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Exploring space literally & figuratively in Eight Moons to Eternity

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Exploring space literally & figuratively in Eight Moons to Eternity

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Content EXPLORING SPACE LITERALLY & FIGURATIVELY IN EIGHT
MOONS TO ETERNITY
by
Sanketh Char Bhat
A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC SCHOOL OF CINEMATIC ARTS
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF FINE ARTS
(INTERACTIVE MEDIA)
May 2024
Copyright © 2024 Sanketh Char Bhat

Eight Moons To Eternity
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my advisors Professor Sean Bouchard, Professor Jim Huntley, and
Rami Ismail, for their mentorship and feedback through this year-long process. I would also like
to thank my team for their work and support, and to anyone who playtested this game and
gave feedback, including my invaluable cohort. I want to finally thank my family and partner for
staying by my side either physically or virtually.
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Table Of Contents
Acknowledgements....................................................................................................................... ii
List of Figures............................................................................................................................... iv
Abstract......................................................................................................................................... v
Chapter 1: Overview & Objectives.................................................................................................1
1.1 The Project.........................................................................................................................1
1.2 The Thesis Question..........................................................................................................2
1.3 Design Pillars..................................................................................................................... 3
1.4 Technical Pillars................................................................................................................. 3
1.5 Production Pillars...............................................................................................................4
Chapter 2: Iterating Inspiration...................................................................................................... 5
2.1 My Background................................................................................................................. 5
2.2 Prior Art..............................................................................................................................5
2.3 Idea Iteration......................................................................................................................8
Chapter 3: Designing Diegetically............................................................................................... 10
3.1 Why Diegetic Design?..................................................................................................... 10
3.2 Diegetic Design and Player Convenience........................................................................10
3.3 Combat & Transitions...................................................................................................... 11
3.4 Cockpit Screens.............................................................................................................. 12
3.5 The HUD.......................................................................................................................... 13
Chapter 4: Systemizing Space.................................................................................................... 15
4.1 Dialogue...........................................................................................................................15
4.2 Traveling...........................................................................................................................16
4.3 Combat............................................................................................................................16
4.4 Codex.............................................................................................................................. 17
Chapter 5: Synthesizing Story.....................................................................................................18
5.1 The Story Event System.................................................................................................. 18
5.2 Authoring Quests & Events..............................................................................................18
5.3 Main Quests & Story Injection......................................................................................... 19
Chapter 6: Painless(?) Production............................................................................................... 20
6.1 Recruitment..................................................................................................................... 20
6.2 First Playable................................................................................................................... 21
6.3 Priority Shift..................................................................................................................... 21
6.4 Production Process......................................................................................................... 22
Conclusion...................................................................................................................................24
