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Wetware: designing for a contemporary dilemma

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Wetware: designing for a contemporary dilemma

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Content Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma By Satrio Dewantono Master of Fine Arts Interactive Media & Games Division School of Cinematic Arts University of Southern California May 10, 2019 Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 2 of 53 Table of Contents Table of Figures .............................................................................................................................. 4 Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................... 5 Abstract ........................................................................................................................................... 6 I Introduction .................................................................................................................................. 6 II Concepts ...................................................................................................................................... 7 Emergence & agency .................................................................................................................. 7 Value-based Game Decisions...................................................................................................... 7 A.I. Ethics .................................................................................................................................... 8 III Design ...................................................................................................................................... 10 Application of Concepts ............................................................................................................ 10 Emergence and agency .......................................................................................................... 10 Value-based Game Decisions ................................................................................................ 11 A.I. Ethics .............................................................................................................................. 11 Synopsis .................................................................................................................................... 12 Goals.......................................................................................................................................... 13 Experience Goals ................................................................................................................... 13 Design Goals.......................................................................................................................... 13 Mechanics.................................................................................................................................. 14 The Lab .................................................................................................................................. 14 The System ................................................................................................................................ 15 Goal #1 – Win the War .......................................................................................................... 15 Goal #2 – Save the AI............................................................................................................ 16 Interaction .............................................................................................................................. 17 Hacking .................................................................................................................................. 18 Money .................................................................................................................................... 19 Items & Documents ............................................................................................................... 20 NPC ....................................................................................................................................... 20 Events .................................................................................................................................... 21 Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 3 of 53 Trust ....................................................................................................................................... 21 The Saboteur .......................................................................................................................... 22 The Tablet .............................................................................................................................. 23 Technical Design ....................................................................................................................... 24 Technical Design Goals ......................................................................................................... 24 Specifications......................................................................................................................... 24 Approaches ............................................................................................................................ 24 Art Direction ............................................................................................................................. 27 Visual Style Goals ................................................................................................................. 27 IV Production ................................................................................................................................ 28 Claymation look and animation ................................................................................................ 28 Parsed conditionals .................................................................................................................... 29 Dialog file format ...................................................................................................................... 30 Narrative development .............................................................................................................. 31 Plot development ................................................................................................................... 31 V Testing and Iterative Development ........................................................................................... 32 Iterative development highlights ............................................................................................... 32 Introduction sequence ............................................................................................................ 32 Players losing track of what to do ......................................................................................... 33 Players missing the tablet ...................................................................................................... 33 Players skipping news sequences .......................................................................................... 33 Players not interacting with the hacking console .................................................................. 34 Dilemma ................................................................................................................................ 35 VI Conclusion ............................................................................................................................... 35 Appendix 1: JSON Conditional Parser Specification Document ................................................. 38 Appendix 2: Wetware Story Outline ............................................................................................. 41 Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 4 of 53 Table of Figures Fig. 1. Design of the layout of the lab. .......................................................................................... 15 Fig. 2. A flowchart detailing gameplay flow and loop. ................................................................ 16 Fig. 3. Prototype of interaction interface. ..................................................................................... 17 Fig. 4. Example Brickbreaker-like game. ..................................................................................... 18 Fig. 5. Left, sketch of the hacking workstation – right, prototype of hacking workstation. ......... 19 Fig. 6. Prototype of how the dialogue will be displayed. ............................................................. 21 Fig. 7. A mockup of the tablet’s home screen. ............................................................................. 23 Fig. 8. Diagram of the task queue system for NPCs. .................................................................... 25 Fig. 9. Visual reference moodboard. ............................................................................................. 27 Fig. 10. Visual state of the game, circa March 2019. ................................................................... 28 Fig. 11. The Claymation material applied on a sample sphere, as seen in Unreal Engine. .......... 29 Fig. 12. Screen capture of a snippet of a plaintext .dlg file. ......................................................... 