Analogue: A hate story - my review

This game is set in the far future, where humanity has spread across several star systems. The main task of the player is to find out what happened with a derelict spaceship and its passengers. This job has been given to you by an organization that archives space colonization history. The ship was one of the first to leave Earth seeking other habitable worlds. Ships like these were meant for travels spanning generations, and when you arrive you soon find out that it has already been on a journey for several man ages. Fleeting in space for thousands of years, it shows no sign of life. You find out what took place by reading log entries stored in the ship's computer systems and by talking to the ships artificial intelligences. The visual style is manga inspired and there is very little animation – the mimicry of the characters is instead shown through still drawings. The drawings are nonetheless great.

The themes of the game are sexism and the relationship between humans and technology. The society that is described is extremely twofold. Through the ship logs you get an insight into three high ranking families' game of power. The men hold all political power, the women are instruments for giving birth and bringing up heirs and their coming courtesans and wives. Many of the logs are written by characters who have been raised under this social system, so they don't question morale or ethics, as otherwise would have been appropriate. But in between these entries you find some people questioning such a divide and react by trying to escape the required norm. One of these characters is called the Pale Bride. This is the person whom I related the most to. Her background is different from anyone else on the ship. This difference in background leads to some interesting confrontations with the rest of the passengers. I won't say much more about it, because that will ruin some of the story, but there is gripping and intricate character development at work here. My hat is off to Christine Love for fantastic writing. The Pale Bride story made me feel deep sympathy. Love raises questions about sex discrimination and freedom of speech, and gives the player opportunity to express their opinion.

The game stars two artificial intelligences (AI) that you can interact with. You interact by showing them the logs and by answering if they indicate they have something to say. The AIs are the only characters that are visually represented in the game. They often share their views on the people whom have written the logs, and I found their views affecting my own understanding and opinion about what took place. If they ask you a question, you will be given two choices. They will respond differently depending on what you answer. You can also influence the opinions of the AIs when your answer is given. All the log entries are not available from the start (you actually have to power on the ships batteries to get access to anything), and those you have access to are randomly spread across the history of the ship. By showing an AI an entry you may get access to more entries. This way you slowly start putting the pieces together. The jumps in time give the storytelling a distinctive touch. The names of the inhabitants is in Korean, and you are early on given access to a family tree that helps you sort out the names. That being said, the names of all the women are mostly incomplete, since the family name of a wife where the only name that were noted. Daughters were not included.

About halfway into the game an incident occurs which sees the game deviate from its ordinary game mechanics. This brings a different kind of tension to the game, in the sense that time becomes a factor you have to take into account. The way you play through this short sequence is by typing commands into an old school 80's style monitor. That's all fine, but then there's the problem that this monitor doesn't display that many lines of text. And when you type a command to display all the commands at your disposal, that alone takes up half the screen. Next, you try some commands to find out what they do, and you find out that they are not relevant to what you're trying to accomplish. Now, the command index might have scrolled out of view, so then you need to type in the command to display the list again. This could have been avoided with the use of a simple list displayed separately from the monitor. As mentioned earlier, this is a brief part of the game. One that doesn't keep it from becoming a great one. The sequence has its pluses, the factor of time keeping you on your toes and the sudden realization that you are indeed on board a dying starship. Oh, and the last part of the sequence is a fantastic twist that I didn't see coming at all.

After you have been introduced to the two AIs, you find out that they also have an opinion of each other, and they offer different views on the inhabitants of the ship. This is where the good stuff starts. With two AIs saying different things and asking for your trust, you have to make up your own mind based on the happenings described in the log entries and each of the AIs comments to them. The game boasts multiple endings, but personally I've only seen one. On a second playthrough, if taking other choices throughout the game, I might have been told a different version of what happened. But this is only guesses. It still adds to the replay value.

Even though your original goal is to figure out the fate the ship and its inhabitants only to file a report to your employer, the player focus is shifted to the victims of this oppressing regime. Through brilliant writing and surprisingly human AIs reactions to what you read, this tragedy feels more and more personal. After a while is doesn't feel like a mission (as described in the company paper), instead you feel a need to have a final say in the events.

The portrayal of AI in this game is thought provoking and flirts with the roles and positions that AIs may inhabit or even fill in the future. It poses a question as to how we see artificial intelligence and what separates this form and the organic form. I found myself from the start naturally skeptical as to why the AIs wanted my trust. What value does it have for them? They are merely an extension of the ships machines – are they not? What value can be found in a button press?