Bibliography.................................................................................................................................27
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List of Figures
1 The Loop……………………………………………………………………………… 1
2 Faster Than Light…………………………………………………………………….. 6
3 SYNTHETIK…………………………………………………………………………... 7
4 Caves of Qud………………………………………………………………………… 7
5 The Prototype………………………………………………………………………… 9
6 The Cockpit…………………………………………………………………………... 12
7 The HUD………………………………………………………………………………. 13
8 The Ship Menu……………………………………………………………………….. 14
9 The Comms Feed……………………………………………………………………. 16
10 The Results…………………………………………………………………………… 24
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Eight Moons To Eternity
Abstract
In this paper I will discuss my space exploration game, Eight Moons to Eternity from its
original conception up until its current state after two semesters of production.
First giving an overview of the project including its design, technical and production pillars, I
will then give a glimpse into what prior art has been used as references and how the original
concept for the game was conceived. I will break down the design of the physical space of the
game, the ship’s cockpit, with a focus on the implementation of diegetic design. I will also
summarize the systems present in the game that the player interacts with to explore the various
locations and events. Proceeding, I will explain how the narrative was implemented into the
game from a technical point of view, including the quest tool that was developed. Finally, I will
give a brief timeline of the production and an overview of the overall process.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
Chapter 1: Overview & Objectives
1.1 The Project
Eight Moons To Eternity is a single-player sci-fi adventure game for Windows that combines
elements of strategic text driven roguelikes and modern fast-paced top down shooters.
Using diegetic UI design and interaction mechanics, the game invites the player to immerse
themselves in the cockpit of a spacecraft as they navigate through the planet Eternity and its
eight moons.
Through the narrative and mechanics, the player experiences what it is like to be a
timeline shifting space nomad, assembling pieces of a powerful artifact known as Eternity’s
heart. The timeline of the Eternity system has been fractured into many branching paths, due to
the NULL POINT event that occurred a few centuries ago. The player is tasked with exploring
multiple timelines, with a piece of Eternity’s Heart hidden away in each one.
Figure 1
The Loop
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Eight Moons To Eternity
Using the established roguelike format, the game’s core loop is a smaller gameplay loop
nested inside a larger narrative loop.
❖ Each “run” of the game takes place in one of the fracture timelines. If the player
succeeds in finding the piece of eternity’s heart in that timeline, that timeline is
considered “repaired”. If they perish in their attempt, the timeline is “lost” instead.
❖ Each completed timeline advances the narrative through sequenced main story events
the player encounters in each run.
❖ The gameplay loop in a timeline consists of planning a trip between moons, then
actually traveling and exploring locations at their destination. During travel and
exploration, story events can trigger where the player engages with both the game’s
dialogue and combat systems.
1.2 The Thesis Question
The thesis question shifted over the course of production, initially stating
❖ “Can I utilize a procedurally generated narrative to make an isolated, displaced character
(along with the player) feel invested in fixing their broken world?”
The above placed a focus on the narrative and procedural generation mechanics of the project,
but I found myself more drawn to the genre-blending and interaction mechanics which
consequently split the question in two:
❖ “How can I blend the classic text-driven rogue genre of games with modern, fast paced
2D shooter rogue-likes?”
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Eight Moons To Eternity
❖ “How can diegetic design best immerse the player into our planned experience?"
1.3 Design Pillars
The core design intentions of Eight Moons to Eternity did not change over the course of
production:
❖ Diegetic UI and interaction design to maximize cockpit immersiveness.
❖ Balancing gameplay between strategic decision making and fast paced action.
❖ Procedural and layered systems to encourage emergent gameplay.
1.4 Technical Pillars
With a background in programming and technical design, I also set pillars/objectives for the
technical components of the project:
❖ Tooling and an established pipeline for narrative content templates and authoring.
❖ Modular system and prefab design for UI to support rapid iteration inside of the engine.
❖ Data-driven class architecture to support save/loading of entire timelines without
worrying about dynamic or recursive class references or dependencies.
The project uses the Unity game engine (2023), Wwise for audio and Yarnspinner as part of the
narrative tool. Perforce provided by USC was used for source-control.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
1.5 Production Pillars
After a year of working in a large team in AGP, I decided to stick to a smaller team and take
most of the responsibility for programming, design and in-engine implementation. Due to a lack
of an experienced artist, I also did my best with art direction. For audio, I retained the audio
team I had when I worked on a previous project, Crab Rhapsody, and they continued to be
excellent to work with.
