Preamble: this is ambitious, but I believe I know how to do 90% of this, which is more than what I know how to do in most projects I take on (generally successfully). The AI is the most obviously difficult part, but it's not a vastly different problem than that solved by Steve Grand in Creatures (which model is my basis, here), and I expect experimentation to be beneficial; that, and playtesting.

The main character is a woman named Molly, made blind by the antagonist and left in a lab of sorts. Molly is controlled by the computer; you cannot directly control her actions. Instead, you play an AI character inhabiting the computers in the lab, and you have to help Molly build confidence and skills, and lead her to becoming the story's hero. Of course, for Molly to escape you and she have to solve puzzles, and avoid the traps, hazards, flaming pits, and other dangers.

Molly was not born blind, and so she doesn't have any reflex for coping at the start of the game. She is scared and unsure of herself and her surroundings, and she doesn't want to leave the small cell she's in, because she doesn't know what's outside the door.

You have limited control over her surroundings; you may be able to open doors, make noises, or otherwise attract her attention. However, your actions have to be sparing, because if things are a little too uncanny, Molly will think she's going crazy, or, frightened, run away. Therefore, Molly cannot know that you exist until her confidence in and control of her own abilities is sufficient for her to be making choices of her own rather than simply be led by the hand, as it were.

She is also an energy well. That is, she absorbs energy (mainly electrical, but also thermal and even kinetic in later stages) from her surroundings with great ease; lights dim as she walks under them, and if she gets too near to equipment that is vital to your own controls (i.e. your hardware, power generators, or active agents like motors) you may not be able to help her (and so you'll have to wait until she moves away on her own, which could be a while). If she absorbs too much energy (that is, more than she has learned to control) she will be somewhat intoxicated by it, and will move less cautiously, and may put herself in danger—and she won't pay as much attention to what you're doing. If she absorbs more energy beyond that threshold it will earth itself on whatever is convenient, and she will pass out; this may leave her in danger, and at best will be annoying since it will take a while for her to come to.

Venting energy in different forms is her primary skill that must be developed; this may include directly releasing electrical energy into a conductor (like a circuit, or even an unlucky Hapless Service Robot Mk 2), thermal energy into a conductor or just into the air, or kinetic energy as soundwaves or forces. Depending on how you lead her, she may be better at some forms of energy discharge than others, and as she learns what she's capable of, may vent heat into the air to keep her energy potential from becoming too great, or even transfer one form of energy into another; for example, late in the game, holding onto an electrical conduit with one hand could let her punch through a steel wall.

Gameplay consists of activating switches (or more often later on, convincing Molly to activate switches) to make some change in the environment (unlock a door, move a platform, etc), leading Molly around by making sounds or otherwise piquing her curiosity, teaching her to associate certain sounds, events, and other stimuli with dangers (much the way Half-Life 2 taught us to worry when we found a cache of rockets) so she will be wary when appropriate, and otherwise carefully manipulating her to see her through the maze safely.

Balancing her curiosity, confidence, and energy potential with her fear and frustration is a major element of gameplay, and although there will be no RPG-style leveling up and attribute meters, Molly's nature (implementation) has analog representations of her attributes, and her mood will show in her animation, facial expressions, and general demeanour: when she is feeling more sure of herself she will move more purposefully, but when she is worried she may walk with her back to a wall. Likewise, she will turn to face sharp sounds. Her energy potential will also be displayed, not with an onscreen meter, but by a glowing aura around her.

Molly's mood is communicated by audio, as well. If she hears a sound, she might say "Hello? Is anybody there?" and even ask for help. If she's feeling particularly isolated, she will talk to herself, or just quietly hum.

Different balances of her skills and qualities will lend themselves to different gameplay, because Molly is really the one playing the game, not you. Hence, a timid Molly might still be very successful if she is observant, while a bold Molly might be able to avoid danger by reflex. Likewise, different levels of sophistication in the various energy transfer mechanisms may have unexpected side-effects, for example: venting energy as sound may let her get a vague sense of the size and even shape of the room she's in, by crude echolocation; stronger kinetic skills might make her much more resilient against impacts with obstacles (like trains); specialization in thermal energy could melt doors, possibly by accident.