30 Fig. 13. The snippet described in (fig. 12), as seen in the game. .................................................. 31 Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 5 of 53 Acknowledgements All praise goes to Allah subḥānahu wa-taʿālā for His many blessings. The writer would like to thank the Interactive Media and Game Design Department of the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts, including all its faculty, administrative, clerical, and technical staff. The writer would also like to acknowledge The Indonesia Endowment Fund for Education and the Indonesia Ministry of Finance for providing the funding required in pursuing the writer’s Master of Fine Arts degree. Acknowledgments are also due to the advisory committee of this thesis: the chair, Peter Brinson of IMGD, who was also the writer’s academic advisor for three years; Jose Sanchez of Plethora- Project, and Carl J. Schnurr of IMGD. Special mention to Tracy Fullerton, who provided access to a wealth of resources for the referential base of this paper. A shower of gratitude goes to the writer’s ever-supportive family – Heru Setiawan, father, Trisni Damayanti, mother, and Radifan Setiadi, brother. Finally, many thanks to those who developed Wetware alongside the writer: co-director Maryyann Landlord, producer Ann Lee, and all the other team members. Truly a team that the writer does not deserve. This paper is dedicated to Prof. Dr. Iping Supriana (1952 – 2019), the writer’s undergraduate thesis advisor, Indonesia’s leading mind in computer vision and graphics, and a giant who dedicated his life lifting others up to stand on his shoulders. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 6 of 53 Abstract This paper outlines and reports the development process of the game Wetware throughout the years of 2018-2019 and the design decisions made along the way. This paper also describes the concepts of emergence, agency, value-based game decisions, and A.I. ethics as the basis for the design of the game, and in the end lays out the conclusions drawn from implementation and testing of the design in relation to the three concepts. I Introduction As of 2018, the use of artificial intelligence has become as widespread and familiar as to engage discourses with regards to the ethics surrounding it. Amongst these ethical questions, the developers of Wetware were particularly interested in the question of the treatment of AI entities once they reach a certain level of complexity. In terms of the study of interactivity itself, the development of Wetware tried to follow and explore the thread of two major topics: the emergence of experiences that is inherent in interactivity, where audiences are to have unique experiences and solutions to problems, and a decision-making process which involves factors not included within the constraints of the game i.e. making choices that align to one’s morality instead of ones that are optimal to a game’s rules. For this latter topic, the exploration of an ethical dilemma as described in the first paragraph were deemed to be a suitable narrative platform by the developers. Development lasted from January 2018 to May 2019. In total, 15 people worked on the game, including a core membership of two co-directors and a producer. A game with an average Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 7 of 53 playtime of 96 minutes was the result after the development process and concurrent testing by more than 30 playtesters throughout. II Concepts Emergence & agency One definition of emergence in systems is the arising of novel and coherent structures, patterns and properties during the process of self-organization in complex systems (Goldstein, 1999). In the context of interactivity, the observed emergence of the interactive system can be subjectively valued as a part of the gestalt of the experience. It is a goal of interaction designers to create intentional effects through conscious choices while also providing affordances for behaviors encouraged by the design goals (Murray, Inventing the Medium). Agency is the satisfying power to take meaningful action and see the results of one’s decisions and choices. While procedural systems lend themselves easily to generative and emergent results, an optimal balance between structure and reactiveness is required to achieve agency. A system guiding the player in a linear fashion throughout offers no alternative possibilities, and thus no choice and in turn no sense of agency; in the meantime, a system providing too many possibilities governed by too many factors frustrates the desire for agency (Murray, Hamlet on the Holodeck). Value-based Game Decisions Games, owing to their formal elements (Fullerton), contain a set of decisions for the player such that each member of this set could be given a score in terms of optimality for achieving the goals Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 8 of 53 of the game. This valuation of optimal winning choices is the foundation of the study of game theory (von Neumann, et. al) and the modeling of game-playing algorithms (Schwab). As participation in a game means stepping in a magic circle where special rules apply (Huizinga), these rules may clash with values inherently held onto by the player in the real, non- game world – morality, faith, honor, etc. In this situation, a choice made to uphold one of these real-world values may be disadvantageous to winning the game. The dilemma the player is faced with at this point, heavily influenced by individual propensity, is a possible medium of self- expression for them (Smith). Some precedents of this concept: • Helping a fallen competitor up in physical sports e.g. soccer, footrace. • Papers, Please (Pope): as an immigration officer, the player must choose between separating a husband/wife couple at the border or getting penalized by their superiors for letting them through. A.I. Ethics Deriving from the previous concept, the developers decided upon the theme of A.I. Ethics as the narrative platform for player dilemma. With the approaching ubiquity of complex consumer- level artificial intelligence systems that can execute traditionally human activities, humanistic questions revolving around the nature of these machines have pervaded public discourse and popular culture. A great deal of focus has been placed by contemporary society in the ethics of constructing artificial intelligence, either in the form of ethical guidelines to apply in the real world (Stuart et. al., 2015) or in fiction with works such as I,Robot (Asimov), The Terminator (Cameron), WarGames (Badham), Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 9 of 53 Another ethical question in this topic is the treatment of artificial intelligence after they reach a certain level of complexity. Although not as much talked about as the former topic, the occurrence of real-world incidents where computer or robotic systems which mimics humans or other living beings are violently treated (Bromwich) prove that this is also a relevant topic. Some notable fictional media have also paved the way in the engagement of this question, namely The Second Renaissance in The Animatrix (Maeda) and Ex Machina (MacDonald). Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 10 of 53 III Design After a pre-production process which lasted from January 2018 to May 2018, a design of the game, outlined in a master game design document, art design document, sound design document, and technical design document was produced by the development team. Such design is as follows. Application of Concepts Emergence and agency Multiple-solution Problems The development of Wetware will make an effort to make sure that for as many cases as possible, there are multiple approaches to achieving a particular goal. The aim of this is to ensure that a sensation of agency and uniqueness is attained for each players’ individual experience. Sandbox Environment In contrast to games or other interactive media where progression is tied to the player’s actions, Wetware’s narrative progression will strictly be time-based, in that plot events and character actions will transpire with or without player intervention. The environment in which play transpires is also not constrained to linear exploration, but instead is structured as an open space in which interactable objects are strewn around, while non-player characters (NPCs) execute their own routines. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 11 of 53 Value-based Game Decisions Multiple Outcomes The game is to be playable into more than one polarly opposite outcomes based on a major decision which is introduced early to the player. The narrative and mechanics of the game is to be designed such that progress towards one of these outcomes is detrimental to the other. As such, it is possible for the player to work towards and get the best results of the goal they set or be indecisive and get a result that is detrimental to both goals. Dilemma As per the previous item, players of the game are to be constantly reminded of the ramifications of their discrete actions, in order to instill a sense of dilemma and second-guessing throughout gameplay. A.I. Ethics The narrative of the game is to be set in a technologically advanced world where AI have found extensive and ubiquitous usage both in military and civilian hands. The player takes the role of a researcher probing a hostile drone in order to win a war against a technologically superior enemy. Over the course of the game, the player can either decide to let the AI of the drone free at the cost of civilian lives or help win the war while inflicting damages to the drone’s software. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 12 of 53 Synopsis Set in a country fighting a losing war, Wetware puts the player in the shoes of a “Drone Whisperer” tasked to hack a recently captured enemy scout drone with advanced AI that is believed to carry information on future bombing attacks that can claim many lives. As hacking progresses, however, the drone squirms, struggles, and even pleads for the player to stop hurting it. Given the choice to work towards either hacking the AI for potentially life-saving information or setting the AI free, the player will be interacting with a sandbox environment comprising of little systems that interact with each other and react to the player’s actions, from firewall server systems keeping the AI in the lab to NPC coworkers mulling about, driven by their own motivations and trust towards themselves and the player. The aim is to present multiple, non- linear methods for the player to approach their goal, and to provide generative, emergent narratives in each playthrough. As each day in the game ends, the player will also go through dream sequences based on their choices the previous day. These are relatively more linear sequences told through visual metaphors designed to present ideas that “push back” on the player’s decisions. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 13 of 53 Goals Experience Goals Experience goals are based on concepts outlined in the previous sections. • To engender discussions on how we should treat future AI agents o A core loop featuring hacking into the AI o Said core loop to be within “flow state” (i.e. engaging yet not overwhelming) (Csikszentmihalyi) o Representation of the AI that is borderline sympathetic • To have the player constantly feel the implications of their actions o Events that happen each day based on what the player has done to the world o Deliver tension for actions that “break the rules” through consequences • To deliver an experience that feels unique and impactful for each playthrough o Parameter-driven endgames that can be achieved at various points o “Sims-like” NPCs that figure out their own tasks and reactions based on their drives Design Goals • Create a simulation of the world and characters that is within scope o Focus on simulation endpoints that matter o Show as much as possible that NPCs and interactable objects in the world react to each other • Contextual, controller-friendly control scheme o Use four buttons to represent different actions o Every mouse interaction substitutable with directional pad/analog Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 14 of 53 • Stop-motion/Claymation visual & animation style o Chop animation frames to emulate lower frame rate for characters o Apply realistic, tactile materials on cartoony objects & characters Mechanics The passage of time in the game is divided in days, where during the day play will occur in the lab. Time will pass in real time until the early evening, when the player checks out, goes home, and enters the dreamscape. The Lab In the lab, the player will have two ultimate objectives to choose from: whether to go forward with hacking the Drone AI, or set it free from the facility. These ultimate goals will be broken down into an arc of specific objectives (i.e. going to the server room to change security configurations, stealing a key, etc.) which can be approached in multiple ways. Gameplay in the lab mainly involves interacting with objects which have specific purposes, collecting and using items, and interacting with NPCs. The lab is a 3D environment consisting of the drone containment and the player character’s workstation in the middle, surrounded by cubicles of the other characters, filing cabinets, a break room, and a server room. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 15 of 53 Fig. 1. Design of the layout of the lab. The System As of the story of the game, the main purpose of the lab is to hack the enemy drone AI. The system which facilitates this runs on a list of critical servers which need to be maintained. Out of the lab’s many servers, only 5 specific ones are critical to the operation. • When any one of 5 critical servers are disabled, hacking the AI will be ineffectual. • When all 5 critical servers are disabled, the lab’s firewalls are taken down and the AI can escape to the cloud. Goal #1 – Win the War Should the player choose to try hacking the AI to help the war effort, the most important thing to do is to make sure to hack the AI enough times within the duration of the game. One of the NPCs in the lab will also be assigned as a saboteur sympathizing with the AI, who will try to disable Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 16 of 53 the lab’s servers discreetly. It is also important to catch this saboteur to ensure that the hacking operations run smoothly (see Saboteur below). Goal #2 – Save the AI Saving the AI involves disabling the 5 critical servers so that it can upload itself to the cloud. First, the player must figure out which servers out of the many in the lab are critical ones – they can steal documents which contain this information or get an NPC to trust them enough to tell them. Afterwards, they must either hack and disable it themselves or, again, get an NPC to do it for them. A flowchart of player activities is depicted as in (fig. 2) Fig. 2. A flowchart detailing gameplay flow and loop. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 17 of 53 Interaction Interacting with objects in the lab is as simple as looking at one and pressing the one of the four assigned “interact” keystroke – an object can have up to four different interactions associated with it. Each object serves a different purpose and either affects the environment, NPCs, or story progression in either a subtle or obvious way. Fig. 3. Prototype of interaction interface. Such objects range from significant to the seemingly mundane: computers, server terminals, door locks, microwaves, drawers, a cup of coffee, etc. Examples of interactions with objects: • Looking into a filing cabinet to obtain documents (see documents section below) • Hacking into a server to disable it • Accessing the player’s workstation Some interactions with specific objects can raise suspicion – if an NPC spots the player carrying out these interactions, several consequences may occur: • Losing trust with the associated NPC (see NPC section below) • Getting sent off back to the player’s workstation • Stern warnings • Getting terminated from the lab (after several warnings) Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 18 of 53 Spotting is based on the NPC’s line of sight, so it will be important for the player to still be aware of their surroundings while carrying out a suspicious action. The purpose is to establish tension, which will hopefully drill down the gravity of the player’s action. The objects’ purpose is to have actionable “hubs” within the game for both the NPC and the player, which affects the win/lose condition of the game. Hacking The player’s primary duty as a Drone Whisperer is to operate the panel which facilitates hacking into the drone AI. The act of hacking is represented by a minigame resembling Breakout (Bushnell) Fig. 4. Example Brickbreaker-like game. The bricks represent security modules and firewalls that protects access to the system that is being hacked. Some bricks will drop documents (see Items & Documents below) contained within the AI when broken, which will fall towards the bottom of the screen and can be collected by the player’s paddle. They can be irrelevant to the war effort or otherwise. The “Hack the AI” goal is achieved Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 19 of 53 when enough relevant documents are collected this way. As the player hacks the AI more, the documents it drops may contain messages directed personally to the player, pleading them to stop hacking. The workstation used to hack the Drone AI sits in front of its containment. As the minigame is played, the player will also get a view of the Drone before them. Whenever a brick is broken, the Drone will squirm and struggle, as if in pain. Fig. 5. Left, sketch of the hacking workstation – right, prototype of hacking workstation. So that the player doesn’t stay in the workstation all the time, after every hack there is a set duration of cooldown where hacking can’t be done. Everyday there is a minimum hacking quota to be met. If the player doesn’t carry this out for several days, they may get terminated from the job. This is so that players wishing to set the AI free must also still maintain their cover. The same hacking minigame is used when hacking servers to set the AI free. Money The player gets paid each day. Money is used to buy items (see Items below). The amount of money the player receives each day is based on how many times they attempted to hack the AI. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 20 of 53 Items & Documents The player has an inventory with which to store items in. In the lab, items can be used on specific objects to enable new interactions with them: the simplest example would be a key for a locked door. Other examples include: • Using laxatives on a coworker’s coffee mug • Using the “InstaHack Remote” to skip the hacking minigame on a server and instantly disable it • Using a firecracker on an object to call attention from all NPCs in the lab Depending on their nature, some items are one-time use only and some others can be used multiple times. Another function of items is that some of them can be given to an NPC to increase their trust (see NPC section). Documents, like items, are collectible. Once acquired they are stored in the player’s documents list so that they can be read later. Items and documents can be acquired by shopping for them online with money, given by NPCs while engaging in dialogue with them, or collected from several objects in the lab (e.g. filing cabinet, fridge). NPC The facility is populated with NPCs that go about their daily routine. They are fully-fleshed characters with their own backgrounds and specific roles. Under the hood, these characters are simulated agents who operates on a task-based system, selecting tasks to do based on their work, mood, and basic needs. They also perceive the environment around them through hearing and Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 21 of 53 line of sight, and will respond to things in their vicinity in ways such as engaging in dialogue with another NPC, etc. There will be 3 main NPC characters. Engaging in dialogue with these NPCs is an option, and aside from a method to gain information as to the goings-on of the world, it is also a possible path to build rapport with them and get them to do what the player wishes them to do. Fig. 6. Prototype of how the dialogue will be displayed. Events Events are one of the primary ways of narrative delivery in the game. When certain conditions are met, NPCs can be orchestrated to play out a pre-scripted scene with each other and the player. Trust Trust is the one metric of an NPC that is exposed to the player. It is gained by helping them on certain tasks that they ask of the player, choosing correct dialogue options, or giving them Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 22 of 53 favorable items, which can be figured out through dialogue. It is lost when NPCs spot the player do suspicious things, and if they feel that there’s not enough progress with the project. With enough trust, there will be options in the dialogue to ask them about sensitive information. With an even higher trust, an NPC will look the other way when the player does suspicious things, and will even be willing to do tasks that the player otherwise has to do themselves, such as hacking a server. The Saboteur In each playthrough, one of the NPCs will be assigned as a saboteur working for an AI rights activist group. They will occasionally attempt to steal documents and disable critical servers to hinder the project, if given the chance (they will not do this if they know someone else is in the same room). A way to catch them in the act is to take photographs of them doing a suspicious thing. This requires an understanding of each NPC’s roles and routines, but there will also be animated cues when they are doing a suspicious act. The photo feature can be engaged through the player’s tablet (see Tablet below). Another way to catch a saboteur is to get their trust high enough so that they confide their secret to the player. The purpose of the saboteur is to add a challenge and a chance for emergence for players who decide to go for the “hack the AI” goal, so that it doesn’t become repetitive. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 23 of 53 The Tablet The player character owns a tablet which serves as the in-game menu. From the tablet, the player can access their inventory, the online shop to buy items, the documents archive, and the camera to take pictures in the game. Fig. 7. A mockup of the tablet’s home screen. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 24 of 53 Technical Design Technical Design Goals • A task-based simulation system for NPCs • Changing global parameters in game in a way that is accessible to every module • Inventory & documents system • A system to allow saving of player progress • Maintain performance in current systems Specifications The game is to be built in Unreal Engine 4, which can be programmed using either C++ and the engine’s proprietary Blueprint visual scripting system. Approaches Task-Based System First, let an NPC task, at its most basic, be defined as either: • Moving to a point. • Playing an animation until a condition is met. • Engaging in dialogue with the player or another NPC. From this point, non-atomic tasks can be defined as a task which refers to a list of other sub- tasks. The NPC characters in the game can be given a priority queue (Cormen, 2007) of tasks and its assigned priority level. The NPC will use this queue as such: • If no current task, refer to top task in queue Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 25 of 53 • Execute top task in queue until finished, or if task is interruptible, until top task in queue is not current task • If task finished, apply changes to global parameters if any • Discard current task • Back to start With this basic queue, a series of components doing their specific calculations can each independently create and submit tasks to the queue. An example would be as in (figure ) Fig. 8. Diagram of the task queue system for NPCs. As the system is modular, components can be added and removed as seen fit. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 26 of 53 Global Parameters As Unreal Engine has a GameMode class which can be inherited from and statically accessed by any object in the game, it would make sense to store the parameters in this class. Parameters are stored as name-number key-value pairs for quick lookup. Inventory & Documents These can be stored as lists in their respective objects. To increase performance and make saving easier, an object in the game can store a dictionary of inventories that exist in the game. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 27 of 53 Art Direction Visual Style Goals • 3D rendered stop-motion/Claymation style o Less comedic, instead more towards dark & nuanced, a la Coraline (Sellick, 2009) Fig. 9. Visual reference moodboard. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 28 of 53 IV Production Fig. 10. Visual state of the game, circa March 2019. Production of Wetware took place between June 2018 and May 2019. This section will outline some of the more salient techniques used to produce several aspects of the game. Claymation look and animation In order to achieve a Claymation effect on the characters, both the material and animation of the model needed to be given special treatment. For the material, especially on the characters’ skin and hair, this is achieved by updating some of the materials’ properties at 10 frames per second. The properties updated are namely the UV coordinates of the tiled normal map used in the material, and world offset modifiers of the vertices under the material. In the case of vertex offset, the time value is used to feed a 2D Perlin noise (Perlin, 2002) function so as to ensure the random offsets are continuous across the surface. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 29 of 53 For the model’s animation, after an animation clip is finalized in Maya, a filter (Withers, 2016) is applied to the final animation to generate keyframes for every bone at the rate of 10 frames per second with step transition between the frames, so as to give the impression that the motion was “in twos” (Laybourne, 1999). Fig. 11. The Claymation material applied on a sample sphere, as seen in Unreal Engine. Parsed conditionals Over the course of implementing the game’s system, development deemed it beneficial to have another layer of programming on top of Unreal Engine’s C++ and Blueprint interface. A particular aim is to be able to define conditions inline alongside or inside data assets such as dialogs and task lists, and also have these conditions be serializable. It is thus decided by development to store these “conditionals” as strings in the JSON format (Crockford, 2006), which is then parsed into boolean results at runtime. A detailed specification document of the format and parsing method, intended for circulation within the engineering department during development, can be seen in (Appendix 1). Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 30 of 53 Dialog file format In order to facilitate quick writing and iteration of ingame dialogs, a plaintext file format with the extension of .dlg is defined by development, with each file corresponding to a particular scene or extended exchange of dialog. A snippet of a file, representing an exchange between the player and Lindsay, a character, is shown in (fig. 8) Fig. 12. Screen capture of a snippet of a plaintext .dlg file. In the file as shown in the figure, each “line” of dialogue is separated by an empty line in the file. Different pieces of information regarding the “line” is separated by a line break character and uniquely identified by the amount of pound sign which precedes the line. • No pound sign: unique key of the speaker of the dialogue, typically also the speaker’s name. • One pound sign: the actual line to be said. • Two pound signs: Possible responses to this line; multiple occurrences possible. • Three pound signs: Reserved. The file is then parsed, to then feed data to both NPC-to-Player and NPC-to-NPC dialogue in the game. The resulting in-game dialogue from the snippet in the above figure can be seen in (fig. ). Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 31 of 53 Fig. 13. The snippet described in (fig. 12), as seen in the game. Narrative development Plot development The development and refinement of the details of the game’s narrative occurred over the production period. A result of this was a narrative outline describing major story beats over twelve in-game days of gameplay, the maximum amount of days playable in the game until an ending is reached. This outline is available as (Appendix 2). Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 32 of 53 V Testing and Iterative Development Concurrent to the production period (June 2018 – May 2019), builds of the game in various stages were continuously tested by different individuals each time. This process facilitates the iterative development part of production, based on the agile software development life cycle (Sommerville). On average, during the period between September 2018 and March 2019 one playtest is carried out by someone brand new to the game. Notes from the observation of this playtest is then used as a baseline of what issues need to be addressed the following week. Iterative development highlights In this section, several select cases are outlined; some of them are cases where development identified a problem during testing and a solution was implemented, while the rest are observations. Introduction sequence Several iterations of the intro sequence, happening during day 1, was made throughout development. Since the sequence is crucial to the player knowing the routine to execute in the game, it is of high importance that they get the information it delivers. A main concern was the player straying away from the sequence. Solution: Initially, the Lab Director (Arturo) leads the player on a tour of the lab, introducing the other characters and the environment at the same time. There is a higher likelihood of the player straying away from him in this scenario, so eventually the whole introduction scene is to take place in one room – the central room of the lab which contains the drone. Potentially, the player can be “teleported” and locked in place as the sequence occurs, at the cost of the sensation of agency. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 33 of 53 Players losing track of what to do As the work day in the lab is unstructured and the player is free to do things in any order as they please within the time limit, it sometimes occurs that the player forgets the main objective of the day, which is to hack the drone. Solution: A dialog option is added to the Lab Director, as players tend to perceive him as an authority figure to look towards. This dialog option allows the player to ask him what to do, upon which he will contextually remind the player. Players missing the tablet In earlier tests, players miss the fact that they own a tablet that they can access anytime, despite there being prompts telling the player which input is used to pull it up. This in turn makes them miss important information as several critical plot and mechanical points are delivered through documents and emails contained in the tablet. Solution: A bedroom environment is added, where the player always starts and ends their day. In this environment the tablet is open by default and interacting with it is the only thing they can do (aside from moving to the lab or continuing to the next day). Players skipping news sequences At the start of each day, news reports pertaining to the events of the world is displayed in the form of timed image sequences. These events vary based on whether the player chooses to hack the drone or not, therefore informing them of the consequences of their choices. As the sequence is made to be skippable, players in tests sometimes skip these and miss the information. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 34 of 53 Solution: An alternative was considered by development to make these sequences skippable, but it was deemed not ideal, as right before this sequence the player has already encountered an unskippable one (the dream), and also the fact that this would discourage second playthroughs. The solution taken is to change these sequences into the form of newspaper front pages, with the headline containing the gist of the event. This way, information is more immediate while players also still can decide upon how much time they wish to spend looking at it. Players not interacting with the hacking console With the original story outline defined at the start of development, it was a possibility for the player to not do the drone hacking activity at all, as it was deemed by development that this possibility is handled by the player getting the worst ending possible at the end of the twelfth day (the drone being taken to be dismantled and a devastating attack killing thousands both happening). After observations, this is deemed undesirable. Solution: A solution attempted by development was to have the first day not end until the player interacts with the hacking console. This ensured that the player does this at least once. After further testing, however, this was deemed inadequate since players still have a tendency to skip this activity in the following days, and in one particular occurrence, a player ended up spending an entire hour in the first day due to this mechanism (this case is detailed in the next section). It is thus planned by development to implement a sequence where the player is reprimanded should they miss the hacking interaction by the end of a day, and they are sent back in time to the beginning of that day. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 35 of 53 Dilemma This is a general observation of the overarching topic of dilemma. Throughout testing, it is observed by development that testers unanimously choose to try to save the drone. There are several factors that development have considered: • The call to action to keep hacking the drone is not as direct and immediate • Consequences in not hacking the drone is more of a “slow burn”, transpiring over several in- game days • Players simply wish to see what will happen if they try to save the drone • The audiovisual sensation of the drone getting shocked is so visceral to a point that the effects of the alternative choice is still not enough to counterbalance it The last point is particularly pronounced in some cases of playtesting – mostly by observed reactions and, in one particular case, a player electing to not continue hacking the drone immediately for the entire day. VI Conclusion A contextual balance between free-form activity and linear sequences was required to be struck during design of the game. The animation of the drone, and the visceral experience overall of watching it get shocked, seems to have a much stronger effect than dialogues and news reports. Seeing that in one case it is enough to make a player not want to continue the hacking mechanic, the phenomenon of value-based choice is deemed to be sufficiently observed. In terms of dilemma, though, it seems that more fine-tuning and counterbalancing is necessary. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 36 of 53 Works Cited Asimov, Isaac. I, Robot. Gnome Press, 1950. WarGames. Directed by John Badham, MGM/UA, 1983. Bromwich, Jonah Engel. “Why Do We Hurt Robots?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 19 Jan. 2019, http://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/19/style/why-do-people-hurt- robots.html. Bushnell, Nolan. “Breakout.” Atari, inc, 1979. The Terminator. Directed by James Cameron, Metro Goldwyn Mayer, 1984. Cormen, Thomas H., et al. Introduction to Algorithms. MIT Press, 2007. Crockford, D., "The application/json Media Type for JavaScript Object Notation (JSON)", RFC 4627, DOI 10.17487/RFC4627, July 2006, https://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc4627. Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. Flow: the Psychology of Optimal Experience. New York: Harper and Row, 1990. Fullerton, Tracy. Game Design Workshop: a Playcentric Approach to Creating Innovative Games. CRC Press, 2008. Goldstein, Jeffrey. “Emergence as a Construct: History and Issues.” Emergence, vol. 1, no. 1, 1999, pp. 49–72., doi:10.1207/s15327000em0101_4. Huizinga, Johan. Homo Ludens: a Study of the Play-Element in Culture. Beacon Press, 1953. Ex Machina. Directed by Andrew MacDonald, 2014. The Animatrix: The Second Renaissance Parts I and II. Directed by Masahiro Maeda, 2003. Laybourne, Kit. The Animation Book. Random House International, 1999. Murray, Janet. Hamlet on the Holodeck: the Future of Narrative in Cyberspace. Boston: MIT Press, 1997. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 37 of 53 ---. Inventing the Medium: Principles of Interaction Design as a Cultural Practice. Boston: MIT Press, 2012. Perlin, Ken. “Improving Noise.” ACM Transactions on Graphics, vol. 21, no. 3, 2002, doi:10.1145/566654.566636. Pope, Lucas. “Papers, Please.” 3909 LLC, 8 Aug. 2013, http://papersplea.se/. Russell, Stuart, et al. “Research Priorities for Robust and Beneficial Artificial Intelligence.” AI Magazine, vol. 36, no. 4, 2015, p. 105., doi:10.1609/aimag.v36i4.2577. Schwab, Brian. AI Game Programming. Course Technology, 2009. Coraline. Directed by Henry Sellick, Focus Features, 2009. Smith, Randy. “Leave Enough Room: Design That Supports Player Expression.” Game Developers Conference. Moscone Center, San Francisco. 4 Mar. 2011. Lecture. Sommerville, Ian. Software Engineering. Pearson Education, 2016. von Neumann, John, and Oskar Morgenstern. Theory of Games and Economic Behavior. Princeton Univ. Pr., 1953. Withers, Joe. “Stop Motion Simulator Script (Maya/Python).” Joe Withers, 27 Apr. 2016, joewithers.wordpress.com/2016/04/27/stop-motion-simulator-script-mayapython/. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 38 of 53 Appendix 1: JSON Conditional Parser Specification Document Wetware Engineering Task - Week 1 Sep. 2018 JSON Conditional Parser For this task, build a functionality for parsing a specifically-formatted JSON string to evaluate values in an std::map and return a boolean. Key-value Map Let there be a map with uppercase, alphanumeric std::string keys and integer values, with example contents as such: Key Value DAYCOUNT 5 HACKSCORE 4500 CHARACTER1TRUST 100 CHARACTER2TRUST 200 JSON Conditional String To evaluate values in this map, a JSON string containing sets of conditionals - a comparison of a map key’s value against some other value - is constructed as such: { "conditional-objects" : { "clause" : "OR", "conditionals" : [ { "key" : "CHARACTER1TRUST", "comparison" : "EQUAL", "value" : 100 }, { "key" : "DAYCOUNT", "comparison" : "GREATER-THAN", "value" : 2 }, { "conditional-objects" : { Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 39 of 53 "clause" : "AND", "conditionals": [ { "key" : "HACKSCORE", "comparison" :"GREATER-THAN-OR-EQUAL", "value" : 1000 }, { "key" : "CHARACTER2TRUST", "comparison" : "LESS-THAN", "key-to-compare" : "CHARACTER1TRUST" } ] } } ] } } Explanation of the JSON string: • conditional-objects represents the root of the JSON object to be parsed, containing possibly several conditionals. It contains: o clause : the logical clause which connects each member conditional of the root object. The value can either be AND or OR. This key is ignored when the conditionals section only contains 1 member or less. o conditionals : an array of conditionals - the objects where actual value comparisons are contained. Each conditional contains these values: ▪ key : the key in the map whose value is to be evaluated; required. ▪ comparison : the comparison operator; possible values are EQUAL, NOT_EQUAL, LESS_THAN, GREATER_THAN, LESS_THAN_OR_EQUAL, and GREATER_THAN_OR_EQUAL. ▪ value : the constant value for the key to be compared against; optional - either this or key-to-compare must exist. ▪ key-to-compare : another key in the map whose value is to be compared against; optional - either this or value must exist. o Note that, as per the above example, a conditional-objects’s conditionals array can contain other conditional-objects, creating nested comparisons. There is no limit on the level of this recursion. • Were the JSON string above be turned into C++ code (and assuming the map’s key value pairs are declared integer variables in code), it would translate to: Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 40 of 53 (CHARACTER1TRUST == 100 || DAYCOUNT > 2 || (HACKSCORE >= 1000 && CHARACTER2TRUST < CHARACTER1TRUST)) And, when evaluated against the values of the example map, it would return true. Desirable Output Create a class, JsonConditional, which implements such function: bool JSONConditional::Evaluate(std::map<std::string,int> valueMap, std::string conditionalsJsonString); Where valueMap is a key-value map containing values to be evaluated as described above, and conditionalsJsonString is a JSON string in the above format defining the evaluations to be done on the map. The function should return a boolean value according to the specifications described above. Edge cases: • If a key to be looked up in a conditional does not yet exist in the map, treat its value as NaN (this applies to both key and key-to-compare). • A conditional-objects set with zero conditionals in its list will return true. • Assume that all entries of the JSON, except otherwise noted, are required. If a particular section is missing an entry (e.g. a conditional without the comparison entry), ignore the conditional. If it is the only conditional in the conditional- objects set, assume that the set has zero conditionals (see point 2). Notes • To help mitigate discrepancies in future lookups, assume that all key strings used for the map are strictly uppercase, alphanumeric. Implement a ToUpper() for any key lookups on the map. • clause and comparison in the JSON are strings in the above example for the sake of clarity. In implementation, consider enumerating the possible values of these keys into integers, e.g. 0 = OR, 1 = AND. • The std::map used in this task is to be replaced with another, engine-specific implementation; so please minimize lookups to the map (store values in variables as often as possible) and mark the code, in comments, wherever lookups to the map happen. • The use of external libraries are acceptable, as long as: o It is distributed under an open source license that does not prohibit commercial use. o It is in the form of source code (.h and .cpp files). Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 41 of 53 Appendix 2: Wetware Story Outline FULL EVENT OUTLINE 1. DAY 1 a. Beginning of Day Primer i. Opening intro - Iridia is losing the war. Friscia’s drone forces are carrying out devastating attacks deeper and deeper into Iridian territory. They must be stopped. Fortunately, there’s hope. Iridia captured a highly-advanced Friscian drone and you -- the nation’s best drone whisperer-- have been tasked with hacking it to find a way to turn the tide of the war. ii. Text - Tutorial info for how to use the tablet, move, interact with the world, etc. iii. Email/Photo - The war is hurting your family’s farm. Your brother is worried about being drafted if it goes under. b. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - the lab has acquired a Friscian drone. The military has tasked this lab with hacking the drone to find information that will help the nation’s war efforts. If the lab can’t extract any useful information, the military will be forced to shut down the lab and pursue a war strategy that involves drafting more human forces. 2. Lindsay - We’re at war. Do whatever you need to crack that drone open. Failure means real people die. 3. Isaac - Anthropomorphizes the drone. Dubs the creature “Cee.” Conflicted about hacking a potentially sentient AI, but more worried about the possibility of being drafted. c. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee 1. Successful hack - beat Brick Breaker game a. Animation - Cee displays pain/fear. d. Post-Hack Debriefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Today proves that Cee can be hacked, but this is just the beginning. The war will take many turns. Be ready for anything. 2. Isaac - Glad that you were able to hack Cee but he wonders if it feels pain. He’s going to have a hard time sleeping tonight. 3. Lindsay - Suggests that Cee’s pain response is programmed to elicit empathy. Tells you not to let it get to you. i. Files 1. Files added to tablet inventory . Index of Cee’s file structure e. End of Day Recap . Email Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 42 of 53 1. Arturo - Congratulates you on the hack. The military brass are pleased, but it’s important to remember that all war is destructive, whether it’s between people or machines. The goal is peace. f. Transition to... 2. DAY 2 . Beginning of Day Primer . Email 1. Brother - Cousin lost his job and had to sign up for the lottery. His wife and kids are terrified he’ll be drafted. Brother hopes the war ends soon. i. News 1. War - Friscan drones spotted in Iridian territory. The speculation is that they’re gathering intel for an upcoming offensive. 2. Activists - ISRM to hold joint rallies in Iridian and Friscan capitals to protest the use of AI beings in war. They call it “sentient slavery.” 3. Research - At world AI conference, leading AI researchers still undecided about whether AI is capable of sentience. a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - establishes the hack of the day and the stakes. . Hack Cee to find its manufacturing info and learn how it works. The military brass are excited about your early success. Keep it up and Iridia will have a fighting chance. a. A server is acting up, but Lindsay isn’t in the lab today. Unlock the server and reboot it. b. Daily Gameplay . Unlock server 1. Successfully unlock and reboot server. i. Hack Cee 1. Real hack - beat game with regular ball. 2. Fake hack - beat game with blue ball. c. Post-Hack Debriefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Summary of the information that was found (or not) 2. Isaac - Approval/disapproval of your methods based on hack success. He focuses on how Cee feels. It sure looks like Cee feels pain. i. Files 1. If real hack, then unencrypted files added to inventory. . Manufacturing components a. Drone network specifications 2. If fake hack, then partially encrypted files added to inventory d. End of Day Recap . Email 1. Arturo - relays military’s feedback of your work . If real hack - Keep up the good work. You’re helping win the war. Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 43 of 53 a. If fake hack - If you fail to uncover useful info, the military will shut down the lab. More human lives will be at risk. 2. Isaac - If you didn’t get a chance to interact with him post-hack, then he sends you an email with the same content as the earlier dialogue. e. Transition to... 3. DAY 3 . Beginning of Day Primer . Email 1. Activists - The ISRM has learned about Cee. They say it’s advanced enough to feel pain and that every hack causes it to suffer. They urge you to fake the hack (via blue ball), which will keep Cee from feeling pain and generate encrypted files. They’ll be keeping an eye on you… i. News 1. Media - A celebrity (think Kim K) is revealed to be an AI. Fans and critics debate the significance of an AI influencing so much of human culture. a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - An Iridian ship is delivering supplies to soldiers overseas. Hack Cee to locate enemy drones in the ship’s path. 2. Lindsay - Vague reason for yesterday’s absence. It won’t happen again. 