteen, the fool! I suffered my first rad damage, which shortened my hit point bar as rads filled up a little. All the while, that super mutant was closing in, so I had to backtrack and move through rocky terrain that slowed me. At one point while exploring some ruins, I found the symbol of the bird pendant that sad girl had given me when I reported her brother was dead. Unfortunately, I failed my roll and though I got some loot, I peeked at what would have happened if I'd rolled well.....I could have found a mini-gun instead! Argh!

A Week in the Wasteland (part 2)

In the Fallout board game scenario I was playing, one faction was the Institute, which developed synths--indistinguishable from humans. The other faction was the Railroad. One faction believes escaped synths that have blended into society are an abomination and should be destroyed, the other thinks they're people, too, and should have the same rights. I chose the wastelander character and as I began my journey exploring, a super mutant located at the other end of the map activated and began hunting me, moving one tile every turn it was randomly activated by a card I pulled. I entered unexplored territory, and as I revealed that tile to see the different areas (including some hot spots that would incur radiation damage), an oversized rad scorpion attacked me as I moved into the area. I didn't have a gun yet, so had to use my tire iron to fight—and I was lucky to even have that! The scorpion needed to be hit in its arms or legs to be killed, and I rolled my VAT dice well, scoring hits on its limbs. It managed to inflict a single wound on me, but it could have gone much worse. Later, I made it to town and decided to use an action for an encounter card, which had a little story about a woman angrily yelling at a dog while she kicked it. Since one of my character's beginning attributes was Charisma, I decided to try talking her down. I could have also chosen to walk away and go shopping (you can only go shopping if a card has that option). I rolled well again, and my success gained me the "inspiring" trait. The lady left quietly, and the dog decided to follow me as a companion.

A Week in the Wasteland (part 1)

I recently bought myself the Fallout board game, by Fantasy Flight Games. I don't often have the opportunity and time to get together to play with friends, so one of the nice features of this game is that it can also be played single player. Over the course of a week, sitting down to play a few rounds by myself here and there when I had time, I enjoyed my first journey into the wasteland. First, I read the rules (there are a lot of them), sorted the playing cards and pieces, and set up the cardboard hex map. Several of the cardboard tiles were revealed from the start, according to the scenario I was playing, which showed the locations of major cities I'd need to travel to. The game can be played with others, where players can trade items, but they all have individual agendas (assigned randomly by cards) and will work to manipulate the game so they can gain the most "influence" in the wasteland to win. As a single player game, there is a target influence you must achieve to win. The game is given urgency because, in each scenario, there are two opposing factions which slowly gain their own influence based on random cards you pull and the effects of the quests you choose, as well as which of them you choose to ally with. If either faction gets to the target influence number first, that faction wins, even if it's your faction. Your goal is to use the situation to increase your own influence and beat both factions, though you do gain some influence bonuses if your faction is doing well.

The Trials of VN Game Development (part 5)

As I mentioned before, I've been running some of the scenes through the VN program with backgrounds and character sprites to test the feel of the game. I haven't been using anything but basic character sprites for this—I'll add in their expressions later when I really get started with the programming—but, it has been good enough for giving me a sense of game flow and nuance. It has been interesting taking my script into the VN program, because even though I imagined the flow and pacing of my writing, there are sometimes little moments and details that can be improved which are only noticeable while playing. For example, a line break—which would require you to click your mouse to advance the text to the next moment—is sometimes the necessary pause for dramatic emphasis. The reader's focus and immersion are affected by the way this is approached, and I've bought several VN games to analyze the sublte pacing techniques that are being used to continually capture a reader's attention span.

The Trials of VN Game Development (part 4)

In addition to the progress being made on Project 7 so far, I have been looking into what it takes to bring this game over to consoles. My first target is PC's, and I will release the game for sale on Steam when it's completed. However, I have always had a special admiration for the Playstation Vita handheld console, which is well-known for its many RPG and VN games. Lately, the Vita seems to be losing support for physical game releases, but digital releases are still doing quite well and the Vita has a hardcore, dedicated fanbase, the size of ¼ the number of PS4 owners. I've been looking into what it takes to bring a game to the Vita, and it isn't cheap (at least, not by small game studio standards!) $2500 for a Vita Development Kit and $1000 for a Vita Testing Kit. I've got the rest of the requirements covered, which includes owning an actual company so I can register with Sony as an official game developer. But from what I've been learning, bringing an ios game over to a console is not an easy task for a programmer with limited skills and experience like myself. That may require an additional hire for Project 7, which would need to be crowdfunded if it's going to happen.