We ended up with a team of around 15 people, which includes 2 programmers, 3 artists, 3
composers and sound designers, 5 narrative designers and writers, another game designer
and my producer.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
Chapter 2: Iterating Inspiration
2.1 My Background
My undergraduate degree was a Bachelor of Science in Game Development from the
Rochester Institute of Technology, which was oriented towards the technical aspects of game
development. It helped build skills related to programming, technical design and graphics
programming.
The first professional design job I had was for an educational games start-up for kids,
something I had never done before. I learnt a lot about design iteration based on playtesting
and creating audio-visual “languages” to communicate design.
During my second year at USC, I learnt how to lead larger teams by working on Grandma
Green, an Advanced Games Project (AGP) as the lead designer, and by working on Crab
Rhapsody as the lead programmer.
These experiences helped me develop a balanced set of skills across multiple disciplines that
helped me avoid early development issues with this thesis project.
2.2 Prior Art
I could not find a strong example of prior art that has tried to blend the 2 genres that EMTE is
attempting to do. Usually any text-based components of fast paced modern roguelikes are
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Eight Moons To Eternity
linear and not equal to the combat portion. For text-based roguelikes, there is usually a lack of
real time combat with a large focus on tactical turn-based systems.
Instead, the prior art for this project focuses on more individual systems from games rather
than the entire experience that they provide.
Figure 2
Faster Than Light
Faster Than Light (FTL)
❖ There are 2 main components of FTL that were invaluable as references. The first was
the overall player experience of “hostile space exploration” where dangers lurk in every
corner of the cosmos. The second is their traveling system and UI, selecting the next
location node on a map and then coming across unexpected events on your journey.
Figure 3
SYNTHETIK
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Eight Moons To Eternity
SYNTHETIK
❖ SYNTHETIK’s fast-paced, crunchy combat and game feel has heavily influenced the
design of EMTE’s combat system. The overall dynamic of dodging and mitigating
damage on a moment-to-moment basis while weaving in precise shots to take down
the enemy is what I hope to accomplish with EMTE’s combat.
Figure 4
Caves of Qud
Caves of Qud
❖ The development of Caves of Qud has been a continuous source of inspiration for me,
spanning almost ten years. Its procedural generation system is highly complex with
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Eight Moons To Eternity
multiple layers, and the GDC talks the developers gave have been a consistent
reference through the pre-production process of EMTE.
2.3 Idea Iteration
When we started pre-production on our thesis concept during the spring semester of 2023, I
explored ways of creating procedural narrative through simple text descriptions and
randomized images. To add variety to my creative process, I also prototyped a small physics
based action game which I really enjoyed tweaking.
I realized that I wanted both types of experiences to be present in my project, but I was unsure
about the theme, narrative and setting. Towards the latter half of the semester I had an ‘eureka’
moment where both the concept of being in a spacecraft cockpit and the name - “Eight Moons
To Eternity” came to me. After further exploration, and brainstorming, I decided on a
time-bending narrative set in a more darker sci-fi world.
Figure 5
The Prototype
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Eight Moons To Eternity
This led me to create my thesis prototype that contained an early version of the cockpit orbital
map and the twin-stick shooter mechanics. It received positive feedback from my peers, so I
decided to stick to it and develop it into my thesis.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
Chapter 3: Designing Diegetically
3.1 Why Diegetic Design?
Although diegetic design was not the initial focus of my thesis, it grew to the main component
of the project that I enjoyed designing. I wanted to immerse the player inside the cockpit and
have less reliance on full screen menus, for which diegetic interaction and UI design were
necessary.
3.2 Diegetic Design and Player Convenience
One of the weaknesses of diegetic design is that it can result in lower quality of life for the
player in favor of thematic design. I had to find a balance between them that keeps the player
immersed while reducing possible frustration with game flow.
I decided to split the game interfaces into two types:
❖ Cockpit Screen
➢ These are discrete screens the player can switch between inside of the cockpit,
each with its own purpose.
➢ Each screen displays information specific to their functionality, and the player
must interact with them in a certain order to initiate travel or to explore a location
on a Moon.
➢ I wanted a step-by-step process for manipulating the cockpit to add to player
immersion and to make sure the player cannot accidentally change game state
without meaning to.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
❖ Pilot HUD
➢ The HUD contains critical player information such as current location, player
health and the current objective.
➢ Since this information always needs to be readily available to the player, the
HUD is always active and visible to the player.
➢ The HUD also nests the two full-screen menus present in the game, the Pilot
Codex Menu and the Ship Menu
