renai? whats that...?
As for the characters I personally prefer games with a selection of main characters (i.e a group) as I get ''lonely'' with one character. But thats personal opinion, we should poll people on whether they like games centered around one character, or not. I dunno how though...
Then theres the fact that the game doesn''t need extra characters deliberately filled in, forced in. I spose I could say that by having only the two main characters the ai, and the girl allows you to focus on their love.
As I think Sunandshadow said about weighting more towards one character, such as the ai impressing the girl .etc, we would then use just the ai, only thing is, I think it''d be nice to have a bit of focus on everyday life -on girls view
e.g
you overcharged me, bitch
[FIGHT] :D, how would you make everyday
life playable though?


Well done boolean! I took the liberty of uploading your excellent writing so everyone can see
Take a look at this.
www.angelfire.com/vamp/genjix/AIloveStory.doc

Korea seems logical Advanced computers and all
Knit picking for cliches, the only i could find was the whole government thing (developed under government control), seemed a bit repeaded. But thats probably me just wishing for more OpenSource.

I like the idea of the Grid somehow. Its a way of indicating to the player that the future is slightly further on, without explicitly stating it. Therefore we do not have to stick to any guidelines on how accurate it is as we dont have to date it (would they have this in the future/would we be that advanced this soon).

A thought would be if later on, somehow the ai was able to interact with a robot, city big brother style spying system, or nanomachine assembler- he''d be able to wreck all sorts of havoc then.
Like lets say he has control of cctv, he could watch the woman doing her shopping around town, and like interact with things such as closing doors randomly. This would be an interesting playable sequence as the woman I think.

With a host of characters we could use them for different purposes (such as one character could be a sort of narrator commenting on apsects). So what do you all think, centre on ai+woman or have other playable characters?

If anyone here is a graphics artist (specifically drawing or sprite designing), Email me.

I was thinking that both the AI and the woman would be the playable characters - you would take turns playing the AI and the woman until they managed to get together in virtual reality, and then you would play them as a team which would give you access to neat combo moves that only the two of them could do together. And we don''t have to show the woman playing ''real life'', we can have her dealing with first the AI''s clumsiness, then the scientists who want her for bait, then the security program enemies in virtual reality with the AI, and we can even throw the boyfriend in there somewhere if we want - maybe she runs to his apartment when fleeing the scientists, and then he tries to keep her there for her safety and because he thinks she''s nuts babbling about this sentient AI, so she has to knock him out so she can get away, even though she doesn''t want to hurt him and says "Sorry!" after she wins the fight... that''s fun, isn''t it?

The AI''s name - Uh, _Jacinta_?! You know that''s a girl''s name, right? I suppose it would be funny if the scientist named the AI that because he was dreaming of a female AI. Jacinta could be okay if the woman renamed him Jaq or Jaceon(Jason), I suppose....

ahhh, I always wondered where that word came from in my head. I asked people what it ment and got dodgy looks. Heh, now I know its a girls name.

I reckon the name we choose should have some sort of link to his creator, like if Jacinta, maybe the programmers dead wife.

Itd be nice also if like the ai rescues the creator who betrayed him sort of thing "like youre still my dad".

Remember that the ai might be more/less emotionally/mentally advanced than us, so some of his emotions that we have to express could be hard for us to interpret.

How do we represent a VR world? How do we in a game represent ''self-modifying'' code?

Switching between the two seems to be the right way to do it. The girls levels will probably be mainly puzzle solving and stealth levels. While the AI can engage in cyber combat vs virii and attempts by the sciantists to imprision it.

There still needs to be a reson why the girl wants to give up her life and become an AI. What about if the girl is in an abusive relationship? That would give her a reason the escape. You could even have a fight a scene where encouraged by the AI finally stands up to her boyfirend.

How do you represent the VR world? thats a matter of personal opionion, I suggest you consult a few cyberpunk resources, such as the novel I posted(*shameless plug*) in an earlier thread.

-----------------------------------------------------
Writer, Programer, Cook, I''m a Jack of all Trades
Current Design project
Chaos Factor Design Document

quote: Original post by Genjix
renai? whats that...?

