adorablebot reporting for duty

I HAVE A LOT OF CLOTHES FEELINGS I NEED TO EXPLORE

probably relevant

I'm thinking a range of architectural styles - it's an old city, maybe it's seen war and it's patched together - a mix of old, new and hasty, ugly new.

Blog appearance

Hope no one minds this new colour scheme. Apparently black text on a yellow background is the most comfortable thing to look at for reading, but if your eyes happen to be vomiting at the sight of it then let me know and I'll change it to something else.

Technology in the future.

I just wanted to share some thoughts because for me the most satisfying stories set in the future are ones that are scientifically plausible. I hope this is interesting to other people too but I promise I won't get offended by anyone who's reaction to this is "urg christ Danny, shut the fuck up".

TLDR? No worries.

Anyway, in order to host an AI of human-levels of intelligence (IF we're even trying to do that), we'd need to first advance several areas of technology. Most obviously we'd need to improve our processors a LOT.

In this very moment in time it is believed that a human brain can perform roughly 1.0x1010 MOPS (million operations per second), (I do not know how this was calculated, I'm just going by quotes). To put this into perspective, the top of the range commercial CPU (to my knowledge) can do about 177730 MIPS (million instructions per second) at 3.33GHz, so in terms of what that means in operations, well... it depends on the operations in question, but you would definitely need a hell of a lot more than 56265 of the things. I reckon you're looking at twice that amount at a minimum. Think about the logistics of that. In particular imagine trying to cram that number of processors, (all properly connected up to the power supply, the memory, the hard drives, the cooling system etc), into a humanoid android alongside all the other stuff that's got to fit in there. There is consensus in the scientific community that this task is currently impossible. (Getting a computer to perform that many operations per second has been done, it's just physically massive and stupidly expensive.)

According to Marshall Brain (in a rather unsatisfyingly undetailed interview involving very little mathematical explanation) we should expect CPU's to match human brain processing power by somewhere between year 2040 to 2050, "maybe". I'm generally a little sceptical about this because what Marshall said in that interview sounds like it's based on Moore's Law which is the theory that the number of transistors on a chip doubles every 18-24 months. This theory relies on technology getting infinitely smaller, which obviously is not going to happen, though exactly when it's going to stop happening is difficult to predict.

Personally I reckon Computers will have to radically change (physically speaking) before they can get to the stage where we're capable of running a functional human brain in real time without filling an entire room full of crap and generating painfully high electricity bills. I reckon quantum computing is the next step but after that, something biological? A lab-grown brain in a jar? Taking this rout may sacrifice various aspects that currently give computers the edge, such as data transmission - which is millions of times slower in a human brain (based on the theory that 1 bit is the equivalent of 3.5x1010 electrons per millisecond). Maybe future people would merge things together. A bit like the whole left brain right brain thing we have going on right now I guess; on one hand it does maths, on the other hand it gets offended that you didn't thank it for the last load of maths you made it do. (God that'd be a right challenge though, figuring out how to convert brain activity into binary strings in real time... you'd have to monitor every neurone somehow. I guess it's a matter of input and output.)

On a less important note, what will hard drives look like in the future? What'll have taken over USB? (Or rather what will have taken over Thunderbolt? I assume Thunderbolt will take over USB next.) Will someone have nailed wireless power supplies? They're getting there already. But also, in terms of power supplies, what will we actually use as an energy source once the fossil fuels run out? Nuclear's plausible I reckon, but I doubt we're going to stop attempting to use natural energy resources any time soon. I quite like the idea of public power supplies that harness solar power and enable citizens to charge their phone / laptop / artificial limbs etc where ever they are. Or chargers that run on kinetic energy (eg exercise bikes). ... I'm getting side tracked again. Back to my original point:

I think it would be fair to say that if we're going to be taking our android characters beyond "passes the Turing Test" levels of intelligence and into "comprehends love on an emotional level" we're speaking way over 50 years ahead. We also probably need to advance a fair bit in terms of our neuroscienctific understanding, I have literally no idea how long that'll take, we've been studying it since Ancient Egypt times and it's said we still know more about the universe than our own brain, where as computers have only been around for a century (nearly), so I imagine that the time technology catches up to human-intelligence storing level we'll still be far from capable of generating a human brain, unless somehow we don't need to understand it to mimic it. (Possible I guess.) Anyway, I think if we're going to start integrating "android rights" into the story we are going to need genuinely intelligent androids - at least as intelligent as something that has rights.

