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X7: Transcriptions for design section (miro boards, etc) - Part 1

Hi guys. This'll be the last post from me on this since there isn't any more huge swathes of text in the video after this bit.

I did transcriptions of the entirety of Dora's opening section for the X7 video, which contained the basic plot of what X7 would have been about. This post contains purely very tangential stuff like planning for game mechanics and whatnot. I was going to just keep this to myself but changed my mind, which means none of the formatting is consistent and it may be hard to read? Sorryyyy

I ran out of images in this post lawl so you can read the Part 2 here when you're done

Warning: post beneath the cut-off is Very Very Long this time. Also no proofreading, we die like all of Elysium's future planned media

Last edited: 07 January 2026

Do you love the colour of the X7

Miro Board 1 - "Design: Minor Systems WIP"

The video pans from right to left, so I'll start on the right side of the screen and work my way left. It's very zoomed out and hard to read, plus a lot of it appears to be a rehash of Disco Elysium's mechanics, so this will be short.

Section: Barks Can only read the blue sticky that says "Set of Barks"(?) and the green sticky that says "UI". There are five screenshots here from Disco Elysium; the two largest ones in the middle are the scab area in the traffic jam, the two smallest ones on the right appear to be nearby the drunk that barks outside Plaisance's book shop, and I *think* the mid-sized left one is next to Lillienne in the fishing village.

The boxes to the left of this are too small to see anything.

Section: Skill Checks Up the top right is a set of stickies describing passive checks that I can't read. The bulk of this section is dedicated to active checks. There's a small part dedicated to white checks (with more notes I cannot read), but most of it is dedicated to the set of stickies: "New [Key?] checks Variations". This includes four new types of checks: "Cooperative (joint) Red Checks", "Impulse check (Intrusive Thoughts)", "Competitive Red Checks", and "Revive Skill (red) checks" which I will discuss further below.

Can't read the descriptions, but we can see some mock-ups for what the check preview screen for the new cooperative checks may have looked like. One is a full-screen one taken next to the Horseback Monument in Disco Elysium. The other two are focused on the check preview/check "card" itself. One of these appears in higher quality later on in the video, so I'll paste it here for easier viewing:

[Image description: The preview card that appears when hovering over an active check in Disco Elysium. However, instead of simply displaying one skill, it has two skill bars. These read: "Cunoesse - Surface Tension: 4" and "Cuno - Inland Empire: 2". The chance of succeeding reads "Even: 40%". Text at the bottom reads "This is a White Check. You may retry it." along with snake eyes (double ones) dice that read "Always Loses" and box cars (double sixes) dice that read "Always Wins". End ID]

The new Revive skillchecks get their own special section at the bottom of the section, highlighted. Green sticky note reads: "Limited number of 'revives' Once a day." Pink sticky note reads: "Handful of different [...] systems, depending on whether it's a health or morale death and what the [character?] is." Also cyan and orange sticky notes, but text is too small to read.

There's a flow chart beneath: "Cuno or Cunoesse health/hype 0" leads to either "REVIVE SKILL [RED] CHECK" or "Don't attempt skill check. Game over". Skill check leads to either "Need specific skills to pass it, according to the death" or "If failed, Game over". There's some more notes to the right of the skills box but they are too small to read.

Section: Interactable & Containers This section is too small to read and also appears to be a re-hash of Disco Elysium's systems, so I won't bother. There are some more screenshots from the game here (one in the Ice Bear Fridge area, two in Harry's hostel room, the others are too small and dark to see).

Section: Portrait Swapping Yellow sticky: "In DE certain interactions can lead to portrait swap" -> Yellow sticky, too small to read -> Yellow sticky: "In X7, we would have more ways to change the portraits. - [...] health and hype in addition to [...]" -> Blue sticky, too small to read

To the right are some examples of what other portrait changes could be included:

Pink sticky: "Face drawing". Requirements: Inventory tools + skill check. Appears to be two stock PNGs of what tools combined may be required to do this, as well as a picture of a white boy's face being drawn all over by another white boy equipped with a sharpie. Two portraits below: Cunoesse's portrait normal, Cuno's with sharpie drawn all over his face.

Pink sticky, cannot be read. Requirement: Skill check. There's a tiny screenshot of some kind of skill discussion, and then four pictures of people with some very poorly shaved hair. Two portraits below: Cunoesse's normal portrait, Cuno's with a shave directly down the centre of his head and his normal hair sprouting around.