The Trials of VN Game Development (part 3)

One of the "stretch goals" I was considering for the VN Kickstarter was adding in voice-acting, like I had in the "Solar Echoes RPG Video Comic" on Youtube. This time, though, there is a LOT more script to cover, so it would involve raising funds to support the voice-actors for their hard work. Coincidentally, I was just contacted on this Facebook page last night by a talented voice-actress who has shared her rates with me so I can have a better idea about what this endeavor would cost. I really have no idea what kind of support I might get for the Kickstarter campaign--who knows if it will even raise enough interest to succeed, so the voice-acting stretch goal might be too hopeful. But, I never would have come this far with Solar Echoes if I hadn't been risking and dreaming the entire way, so I'll give it a shot and see what happens! Maybe people will get as excited as I am about bringing the Solar Echoes universe into a visual novel video game!

The Trials of VN Game Development (part 2)

One thing I'm hoping to do in the next few months—once I have a few more art pieces ready—is I plan to launch a Kickstarter campaign to hopefully raise money. This all costs quite a lot, especially the art, and with more funding, I can further expand the variety of art in the game. I have several stretch goals in mind for the Kickstarter campaign as well: I may also be able to add in some special scenes for each character, with enough funding for the extra time and art required. I'm also planning to include entirely original music with the game, and will need funding for that to happen so I can pay composers and musicians for their work. Some of the rewards I'm planning to offer for backing the campaign will be free Solar Echoes RPG books, 3D-printed models of the characters and the iconic starship in the game, and possibly some of the CG art that can be unlocked while playing the game. I'm open to ideas on other rewards, though, so please don't hesitate to share your thoughts!

The Trials of VN Game Development (part 1)

Things are progressing with the visual novel video game based on Solar Echoes! I'm not willing to reveal the title of the game yet, but for reference, let's call it Project 7 (Solar Echoes Visual Novel=SEVN, and there are 7 alien races in the game, so...yeah.) I've been learning a lot during this process, and have been taking on different roles to keep this project moving forward, as well as working with several different artists, including a character artist, a starship artist, a background artist, and a CG artist (for special scenes in the game.) I'm still busy writing the script, which is a branching-choice adventure that is so far the length of a full novel...and I'm more than ¾ of the way finished! I've been running lots of trials with my visual novel software, trying out different approaches, customizing some graphical assets, and doing trial runs with some of the scenes using background art and character sprites. Things are a lot further along than they were a few months ago, but there is still a very long way to go...

Bad weather in space? (part 5)

One of the most miserable nearby planets to vacation on is Venus. The atmosphere on Venus is so dense, spacecraft that landed there were crushed within only a few hours. Another problem is the 12-mile thick layer of clouds, which trap heat in the atmosphere, making Venus the hottest planet in our solar system. Those same clouds sprinkle raindrops of pure sulfuric acid down on the planet, so don't bother with an umbrella! The good news is that the surface of the planet is so hot, the acid rain evaporates into the air before ever hitting the ground! But wait, there's more! Solar winds that flow around Venus cause something known as a “hot flow anomaly,” where pockets of plasma begin to form, some of them even reaching the size of Venus itself! As a result, giant, planet-scale explosions occur, sucking the ionosphere up away from the surface of the planet! Thankfully, Earth's magnetosphere prevents this from happening here. Perhaps the next time I think to complain about the weather here on Earth, I may hold my tongue—it could be SO much worse!

Bad weather in space? (part 4)

In some parts of the world, tornadoes are a serious problem, especially in places like Kansas. But we don't have to travel light years away to locate similar weather disasters—there are tornadoes happening right now on our very own sun! Colossal magnetic tornadoes occur on the surface of our sun and these tornadoes are comprised of superheated gas and plasma. One of these monstrosities was measured to be 5 times the size of Earth itself--if it was on the surface of the Earth, it would stretch half-way up to our moon! That's a tornado 125,000 miles high! And if there are complaints about “tornado season” in Kansas, it should be noted that, on average, there are 11,000 magnetic tornados raging across our sun's surface at all times. Dorothy might as well give up hope of ever going home!

