It should depend on the overall theme of the game. If you go with the psychological distress theme, then the six initial cubes should represent (in some form) different issues of facets of the overall issue. The "bottom" cube would bring them all together into the main issue, which would be resolved, allowing to travel to the sky-cube, where maybe there would be a portrait of the character.

Whatever the themes, they should be something that can be unified by the one cube, then transcended somehow by the skycube.

btw, the ''hole'' in the sky cube could actually represent a topilogically sound way of getting out, meaning it would not have to be a dream world... there could be such a cubic tear in the real world, and the hypercube would be a kind of bubble. Gonna draw a 2D-3D analogy real quick:

.             _______________________________.            /                              /.           /             ___              /.          /             /  /             /.         /             /__/             /.        /                              /.       /______________________________/.                      .                _____________.               /  ___       /|.              /  /| /|     / |.             /  /_|/ /    /  |.            /   |__|/    /   |.           /            /    |.          /____________/     |.          |            |     /.          |            |    /.          |            |   /.          |            |  /.          |            | /.          |____________|/. 

the ''plug'' on the cube would be attached at the ''hole'' in the real world.

True, since the 8 cubes are really just the surfaces of the 4-D space that is the hypercube.

Wouldn''t the "tear" in the sky cube be in a 4th dimensional direction though? (Ponders this using cubes, squares, etc). I think so...that would make it hard to percieve/travel through...

Also, would the boundary between cubes seem normal to our senses? We would be making a 90 degree turn (again in a 4th dimensional direction). All of this is so new to me(though your diagrams have helped me come to understand it a little).

The reason I was mentioning the psychological ideas was because those were the early ones bounced around. If you wanted more ideas for that, you may wish to check out "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden." It provides, as I understand it, a prety good picture of what schizophrenia is like.

I think the thing to do at this point is to pick an overall theme, and start plotting how things would go with that theme. Maybe lightly plan out several themes. We''ll be here to help more, as needed.

The "plug" in that example would be unnecessary, since it extends in a direction perpendicular to the 2D plane. A Hypercube in a similar configuration would likewise need no such protrusion. Rather, the "rift" in the 3D world would appear as a suspended sphere (or cube, or whatever) just as the "rift" in the 2D world appears as a square (or circle, or whatever).

The problem comes with travelling through that rift. Unless there''s some kind of 4D "gravity", no three-dimensional object or entity has a means by which to move along a fourth axis. Just as no 2D man could climb out of a hole in the sheet of paper he lives on, no 3D man can travel at will through a fourth spatial dimension.

Once he''s in the hypercube, he can navigate the 3D "sides" of the thing, but he can never extend himself into the 4D interior of the hypercube. Since some movement, however miniscule, in such a direction would be required to exit the 3D plane and enter an adjacent hypercube, some outside force will be required to facilitate that transfer.

An alternative is to have the hypercube "laying" on the 3D universe such that one of its "sides" is coincident with a region of space. It would be more like a box laying on a table, so instead of having a "rift" between two separate things, there could just be four impossible corners that a 2D person could turn without actually perceiving himself to have turned a corner. In this way, you could wander around in a cave and suddenly find that you have in fact rotated yourself 90 degrees. It''s tricky, and it still requires some bizarre miracle to "turn the corner" onto the surface of the hypercube, but it''s another option.

For my part, I''d like to see this in some kind of structure, be it an alien ship or an ancient Incan temple. That way, some kind of mysterious mechanism can be in place to overcome the little problems of getting from the 3D space to the 4D hypercube, and a little bit of story would be stimulated.

Idhrendur, you beat me to it!

On the topic of themes, I recommend colors. I''m thinking of this as a fairly spooky game, or at least discomfiting, and I can''t help but think of Poe''s "The Masque of the Red Death". Make the six "side" rooms into Red, Yellow, Green, Blue, and Purple, and have the "top" and "bottom" (Inside and outside?) rooms be Black and White. White could be the 4D "sun", lighting the six main rooms through windows or some similar contrivance, and Black would be the only room that doesn''t share a wall with the White room.

Of course this is a horribly underdeveloped idea, but I couldn''t just post my chagrin toward Idhrendur. I needed some kind of content.