Pink sticky: Lost beanie. Requirement: Skill check. Two portraits below: Cunoesse's with her beanie missing, Cuno's normal portrait.

Pink sticky directly below, cannot be read. Requirement: Skill check. I can't tell what the portrait differences are in this one since they're so small.

Pink sticky to the right, cannot be read. Requirement: Skill check. Two portraits: Cunoesse's with her beanie missing, and instead of Cuno's, it's a duplicate of Cunoesse's normal portrait with her beanie. I think this one was for the case where Cuno steals Cunoesse's beanie or the player gives it to him.

One more pink sticky to the right with nothing around it but I cannot read it.

Section: Health & Hype V5 Big sticky at the top: "SHARED & TRADEABLE HEALING ITEMS". On the left is Health, reddish-orange as its colour like in the game. On the right is Hype, X7's replacement for Morale, blue as its main colour. Both have some small sprawling trees of notes on them including things like what happens when you reach 0 of each respectively and what healing items they have respectively. In the centre between them are Cunoesse and Cuno's portraits with health bars above, and another tree splitting into Cunoesse and Cuno's health and hype, but they've been covered with a translucent box and crossed out. There's a note on top of this but I can't read it.

Down the bottom is a section on substances. There's four categories: [...] which boosts PSY and heals HEALTH; SWEETS, which boosts FYS and heals HYPE; FIDGET TOY, which boosts MOT and heals HYPE; and CAFFEINE, which boosts INT and heals HEALTH. Lots more notes here that are too small to read as well.

Section: RIP Not sure what this is. It's greyed out like it's not being used and has a "RIP" dead centre of it. Some visible text on it: "what is happening when they go too far away from the [...] complex with the raft ?" next to a yellow sticky that says "Invisible threshold"; "Game over"; "Barks"

Section: Orb & Orbital Orbital: "Orbitals are mostly skill-dependent"; "In X7 Orbitals are always character-dependent."; Five stickies noting what the colours of orbitals mean: "Blue Orbital INT", "Red Orbital FYS", "Yellow Orbital MOT", "Purple Orbital PSY", "White Orbital Thought Cooked". Some flow charts below I can't read. Orange stickies on a screenshot of the Whirling's balcony at night: "Orbital showing up after completing a Task, opening FELD after interacting with it"; "The player [...]"; "Allow the player [...]"; "Orb development". Looots of lots of stuff here I still can't see.

Orb: Much stuff here, cannot see! Four stickies once again noting the colours correspond to the skill categories, with a fifth green one I can't read. Below everything else is one small flow chart: "Thoughts giving BONUSES when interacting with orbs in DE" lead to "The Fifteenth Indotribe" and "Deja Vu" thought, can't see anything else.

New Orb Propositions: Three branches, but I can only see "Orb Check", which has been crossed out and so not planned to go into the final game.

Orbital Example: Six screenshots of Harry on the Whirling's balcony at night, with MOT and FYS orbitals around his head and being clicked on. Orange sticky: "Orbital giving only observation line". Two yellow stickies, can't read. Yellow sticky on right: "Description stays few seconds (approx. 20)"

Orb Example: Two screenshots in the Whirling, next to the bar, at night. Orange sticky: "Orb giving only observation line". Two yellow stickies, one for each screenie, can't read.

Cut-off section below reading "Orb & Orbital [...]", so there's more stuff unable to be seen.

Wheew, that was all in the first one second of the "Design" section of the video! Let's move on to the *next* second, shall we?

Miro Board 2: Major Systems WIP

Section: [N/A - Thoughts Overview] Just a bunch of stuff about how the thought cabinet will work. In the box on the right, four visible sections - Overview, Internalize, Stop, Thought Complete, Compartmentalizing. Also a big line demonstrating how Cuno and Cunoesse's thought cabinets bounce off eachother through "Mixed Chain Thoughts" and "Discussion Chain". I can't read most of it but you can look at it if you want.

The "Discussion Chain" diagram is shown in higher quality later on in the video here:

It's a flow chart featuring both their thought cabinets, the list of possible thoughts to obtain, and the thoughts you obtain from FELD AKA discussing with eachother. I'm not sure how to describe it in more detail than that.