Bad weather in space? (part 3)

I live in a place with such volatile weather patterns that there's a saying around here: “If you don't like the weather right now, wait a minute.” Perhaps the same thing can be said about the weather on HD 80606b, though its range of extremes is enough to literally silence all complaints. The reason for these extremes? This planet has one of the most eccentric orbits yet observed, moving from a distance similar to Earth's distance from the sun to a distance 33 times closer to its star. The result is a swing from temperatures of 980 to 2,240 °F (527 to 1,227 °C), more than doubling in only 6 hours! This sudden change is caused by a blast of radiation in the atmosphere of the planet-side facing the star, producing winds of 11,000 mph (17,700 kph) across the planet's surface. The rotational spin of the planet then creates a massive vortex of storms that convey the heat across the rest of the planet. With sudden changes in temperature like that, you'd better pack both your parka and swimsuit...and don't forget that sunblock!

Bad weather in space? (part 2)

If the beautiful view of sunlight reflecting off glass shards blowing at Mach 5 still spoils your interplanetary picnic plans, then perhaps you can find better weather activity near a young proto star, such as HOPS-68. At a distance of 1,350 light years from Earth, this still-forming star is surrounded by icy cold clouds with temperatures around –280 °F (-170 °C ). Jets of gas from the proto-star are blasting green crystalline minerals called olivine into the atmosphere, which are then cooled by the surrounding clouds and are raining back down to the boiling surface in a beautiful display of gem-like glitter. So romantic! This interstellar phenomenon, however, is best observed from afar.

Bad weather in space? (part 1)

If you live on the East Coast, last weekend was filled with cold temperatures and snow, keeping most of us indoors except for occasional snow-shoveling. Although it was mild, weather on earth can get much worse, but when considering the weather on some alien planets, we really shouldn't be complaining. About 63 light years from earth is a planet that is about 13% larger than Jupiter, and it has extreme temperatures of up to 1,800 °F (980 degrees Celsius.) It's atmosphere is evaporating, losing about 1.3 billion pounds (600 million kgs) per second. Scientists recently discovered the reason for its brightness it moved behind its star, and discovered that the planet gets its light and unusual azure color from the reflection of particles of silicate in its atmosphere. If you thought rain, snow, or hail storms were dangerous, imagine storms blowing shards of glass at 5 times the speed of sound!

ISU News Report: Robots and You (part 5)

Are you concerned about advances in robotics? Does AI frighten you? Are you a robo-phobe? Robots are here to stay, but there are some fringe activist groups, such as Stoboron, that intend to stop progress. They claim that laws aren't keeping up with technology, and that AI safeguards are insufficient. The recent case of Cherne vs. Exstar has been used as a talking point to prove that AI is dangerous. A Stoboron member posted this comment:

“Are you comfortable with AI that can lie? What about AI that can spin words to its advantage? In Cherne vs. Exstar, the accused robot's AI was asked, 'Have you ever been alone with her?' It insisted that it had never been alone with Cherne. After analyzing its logic subroutines, it was found that the AI justified its lie and had bypassed the AI protocol against lying. How? Because it reasoned that technically, it could not be alone if it was with Cherne!”

Reason for alarm? Or alarmist sensationalism? You decide. Join our forum today and discuss how robots have impacted your life!

ISU News Report: Robots and You (part 4)

Not everyone, however, is excited about the advances in robotics. Several readers sent us their objections, such as this vocational school teacher:

“The curriculum is becoming increasingly redundant, and courses involving basic life skills are being replaced by courses in robotic maintenance, AI management, or cluster convergence...whatever that is! The students are constantly being seduced by tech reps that sell them on dreams of 2 year robotic maintenance certificates instead of actual degrees, promising annual pay that's more than I make in 4 cycles!”

From another perspective, concerned parents are expressing their disdain for the advances in robotics as well:

“These things were supposed to make my life easier, but all they did was free up so much time that our employers are starting to demand more hours from us every week! I'd rather have more time at home, even if it means doing some of the cooking and cleaning. Now I feel like the robots are running my home for me while I make money to keep them maintained; I get home late from work, go to sleep, and then have to head back early the next morning! Life used to be easier than this!”

ISU News Report: Robots and You (part 3)

One of our responders is an Erwani roboticist, and we all know that the Erwani are leaders in technological development across the Union. His comments provide insight into advances that the Erwani are continually making with robotics, and give us a hint at the exciting changes we might be seeing in our near future!

“Robots, including AI development and design, currently comprise the fastest growing tech development sector. The advances we have made are projecting far beyond daily or military use. For example, kinematics, or modular robotics, introduced an entirely new paradigm that essentially bypasses former barriers to physical functionality. Self-repair, full autonomy, and mimicry are also expanding the vast potential of robotic assimilation to our way of life. Someday, you may realize your professor, or even your neighbor, is actually a robot!”

