This is a thought I wrote about some time ago (in my blog), it was an intersection of God of War 3 and something I had been working on. As such it was a thought but recently the thought had reemerged as I decided to replay Shadow of Mordor on my PS5. Something stirred and the ideas I had that should be in every game. You see God of War 3 created my thought and it was all based on the very first introduction when you see the armies of Gaia (optionally a chaos based intrusion) gave us a view of Olympus. Now God of war 3 doesn’t use it, as such I feel no guilt.
To see the impact there needs to be a unique option that you find. As such it ‘triggers’ the introduction. The introduction is a simple path where the game is shown to you with the basic abilities that you gain. This is also the setting where you start.
Heaphestus
Heaphestus is the tinkerer of the lot. He made the olympian weapons, but he had done a lot more, as such this is where all the players begin. It is up to you to get the machines working again. Sustenance is first, food and water needs to be recharged. For this the machines work on ore to get some parts working. And that gets the whole thing up and running. Still, you need to do more. Olympus had elevated knowledge of solar energy and those need to get started. It is a mere 2 hours of the game, but that set the larger game. I decided on the thought that Olympus and others were transcribed in classical works. These works are added to the game, and as the gamer progresses in the game, he gains an above working knowledge of the gods, the earlier stage of Greek civilisation and some of the philosophers. When the machines are back online, the other rooms become accessible.
Automatons set the stage for Olympus. They do the mundane tasks. The food machine sets the first automatons in motion. We see the stage where the machines are fed and it beacons the cloning machines to start creating the life stock that are processed for the foods that you receive. You get to create the fields for weeds, corn and grapes. As this is done (seems simplistic), you are guided to a room where several pendants are and you are only allowed to take one.
Aphrodite, Hermes, Poseidon, Athena, Ares, Apollo and Hebe are the only pendants to chose from. When one is picked the others are closed off. This is essential to create a level of replayability. At this point I am still brooding on one point. Should this be set to the creation of your character. As such if you are a man you get Hermes, Poseidon, Ares and Apollo. The female character gets Aphrodite, Athena, Hebe and one (for now) hidden character, you know spoiler alert. Each has their own part in the palace and with Heaphestus making it all available the palace opens up. Some will take a few more ‘hours’ but that is linked to the machines taking hold of Olympus. As I see it, the automatons are linked to your personal choice. A sort of greek filter of your character. The man get female automatons, the woman get male automatons.
As you go through this place, you only get one track in the beginning. With the bracelet (or tiara) you have one path, as you play the game you unlock gems of succursus. (Read: support gems). Each support gem opens up the track for that god. It is in that ay that you get more and more access.
Hermes
He is the messenger of the Olympus. It also means that he will open up two major parts. The owl system when the system becomes available. Lore of Olympus is opened up and the messages return to where they are. It is shown in the office of Athena where now a Athene Noctua arrives. This metal tawny rascal will be your mental guide to a lot. It will also tell you where important owls are. You still need to interact a first time though. The second setting is a mobile hub (based on a few thousand old design. To get both active, you need to repair them. This will set the stage where instruct an automaton to direct to repairing a machine. It is now that you learn that Automatons come in a variety of settings. This allows you to tinker with the machines in the space of Heaphestus and you will see that these automatons require more ore to make and as such you need to ‘dig’ in his basement and find more ores (and open) a cavernous level where low level automatons start grinding for ores. Back to Hermes, Once these machines are back online, the screens in this rooms will give information on Greece (Athens, Sparta, Heraklion, Rhodes) and you will see all kinds of news pass by, including a repetitive loop of each of these places.
The mobile stage gets you access to the rooms directly as they are opened up
Ares
He is known as the god of war, but in Olympus he is the foremost authority on security and defence, with him the defending Automatons are aligned and activated. You have no chance to beating any one of them, but in that setting, they are keeping Olympus safe and with the gems you have you will be safe in these areas. So there is a stage to keep them an authority and you need to up your stealth skills (not sure how yet).
With defence up and running, you will gain the option to create the Butcher automaton. It will prepare the life stock for consumption, it also unlocks the cooking automaton. It will also be the time to gain access to the vaults of
Dionysus. They are open to all, so you are safe, but in that space is the wine automaton and the fruit automaton.
Aphrodite
Aphrodite is the goddess of love, beauty, fertility, physical pleasure (sexual), eternal youth, grace, and beauty. These elements get us a few parts. In the first we learn that she was the orchestrator of Aesculapius the famous healer. He was killed by Zeus, but this also set the gods against one another. Aesculapius and Prometheus were hunted by the gods and they are still part of this world. The second part is the physical pleasure, with Aphrodite in play you can have sex with the automatons, but her powers are eternal youth and beauty (via Aesculapius) and it will open up another stage. The Automatons are yearning and with Aphrodite you get to see their ‘thought’ and the unmentioned sides of the automatons. Her healing niches are all over Olympus, once staged for the human servants and now you get to use them to revitalise your health from hunger, thirst and exhaustion.
Thats the lines for now, there is more of course. But it still need to be syphoned out (it makes sense later on). You see, this would be a streaming game. Amazon Luna makes the most sense. You see as the lores unfold the optionally connected Kindle would get the classical works. It is at heart an educational game. The lore are classical works (they shouldn’t have any ‘protection’) the player gets more on the age of polytheism. I saw that need during the TV show I was designing namely Keno Diastima. And the age of that is largely lost to the Christian waves that is now losing its grip on what they enforced. The polytheism from Greece and the Nordic is getting a fresh wave of people who have had it with the deceitful clergy from Italy. This is also a setting where we can elevate knowledge of the gamer. It is not a wave of conversion, merely a side to show that we come from a larger stage. And that large stage was forgotten. It is merely a way to show the people that we come from a huge stage of excellent work. Homer, Herodotus, Aurelius (not a Greek), Plato, and so many more. For the larger extension mostly forgotten. And this game can reeducate people to see that larger stage. There is an opening market to that (or better said, I believe it is).
There are more sides, but not in this game. This game is about educating the people on the Polytheism that brought the Greek civilisation to bare. And as we learn about the Greek gods, we also learn that they had a lot more to offer than we realise.
Games have gone into a slump of forced advertisement and targeted turbo moments, but not much more. Certain games are pushing us into microtransactions and they will make their fortune their way and by the time people figured it out too much is lost for to people who merely wanted to have a good time, paid double plus bonus. That was never what gaming was all about. Intelligent gaming can be used in other ways, to educate. Something too many game designers have forgotten about. It is the age of advertising money and too many greed driven people are pushing that wave. I believe it is time for some to push back. I think that Amazon has options here (the kindle does help), the other track doesn’t need a kindle, but Amazon is the first choice, Tencent Technology the second option. As such Microsoft loses a lot more than they bargained for. Will it work? I hope so (partially for my own reasons).
If we push the agenda of joy and education, not of advertisement, we have a chance. Some food for thought. When do you ever get something for free? Never ever, there is always another side to that coin. And that is where the greed driven are. To see that side polytheism optionally brings that first wave. And when you get to the sides of Poseidon, Apollo and Hebe we get more to see that the Greeks knew things thousands of years ago, isn’t it weird that we never evolved from there? The Vatican never aided in that struggle, did they? That’s all for now.
Have a great day.
Lawrence van Rijn - Law Lord to be 