Section: [N/A - Thoughts in Detail]

[This one's proofread, the typos in this *should* all be carried over from the original text. Transcription of this whole section:]

"Discussion chain, focusing on how they communicate and develop their relationship [...] thoughts) We should not over-systemized those chats and end up with a rigid binary predictable sysem, especially when it's about mind. So sometimes thoughts could start as something they want to talk about (discussion chains) and at any pint becoming a private matter (private chain/private thought), or the other way around of course.

Also, C&C should not feel the same things at the same time. A discussion chain might be beneficial for one while the other is troubled for example.

This chains systems should help us to tell stories and create strong interactions between the THC and the rest of the game.

Growth Private chain

Cunoesse and Cuno, at their age and especially at this specific period of their life, shape their personalities together, learn together, grow together. Their thoughts are growing and evolving quickly, as they understand and discover new things everyday.

Communication (and growth, the growth of mutual topics and of their relationship) Discussion chain

Sometimes, they talk about something that happened. Sometimes, they have doubts and want to talk about it. Sometimes, they try to sort things out. Sometimes, they want to get something out of the other. (At this age they are often easily influenced about certain things, so they lie and manipulate.) Many reason to talk and think anyway.

---

FUNCTIONNING

Chain thoughts quantity and length :

Since a lot of thoughts will be chain thoughts, we need to have few chains, few starting points and have that multiplicity coming from the links of that chain, (so from the thoughts that are inside the chains). Some chains are shorter than the other, depending of the nature of the topic.

Players will just see thoughts, just one type of thoughts. Sometimes new thoughts will come as "Part II, NN" (or sometimes not even written explicitly, they will be just in the flow of an recurring thinking process, like obsession or a concern for example. Players won't see them as chain thoughts, or as different from any other thoughts. They won't be represented with different colors or anything visual like this like I did on the diagrams. The diagrams are there to make it clearer for US.

Discussion chain

After a thought internalization is complete with the current controlled character, the player can talk to the other character and give them a new thought as the outcome of the conversation. After that other character thought is fully internalised, they can do the same thing. It keeps ping-ponging like this until the end of the discussion chain. A dicussion chain can include 2 to ? thoughts.

A discussion chain thought can evolve in different ways :

Because the "discussions" (aftermath internalized thoughts dialogues) are branching dialogues, they can unfold in various ways and give different thoughts to the other character according to player's choices. Discussion chains can become harmonious and a source of mutual benefit or a source of tension and conflict. But discussion chains are not necessary synced and benefit or penalize both C&C at the same time. Discussion chain are not good or bad. It depends for who, depends the point of view. TThoughts later on in the "Discussion chain" can have more significant bonuses. But we shouldn't create linear bonuses progressions in the chains to avoid players to focus too much on bonuses rather than story content. Same as for the outcomes of the "Discussions, we should not give expected results : [begin crossout] "I should choose the kindest dialogue line [in the "discussion"] to ensure I will have bonuses". [end crossout] We should try be full of surprises and humor, to avoid player choices being focus only on gaining specific bonuses through their dialogue line choices, and amaze them with the outcomes (thoughts).

The discussion chain is also affecting each of their relationship meters [dialogue lines and animations].

Private chain/Private thought

Private chains can be a succession of thoughts forming a growing process, a maturation with a starting point and an end point. Private chains occur in each character separately.

The private chain require inner dialogues to unlock the next thought. Private chains can include 2 to ? thoughts. The player is notified that they internalised a thought with an orbital, which open FELD and trigger that inner dialogue. The player can still leave the dialogue from the beginning and not get the thought. Also, the orbital remains present until they interact with it.

A private thought is like a private chain but with just one thought. No chains, so no new thoughts after completing internalisation. They are just like regular thoughtsin DE.

SLOTS

Starts with 3 unlocked slots per each

All chains, and thoughts (private and discussion() give new slots when a thought is internalized.

The player can still "forget" to free slots. But in X7, the button could be named differently, like "compartmentalizing" for instance, because after interaction with the button, the thoughts will be put back in the list instead of being destroyed. (Why would kid forget things so easily, what this would be in X7? In DE it made sense with the "re-building" Harry thing, but I think it does not really work here, also I don't see the benefit to remove them forever in X7).

[Sub-point] "Compartmentalizing" cost 1 SP.

[Sub-point] When put back in slots, they don't need to be cooked again.