3.3 Combat & Transitions
The third diegetic component of the project is the combat state of the cockpit and how we
transition to and from it. Combat is supposed to feel dangerous and life-threatening, so it
required a transition to match that experience.
Working with my artists, we came up with the concept of blast shields on the windows of the
cockpit that slide in, and a specific cockpit screen for combat on the main blast shield. Combat
is also the only mechanic that takes away player control for a brief amount of time during the
transition of the blast shields appearing.
The initial loss of control, the visuals of the blast shields appearing and the sound design of the
combat alarms and the shields locking in created a gripping transition between the game
states that successfully created a feeling of danger for the player when combat was triggered.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
3.4 Cockpit Screens
The cockpit is sectioned into 5 distinct screens that the player can navigate between.
❖ Center - Travelling System
❖ Top - Orbital Map
❖ Left - Location Scanner
❖ Right - Destination Scanner
❖ Bottom - Communications Feed
Each cockpit screen is forbidden from occupying space in the corners of the screen, which is
reserved for the HUD UI.Cockpit screens all share common UI elements and UI states to
ensure consistency.
Figure 6
The Cockpit
By positioning cockpit screen elements at certain places, information can be shared across
two screens such as the planned travel costs that are visible both in the center screen and top
screen or the moon holograms that are visible both in the center screen and side screens.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
3.5 The HUD
Figure 7
The HUD
The HUD comprises of 4 components that each occupy a corner of the screen.
❖ Top-left: Ship Status.
❖ Top-right: Codex sub-menu button and Objective tracker.
❖ Bottom-left: Ship Health and Combat Modules.
❖ Bottom-right: Ship sub-menu button and Scrap Counter.
Figure 8
The Ship Menu
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Eight Moons To Eternity
HUD components all share common UI elements and UI states to ensure consistency.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
Chapter 4: Systemizing Space
During pre-production four distinct core systems emerged for gameplay, and to help answer
my thesis question(s):
❖ The Dialogue System: Text-based gameplay, including player decision making
❖ The Combat System:2D shooter based gameplay
❖ The Travelling System: Immersion and narrative
❖ The Codex System: Tutorials, player information and worldbuilding.
I knew I needed separate systems for the text-driven gameplay and the 2D shooter gameplay in
order to discretize the game states between them. The Codex System helps ground the player
into the world by logging information that they learn in each timeline. The Travelling System
enables certain narrative events to take place and adds on to player immersion as a cinematic
experience.
Throughout production these systems remained intact along with their main purpose and
functionality.
4.1 Dialogue
The dialogue system is embodied into the Communications Feed. It contains a dialogue
history, a speaker portrait, prompts when the player must make a decision and functionality for
locking/unlocking certain dialogue options based on player state.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
Figure 9
The Comms Feed
4.2 Traveling
The Traveling system consists of marking a destination in the Orbital Map and then hitting the
Travel button in the center cockpit screen. It is integrated with the story event system,
triggering traveling events based on the duration of the trip.
4.3 Combat
The combat system works as a separate game state, although it still takes place in the cockpit.
It is the only time control is taken away by the player, disabling their ability to look around the
cockpit. Players are locked into the combat state until the encounter is complete.
An important aspect of combat is that the main way that players can lose a timeline is through
losing an encounter. Combat increases the stakes and induces a feeling of danger, so
encounters try to be fast-paced by utilizing aggressive enemy AI and low time-to-kill
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Eight Moons To Eternity
4.4 Codex
The Codex serves as the knowledge base for the player. Its functionality is akin to a journal,
recording information presented to the player. During the tutorial, the player unlocks entries
about their ship and the cockpit systems, acting as a reference in case the player needs more
time to get used to the game systems.
It is integrated with the Communications Feed, with certain names of factions, NPCs and
Moons highlighted that when interacted with, unlock the relevant entry in the Codex.
Timeline-specific entries are cleared at the end of each timeline.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
Chapter 5: Synthesizing Story
5.1 The Story Event System
The main medium of delivering narrative to the player is text using the dialogue system
(communications feed). A narrative sequence with a distinct start and end point is called a
“story event”, and the main storyline quests and side content quests are comprised of multiple
story events.
Locations on each Moon that the player explores are each a single story event, and the same
goes for traveling events encountered by the player. Quests that are generated in the world
also create their relevant story events. Quest events in locations are treated as “children”, a
location story event will have a child quest story event nested inside that is accessible as a
dialogue option. Quest events during traveling are standalone.
