Hey there, friends! Welcome back on board of “San Francisco”, a huge spacecraft travelling far, far way from planet Earth.
Last time I promised to tell you what character I was using as a placeholder for the main character in the very first demo version of the game. And it was… Cleveland Brown from the cast of “Family Guy”! The animation in the cartoon is clear and sharp, so I had no trouble cutting the character from required sequences and created a sprite that could stand, walk around, collect items and so on.
And the winner today is Magiseth! Congratulations! We will email you the key shortly.
=)
All right, and now let us continue our tale of the project development.
Every story starts with a character. My Odysseus is a kind, smart and funny African-American, a flight engineer of the “San Francisco” research vessel. His features: average height, dark hair, A bit on the tubby side, but physical enough, not a wimp.
He loves some sound sleep and a nice meal, is smart and has a great sense of humor.
Odysseus is such a fun guy, you may think, but it’s not that simple. It’s true, Oddy has found his ways to enjoy life and tries to find benefits in any situation, but don’t forget that he’s been alone for seven years now, and that fact also had an impact on him… He became too lazy and is loosing his motivation. He tends to give up even on the simplest tasks. That’s why Barton worries so much.
Yes, Barton! What about our robot? Oh, I’ve had so many references for Odysseus’s robotic companion: from paranoid robot Marvin to TARS the service robot from “Interstellar” and a dozen other vivid characters from the golden age of sci-fi. And even though many of those had an impact on the character development, still Barton’s personality is unique and deeply connected to the personality of the main character.
Barton features a highly-developed AI and a bit of annoying personality, but also enjoys a good joke. Sometimes with a great portion of sarcasm. He is committed to setting various tasks for the engineer and reminding him on the errands on a regular basis.
But still he is a robot and must obey the commands of the crew members.
Odysseus understands that Barton is usually right, but based on his experience and intuition, he believes that not any problem can be solved using a formal approach. Barton sees his duty to constantly coerce the flight engineer to do his job, but also does his best to support Oddy, seeing how hard it is for him. He worries very much about the engineer’s state of mind.
By the beginning of the game’s story, these two seem to have found a delicate balance. Unfortunately it involves Barton pretending to set tasks for Oddy and forcing him to performing these, and Odysseus pretending to do so. Surely, some chores and some minor repairs are still being done, but this won’t be enough to overcome a difficult situation. Somebody will have to change his ways. The ship is in danger.
I suppose, next time we will talk about the ship that has become a home for Barton and Oddy in the last few years. And now a new giveaway! The game starts with a pilot episode (and it’s not a part of the first episode but a separate independent episode) takes effect on a date. Name that date!