A ren''ai game is a Japanese dating simulation, generally having a male main characters who can court one or more of the female NPCs through dialogue choices, gift-giving, etc. A hentai game is an X-rated version of the same thing where the game rewards the player for ''getting'' an NPC by giving them a pornographic scene starring that NPC. They''re fun. Ahw and I are fans of the genre. The closest American thing would probably be the Leisure Suit Larry games.

quote: Original post by TechnoGoth

There still needs to be a reson why the girl wants to give up her life and become an AI. What about if the girl is in an abusive relationship? That would give her a reason the escape. You could even have a fight a scene where encouraged by the AI finally stands up to her boyfirend.

I have always had the idea that at some point the girl is hurt badly, and the AI tried to save her by jacking her into the system where he thinks he may have some control over her health.

Or, maybe have it so that she has some kind of repressed memory from early in the game that the AI really, really needs, and the only way to get it is to jack her into the AI. Everything is telling her that it will NOT work, and that she will be killed, but the AI asks her to trust him.....

There are many possibilities.

Leisure Suit Larry what a legend.

Heres a thought. Anyone heard of many worlds theory? The one where everytime there is a possibility, the world splits. Like for instance if an electron rolls left, rolls right, rolls forwards .etc then the world splits into 3.
There was an experiment invented by a quantum physicist ages ago where he could prove the theory right, by having a gun pointing at him, and random bullets are loaded into chambers. He keeps shooting the gun, and in a universe somewhere on, he will never die (this was never performed). Imagine a suicidal character who knows of this and is constantly trying to kill himself but it just doesnt happen. The ai prehaps foils a few of his would be suicide attempts and this angers him. All he wants to do is die.
He sees the girl going after the ai and becomes obssessed with foiling her plan.
That could then be an excuse for us to finish the girl, and let the ai rescue her.
But then in the same way we can later on ressurect the both of them, as robot/nano-swarm ...

What do you think? Overkill?

I wrote 500 lines of code and debugged it in one night.

quote: Original post by boolean

quote: Original post by TechnoGoth

There still needs to be a reson why the girl wants to give up her life and become an AI. What about if the girl is in an abusive relationship? That would give her a reason the escape. You could even have a fight a scene where encouraged by the AI finally stands up to her boyfirend.

I have always had the idea that at some point the girl is hurt badly, and the AI tried to save her by jacking her into the system where he thinks he may have some control over her health.

Or, maybe have it so that she has some kind of repressed memory from early in the game that the AI really, really needs, and the only way to get it is to jack her into the AI. Everything is telling her that it will NOT work, and that she will be killed, but the AI asks her to trust him.....

There are many possibilities.

I think it''s very important that the AI _not_ be responsible for seriously harming the girl, including at the beginning when it''s messing stuff up by accident - it''s really not very romantic to put someone''s life in danger. So if you want the girl to get hurt, maybe dying, and the AI saves her by converting her into another AI, it has to be the scientists or some other enemy that has injured the girl. Or, it would be interesting if the government got involved and decided they wanted the girl and the AI dead instead of just captured like the scientists wanted, and the ''father'' scientist has meanwhile come around to the belief that he wants his ''child'' to have the girl if that''s what makes him happy, so he''s the one who converts the girl into an AI - he would know how, after all, if he made the first one.

maybe Angell has serious identity issues. Sometimes he thinks he is human, others he thinks he will be human and then others he hates humans. Tied between both world the woman ends up failing, and the ai sees a chance to reincarnate her somehow, saving her.
As for the VR world, [nods to TechnoGoth's novel], The Grids massive computing power allows for huge graphics, and so people can interact with these massive graphical environments, so when people use computers they use them interactively. That way interacting with files would mean interacting with items, and you could even have shops and stuff... and fights [again nods to TechnoGoth's novel].

Im ashamed to show you because its not much but anyway
The Grid





[edited by - genjix on March 13, 2004 4:46:46 PM]

We''re working on a short demo of how the VR world could be like (soon enough). Any contributions are welcome.