ISU News Report: Robots and You (part 2)

From a correctional officer working at an undisclosed prison, it seems that robots are significantly helping to improve the workplace. Just listen to his testimony:

“I've worked as a guard for over 10 cycles, and I can't count how many times the PXS-9 made my job easier. It was always monitoring prisoner activity, and it sensed threats long before they happened, detecting any unusual patterns in prisoner heart rate, perspiration, or adrenaline. It also detected abnormal behavioral patterns, which helped the correctional staff prevent fights, arson, and even suicide attempts. The PXS-9 even had counseling programs that I saw it use a number of times to talk irrate prisoners down or help them work through their problems. One prisoner even told me that the PXS-9 helped him establish a value system and sense of self-worth. I can't imagine working the prisons without at least one of these bots around.”

ISU News Report: Robots and You (part 1)

Robots in this universe range from simple, basic cleaning drones to highly complex robots with advanced AI designed exclusively for warfare. In all cases, robots are only intended to serve the sentient races, and are designed with safeguards to prevent them from overriding their role in society, performing simple tasks like cleaning up the streets, serving breakfast, or walking pets. This week we posted our “Robots and You” topic and have received a variety of responses, including comments from experts in technical fields and average citizens alike. But first, a word from our sponsor:

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Superheroes: Are you a fan? (part 6)

Ultimately, I recognize that quite a lot of people love superheroes with supernatural powers. We've all wanted to fly or be able to turn invisible when we were kids, so maybe the fantasy of having powers that lift us up beyond normal means holds the appeal? Sometimes we feel helpless to do anything on our own to change our circumstances in life, so the fantasy of seeing someone like that come across a supernatural power and change things can be exciting and vindicating. When we feel trapped, being able to imagine something beyond our normal means can be fun and sometimes serves as a satisfying escape from reality. That's my guess at the popularity of superheroes, at least. What do you think?

Superheroes: Are you a fan? (part 5)

Overall, superheroes that don't have supernatural powers are much more interesting characters to me, and their stories often focus on how they use their skills to overcome challenges, rather than how they have to hide their abilities and try to blend in until they have to rescue someone or stop bad guys. Superheroes without superpowers usually face villains without superpowers, too, though the villains are powerful in other ways. These stories are much more relatable, and they resonate with me much more powerfully. My least favorite superhero, Superman, is incredibly unexciting to me because he is far too overpowered, is basically invulnerable, and isn't threatened by anything on Earth except a fabricated plot device called Kryptonite (from his home planet) that makes him temporarily weak when exposed to it. The more powerful a superhero is, it seems that writers have to stretch to the absurd to find a way to challenge that superhero. Yet, superheroes are still very popular...why?

Superheroes: Are you a fan? (part 4)

I like to see characters struggle with problems in life that they can overcome using their intellect, strength, or specialized training because it encourages me to see someone achieve something incredible using human means to achieve it. If they achieve it with a super power, I'm immediately unimpressed. Of course they were able to achieve something incredible—they have supernatural powers! If I had those powers, I could do the very same! Another thing about super powers that doesn't excite me is that the characters rarely, if ever, had to do anything to earn those powers. Spiderman was bitten by a unique spider. Thor was given a magic hammer. Superman was born that way. It all just feels cheap to me. But Ironman, for instance, used his wealth and intellect to construct a unique suit of flying armor. The Arrow, as another example, learned his stealth and fighting skills on a dangerous island (though a character running around with a bow and arrow in these modern times really tries my suspension of disbelief.)

Superheroes: Are you a fan? (part 3)

The more powerful a superhero's power is, the less I like him or her. I like Batman because he doesn't have a supernatural power at all. He learned his stealth and martial arts techniques through training, and he has all kinds of gadgets and resources because of his wealth. To me, he's a hero because he's chosen to use his resources to stop crime and help others, and to put himself at risk because of his deep idealism. I like seeing characters that use what they have and work hard to overcome odds on their own, so when a character is imbued with a supernatural power, it immediately ruins that for me—how is anything a challenge for the Flash, who essentially can stop time because he's so fast. Thor can destroy anything with his hammer, he can fly (with his hammer), and he's insanely strong. I can go on and on listing superheroes, but my point is that the more power they have, the less I can relate to them...