Atman 0.2.1

Fixes found by two AI playtests of 0.2.0, which ran on playtester's new Strata driver.

• The dusk path (#30):
  • The direction hint under NEXT now points at the snakes on the path. Before, it pointed at your door, and three of four testers never met the rope.
  • NEXT talks you through each snake: light the lamp, go closer, look steadily, and how many are left.
• No more silent keys:
  • V, B and C say why they did nothing.
  • Tab opens the codex on the page that just opened.
  • H hides the HUD.
  • In short windows the text is smaller and keeps clear of the HUD.
  • The codex footers say where its sources are listed.
• The dream (#32): it now begins with "You sleep, and dream." and is seen through a faint violet haze. Both testers who reached it had taken it for a broken clock.
• V steps out to just behind the body, so you see yourself at once.
• Under the hood: Strata v0.6.0 (#29), and saves written by 0.2.0 are now tested to load (#31).

Saves from 0.1.x and 0.2.0 load.

This is still a pre-release: the working translations of Gauḍapāda's Kārikā await review (#28). No person has played this build by hand. The AI playtests and the other checks are in docs/playtests/0.2.1.

Downloads: Windows x64 (.zip) and Linux x64 (.tar.gz), each with a .sha256. You can also play in a browser at https://atman.play.danielstephenson.dev.

Atman 0.2.0

The third teaching, Three States, and what came with it.

• The dream and the deep sleep (#21):
  • On the first night after the rope and the clay you dream the valley. The sun runs backwards, every place wears the next one's name, and nothing seems strange.
  • Then deep sleep: a dark screen with only the river.
  • Then you wake, and two codex pages open: the dream (Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad 4.3.9–10, 4.3.14) and the fourth (Māṇḍūkya Upaniṣad 2 and 7), both in Hume's 1921 translation.
• Text size and captions (#22): F2 sets the text size and F3 turns on captions for the sounds that matter. In a browser both are in How to play.
• The after-mode's days differ (#23): some evenings the village sets clay lamps along the ghat steps and floats more on the river, and some mornings egrets cross the valley.
• A second village (#24): F6, or New in a browser, keeps one village and lets you play another.
• Wayfinding (#25): the HUD says which way the next place is, for example "30 m ahead, to the left".
• Driven play-testing (#26): a test harness can drive the game through the engine; driven runs never touch your saves.
• A review packet for the translations, docs/REVIEW.md (#20).

Saves from 0.1.x still load. If you finished 0.1.x, you dream on your next night.

This is still a pre-release: the working translations of Gauḍapāda's Kārikā await review. No person has played this build by hand. What was checked instead, including one AI playtest of 0.1.2, is in docs/playtests/0.2.0.

Downloads: Windows x64 (.zip) and Linux x64 (.tar.gz), each with a .sha256. You can also play in a browser at https://atman.play.danielstephenson.dev.

Atman 0.1.2

A third usability round on top of 0.1.1 (#18).

• Messages are drawn under the prompt. In a window 720–800 pixels tall they used to be printed over the HUD's NEXT and CHORES lines, so the new game's greeting could not be read.
• Place names keep a gap after the HUD's words, so the HUD no longer reads "Standing Newcomer A neighbour's house".
• On a touch screen the codex no longer names keys the screen doesn't have (its buttons do those jobs). The touch pad's Keys button, which did nothing on a phone, is gone. How to play's touch list now names the Watch button and says when Lens appears.

Still a pre-release: the working translations of Gauḍapāda's Kārikā await review. No one has played this build by hand; what was checked instead is in docs/playtests/0.1.2.

Downloads: Windows x64 (.zip) and Linux x64 (.tar.gz), each with a .sha256. The game is also playable in a browser at https://atman.play.danielstephenson.dev.

Atman 0.1.1

A usability round on top of 0.1.0 (#15).

• The codex in an upright window (a phone held upright): the page alone is drawn across the width, about 1.4 times larger, with the list of entries above it. Landscape windows are unchanged.
• CHORES on the HUD, where it said QUESTS; after the teachings are done it reads "CHORES (as you like)".
• Phone messages sit to the left of the button pad, so the greeting no longer covers Use.
• docs/WEB.md explains sound in a browser: silent until the first tap or click, and the Sound button's choice is remembered.

Still a pre-release: the working translations of Gauḍapāda's Kārikā await review. No one has played this build by hand; what was checked instead is in docs/playtests/0.1.1.

Downloads: Windows x64 (.zip) and Linux x64 (.tar.gz), each with a .sha256. The game is also playable in a browser at https://atman.play.danielstephenson.dev.

Atman 0.1.0

Atman's first release: the MVP, a first-person game about Advaita Vedānta on the Strata engine.

You wake in a river village on a spring afternoon, with a body, a name and a list of chores.

• At dusk there are snakes on the path to the ghat, until the lamp shows them to be rope.
• The potter has a wheel: throw pots, name them, see them as clay, and break one to find the space was never in it.
• The codex holds each verse the game teaches, in Devanagari, IAST and English, with its sources.
• Once both teachings are done and you have slept, the after-mode begins. It never ends, and nothing is scored.

Download for Windows x64 or Linux x64 below, or play in a browser at https://atman.play.danielstephenson.dev on a computer or a phone. The README in each download says how to start it; F1 shows the controls in the game.

New since the playtest (#13)

• Places: houses and places are named on screen as you near them. Your door is indigo, the potter's ochre, and the shrine's saffron under a pennant.
• Night: a brighter lamp that reaches further, a lamp lit by every door after sunset, and a hint to light your lamp.
• Progress: a NEXT line that says what comes next. A new codex page is announced, and the after-mode opens with words of its own.
• Sound: all of it synthesized as the game plays. M or the Sound button turns it off.
• Phones: the words name the buttons, and messages are easier to read.

Known

• The English of Gauḍapāda's verses (the rope and the pot-space pages) is a working translation awaiting review, and the codex says so.
• macOS is not built. The Windows build is not signed, so Windows may ask before it runs.

Saves: %APPDATA%\Atman\default on Windows, ~/.local/share/atman/default on Linux.