Week 5: Island revisits and changes

The Islands (revisited)

This week I decided to revisit some islands, and randomly-rolled them from the 28 I made in the first 4 weeks. Each island name links back to the original devlog.

Vermouth Island

Elevation

280 m

Area

6.5 km2

• 6: Path: The sweet shop at the base of the lighthouse has an almost labyrinthine interior—one long path to the till, winding between shelves of sweets overflowing with sun-bleached wrappers.
• 2: Focus: The lighthouse-keeper-slash-shopkeeper tells us that the path to peace is “through the children”, then offers to sell us some candy at a “discounted” price. We take her up on the offer.
• 4: Event: A small crowd gathers on the dock, peering in through the sweet shop's windows. We think they're after us until one person steps in and calls to the keeper that they're looking for a lost child. But, no, nobody knows where they are.
• Event: Long story short, we find the child hiding on our boat, amid the more complex instruments. They have the virtue of curiosity. We give them a share of the candy (and try some ourselves—aniseed?) and the people practically shoo us on our way, but with less menace this time.

Reasons to return: To research the history here. To make peace? To see what the people here isolated on the Northern island.

Beak Island

Elevation

250 m

Area

6.1 km2

• 5: Impression: Birds perch on every tree, cooing affectionately, waiting for the signal.
• 3: Path: Stakes driven into the ground along a trail of char and salt, connected by a plasticky blue rope. Hanging signs read “No entry! Please forgive me!”.
• 4: Path: The dig site—now an earthen ramp leading to and around the vast curve of the nautilus shell that's caked in prehistoric barnacles.
• 6: Event: A whooping cry from deeper into the dig site, round the turn of the shell. Cheers, claps, and a wine bottle cork that comes sailing over the shell and lands in front of us.
• 7: Focus: A hole carved into the shell, just big enough for a child to squeeze through. Eyes stare blankly from the darkness inside. Not judging, not pleading, just… watching. Waiting.
• 2: Focus: A supply depot comes into view around the turn of the shell. Shovels, brushes, ration packs—terrible rations, by the looks of it.
• 9: Path: …haphazard trails of wire winding round the turn towards weathered-looking dynamite. Waiting for the command.
• Event: Another round of cheers—back the way we came. We didn't pass anyone on our way here. Something's amiss. We retreat and lay out some signal buoys to ward people away.

Reasons to return: To continue the dig and expose the shell. To investigate that crevice seen from afar. To mark the area as inhabited. Rescue the dig party?

The Can Opener

Elevation

71 m

Area

1.1 km2

Temperature (day)

22°C

Temperature (night)

12°C

• 2: Path: A tracery of saltwind-stiffened clotheslines hang from container to container to container, barren of clothes.
• 1: Impression: We're certain the containers are in a different configuration—but they're just as harsh on the eyes.
• 5: Focus: A welding crew lounge by a stack of containers, casually plotting over the Can Opener's equivalent of architectural plans, discussing safe working standards.
• 3: Path: Ropes trail from the ship's stern to little fishing dinghies lagging behind.
• 7: Event: The mighty engine starts… and stops.
• Event: Armed guards hurry us away and back to our boat. They're reeling in the dinghies, pulling in the rigid clotheslines, scrambling for bulkheads… we do our best to get clear of whatever's going to happen, and when we turn back, the massive ship is gone.

Reasons to return: To see just how they survive like this. To gain access to any ocean charts they have. To find out why some utopian dream brought to life has a passport system.

Redemption Island

• 1: Event: Our radio starts singing at the boundary of the island territory. Jazz and hymnals.
• 2: Path: There's a ladder up the radio mast, coiling round the legs, swaying in the wind like a frond of seaweed.
• 4: Focus: Another boat lies abandoned at the jetty, well-stocked with supplies and carefully roped to the shore.
• 5: Impression: The sky feels close here.
• 10: Event: The sky opens its eyes.
• 6: Impression: A faint air pressure, a rumbling on the skin. It feels like a scanline trickling down a television looks.
• Event: The absurdly-proportioned carcass of an offshore oil rig falls out of the sky, spindly steel legs buckling just from the air pressure. It slams the sea like it's ringing a gong, then fragments and disappears beneath the waves. We flee, thanking providence our ship is anchored far on the other side of the island.

Reasons to stay: To make a proper contact. To determine how the whole system receives its power.

Tombstone Island

Elevation

59 m

Area

6.7 km2

Temperature (day)

25°C

Temperature (night)

13°C

• 4: Path: A precarious stairway carved into the side of one of the pillars. We're sure it wasn't here before.
• 2: Impression: Starfruit saplings everywhere, tended by industrious ants. We pick fruit at every stage of development.
• 6: Path: A natural bridge over the stream made by a fallen tree—jagged and splintered, it bows under our weight as we travel to the pillar at the top of the stream.
• Event: A cascade of shadows falls on us one after the other. The pillars have come to us. Have we trespassed? Are they angry? We retreat to the ship. They don't follow.

Reasons to return: To scale one of the pillars. To gather fruit. To identify the ants here.

Wart Island

Elevation

77 m

Area

1.9 km2

Temperature (day)

22°C

Temperature (night)

10°C

• 6: Focus: Bitter thistles crowd out the soil.
• 2: Path: The crack of blue-green moss runs the length of the island, now, right over the hill, a spreading wound.
• 1: Focus: A barrel of murky rainwater, occupied by raving frogs.
• Event: The two women emerge from the hut and wave jerkily to us; we call out and they respond with crackling babble, like tuning into a foreign radio station. Then we notice their arms are at their sides, and the waving things aren't arms, and we run.

Reasons to return: To have a proper conversation. To see if there's anything that can be done. To scale the peak and to visit the other building.

Wyrm Island

Elevation

28 m

Area

3 km2

• 3: Event: A lone bird soars in to the arch, to the tree, to the nest, bright red wings folding in like an arrow head before bursting like fire to soften the landing.
• 4: Focus: Armed gunmen sit on a crate—of dynamite!—on the tail of the island.
• 7: Path: Slippery ledges zig-zag the inside of the arch; sparse, barbed roots hang from the top.
• 9: Event: Scree dives over the side of the arch, plunging into the water below, which spits it up onto the gravel beach.
• 8: Path: The far side of the arch is slumping and creaking under the strain of holding up its own weight.
• 2: Focus: An age-old barrel tucked under the salt-whitened roots of a tree. Smells alcoholic.
• 6: Focus: One species of nuts growing in the thicket has pale red flesh and a gingery taste; another has a leathery shell and salty aroma; yet another are spiked like chestnut shells, but have many tiny pebble-like nuts inside. We gather—and taste—samples.
• Event: An explosion from the tail of the island. We got what we came here for, so we head off before things get too dangerous.

Reasons to return: Recover the geode… perhaps. Catalogue the cornucopia below the arch's shoulder, yes.

Thoughts and Changes

The first thing I'm finding is that this is kinda awkward. I think the game just doesn't work for repeat exploration—which is fine, it's meant to be part of a set of games and the followup stuff can be played in another game. The main sticking points are:

1. whether or not to use the same feature type when rolling a previously-rolled number (e.g. Vermouth Island feature 6 was a Focus originally, but I decided to make it a Path this time by actually entering the shop)
2. the fact that you're still forced to leave each island, which is fine the first time around, but doesn't feel 100% right when I have explicit goals (the "Reasons to return").

Problem 1 I kinda-sorta fixed by just picking whatever feature type I wanted no matter what the feature was originally. Problem 2's trickier and might be basically unsolvable without adding significant rules to the game, but while thinking about it I did have the idea that instead of being forced to leave, you might be forced to choose whether to stay (for a while) or go. Anyway, if I cut the revisiting stuff then the game becomes simpler and I can just focus on how the mechanics work for first-time explorations. Besides, I found it a little harder to write these revisits than original visits—a little less inspiring.