Since Cunoesse & Cuno will have 30 thoughts max per each in the full game, they will need 30 slots per each in total."

[End transcription of this section.]

Section: Whole left side Just reiterating Disco's stuff, or mocking up what they'll look like in-game (in particular for the task tabs in the top section: "Active tasks Tab", "Done tasks opened", "Active task opened", and "Done task Tab". Also a sticky note on the left about "SHARED TASKS".

That's another second done! Yay! It's OK, we can skip many many seconds now til the next bit of writeable stuff.

Atlassian Pages - Relationship Tracker

Transcription of this whole section:

[Table description: 1x3 cells denoting how much certain types of events should impact Cuno and Cunoesse's relationship. Plus/minus 5 to 10% = A small boost/decrease. (italicised subtitle: "player's streak in either direction.") Plus/minus 15 to 20% = A significant boost/decrease. (italicised subtitle: "pretty strongly by the player.") Greater than plus or minus 20% = A relationship-altering event. (italicised subtitle: "turn the tides immediately.") End table]

"Adjustments at the lowest 5-10% level are best for almost all mundane purposes and interactions between characters. Adjustments in the middle scale should be reserved for select, important moments in the game. Relationship-altering events of the highest scale should only be used in case of critical story events. Events of the highest (and medium) scale should, of course, also be flagged and tracked by booleans for reactivity.

From a game-balancing perspective, it's a good idea to forgo the manual input of numbers altogether, and simply define three global variables, something like:

low_rel_adjust = 5% mid_rel_adjust = 11% hi_rel_adjust = 17%

If the writing team uses these variables consistently to adjust stats, then in the case that the system needs to be rebalanced, the value of these variables can be adjusted in FELD at the top level. The result is a system-wide rebalancing of the relationship system without any rewrites from the writers' side.

---

In addition, we can track the current state of their relationship trackers with Booleans by getting for ranges (returns true if value is between min and max) : Hate, Dislike, Like, Love.

[Table description: 2x3 cells to demonstrate possible ranges in Cuno and Cunoesse's relationship value for certain relationship types. Horizontal titles: Hate, Dislike, Like, Love. Vertical title: TRACKERS. Hate-TRACKERS: 0 to 25 Dislike-TRACKERS: 25 to 50 Like-TRACKERS: 50 to 75 Love-TRACKERS: 75 to 100. End table]

These Booleans (hate, dislike etc.) could be use to trigger certain side effects of their trackers such as adding or changing dialogue options, add modifiers in party checks as well as setting how frequently they "look at/anti look at" (in game world, inventory and thought cabinet).

---

[Title] Smooth distance parameter responding to their continuum relationship trackers [End title]

The distance when in idle and navigating the game world between them will be the outcome of the sum of both trackers converted in distance (we don't use Booleans mentioned above, we use the float directly). From a player perspective, that's the uncontrolled character which will slow down/speed up to set the distance."

[Image description: Two rows of four drawings, eight total, demonstrating the distance being impacted by the characters' views of eachother. First row, drawing 1: Both characters unhappy, longest distance from eachother. Drawing 2: Both characters neutral, slightly shorter distance. Drawing 3: Both characters smiling, very close to eachother. Drawing 4: Both characters very happy, close enough to hold hands. Second row, drawing 1: Character A is very unhappy and therefore puts lots of distance from Character B, who is neutral. Drawing 2: Character A is very unhappy and character B is smiling, so the distance is slightly shorter. Drawing 3: Character A is very unhappy and Character B is very happy, so they are very close to eachother. Drawing 4: Clone of Drawing 4 from Row 1, both characters are very happy and therefore are holding hands as they walk. Two-sided arrow on the bottom, the length of all of the images, has a caption: "Smooth distance parameter responding to the continuum relationship trackers" End ID]

[End transcription]

Gameplay: Cuno & Cunoesse's Skills

yeah yeah everyone's seen them but I want a place to come back to them easily

Cunoesse: Intellect, 1 point: Pursuit, 1 point, 1 bonus slot (wildcat chasing prey as portrait?), Ambush, 1 point (I think a lioness crouched down waiting to chase prey), Conceptualization, 2 points (same as DE) Psyche, 4 points: Surface Tension, 5 (a swimmer with water covering face), Stride, 4 (mask with shushing finger held to lips?), Mimicry, 5, 2 bonus slots (collage-style hodgepodge of various cutouts of faces to make one full face) Phisique[sic], 5: Half Light, 5 (in-game portrait, also signature skill), Might, 7 (Endurance in-game portrait), Pain Threshold, 5 (in-game portrait) Motorics, 2: Sensorium, 4 (glowing cat eyes), Reaction Speed, 2 (in-game portrait), Interval, 4 (melting clock from Salvador Dali's painting "The Persistence of Memory")

