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You teleport (linking-book-style) from the planet-room to a row-boat, being rowed to a small island. (Due-to a bug, the background screen doesn’t change properly.)
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After a short cut-scene, you are provided with a few choices:
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You can ask Gary some questions, shown on the right. Try that.
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Then press, “Please continue rowing”.
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More cut-scene play.
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Press “Please continue rowing” again.
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Your character eventually arrives at the pier.
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Click “Climb onto the pier.”
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You now are in a room, with a 360-degree view of the pier. You can rotate around and look in different directions. The images on the lower-right section of the screen shows you players, non-player characters (NPCs), and objects in the room.
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As you stand around, Gary enacts an “idle” activity that is narrated. “Gary pulls a piece of grass, and twiddles it between his fingers.” Etcetera. All NPCs potentially have idle narrations.
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Sunset from the pier.
Each segment of the cut-scene is a MIFL (mXac Interactive Fiction Library) object. (Code is available in the mXacSourceCode.zip file download.)
The rCutSceneEvansworthApproach1 resource looks like this:
Screenshots of the tools M3D.exe
M3D.exe is a 3D editor, used to create 3D models and 3D worlds used in CircumReality. (The source-code is included in the mXacSourceCode.zip download.)
If/when you get this start-up error, either (a) find the code in the source-code and remove the time/date check, or (b) temporarily set your computer-clock back.
Below is the Stibbles.m3d file, located in the mXacSourceCode.zip download.
Stibbles.m3d from a different angle:
Creating a new building user-interface:
Adding windows to the building user-interface:
Character heads:
Painting a surface user-interface:
The terrain editor:
CircumRealityWorldSim.exe
This tool is an integrated-development environment for editing a CircumReality world. It also “runs” the world on a remote server, or the player’s computer. (The source-code is included in the mXacSourceCode.zip download.)
M3DWave.exe
Wave-editor. (The source-code is included in the mXacSourceCode.zip download.)
MNLP.EXE
This tool lets you create your own text-to-speech voice. (The source-code is included in the mXacSourceCode.zip download.)
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Choice-fiction (“Choose your own adventure” and “Fighting Fantasy”) game-play is intermingled with other game-play. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choose_Your_Own_Adventure, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fighting_fantasy)
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Use Cyan’s Myst-like 360-degree surround-images for graphics. Also like Riven, and Myst III:Exile. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myst, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riven, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myst_III:_Exile)
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Add Zork-like interactive fiction. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zork, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interactive_fiction)
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Text-MUD-like features are added. MUD = Multiuser dungeon. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MUD)
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Players select a character-race and gender.
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Add text-MUD-like combat. Combat is NOT the core of game-play, though.
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Player-characters can learn-and-improve skills, computer-role-playing-game like. “Skills” have turned-out to be unimportant to CircumReality game-play though. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role-playing_video_game)
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Add multiplayer capabilities from text-MUDs. CircumReality also supports single-player no-internet play. And, “run your own private game for a few hours on the weekend,” so that you can play with a small group of friends.
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Players can team-together into “parties”.
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Players can undertake player-versus-player activities, NPC social-manipulation as well as duels.
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Game-play is script-driven. New game-play can be added, such as card-games, real-estate, etcetera. As per LP-MUD. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LPMud)
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Non-player characters (NPCs) act as item-and-quest vending machines.
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Add non-player characters (NPCs), with capabilities similar to Bethesda Game Studio’s Oblivion, Fallout 3, and Skyrim. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_IV:_Oblivion, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallout_3, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_V:_Skyrim)
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The NPCs have daily schedules that they maintain. Working, sleeping, eating, meeting friends, etcetera. They also have goals.
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Players can listen-in on conversations between NPCs.
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Players can complete “quests” for NPCs.
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NPCs act as equipment vendors.
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NPCs are sources of information (and stories).
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Players can “talk to” NPCs by selecting an item from a short-menu of questions/responses.
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As players change the world... Similar to Fallout 3. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fallout_3)
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NPCs disappear, or move-in.
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The player’s accomplishments are written into a journal, along with descriptions of the effects of their accomplishments. Somewhat like a village newspaper. This feature is similar to Fallout 13’s radio-announcer.
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NPCs speak using text-to-speech (and transplanted prosody). (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speech_synthesis)
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Players can “talk to” NPCs by typing in natural-language questions, such as “Where is the cafe?”, “Is Fred friends with anyone?”, “How much is my sword worth?”, and “What time is it?”
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Chatter-bot functionality is also possible. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatterbot)
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NPCs have relationships with other NPCs:
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When an NPC likes/trusts a player-character more, the NPC’s friends like/trust the player-character more. The NPC’s enemies dislike/mistrust the player-character more.
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NPCs are in “factions”, similar to extended relationships.
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Players (and player-characters) can infer NPC relationships by watching NPCs interact. Or, players can ask the NPCs (with natural-language processing) about their relationships – which the NPCs sometimes lie-about or deny. Or, players can ask OTHER NPCs about relationships between NPCs.
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Players have a “journal” that displays graphs of the NPC relationships.
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Players can get NPCs to like/trust them by:
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When players complete “quests”, NPCs like/trust the player’s character more.
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Gifting objects (and money) to the NPCs, such as boxes of chocolates. Specific NPCs only accept certain gifts. Players can determine what gifts NPCs like by observing the NPCs, or by asking other NPCs what the NPC likes.
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Being polite to the NPCs.
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NPCs occasionally ask the player-characters personality-test questions. If the player answers the questions correctly, the NPCs will like/trust the player better. “So what do you think about my new dress?” Players are provided with 3-to-4 possible answers. As NPCs like/trust the player-character more, it becomes more-important for players to answer the question correctly, as expected by the NPC.
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Players can tell the NPCs rumours. (See below.)
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NPCs observe player-character’s actions, and modify their like/trust of the player-character. One NPC in the game notices if the player helps cleans rooms for him.
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Befriending the NPC’s friend improves a NPC’s like/trust. Becoming an enemy of the NPC’s enemy has a reverse effect.
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Players can “find” and propagate rumours.
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When players complete quests, NPCs sometimes tell the players rumours.
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When a NPC likes/trusts a player enough, the NPC sometimes tells the player a rumour.
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When players observe NPCs interacting, their player-character sometimes learns a rumour.
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Player-characters can learn rumours from notes, diaries, NPC-spoken stories, etcetera.
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Players can pass the rumours amongst themselves.
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Players have a journal with a list of rumours, and which NPCs the rumours are associated with.
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