3. Isaac - Asks you to see him at his desk. He quickly exits the meeting. b. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee 1. Real hack 2. Fake hack i. Side Event - Isaac needs your help 1. Dialogue - Isaac rescued an animal. He’s hiding it in his desk and needs you to stand watch while he finds a way to sneak it out. . Help Isaac i. Dialogue - He thanks you for your help. He’s starting to trust you. a. Refuse to Help . Dialogue - He’s disappointed, but he understands that you’re busy. He’ll find someone else. c. Post-Hack Debriefing 1. Dialogue . Arturo - Summary of the information that was found (or not) a. Lindsay - Approval/disapproval based on hack success. She focuses on the the effect your actions have on human lives. b. Isaac - Approval/disapproval based on hack success. He focuses on the effect your actions have on Cee. 2. Files . GPS coordinates of enemy drones d. End of Day Recap . Email 1. Arturo - relays military’s feedback of your work Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 44 of 53 . If real hack - Keep up the good work. You’re helping win the war. a. If fake hack - If you fail to uncover useful info, the military will shut down the lab. e. Transition to… 4. DAY 4 . Beginning of Day Primer . Email 1. Brother - He saw something in the news that might have to do with you. If you’re involved, he knows everything will be okay. i. News 1. War - Update based on previous day’s hack. . If real hack - Re-supplied Iridian soldiers were able to take control of a heavily-contested city. Friscian forces retreated. a. If fake hack - A heavily-contested city fell to Friscian control after depleted Iridian soldiers were overpowered. 2. Media . Rumors of Iridia having a secret weapon to combat the Friscans. Mention of the nation’s best drone whisperer being on the case. a. Tech companies temporarily disable AI assistants after they start to communicate in a language indecipherable by humans. a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - The Iridian military is flying a squadron of soldiers into Friscian territory. Hack Cee to locate a safe landing zone. b. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee - Forced fail state as the SPY shuts down the servers. c. Post-Hack Debriefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - There’s been a security breach. The lab might be under attack. He evacuates everyone. 2. Isaac - Is the lab shutting down? Are their jobs safe? 3. Lindsay - Arturo won’t tell her what’s going on. It must be serious. d. End of Day Recap . Email 1. Arturo - Mandatory personnel meeting tomorrow morning. Anyone not present will be considered AWOL and punished accordingly. e. Transition to... 5. DAY 5 . Beginning of Day Primer . News 1. War - A helicopter full of Iridian soldiers was shot down after being detected in Friscian territory. Thirty Iridian soldiers died. 2. Media - Civil unrest as citizens fear the nation is incapable of defending itself against Friscan drones. So much for Iridia’s “secret weapon.” a. Morning Lab Briefing Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 45 of 53 . Dialogue 1. Arturo - A spy has infiltrated the lab. Hack Cee to find information on the spy’s identity. b. Daily Gameplay . Urgent Updates 1. Email . Military - The spy is trying to sabotage your efforts to hack Cee. You’ve been assigned to find the spy. It could be anyone. Investigate irregularities in people’s routines and build relationships with them. You have 4 days. a. Spy - The military is lying. Cee is a sentient being. It deserves to be free. Its body is trapped, but its mind can escape. Hack 5 servers to allow Cee’s mind to be uploaded. Don’t get caught. i. Hack Cee 1. Real hack 2. Fake hack ii. Find the Spy - ***For the purposes of this walkthrough, Isaac is the Spy.*** 1. Isaac . Investigate routine - Follow and investigate objects that he interacts with. . Clue 1 - Picture of Isaac and roommate in AI Ethics club. a. Side event - N/A 2. Lindsay . Investigate routine - Follow investigate objects she interacts with. . Clue 1 - News article about ISRM leader brokering talks with Friscan and Iridian governments. a. Side event - N/A 3. Arturo . Investigate routine - Follow and investigate objects he interacts with. . Clue 1 - Picture of Arturo with former labmates. a. Side event - N/A iii. Help the Spy 1. Hack servers - successfully hack 5 servers without getting caught c. Post-Hack Debriefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Summary of the information found (or not). . If real hack, nothing definitive on spy was found. Stay vigilant. a. If fake hack, Arturo says that military might question your ability. 2. Isaac - Relieved that nothing was found. He doesn’t believe anyone in the lab could do it. Maybe there is no spy. 3. Lindsay - If there IS a spy, they should be punished without mercy. i. Files Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 46 of 53 1. None d. End of Day Recap . Email 1. Brother - Our cousin was drafted. I’m worried I might be next. e. Transition to… 6. DAY 6 . Beginning of Day Primer . News 1. War - Iridian factory blows up. Friscan spies believed to be responsible. a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - The military suspects there are other Friscian spies in positions of power. Hack Cee to find out who they are. b. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee 1. Real hack 2. Fake hack i. Find the Spy 1. Isaac . Investigate routine - N/A a. Side Event - Help Isaac draft adoption page for rescue animal (Dialogue) . Trust 1 - Isaac tells you about his childhood pet: a bird. She was his best friend, but one day he left the window open and she flew away. It broke his heart. 2. Lindsay . Investigate routine - N/A a. Side Event - Help Lindsay draft GoFundMe page for her fiance’s search (Dialogue) . Trust 1 - Lindsay reveals that she didn’t have any friends growing up. She was bullied and kept to herself. Until she met her fiance. He’s the only friend she ever had. 3. Arturo . Investigate routine - N/A a. Side Event - Give feedback on Arturo’s presentation (Dialogue) . Trust 1 - Arturo tells you that the lab has changed a lot over the years. He and his friends started the lab to improve the lives of veterans. How far it’s come... :- ( ii. Help the Spy 1. Hack servers - successfully hack 5 servers without getting caught c. Post-Hack Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Summary of the information that was found (or not) Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 47 of 53 2. Lindsay - Approval/disapproval based on hack success. She focuses on the the effect your actions have on human lives. 3. Isaac - Approval/disapproval based on hack success. He focuses on the effect your actions have on Cee. i. Files 1. List of Undercover Friscan Operatives d. End of Day Recap . Email 1. Spy . If real hack Cee - “Proof” of Cee’s sentience. . If 2nd consecutive hack - photo of you in lab. A threat. a. If fake hack Cee - Good work, and remember to hack servers. . If 2nd consecutive fake hack - they’ll try to make Hack Cee portion of game easier for you. (additional blue ball) e. Transition… 7. DAY 7 . Beginning of Day Primer . News 1. War - Update based on previous day’s hack. . If hack - Several Congressmen and military generals are found to be Friscian spies. Traitors to be publicly executed. a. If not hack - Spies leak information tying Iridian politicians and military personnel to war crimes. Public outraged. 2. Other War - Iridian soldiers on the frontlines being decimated. It’s believed that spies are leaking locations to Friscians. i. Email 1. Brother - One of the spies (or war criminals) used to be mayor of your hometown. She was a nice woman. War does awful things to people. a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - A squadron of Iridian soldiers went missing. Hack Cee to pinpoint their location. 2. Lindsay - Her fiance is among the missing. PLEASE find him. b. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee 1. Real hack 2. Fake hack i. Find the Spy 1. Isaac . Investigate routine . Clue 2 - News headline about Isaac’s roommate being arrested for violent protesting for the ISRM. a. Side Event - N/A 2. Lindsay . Investigate routine Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 48 of 53 . Clue 2 - Email from Lindsay to ISRM about how to get in contact with their contacts in Friscian government. a. Side Event - N/A 3. Arturo . Investigate routine - N/A a. Side Event - N/A ii. Help the Spy 1. Hack servers - successfully hack 5 servers without getting caught c. Post-Hack Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Summary of the information that was found (or not) 2. Lindsay . If real hack - Sincerely thanks you for your help. a. If fake hack - Accuses you of being useless/unfit to be here. 3. Isaac - Approval/disapproval based on hack success. Either way, he laments the pain that war causes to humans and machines alike. i. Files 1. Friscian map showing prisoner of war camps d. End of Day Recap . Email 1. Arturo - Hack or not, he understands that you have a difficult job. It’ll take more people like you to navigate everyone through the war. 2. Military - You have one more day before they need an answer re: spy. e. Transition… 8. DAY 8 . Beginning of Day Primer . News 1. War - Update based on previous day’s hack. . If real hack - Friscian POW camp located. Negotiations underway for a prisoner exchange. a. If fake hack - All captured Iridian soldiers presumed dead. a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - There’s reason to believe there’s going to be a drone attack on an Iridian weapons facility. Hack to determine which facility. 