Cuno: Intellect, 3: Rhetoric, 6 (in-game portrait), Logic, 5 (in-game portrait), Encyclopedia, 3 (in-game portrait) Psyche, 2: Inland Empire, 2, 3 bonus slots (in-game portrait, also signature skill), Empathy, 2 (in-game portrait), Scar Shield, 4 (some kind of AI-generated buff guy cast in shadow with horns and lightnign behind him?) Phisique[sic], 2: Beastmaster Racoono, 3 (I think a 3d sculpt of some kind of animal with an object in its mouth?), Physical Instrument, 4 (same as in-game portrait), Electrochemistry, 2 (same as in-game portrait Motorics, 3: Composure, 4, 4 bonus slots (in-game portrait), Interfacing, 4 (in-game portrait), Perception, 3 (in-game portrait)

Other skills which are mentioned elsewhere in the video but are not in this picture: Cunoesse: "Refleks", "Stride" Cuno: "Hand-Learning", "Lexi-Cunn"

Atlassian Pages: Skill Checks

[Transcription of section:]

"[cut-off text] runs out, the Impulse Check functionally behaves like a regular Red Check.

When the timer reaches zero, the Impulse Check becomes inaccessible, like an intrusive thought banished. The dialogue option text becomes dark and cannot be highlighted or clicked, and if the hub where it first appeared can be revisited, then the option is entirely gone the next time the player returns to the hub. Thus the game should keep track at runtime of whether a given Impulse Check was shown and show it only once, then hide it forever. (The color of the frame as well as the formatting of the countdown text, e.g. [5s] vs [5 sec], is something TBC consulting a UI designer and seeing the checks play out in Discube Elysium to ensure best readability.)

In the card's properties, the writer should be able to specify how long the available reaction time to a given Impulse Check is, though a default value should also be set globally so that it can be easily adjusted story-wide. (For example, let's start with 6 seconds as the default.) We're also thinking that certain skills (like Cunoesse's Refleks) might give bonuses to reaction time, thus possibly granting 10% or 20% more time than the specified value to react to an Impulse Check, depending on the number of Skill points invested.

(Note that there should also be an in-game setting which disables the timer on Impulse Checks (but still keeps them a one-time opportunity) for accessibility purposes and for the sake of players who find this form of quick-time gameplay frustrating.)

[Title] Cooperative (Joint) Red & White Checks [End title]

To pass a Cooperative Red Check, both Cuno and Cunoesse need to roll a 2d6 on one of their respective Skills. Therefore, two Skills are being tested simultaneously: one of Cuno's and one of Cunoesse's. For example: Cunoesse needs to push a derelict motor carriage using her Might while Cuno uses Hand-Learning to pop the clutch. Impersonating an adult whilst stacked on top of each other in a trenchcoat tests Cuno's LexiCunn and Cunoesse's Stride.

The Cooperative Check is a sum of the two rolls:

2d6 + Cuno's Base Skill (Attribute value) + Cuno's Modifiers

+ 2d6 + Cunoesse's Base Skill (Attribute value) + Cunoesse's Modifiers

against a Cooperative Check Difficulty, for which the tresholds are about twice as high as they would normally be for a single Red Check (and they will have their own naming table, e.g. Celestial, Superlative, Omnipotent, etc.). Visually, the two dice rolls unfold in parallel, one on each side of the screen.

Outcomes in a Cooperative RC work the same as they would in a single RC (success, failure, and criticals) because we're evaluating the sum of their two rolls - in this instance it doesn't really matter who fucked up their roll.

[Highlighted] Individual crit fail or crit success of 2d6 can fail or pass the check. If both a crit success and a crit fail roll the check is passed (Crit success beats crit fail). [End highlight]

[Image mock-up of what the cooperative check card will look like, same as the card described as above in the first Miro board.]

[Title] Competitive Red Checks [End title]

The most dramatic of Red Checks will occur in the endgame, when Cuno's Skills face off against Cunoesse's Skills and vice versa.