5.2 Authoring Quests & Events
Summarizing the above, Story events can be one of these types:
❖ Location event
➢ Location Quest event
❖ Traveling event
❖ Traveling Quest event
Any of these events can be easily authored by a designer and added to the world generation.
Additionally, side quests are also authorable by a designer with no extra programming required
per quest.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
The dialogue itself is authored in Yarnspinner Yarn script files. These are then read by a Unity
scriptable object called a “Story event template” where designers can add metadata (event
name, event description) and game functionality such as setting some nodes to lock/unlock
based on player state, having a node trigger combat or a reward and removing the location the
event is set in.
Main quests including the main narrative sequence have custom code for functionality due to
additional complexity.
5.3 Main Quests & Story Injection
Main quests consist of 3 types:
❖ Bounty Hunt: The piece of Eternity’s Heart is with a NPC that hops between Moons that
you must track down.
❖ Stronghold: The piece of Eternity’s Heart is defended in a faction stronghold that you
must either raid or diplomatically resolve.
❖ Distant Location: The piece of Eternity’s Heart is hidden away in a random location in
one of the more distant moons.
Story Injection:
Each Timeline has a set of linear, non-repeatable story events, usually consisting of talking to
either the Scientist or the Nemesis. These are “injected” into the sequence of the main quest
at certain predefined points. Since these are non-repeatable, once the player completes a story
event, it will not trigger again even if the player fails the timeline and goes again.
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Chapter 6: Painless(?) Production
6.1 Recruitment
Speaking candidly, I was a bit disappointed with how recruitment shaped out during the Spring
semester, both with my presentation/salesman skills and that it was impossible to get people to
work on it for credit. I only got a handful of responses, but I did get a solid narrative team which
was incredibly helpful over summer.
With my technical background I did not need a M.S C.S student to work for credit, as I chose
to handle all core engineering myself (which I stand by as a good decision after this semester).
It came at the cost of not having anyone on the team with the incentive to spend more time on
the project aside from myself.
I went through the entirety of pre-production with absolutely no visual design iteration.
Establishing art direction, UI wireframing and other common visual design prototyping
processes was missing headed into production. However, I managed to recruit 2 great artists at
the start of fall semester who have continued to contribute to the project.
I retained my audio team from Crab Rhapsody - my composer Evan and sound designer Paul,
and we added a third (Will) based on a recommendation from Evan. They have been a
consistent rock throughout the production process and EMTE would be only half as good
without the AAA level of audio direction they provide.
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Eight Moons To Eternity
Additionally I also have a couple members from my AGP Grandma Green team. Jamie, who
was my lead engineer is now my part-time producer, and Melody, who was and is a great
designer on both projects.
It’s very comforting to have people you’ve worked with before, and we did a little bit of
post-mortem of our previous projects and what we could do to make things better this time.
6.2 First Playable
At the start of Fall, the team and I made our first concrete milestone as the First Playable, a
build that showcases the core game loop without major blockers that playtesters could get
their hands on. Hitting first playable at the end of September made the rest of the production
feel so much smoother due the various benefits:
❖ It forced me to make the “container” of the game first that anyone could just mess
around with.
❖ We started play-testing almost every week from the start of October, which was
incredibly beneficial.
❖ It resulted in the creation of an “experience” compared to a “game” which built
momentum to cause my priority shift.
6.3 Priority Shift
Around 2/3 into the fall semester, I shifted priorities from hitting a well-defined Alpha (Features
+ Sequence) to hitting a polished Vertical Slice instead (Features + polish for 1 segment), and
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Eight Moons To Eternity
fleshing out the procedural generation engine next semester instead, relying on more
“hardcoded” content. The reasoning was due to the experimental nature of the game
(interaction mechanics + genre mashup) and the modular back-end setup I implemented.
Consistent play testing was incredibly useful to quickly figure out what is fun and works, and
what is confusing or frustrating. Even 1 or 2 people giving feedback a week was very
motivating and helped us iterate on the diegetic UI + UX efficiently
With the story template system setup, it allowed for rapid content creation that I wanted to
focus on next semester, along with system balance and pure “game design”.
Overall it felt that I would get better end results with a vertical slice and figuring out what else is
needed and what else needs to be communicated to the player before tackling core loop
balance and sequencing.
6.4 Production Process
The way the team and I work is a pipeline from each team (narrative/sound/art/design) that all
feed into me, who then reviews, gives feedback then implements in-engine. And when I
implement things for the first time, I make sure it’s flexible and easy to update in the future.
The benefits have been very apparent - when I want to make a change, I know exactly how it's
set up and the fastest way to fix it. I know everything about the project to a fine detail from
design to implementation. I know critical features and systems are future-proof and when I see
a bug, I can fix it immediately instead of the usual 1 week waiting game. There is never a
moment where there is no work for me to do, so I am never blocked by someone else's task. If
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Eight Moons To Eternity
I get bored of the back-end, I do the front-end stuff and vice versa. It felt “playful” in its own
way.
Of course the downside is obvious as well. I can’t depend on anyone else to fix things that I
have implemented, it has to be me every time. Many team members were hesitant to be
in-engine at the start of the project, which hasn’t really changed (although this might’ve been
the case either way).
In the end, this way of production has made the overall process feel more fun and engaging for
me and like how AGP is called “industry LARPing” I would like to think the way I’m doing things
is “indie LARPing”.
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Conclusion
What went Right
Rapid iteration in design and programming
❖ As the main designer/programmer on the project, I had the main benefit of being able to
iterate on game systems and interfaces very quickly, without the usual lag time of
meetings and back and forth between a designer and programmer.
Player immersion
❖ Through playtesting and survey results, we see that player’s felt immersed in the
experience, which was apparent early on in development. The diegetic mechanics and
transitions between game states were successful in making the player feel like they
were piloting a spacecraft, even when the genre shifted to the 2D shooter state during
combat.
Figure 10
The Results
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Eight Moons To Eternity
What could be better
Procedural Generation Design
❖ I approached the design for the procedural generation incorrectly by trying to prototype
and iterate it before having content and before I realized exactly what I wanted the
narrative player experience to be. It resulted in a nebulous implementation that is very
surface level with a lot more room for improvement
Burnout
❖ In my previous year I worked on two year-long, large scale student projects in
leadership roles. It took a lot of time and effort to work on both projects and other
classes and not fall behind, which I had initially thought was manageable. It wasn’t until
I started working on my thesis where I really felt creatively drained and burned out. It
really became an issue in this past spring semester where I only accomplished half of
what I had set out to do.
How I feel about it
I’m very proud of what the team and I accomplished this last year, creating a more immersive,
cinematic experience. Although it resulted in less “game” to chew through, I followed the fun
with my development process and came out of it having learned so much more about other
disciplines.
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The future of EMTE
I plan to continue working on it after graduation and to release it on Steam in Early Access, and
I predict it would take another six months of development to get it to a state that I would be
happy with.
Player reception has always been a highlight for this project, receiving very positive feedback
after each playtest. I’m excited to see how the pl;ayer experience turns out once all the
systems and gameplay elements I envisioned are in place.
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Bibliography
Bucklew, Brian, and Jason Grinblat. “Caves of Qud.” Steam, Kitfox Games, 15 July 2015,
https://store.steampowered.com/app/333640/Caves_of_Qud/.
Davis, Matthew, and J Ma. “FTL: Faster than Light.” Steam, 14 Sept. 2012,
https://store.steampowered.com/app/212680/FTL_Faster_Than_Light/.
Luck, Alexander, and Eric Alexander Krutten. “SYNTHETIK.” Steam, Whisper Games, 15
Mar. 2018, https://store.steampowered.com/app/528230/SYNTHETIK_Legion_Rising/.
27

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Asset Metadata

Creator Bhat, Sanketh Char (author)

Core Title Exploring space literally & figuratively in Eight Moons to Eternity

School School of Cinematic Arts

Degree Master of Fine Arts

Degree Program Interactive Media

Degree Conferral Date 2024-05

Publication Date 05/17/2024

Defense Date 05/16/2024

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

Tag diagetic design,exploration,game design,Interactive Media,OAI-PMH Harvest,sci-fi,video games

Format theses (aat)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Bilson, Danny (committee chair), Nelan, Andy (committee member), Russworm, TreaAndrea (committee member)

Creator Email sankethb@usc.edu,sankethcb@gmail.com

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-oUC113939744

Unique identifier UC113939744

Identifier etd-BhatSanket-12923.pdf (filename)

Legacy Identifier etd-BhatSanket-12923

Document Type Thesis

Format theses (aat)

Rights Bhat, Sanketh Char

Internet Media Type application/pdf

Type texts

Source 20240517-usctheses-batch-1151 (batch), 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 author, as the original true and official version of the work, but does not grant the reader permission to use the work if the desired use is covered by copyright. It is the author, as rights holder, who must provide use permission if such use is covered by copyright.

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

Repository Email cisadmin@lib.usc.edu