Although RPG-style levels and point distribution will not be a part of the game, items will play a role (for example, a white cane will help her to move with more confidence; she may need to bring a key of some sort from one location to another to unlock a door; warm clothing may be needed to get through a cold area safely, and so on). And, since energy is a major part of the game, conductors and insulators of various sorts may be useful implements in certain circumstances.

Your view is isometric and orthographic; games such as Diablo and Fallout feature a similar perspective (or rather, lack thereof). You do not have the freedom to go anywhere; your view is limited to the room that Molly is currently in. This forces you to manage your own controls carefully, because you may not have the same resources available to you in different rooms, and if you need to actively keep a switch depressed (rather than simply toggling it) in order to achieve some goal, you won't be able to do that if Molly is in the next room.

Some puzzles/levels will include:

• Escher-esque designs that are not physically possible (easy due to the isometric/orthographic view; minor physics adjustments are all that's needed to carry Molly, objects, etc across the joints). This is more "cute" than anything, and may be scrapped, since I may want the player to be able to rotate the camera, which would ruin the effect. Obviously Molly wouldn't be able to see it, so it would mostly just mess with the player's head.
• a large room which you will have to physically twist and tumble like a Rubik's cube to get Molly safely through it (unlocking and unblocking the exit on the way); at least part of it may be flooded, too. Remember that landing in water is likely to be safer than landing on a hard wall, but if the water is electrified there may be unintended consequences to Molly's energy potential, and passing out in water is not going to be good for her.
• a teleporter. Unlike Star Trek teleporters, items/persons are not simply moved, but rather swapped with those on the other side. It is a spherical room, to better hold up under pressure differences between locations.
• a malfunction with the teleporter such that Molly is physically in two locations at once. (Why? Quantum entanglement, of course!) That is, you have to manoeuvre her through two different rooms at the same time such that she is always in an area that is blank in both. Finally, you will have to fix the malfunction, to get her to pull herself together. (You could say that she's beside herself at this point.)

The storyline will culminate with Molly defeating/destroying the antagonist (an AI), but I have not yet decided what this will entail.

Overall this is sort of like Portal, but turned inside out; you aren't the player trapped in the mechanism, but instead you are the deus ex machina pulling the strings. The normal conventions of video games apply not to your character, but to Molly's. Whether Molly is happy with your efforts or not is largely up to her—she may resent your assistance if it's resembled "tough love" a little too consistently, or she might be happy for the help; she might even be oblivious altogether. The game can play out in many, many different ways.

The story leaves the player's character as transparent as possible; there's not a lot of pretence of you being the AI, or even development of the character you play; rather, you yourself are the character, and how you choose to lead Molly will reflect that.

Unintegrated

The story is going to need to develop Molly's character for it to be engaging; the player is intended to basically form a relationship with Molly. As such, I've been working on some ideas related to character development:

• other people in the lab? is the antagonist keeping you away from them?
• other people in the lab who are in the antagonist's pocket—you have to lead them away from Molly.
• files on computers: log files (or fragments thereof) that journal Molly's history somewhat. If you play them aloud, it provides her with something to react to (since a file will correspond to a set of inputs to the network—thus how those inputs influence her will change depending on her development and current state, so playing the same file later might have other effects).

You can only see via security cameras. Your perspectives are therefore limited to the set of cameras in the room; if there are four cameras in a room, then your screen will be divided into four views.

(The Capefish is all around you…)

Capefish is a content management system for perfectionists with agendas. It gives you control over your design while still letting you edit in a browser and play with Rails.

Go to Capefish.org to see it, get it, and just possibly live it.

(Mark your space.)

If you use Spaces but would like to differentiate them from each other more, then quit stalling and download Spacemarks.

What does it do?

Spacemarks marks your Spaces! Specifically, it puts a big ol’ number on them, telling you which space is which.

Is it pretty?

It sure is!

Can I customize it?

You sure can!

I like it, but…

Tell me! I’d love to hear what you think.

The Future

• the biggest feature I’ve got on the drawing board right now is showing images. That way you can have your own marks, in addition to or in place of the default numeral marks.

  You could also use this to give yourself different desktop pictures for every Space! This would play very nicely with multi-monitor desktops like Mandolux frequently has.

• also, arbitrary text! Label your Spaces with what they’re for.