In a Competitive Red check, the characters roll "against" one another by engaging in a series of action-and-response Red Checks. For example, Cunoesse rolls Might, and the score she sets in her Red [rest of text cut-off]"

[End transcription]

Miro Board 3 - "Box of Locusts"

Holy fricking cow brah I am not making it thru the winter

Section: "Design Questions"

How do ages progress? a. Is it by act? b. By hours? c. etc

How do we notify players of changes in the box?

Are there other changes between ages?

Section: Slide 1 - "Overview"

Top row of stickies: Yellow sticky: "Part of player expression" Red sticky: "Manipulate a micro environment through FELD" Yellow sticky: "Construction and management sim Locust City" (Red button: BeastMasterRaccoono; Pink button: CUNO) Yellow sticky: "KINGDOM MANAGMENT" Small yellow sticky: "Evolving interactable" Red sticky: "Similar to when Harry talk to corpse with his inland empire, Cuno will create and play with the City thanks to his Beastmaster Raccoono" Green box: "Cuno loses himself in the fantasy of Locust City. He wants to live within this world he's created out of a bunch of locusts in a box. He struggles to live in the hardship of the world around him. It's tough and unrelenting. The fantasy can give him a feeling of control, or at the very leaste some of the tools he needs to make it through his current turmoil." End of sticky row

Left side of slide: Paragraph: "Cuno carries a box filled of Locust with him. This is the Locust City. its in his inventory under interact tag. [arrow which points to an edited screenshot of Disco Elysium's inventory system, specifically to the Interact tab] When interacting (in x7 all interact items will have to be equipped in characters hands since there is two chars and a shared inv, it's opening FELD, give an overview of he current situation of the box which is like a small city. Through dialog options, the player can inspect it, remove things, add things they have in their inventory in it, smell it equivalent, manage the city (this could affect Cuno's political alignement). Some of those dialogue options will lead to pass skill checks, gain secret task and Cuno tasks. The state of the box and its locust evolve with time passing and according to player choices." Blue sticky: "Locust City Soundscape when interacting with it" Green sticky: "Animation Cuno in game world checking in the box?" Paragraph: "After you interacted with it for the first time, an Icon appears in your inventory to access it quicker. And each time (actually more interesting and surprising if the player is not all the time notified) there is an availalbe update in the box the player would be notified with the dot" [screenshot of the tabs in DE's bottom right hand corner, with task and thought cabinet tabs orange and a notification dot on them, to demonstrate what is being talked about] End left side

Middle of slide: Image: Edited screenshot of Disco Elysium's inventory system. The icon is the box containing the Locust City. The title is "Locust City". The description reads: "A cardboard box with several rows of little holes in the lid. Though at first glance the box seems perfectly ordinary, upon closer examination, it's obvious that it has been prepared with great care." Artwork: Painting of a box with flowers on the side Artwork: Painting of an orange-haired child sitting in a field with a box in front of them [A/N: If anyone knows where these images originate from please let me know so I can add them here] Small flow chart of stickies: "Cunoesse can also interact with it (equip it in her hands)" -> (Branch 1) "Cuno reaction? (lookat+FELD interject first time)" / (Branch 2) "Not much to do in her FELD (she just see some eatable locust and some mess)" -> "Add negative modifiers when she has it equipped" Large pink sticky: "When interacting (in x7 all interact items will have to be equipped in characters hands since there is two chars and a shared inv" End middle of slide

End Overview slide

Section: Slide 2 - "Content"

Top of slide: Yellow sticky: "What is the locust city" -> Blue sticky: "Locust city was more the big colony he had in his appartement in the vivarium I think" Green box: "Through dialogue options and skill checks (often Beastmaster Raccoono), player can customize and manage Cuno's Locust City. Cuno is playing like a kid with a doll house. The nature of dialogue options and decisions to take to manage the Locust City imply that somehow he reproduces his vision of the world around him, which gives some extra bits of lore about Elysium and his thoughts on political views on it (political from a child pov). [new line] Some choices could affect Cuno's political alignment. [new line] Since all of this is in his head (mainly his Inland Empire) Cunoesse is not aware of it. So we could achieve a nice text-based living Locust City without any reactivity involved." Black sticky to left: "Insects Doll house" Black sticky to right: "Text based building sim game" End top of slide