Whilst thinking about all that, I had an idea. What if the androids' "brains" are not actually stored in their "bodies", but rather the thoughts are processed elsewhere then instructions for actions are sent to the android through the internet. The android simultaneously sends data to wherever it's processors are through a number of different input devices, including image capturing devices, audio recording equipment, scanners that record texture and terrain, thermometers, and so on. If the android move out of wireless network range you lose control of the robot and their "panic-find the internet" program kicks in, walking them around until they re-connect to a network. (Same goes for power supply if it happens to be wireless.)

In this sort of system they could rent houses to act as a giant cranium. Or maybe not an entire house. I guess alternately they could rent a space on the cloud for that sort of thing... god the internet would have to change a lot though, I mean, does wireless data transfer have a limit? And is privacy an issue for androids? I guess that would depend on their motivation. And then there's the question of validation - I assume humans would want to implement some fail safes to prevent the robot uprising... actually validation on a device capable of human intelligence could get seriously political.

This monologue has gone on to long. Time to put an end to it. If you did read it all let me know your thoughts.

I'm dumping this here to get it out of my brain

I'm trying to find the right balance between using spacey terminology and being obnoxious- like Guard vs. Legion? There's other words that have Roman basis to mean roughly the same thing, an army. Cohortes. Hastati (Hastatus). Phalanx. We need to get down a Joss Whedon amount of culture meshing.

I'm not a Roman expert, and I'm not sure how much you guys know about their whole deal, so I'll lay down the skinny- feel free, if you know all this (or don't find it interesting or important, there's no harm in that), to ignore it. I find it good to riff this stuff aloud, though, and know stuff gets better when you get feedback.

The Legion were required to be free men, and you were respected for having done your stint in it. It's turn ons included being obnoxiously large, conquering countries in wars that lasted for decades at a time, taking slaves and not being in Rome. And the thing of that was, it meant a lot of general mayhem in the capitol, because not enough of these guys were back to toe the line for people. I'm not talking casual theft, here, either; Rome, before they got their stuff together, was plagued with riots, mobs, home invasion. Gangs roamed the streets just tearing things up willy nilly; not a good place to be in.

So that's when the Vigiles came in. That's 'Watchmen' in latin. They started out as a little group of slaves sent out by the richer folk at night to stop things getting trashed, the Triumviri Nocturni. I'm not a latin buff, but the best I can make of the translation of that is 'Night-time Group of Officials Who Share Equal Power'. They didn't really do much besides protect their master's stuff, a private security force that were a sort of guard/fireman/alarm system hybrid. So they evolved (with a bit of nudging from the state) into what'd become the crux of the capitol- The Cohortes Vigilum, The Vigiles, the Spartoli, after the little buckets that they carried to, I assume, sort of ineffectively look like they were doing something to combat that massive fuck-off fires that would sometimes take ahold of Rome (they twigged on about germs pretty fast, but apparently not building furnaces in wooden houses). They were pretty similar to what we have today as a modern force- a Cohort of about 80 men would patrol their administrative area at night and beat the loving shit out of any burglars, run away slaves and would be mobs. I am joking, they weren't like our guys at all, because they also sometimes put out fires. And, I kid you not, one of their biggest deals was guarding the public baths at night. I am not sure from what, or why, but I am choosing to trust this fact blindly.

This is a lot of words, but I promise I'm going somewhere with this. Probably. I wish I hadn't promised, that was a stupid thing to do, now I actually have to make a point.

Things weren't breezey between the Vigiles and the Legion. Not's to say that I'm sure some weren't amiable, but the Vigiles weren't under the same system as their martial brothers. If push came to shove, though, the Vigiles tended to be faithful to Rome, while the Legion was faithful to the Emperor. The Vigiles were not free men, not until right at the very end, when citizenship after a certain length of service was granted as a 'you didn't die! :D!' bonus.

