2088: Cultural Assumptions

Vinay Pai appears in his game to offer some tips.

       

The plot of The Cryllan Mission has resolved into a somewhat interesting mystery full of poignant metaphors. I'm a bit worried that it won't pay off, but I'm enjoying the journey so far

        

It turns out, first of all, that the residents of the various cities are Cryllans, not remnants of the lost U.S.S. Houston. Whatever they look and sound like, it's close enough to humans that they don't seem to recognize that we're not from their world. (How we're communicating at all is a mystery best left unaddressed.) The story that they tell is that Crylla used to be a peaceful, sedate, multi-cultural planet with a nurturing government and no weapons. Fairly recently, however, a revolution took place against the "misanthropes" who had previously "infested" the government, the state was overthrown, and a new government was formed. This new government values industry, ambition, and long-term planning. Some Cryllans are happy with the new circumstances; some are appalled.

             

This NPC would prefer things returned to normal.

           

This one wants to make Crylla great again.

            

One big change is in the availability of weapons and armor. The state now encourages everyone to own guns, ostensibly to protect them from "misanthropes." The misanthropes, for their part, protest that they aren't a different species; they just have a different skin color. A couple of them--refugees from a destroyed city--say that they used to be wealthy landowners, with a household full of servants, but are now looked down upon as second-class citizens. One of them, Aenur Bryllium-Se in Zenetych, makes an impassioned argument against these new weapons:

             

What are you? Some kind of communist?

        

Aside from the obvious plot holes (e.g., the language issues), this is a reasonably compelling story, particularly since I still don't know the fate of the Houston astronauts or how they might have instigated these events. 

Now, until yesterday, I was also convinced that the plot was an obvious case of real life writing the story. Doesn't it sound a lot like a story that some young Indian boys might have written after experiencing the culture clash of moving to America--particularly Texas? Their lives overthrown, their status inverted, perhaps coming from an upper-class existence back home and now suddenly lumped in with everyone with dark skin, denigrated, mistrusted? Especially coming from a country with strict gun regulation to a state that actively encourages people to open-carry? Is it any wonder that the disruptive force that has landed on Crylla is called the Houston?

               

This sounds like a mighty topical issue.

            

Alas, there are dangers in assuming too much autobiography in a fictional story. I had a brief exchange with Vivek Pai, and he said that the brothers not born in the U.S. emigrated at too young an age to remember much of India. They were more influenced by 1984 than real life; even the name of their company (Victory Software) was not simply taken from the "Vi" in front of all of their names but rather the ubiquitous brand name (Victory Gin, Victory Coffee, Victory Cigarettes, Victory Mansions) in Orwell's novel. Star Trek was also a clear influence, as was Apocalypse Now and The Killing Fields.

Whatever the case, I'm more interested in 2088 than last time. Since the first entry, I've explored the opening overland, which is 128 x 128 and wraps. I visited the cities of Karkala, Torphur, Adion, and Zenetych, and talking to every NPC that I could. The NPC names are a weird mash-up of what sounds to me like Indian, Polynesian, English, and Greco-Roman; for instance, Rala Mahana, Vanesh Wyckenry, and Brudhier Bryllium. Some women are designated with the suffix "-Se" after their husbands' last names, as in the married couple Hrishym Bolgarium and Giselle Bolgarium-Se.

Interacting with NPCs is entirely a one-way process of clicking on the various dialogue buttons--"Background," "Introduction," and "New Topic"--with any of them offering the possibility of "More Detail." Despite the different labels, clicking on them in order generally produces a progressive (if somewhat redundant) narrative, not so much individual topics. Vivek said that NPCs are so verbose and repetitive not so much as a reflection of Indian dialogue patterns but because the brothers were trying to pad the length of the game and make it more of a challenge to find the real clues amidst all the blather. So I'm 0 for 2 on my cultural assumptions.

Most NPCs, incidentally, don't talk at all. You waste a lot of time running up to icons and hitting Apple-T.

              

Off to kill a guard, I guess.

           

Karkala and Zenetych both had a full set of services: weapons, armor, food, transport sales and repair, and medicine. Janiv Masawanere, who works for the Karkalan government, told me that you have to have papers to buy a transport, and those are currently restricted to guards. Zenetych's NPCs are proud of it as a high-tech city where many of the weapons and armor currently being sold were originally invented. 

One Zenetych NPC, Hackyrn Kassimar-Se, is married to a human and doesn't seem to realize it. She says she lost her first husband in the war, but then "Yanov" came along, "one of the new appointees to manage this district."  A "Janov Kassimar" is listed among the crewmembers of the Houston. He has two children with Hackyrn, Yany and Iri. He has recently been recalled to Nepenthe, so I didn't get to meet him directly. Did the Houston crew overthrow the legitimate Cryllan government themselves? What else would have led the Cryllans to adopt so much of the humans' culture?

Torphur was a ruin of a city with only one NPC, a refugee named Broonden Mair who admitted he was a "misanthrope" who had rebelled against the new government, with the help of "dissenting outsiders" (the Houston crew?). He told me that force field generators can be destroyed with a plasma grenade.

                  

Torphur is as destroyed as Magincia.

           

The force fields in question activate at night, preventing "misanthropes" from entering the cities. The implication is that the self-same "misanthropes" make up most of the thieves, outlaws, soldiers, merchants, and other enemies attacking me in the countryside.

          

Crylla at night.

           

Adion was hidden amidst some mountains, but there wasn't much I could do there. A group of guards at the entrance said it was a "restricted" city and said I'd be executed if I proceeded. 

         

The wilderness combats remain generally easy. The only thing you have to worry about is earning enough money to offset the cost of the medicine you use post-combat. That hasn't been hard. I've mostly been letting the computer fight except when NPCs get hung up on each other. My characters all leveled up at some point, which confers attribute and hit point increases.

               

Leveling up.

             

NPCs told me repeatedly of another land lying "beyond Cramur." Cramur is a dungeon that connects to at least one other continent, where I will find the cities of Nepenthe (the seat of the government) and Eune.

I found Cramur and accidentally entered it too soon. Dungeons apparently switch you to 3-D view, until you encounter monsters, when you go to a regular combat grid. (This dual interface was featured in Ultima IV and V, which Vivek confirmed as influences.) The problem is, the entrance seems to be one-way. I can't leave from the square I entered and I can't find the exit. The monsters, meanwhile, are much tougher and more numerous than those on the surface--I think I need to be Levels 3 or 4, with plenty of upgraded weapons, armor, and grenades, before I attempt Cramur.

             

The dungeon view.

          

Unfortunately, 2088 is a bit of a bastard when it comes to character death. First, it saves the game upon every death. It also saves when entering and exiting buildings. Second, if your doctor dies, there is no way to resurrect him or any other party member. The doctor is the only character who can resurrect, and the service isn't available in towns. Not only did I have to restart after the game saved in Cramur with no way out, but my next party also became completely useless when the doctor died. (There's also no way to swap out party members; you have to reconstitute the whole party.) I guess I'd better put two doctors in my next party, then spend a while grinding.

                

This combat is not survivable at my level.

          

My enjoyment of the game increased when I realized that it does support movement by the numeric keypad. The problem was that KEGS automatically maps the keypad to the joystick, but if you disable the joystick, you get your regular keypad back. It makes it so much easier to move around than clicking on the screen. I look forward to visiting other cities and seeing how the plot develops.

Time so far: 3 hours.