Middle area: Left: Mock-up of game. Blank screen-sized box, within it on the right hand side is a long black bar. Title: "CUNO FELD". Below, narrator nametag "BOX OF LOCUST -". Short box labelled "DESCRIPTION" below. Long box labelled "Dialogue Options" below. Description bubble: Circle pointing to Description box on image. Text: "A description of the box and its current state, evolving and updating during the game" Dialogue bubble: Circle pointing to Dialogue Options box on image. Text: "Some dialogue options updating according to player choices" Dialogue bubble also points to a green box labelled "MAIN HUB" with a row of empty dialogue options, with a screenshot beneath showing an in-game screenshot of dialogue to show what it looks like. Main hub box branches into two other boxes. Box 1: "1.-INSPECT the box" Box 2: "2.-OPEN the box" Branches into three paths with sticky label "OVERIEW" Branch 1: Green box - "1.- INSPECT smth(s) inside the box)" - Extra box labelled "Examples" with two empty numbers Branch 2: Green box - "1.-Build (available depending if player has certain items in the inv) - Extra box labelled "Examples", includes text "1.- Build the Green Legs monastery with a few matches" -> Connects to white box next to Branch 3 Branch 3: "2.- Manage" Connected to white box: "Dialogue option showing because you build the Green Legs monastery" Connected to green box: "Example - 1.- Organise a meeting at the Locust City Green Legs monastery to decide of the fate of the Green Leg cardinal; 2.- Destroy etc; 3.- Tktk" -> Leads to white box: "1.- Excommunicated [Beastmaster Raccoono - Challenging 12] Release in nature" Transparent box: "To help writers and designers to imagine the Locust City we could make a map" Yellow sticky: "This map could be also an item in the game that you can get at the end" Crude drawing of a map showing a dot labelled "Aemilie House", four lines converging labelled "The green Legs monastery", and a circle and long rectangle labelled "The Rock division" End middle area

Left bottom area: List: "GAIN TASKS", "GAIN SECRET TASKS", "GAIN THOUGHTS", "GAIN XP", "PASS SKILL CHECKS", "PROGRESSION AND EVOLUTION" Black box: "Cuno could start with a very small Locust story, with one or two Locus involved and it's the player that will expand the story with Cuno. [new line] At the beginning there is a slight Tamagotchi vibe (but story rich) where you get attached to very few locusts, like 2 or 3, But they reproduce, he puts some new ones in the box he found on the way, and its slowly increasing and becomes more a Construction and management sim Locust City, a KINGDOM MANAGMENT. The story is flourishing and the player can decide to focus more on certain characters and the story of the City [new line] [crossed out] Or the other way around, the player starts the game with a rich city that Cuno build up and the City collapse as the locusts dies during the game. [end crossout]" Dot point: "New dialogues options when leveling up Beastmaster Raccoono" End left bottom area

Bigger transparent box:

"Cuno influences the direction of the kingdom and its society by deciding on cultural practices and values. Offering items and telling them how to use them also has an effect.

The time between Cuno checking on the kingdom act as millennia -- only minutes/hours for Cuno. This lets us see how single decisions have a big impact.

DECISION BRAINSTORM Funeral practices Foster the young or help the old? Fear or adore the darkness Worship Cuno as a god? Religion, science, mathematics, or art Individualism or collectivism Marriage? Crime and punishment Hunters or farmers Elect a regent?

OUTCOMES (not obvious through decisions) [Yellow sticky: "Get really weird with this"] Drawing boundaries (creating countries and rivalries) Cannibalism Democracy Welcome or fear outsiders War or peace Gaining certain resources"

End transparent box

Other example: Four yellow stickies "food" "birth" "other locusts immigrants" "death" End other example

End Content slide

Section: Slide 3 - "UI Flow (Inv Wireframe TBD)"

the simple flow chart diagram has harmed me once again

Bottom "Box Of Locust" section: Top white box: "Just like a substance, after an "Interact" will be equipped for the first time in character hand, FELD opens and the icon of the interact displays in hand's slot." Left white box: "After the first time it was equipped, The box of locusts becomes more easily reachable thanks to an additional box of Locust icon on the" Yellow sticky 1: "Problem with this is it makes it easy for the player to avoid neglecting the locusts" Yellow sticky 2: "Ideally, we want the player to have to remember to check up on them -- like a Tamagotchi" End Box Of Locust section

End UI slide

Section: Slide 4 - "Time & Updates"

"Time between updates should be millennia in order to see significant changes in the locust civilisation. This equates to minutes or hours for Cuno. Through his imagination, he sees a whole society grow, prosper, and potentially even collapse."

"Note: The diagram below is a very high-level concept for how the societies could differ. It will need much more brainstorming. Progression from one Age to the next won't be obvious nor will it be a binary choice. There will be variations of each Age possibility depending on the decisions Cuno makes and the items they receive."

Top-down flow chart/tree with five rows. Boxes on the left are NEGLECTFUL, boxes on right are ATTENTIVE.

Row 1 - Age I. One box. "Just a few locusts, survivors Commune with god (Cuno) In his favour and service)" Row 2 - Age II. Two boxes. Box 1: "Warring tribes; Fight for resources; Monotheistic nomads". Box 2: "Shared resources; Polytheistic farmers; Agricultural spiritualism" Row 3 - Age III. Three boxes. Box 1: "Castle warfare; Mycelium alchemy; Warrior culture; Xenophobic". (Sticky: Encourages distrust of Cunoesse). Box 2: "Democracy; Domestic servitude; Caste system; Dualistic theism". (Sticky: Post-colonial India; Light and dark deities (C-C). Box 3: "Parapsychology; Moss mythology; Collectivism; Flight worship (sky burial)". (Sticky: "Could do a psychological evaluation of Cunoesse"). Row 4 - Age IV. Four boxes. Box 1: "Cannibalism; Stake blastema culture; Nihilism; Corpse steppes". Box 2: "Fungi barons; Mutations; Slavery; Aristocrats". Box 3: "Multiculturalism; Hippie culture; Hedonism; Lichen fusion". Box 4: "Monolithic society; Moss bioreactor; Huge population; Swarm behaviour". Row 5 - Four boxes. Box 1: "DEAD" (+ Sticky: "Could have other ways to accidentally kill them off -- i.e. via toxic items"). Box 2: "DIVIDED". Box 3: "LAISSEZ-FAIRE". Box 4: "UNITED".

Section: "Item / Upgrades"

Worship: Pebble (spirit ward); Carved stone (church) Weapons: Sharp sticks Cultural: Psychedelic shrooms Energy production: Glass vial (moss bioreactor); Dirty water (cyanobacteria x mushrooms)

Section: "References"

On the left appears to be this quote from Cixin Liu's The Three-Body Problem:

"Look at them, the bugs. Humans have used everything in their power to extinguish them: every kind of poison, aerial sprays, introducing and cultivating their natural predators, searching for and destroying their eggs, using genetic modification to sterilize them, burning with fire, drowning with water. Every family has bug spray, every desk has a fly-swatter under it... this long war has been going on for the entire history of human civilization. But the outcome is still in doubt. The bugs have not been eliminated. They still proudly live between the heavens and the earth, and their numbers have not diminished from the time before the appearance of the humans. The Trisolarans who deemed the humans bugs seemed to have forgotten one fact: The bugs have never been truly defeated.

A small black cloud covered the sun and cast a moving shadow against the ground. This was not a common cloud, but a swarm of locusts that had just arrived. As the swarm landed in the fields nearby, the three men stood in the middle of a living shower, feeling the dignity of life on Earth. Ding Yi and Wang Miao poured the two bottles of wine they had with them on the ground beneath their feet, a toast for the bugs."

There's one extra sentence underneath this bit of the slide but I can't read it.

On the right: "As a symbol of good luck and abundance in Chinese culture, harnessing the power of the grasshopper or locusts encourages us to take chances, and leaps of faith. Sometimes associated with astral travel, locusts symbolise the ability to overcome fear and move in the direction of positive change."

Section: "Age I - The Mortual Age"

I can't read anything on this, but I'm including it because it looks like there's at least one screenshot of a movie or something on here. If you recognise where any of the pictures on here are from, please let me know so I can add it here!

[EDIT 05 NOV 2025]: Courtesy of @tomtomtomtomtomtomclub - one of the screenshots is of the Man in the Planet from Eraserhead!

[EDIT 07 JAN 2026]: this was all the way back when the original edit was made but I forgot to add it here since I had to move some stuff around LOL -- thanks to @laughingpinecone for finding the reference image! turns out it's a promotional poster rather than an actual screencap from the film itself!