SO

There's been a war- the Colluctation (IT'S A WORD, I'M USING IT), the Strife, the Brigue, the Sedition. I think Liz has it nailed, there- it needs to be distant and unspecified. That's not to say we shouldn't have a more detailed explanation for it (especially if it'll help write plot better, I'm all for that, though I tend to get bogged down by details as this billion word essay on what we're calling out police force is probably telling you), but since it's not plot integral it'll be more effective just being hinted at, this ominous, bank breaking war.

I see direct parallels between Rome's struggles and what we're aiming for- they were dirt poor, by the end. By which I mean the plebeians were, the streets torn to hell as a result of generations of conquering that had no direct effect on the guys that just wanted to eat. The Vigiles were not entirely accepted, but necessary, and even when the army was limping around it was them that gots the glory. I think 4-10 years is a good amount of time for the war to have passed? Long enough that things like rationing, black markets, war wounds are still fresh, but things have mostly settled back down.

ALSO. League of Misopolemiacs. Apparently that means 'to have a fear of strife'. MISOPOLEMIACS.

There's more, but it gradually gets more incoherent as 1a.m approached.  

Day / Night

Hopes and Dreams

[00:11:00] Liz Edwards: I was thinking we could do night / day -- some things are open in the day, some things at night
[00:11:38] Liz Edwards: the game will probably be linear (i assume!) but itd be nice to revisit places and have them different
[00:16:33] Liz Edwards: i find it really sad when games are only set at night, too, i don't know why haha

[00:19:20] Danny Weatherley: haha yeah good idea!
[00:19:32] Danny Weatherley: i like the idea that its switchable and that could be part of the puzzle

[00:20:29] Liz Edwards: yeah, even if its just an option to say, "lets get some rest and check it out in the morning"
[00:20:50] Liz Edwards: but if you skip too many days without progress your boss gets mad or something haha

[00:22:50] Danny Weatherley: it'd be great it at just certian intervalls people get mad at you for doing typical game stuff

[00:23:07] Liz Edwards: i'd love that
[00:23:38] Liz Edwards: i hate getting repeated responses
[00:24:03] Liz Edwards: we should try to have that not happen!
[00:26:15] Liz Edwards: like you can ask a question a few times but the responses are "You already asked - I said,-"
"Seriously? I said-"
"Are you malfunctioning or what?"
and then the question disappears

[00:26:32] Liz Edwards: we'd have to have a note system so responses can still be read by the player

[00:27:43] Danny Weatherley: yeah like a journal or something

[00:28:06] Liz Edwards: the player should be able to write in it too
[00:28:34] Liz Edwards: i can't remember what game it is that lets you respond to emails you recieve
[00:28:54] Liz Edwards: Uplink let you, and there was another
[00:28:56] Liz Edwards: maybe the xfiles game
[00:29:08] Liz Edwards: i just love being able to write things back, mostly dumb things
[00:29:28] Liz Edwards: even if just to get a canned "this email bounced", "I am away on holiday!", response :B

Clothes Pondering

We are going to need our resident sexy toga expert to chime in, here!

Today I've been thinking about animation. Who'd have thought I'd have to dreg up knowledge from the first year of uni?

Danny, would it be possible to get a template sometime so I can practice animating in the proper dimensions and stuff? My understanding of your previous asset post is dubious at best!

I'm going to start tagging our posts now before they get out of hand. So we'll have:

story/plot,
gameplay/mechanics,
programming/technical,
art/assets
admin

does that cover everything? (for now, obviously as we get further we'll add tags and whatever)

IDEA

If we're going with the android cop vs android murder/hardware harvesting ring thing, he should go undercover.

Are the bad guys androids or human? Jerk androids would be scary but I like the idea of our android pretending to be human. If anyone sees you using android gadgets you are busted. WHIRR WHIRR. What was that? WHIRR I NEED TO USE THE BATHROOM EXCUSE ME

THAT IS ALL

Hmm, on one monitor, this looks dark and a little blue (as intended). On the other, it's not so dark and less blue. I don't know what screen to trust! How does it look for you guys?

I actually have no idea how to calibrate screens properly, argh.

edit: I fixed the blue tinge on my primary monitor but can't get it to be as bright as the other; maybe i should just make that one dimmer? Haha.