I think (and am probably wrong) that the rift could work. Using the 2D/3D analogy, it could work. Imagine the cube, stuck on the underside of a two dimensional plane. If there were the hole between them, someone on either surface could travel therough the hole by just staying on the surface and walking in a straight line. They''d make a 3d turn of 180 degrees, but they''d be on the inside surface of the cube. It''d be similar to the 90 degree turns made between the surfaces of the cube. Approaching the hole, the 2D person would see a line as the boundary.

Extrapolating, a 3D person appraching a hypercube would see a square marking the edges of the cubic "hole." They could walk through the square boundaries (making a 4th dimensional 180 degree turn), and be on the inside edge of the hypercube.

Also, from the ouside, the hypercube would only appear to occupy as much space as the hole into it. From the inside, it would appear as large as all the surfaces put together.

Well, this probably looks like I know what I''m talking about. I hope that''s actually the truth.

Ya know, "The Mask of Red Death" had occured to me in passing before, but I didn''t think much about it. Guess I was worrying about the geometry at the time!

Excellent assessment, Idhrendur! I think you're absolutely right. Provided that space is "folded" at the hole instead of "torn", that's exactly what would happen. And so the portal ("rift" now seems to be a misnomer) would look like six "windows", each of which shows a view of the parallel surface of the hypercube in a different direction. Since it can be assumed that 3D objects are infinitely flexible in 4D directions (considering bent space and all), there wouldn't even be a discomfort going around the "metahairpin" of the entranceway.

But I pity the poor bastard who tries to go through the corner of the portal. Squish.


Edit:
The "squish factor" also precludes spherical or curved portals. Space bent like that would be a sort of "lens", projecting a person or object into a volumetric region that is not what they are supposed to occupy.

Thinking further, would it not be possible to have a simple rectangular portal? I'm thinking now of a slit in a piece of paper allowing a 2D person to get onto an adjacent sheet. In 3D it would be like the Travelling in Robert jordan's Wheel of Time cycle, where a rectangular "door" opens up in mid-air. In-game, that would certainly make for more convenient Portal placement, and you could even have one open inside of a doorframe, making it more difficult for the player to spot it. Just a thought.

[edited by - Iron Chef Carnage on December 5, 2003 5:56:01 PM]

great insights all! :D

although I think a 'slit' would be a cool way to make a puzzle out of getting out, I feel it lacks the drama of the 'cube in the sky'.

Now, I like the incan temple idea, and I'm starting to think along the lines of stargate. In the outside world, there would be some sort of ancient cubic room/structure inside a temple that, when turned on, creates energy beams from the eight corners to the center of the room and pulls open the cubic window. the image of the window opening would actually appear similar to the image of a hypercube that I drew above... the cubic window in the middle joined to the outside room by the respective corners.

I don't know if it would be cliche for the government to have found and taken control of this room/temple... should you just have stumbled into it as a lone explorer, perhaps?

Edit: Thinking about it, I think that the slit idea would be best applied if there were multiple hypercubes adjacent in 4D space... but I think that may make the game needlessly confusing.

[edited by - origamiman64 on December 5, 2003 8:06:04 PM]

I had been thinking of the portals more, and from what I can imagine (extrapolating yet again from the 2D/3D model), they would form a cube together, that would seem to float in the middle of the entrance/exit/sky cube. And if the view through it were unobsturcted, you could just see outside. If I still had Bryce 4 installed, I could render up a picture of looking through the rift either way real quickly.

Also, I'm glad you seem to have decided to have walls seperating the cubes. The visuals would be much more complex otherwise.

The government being in control could exlain any obvious technology, and maybe the backstory is that you are commisioned to explore this place. But that's relatively unimportant, I think the theme of the hypercube and the sub-themes of the cubes is more important.

And I like the idea of a Mayan temple more than an Incan one. The Mayans had a LOT of advanced knowledge (and I've heard that their writing can be translated now, which leaves room for many interesting uses of writing).

If you do go with the temple idea, I reccomend you deeply Native American cultures (at least ones that built temples) before doing too much. That could help with the immersion, and may provide further inspiration.


Edit - Added the 3rd paragraph and on.

[edited by - idhrendur on December 6, 2003 4:31:51 AM]