9/10

Official game webstite 

Recording, editing, coding and first playtest - week 7, 8, 9 and 10

About time for a new update.

So I've been spending some time recording sounds, this time with family members to help me create some of them. I got quite a few recordings, so it was necessary to organize and name the files according to what was being recorded. I've been recording various types of effects, including fire, stuff hitting wood and more footsteps. Recording the more abstract sounds turned out to be a laugh, since I got the bright idea of using my mouth to create some of them. Listening to myself babbling and gurgling away, it turned out to be somewhat of a challenge to stop giggling.

I’ve also been learning bits and pieces about Unity, reading through a tutorial in a book I’m using.

When it comes to coding, I’ve been trying to code footsteps sounds into the game. That is taking some time. There are several reasons for that, but one of them is that I haven’t been taught how to do such things. Another reason is that in my book, there is nothing about making footsteps. I’ve been making some progress, but haven’t found a solution yet.

On a high note – we had our first playtest of Revenge last week. It was a lot of fun. We got some really good feedback and we are looking forward to implement changes to the game based on that. At the time of the playtest, I only had one single sound ingame (the river sound), so I got little feedback on the sound. Last week I also edited my fire sound, trying to make it sound “big”. When listening through my fire effect recordings, I wished I had made some different sounds as well, since some of them were maybe a little bit off. But I tried to make the best of it, and eventually decided that’s good enough. The fire sound is now ingame and loopable. Have a listen at a sample below. Editing on two of the more spooky sounds in the game have also started.

The life of a sound recording artist extraordinaire! - week 4, 5 and 6

These last three weeks there have been several things school related that needed my attention.  And unfortunately, not all of them had to do about Revenge. But I have been able to do some  work. I've finished my list of sounds, so now I got a better idea of how much I need to record and  edit. This list will of course be added to as necessary. When it comes to coding, I'm still learning to use Unity and Javascript, so I have written no code in the game yet. But the beauty about Unity is that you can still build a gameworld and walk around in it without having to manually implement code. So we do have a game prototype that contains models and terrain. Go ahead and take a peek in the gallery on our team's website.

The majority of work I've been doing since last update is picking up audio equipment, charging batteries for recorder (takes at least 12 hours per charge - ridiculous), a fair amount of walking to recording sites (no car), learning to use equipment and eventually recording some actual sounds. This have taken some time, and not always with luck on my side, having to deal with faulty equipment and getting a flat tire on my bicycle. But in the end I got some recordings that I could use. Hurray! Specificly, I have recorded sounds for a river and the sound of footsteps.

After spending some time getting to know Adobe Audition (sound editing program), I managed to create a loop of the river sound that has now been put in the prototype. Not completely satisfied with the sound, so I might edit it some more. But at least I have something in the game now!

Lastly, I've written an update on what the entire team have been doing on the site. Do take a look.

Sound preparations and marketing baby steps - week 3

This week I’ve continued my sound list, as well as thinking about some ways in which I can record the sounds. I have discovered that some sounds will be more difficult to record than others. For inspiration, I’ve been playing some games, adjusting the sound mix in the game, so I could hear ambient sound effects more clearly.

My job this week also, was to write a synopsis of the game for our website. At the point I was writing it, we didn't have names for our characters. I decided to use nicknames when writing it, and at our next team meeting we came up with some proper names. Eventually we decided to use Fred, Joseph and Julia. You can read the finished synopsis on our website.

The foundations - week 1 and 2

In the last two weeks we have been busy thinking up with the concept for the game. We have had different versions of the story thrown back and forth. Basically, we had to come up with everything from story to the way the game plays, enemies, game scenarios, camera perspective, game atmosphere, sound and use of interface. In short - there has been a lot of discussion on the team.

Outside of group discussions, I'm trying to learn how to use Unity. I haven't been able to do much coding yet, as the tutorial I've been using didn't include much. I have also been making a Gantt-diagram and a document where I write down what parts of the game I will be working on, and the estimated time for doing it. A part of my job as well is taking care of the sounds in the game. So I'm trying to get an overview over which sound effects we need and how many.

A brief introduction

Hello!

I'm Thor Kobberrød Husby and this blog is dedicated to a Unity game. I'm currently learning how to program at a Norwegian university. The game is being developed as a project at the university. Here I will post about my contributions to the game.

We are six people working on the game, which as of yet has no official title. But we have been using two different working titles, "Framed" and "Revenge". I think I'm going to use Revenge here on the blog. For now.. anyway.