Hello to one and all, it has been a while since I’ve been active on the forums. Know that summer is here, I have considerably more time available to work of projects that I feel a personal investment in.
Lost Code, in a very infantile state, was posted here on the forum some time back. However it has gone over several revisions as well as what I would like to say a fair amount of progress. At the time of this thread’s creation, it sits at around twenty-thousand words. The original concept has been revised, one or two unnecessary proper nouns removed, and a new place in my withered prune of a heart.
Explore a withered earth through the eyes of a mechanical being, and see just what fate means to both you, and the being you control.
I have reached a point where I would like to present it here in an Alpha Test, in order to receive feedback as to what works and what doesn’t. I mean that in both the sense of story direction and presentation, but also in the discovery of any way to break it that I have missed.
might not be the most pleasant modification to look at, but it will have to do for now. With that done, you feel much for secure. The weapon is a reassuring weight in the current circumstances, you just hope that you will not have to use it. It should be much more.
You step falters for a moment your pace is thrown off by concussive force passing through the door, followed quickly by the sound of an explosion tearing apart concrete and metal. The attackers either have gotten “Your” . Also, add some commas or a conjunction to the first sentence.
The sound of gunfire and destruction no longer have a barrier be muffled behind, to be
The carcases of the simple machines either riddles with bullet hole ____ riddled
your servos will still need time to move your form. ----- servos?
For the part after I was attempting to save the organics by killing the organics and got bombed----You should put quotation marks around speech to separate it from internal dialogue.
Well this is certainly interesting. A unusual point of view to be sure, and that 4th wall break came outta nowhere. But hey, looking forward to the next updade
To start off, a thank you to all of you who responded so quickly, and with positive impressions to boot. I am glad that it’s thus far an interesting read.
Now:
@Lybza
What? I would have no idea what you could ever be talking about? I mean, Zero? That’s a number, totally not a video game character ninja person. I mean, that sounds ridiculous. Although, I suppose, a conclusion like that isn’t entirely unfounded.
@Sovereign2Lilith
Thank you very much for catching the issues you posted, I’ve corrected them in my local copy, I’ll push them after a little while so as to not interrupt anyone currently reading.
However, In regards to the “servos?” are you inquiring as to what a servo is? If that is the case then: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Servomechanism. Int his instance, it’s more tech speak to reinforce the fact that you have robot arms.
@nightflame
That difference in kind, and jarring suddenness were my intention there actually. It might be a bit heavy-handed, but I would like to place the player in a position of regarding the Main Character as a separate entity.
@Coal_95
Yeah I can understand creating this separation between player and mc, kinda like a Baten Kaitos vibe. Have to ask though, who are we talking to? Doesn’t seem to be the mc.
@nightflame
They are in fact not the MC, they are intended to be played as an entity separate from both the intended narrative, i.e. the ordinary progression of the game, as well as a third party perspective able to look on and judge both the MC and the player as separate entities. I’m not entirely sure how well the current implementation of that works, but there it is. Their actual nature is something that, based on their nature in regards to the narrative, is not able to be concretely described within it.
I could come out and explicitly describe who and what they are, but there is something I intend to do within the work itself that should provide some context.
@Jinx_the_Atomic_Cat
Ah in that case I do apologize, but would I be able to ask what exactly lost your interest?
Suddenly, I have someone going on about controlling someone? Is that going to be in the actual game, or was that just you just kinda screwing around having fun with the alpha?
The idea as of the moment is for it to be there, yes. However, the main point of the Alpha is to see what works and what doesn’t. I would ask if if what happened wasn’t clear enough though, I thought it was rather explicit that the individual was speaking to you the player. If not I can either revise it, or cut it if it is simply a lost cause.
No, at first I thought it was some sort of like, ghost in the machine thing, or maybe the person the AI saw was trying to remotely access it or something. It kinda threw me out of the story thus far.
Ah thank you for pointing that out then, I’ll see what I can do to revise it then. If it still doesn’t work, might just leave it out if it’s that jarring.
First things first and that’s the stat page, after all it’s the first place my eyes leap to. I’m not sure if it was your aim or not, it’s fine as it is, but in regards to the stats, if you want a space in between the stats rather than an underscore _, you can simply put a space after the code and type in what you want to appear.
E,g,
*stat_chart
→ text android_name Android’s Name
The stat will appear as Android’s name rather the code name given before.
I’ll agree with @nightflame on the point of an unusal point of view, the style of writing you use is unique, I like that. And what’s better than playing from a different point of view rather than the expected?
Things were interesting, the narrative was smooth and clear, but then things got a bit confusing going into an offline phase… not quite sure who’s speaking with the narration and such there.
I’ll take the confusing ending where I’m not sure who’s speaking as what the others meant by that, I would recommend leaving a closing author’s note to let players know the demo is over, but that they can continue a conversation with you by clicking the next button.
So I liked the way this started. It was fun, and I love those stories about robots discovering their consciousness.
The whacky left turn it took was really jarring. At first I thought it was nonsense. Just some leftover coding experiment that got stuck on the game. As it went on it felt like a joke…being played on me.
Honestly I don’t see the point of it. This might be just me but I want to forget I’m bbq playing a game. I want to fall into the character and get lost. Perspective shifts really hurt that and this…
I’m sorry if this sounds blunt, but it was like the story stopped my character vanished and all of a sudden I was being ranted at by a crazy person.
Maybe I’m way off, or aybe it’s just not for me, but the second part of this demo left me feeling confused, and tricked somehow.