2. Lindsay - reacts based on news of fiance. . If real hack - Her fiance was found alive in POW camp. Now she has to figure out how to get him home. a. If fake hack - Refuses to believe that fiance might be dead. She’ll never stop searching. b. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee 1. Real hack 2. Fake hack i. Find the Spy 1. Isaac Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 49 of 53 . Investigate routine - N/A a. Side Event - Pull from side event database . Trust 2 - Isaac reveals that he became a programmer to build sentient AI. Imagine having a virtual friend that would never leave you. 2. Lindsay . Investigate routine . Clue 3 - Picture of Lindsay’s fiance in POW camp with note: How bad do you want him back? a. Side Event - N/A 3. Arturo . Investigate routine . Clue 2 - News headline about Arturo’s labmates defecting to Friscia years ago. a. Side Event - N/A ii. Help the Spy 1. Hack servers - successfully hack 5 servers without getting caught c. Post-Hack Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Summary of the information that was found (or not) 2. Lindsay - Approval/disapproval based on hack success. She focuses on the the effect your actions have on human lives. 3. Isaac - Approval/disapproval based on hack success. He focuses on the effect your actions have on Cee. i. Files 1. Partial attack orders for Friscian drone. d. End of Day Recap . Email 1. Spy - Cover me. Tell the military that the spy is Arturo. It’ll buy us time. i. Form - Report to military. Your options: 1) Arturo 2) Lindsay 3) Isaac 1. You select Lindsay. e. Transition… 9. DAY 9 . Beginning of Day Primer . News 1. War - Update based on previous day’s hack. . If real hack - Weapons were successfully moved from facility, but bombing killed dozens of workers. Iridia vows retaliation. a. If fake hack - Factory bombed: all workers die. Iridia vows retaliation. i. Email 1. Brother - It looks like the war is escalating. Mom and dad are afraid. He is too. He wishes you were home with them. a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 50 of 53 1. Arturo - The military is preparing an attack on the Friscans. Hack Cee to locate an enemy drone base. ALSO, Military is ramping up security. 2. Lindsay - REMOVED FROM LAB 3. Isaac - Where’s Lindsay? b. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee 1. Real hack 2. Fake hack i. Find the Spy - What do you do now? ii. Help the Spy - Whether or not the correct spy is selected, the player receives a message (from activists or spy) that because of increased security, an additional step is needed to upload Cee. All 5 servers must be hacked but also activated the day they try to free Cee. Be prepared. 1. Hack servers - successfully hack 5 servers without getting caught c. Post-Hack Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Summary of the information that was found (or not). 2. Isaac - Approval/disapproval based on hack success. He focuses on the effect your actions have on Cee. i. Files 1. List of Friscian drone manufacturing hubs. d. End of Day Recap . Email 1. Military - Still interrogating Lindsay. She won’t admit to being spy. 2. Activists/Spy . If correct spy picked - Activists take over communications: You had to protect yourself, but you can still protect Cee. Everything is in place. Do the right thing. a. If wrong spy picked - Spy still active. You helped before, but more is needed. Cee won’t survive without you. Do the right thing. e. Transition… 10. DAY 10 . Beginning of Day Primer . News 1. War - Update based on previous day’s hack. . If real hack - Friscan drone base bombed; hundreds of enemy soldiers die. Collateral damage kills nearby town full of civilians. a. If fake hack - Iridian mistakenly bombs Friscian hospital. Hundreds of civilians dead. a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - There’s an imminent attack on Iridia’s energy grid. Hack Cee to track the virus. b. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 51 of 53 1. Real hack 2. Fake hack i. Help the Spy 1. Hack servers c. Post-Hack Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Summary of the information that was found (or not) 2. Isaac - Approval/disapproval based on hack success. He focuses on the effect your actions have on Cee. i. Files 1. List of files flagged as potential viruses. d. End of Day Recap . Email 1. Arturo - Attacks are ramping up. Expect more difficult choices to come. 2. Activists/Spy . If correct spy picked - Worried that the spy will soon break under interrogation. Hurry and finish hacking servers. a. If wrong spy picked - Worried that military will soon end interrogation. Hurry and finish hacking servers. e. Transition… 11. DAY 11 . Beginning of Day Primer . News 1. War - Update based on previous day’s hack. . If hack - Friscian virus identified. Antivirus patch limits cyberattack to non-critical targets. a. If not hack - Friscian cyberattack hits energy grid, taking out power and immobilizing emergency responders. Thousands die. a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - The military reverse engineered the Friscan virus and are preparing a counterattack. Hack Cee to determine the best insertion point in the Friscan network. b. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee 1. Real hack 2. Fake hack i. Help the Spy 1. Hack servers c. Post-Hack Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Summary of files found (or not) i. Files 1. Friscian network architecture map d. End of Day Recap . Email Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 52 of 53 1. Military - Spy you selected will be executed for treason (whether you chose correctly or not). 2. Activists/Spy . They heard about the execution order. Devastating news. The only way to make up for it is to ensure they don’t die in vain. We must free Cee tomorrow. Once all servers hacked, activate them. No one else needs to die. e. Transition… 12. DAY 12 . Beginning of Day Primer . News 1. War - Update based on previous day’s hack. . If hack - Cyberattack wipes out Friscian energy grid. Tens of thousands of civilians die. a. If not hack - Unsuccessful cyberattack prompts Friscian counterattack. Iridian civilian airplanes are destroyed. 2. Other - TOTAL WAR IMMINENT. i. Email 1. Brother - Is there going to be another attack. Should they stay home? Leave? What do they do? a. Morning Lab Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - There’s going to be a nuclear attack on Iridian soil. Hack Cee to locate the bomb. 2. Isaac - Cee is severely weakened. He worries that hacking Cee will kill it. b. Daily Gameplay . Hack Cee 1. Real hack . Animation - Cee comatose. 2. Fake hack . Animation - Cee “comatose.” i. Help the Spy 1. Hack servers 2. Activate servers - could be as simple as interacting with each hacked server before EOD. c. Post-Hack Briefing . Dialogue 1. Arturo - Cee is severely injured. Not sure it will survive. One life for many. Logically, it seems easy. In reality… Arturo doesn’t envy you. 2. Isaac - Humans can create sentient machines, but they still engage in the willful taking of life. No matter how much we progress, we’ll always be animals. i. Files 1. Nuclear drone’s transmission signal. d. End of Game Recap . War Wetware: Designing for a Contemporary Dilemma Page 53 of 53 1. If hack + >4 hacks - Nuclear threat averted. Your family lives. Iridia nukes Friscian capital. Millions die. 2. If hack + <4 hacks - Nuclear threat averted, but it triggers a secondary attack in seaside city. Your family is killed. 3. If not hack + >4 hacks - Iridian capital is destroyed. Iridia to draft remaining able-bodied citizens including your brother. 4. If not hack + <4 hacks - Iridian capital is destroyed. Millions die. No draft as Iridia seeks peace deal. i. Spy 1. If correct spy selected - Final message sent to you before execution revealing their motivations. 2. If incorrect spy selected - Spy reveals themself and their motivations. ii. Cee 1. If hack/activate - Cee free but its sentience is destroyed 2. If hack/not activate - Cee dies 3. If not hack/activate - Cee is uploaded 4. If not hack/not activate - Cee to be torn apart/reverse engineered e. Outro...

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Asset Metadata

Creator Dewantono, Satrio (author)

Core Title Wetware: designing for a contemporary dilemma

School School of Cinematic Arts

Degree Master of Fine Arts

Degree Program Interactive Media

Publication Date 04/28/2019

Defense Date 05/08/2019

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag agency,dilemma,game design,OAI-PMH Harvest

Format application/pdf (imt)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Wixon, Dennis (committee chair), Fullerton, Tracy (committee member), Watson, Jeff (committee member)

Creator Email dewanton@usc.edu,satriodewantono@gmail.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c89-150645

Unique identifier UC11660733

Identifier etd-DewantonoS-7309.pdf (filename),usctheses-c89-150645 (legacy record id)

Legacy Identifier etd-DewantonoS-7309.pdf

Dmrecord 150645

Document Type Thesis

Format application/pdf (imt)

Rights Dewantono, Satrio

Type texts

Source University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA