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LIVING WORLD ARCHITECTURE
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Living World Architecture (LWA)
“Living World Architecture” is what Silver Style designated a component
of their internally developed engine, which is also powering The Fall. There
are hundreds of so called non-player-characters (NPCs) in the game. The question
that drove the development of the LWA was, how it could be me made possible
to incorporate and manage such a large number of NPCs and create a world that
feels alive and credible.
After having worked on the LWA for more than one and a half year it is now
possible to establish almost any kind of dependency between arbitrary objects
in the game, no matter if it's characters, map objects, buildings, items or
tools. The LWA also manages the general behaviour of the NPCs and the enemies
of the player. Every single character has a set of activities he will follow
depending on certain circumstances. Time plays an important role as an NPC has
several tasks he can address during the day. And depending on their preferences
characters will go to sleep in their bed or whatever resting place they have
at night.
All these activities and behaviour patterns can be assigned individually, of
course. One could create any imaginable setup, however, it is crucial that the
tasks fit to the NPCs since they're extensively commenting on whatever challenge
they're currently facing and their living conditions in general. And through
aforementioned dependencies we can establish relationships between characters
(love, hate, envy etc.) or model the preference for certain objects or hobbies
- tech expert, gun fanatic or survival specialist to name a few.
Another important aspect to be realized by the LWA is the status check of NPCs
and their attitude towards the player. Friendly characters will support the
you in the event of an enemy attack. Neutral NPCs again could try to take advantage
of an situation in which you're outnumbered and may pose an additional threat
then. The behaviour and attitude of the characters depends on the way you're
behaving and playing the game. Information on very important incidents spreads
faster and wider than news on less interesting occurrences in the world of The
Fall.
The features described above are only a few of a variety of elements realized
through the LWA. Detailing them completely would require a lot more time and
space. To sum it up, the Living World Architecture is a powerful, efficient
and flexible tool, enabling us to construct credible and dynamic worlds for
all types of Role-Playing Games. And The Fall will be the first game to stand
out from other RPGs because of the things we're able to do with the LWA.
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