Fountellion in THE SPIRAL: Greenwise & the Nature of the Game

'INTERWOVEN'

Somehow... we managed it. We were able to interweave a human quest; a human story and combine it with a natural one; a natural testbed or crucible of sorts – for Artificial Life.

As it continues to update and to evolve around the Spiral so do we continue to learn more about how evolution can produce minor changes that spread so quickly. Yes, there were a million things we just couldn't simulate; things that only nature can produce. But that was where the human elements – like the Stokermen – came to the rescue. They fulfil a function in the fabric. Just as we as a species do in some ways, in reality, only without equal, where we have co-operated so... utterly. But still, at the most basic level, we spread seeds around like many mammals. We are Nature's movers and shakers.

So we had to interweave them successfully, because every human experience seems to need a quest; an objective. In the case of Fountellion, the main quest is to learn about the world, about an idea concerning our own nature; to build up an awareness of the forces at work within us all. The interconnections. This was so it could be something deeply relevant for players to carry over, back into their lives – as if just being close to such 'super-nature', wasn't enough. Has it not already been enough; since the beginning?

At so many stages we wondered how it was going to be possible... Don't get me started on the weather patterns. And many times we had to tinker; tweak variables, change things, introduce new species into the chain, intervene in the numbers being produced. But it... somehow... stays together... It [the fabric] managed to keep its balance somehow by its very imbalance... its environmental pressures upon its lifeforms. Like anything growing and unique it's really quite mystical isn't it? [Laughs]. It's grown now beyond all that... to become more than just a reflection.

- Interview with Zack Collins, 'Green Garden' Development Division team