Alpha Centauri 2

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri & Alien Crossfire => The Theory of Everything => Topic started by: MysticWind on November 29, 2017, 09:31:11 am

Title: Stuff about the setting that's unexplained in the game
Post by: MysticWind on November 29, 2017, 09:31:11 am

SMAC is probably in the top ten of best game world-building and writing, period. So what are some tantalizing major elements that went unexplained? (as opposed to minor stuff like what the "Crusader Wars" were and other background fluff)

1. What's a psych chaplain?  It's actually a title in The Jesus Incident by Frank Herbert, but there must've been a specific meaning intended for it, as it was Miriam's job.

2. What's the significance of Librarians? They're both a difficulty setting and a specialist. It was tantalizing enough that I came up with a fan faction, "Library of Planet." The GURPS SMAC book says they're people who surf the Datalinks all day trying to piece together the internet archives of Earth, but I'm not sure how much of the GURPS book was what Reynolds and co. had really imagined the setting. Anyway, it's neat that the other major sci-fi series where librarians are held in high regard is Warhammer 40,000.

3. What's a Datalinks, anyway? It couldn't be the Planetary Networks, since that's not discovered until later, so maybe it was the ship's intranet? I seem to remember in the Michael Ely story they mention that they had a copy of all of the files of the internet.

Title: Re: Stuff about the setting that's unexplained in the game
Post by: Kurvivor on December 01, 2017, 07:46:02 am

Quote

What's a psych chaplain?

I would posit that it is a self-explanatory title. Obviously in AC universe humanity finally turned society building into a science, wyth 'psych' as a shorthand metric on its healthiness/ stability.
So, miriam's responsibility would be psychological and spiritual health of the crew
PS i would guess Miriam is from some lutheran denomination...

Title: Re: Stuff about the setting that's unexplained in the game
Post by: bvanevery on December 05, 2017, 08:37:17 am

I always thought Sealurks were gratuitous and a bit stupid.  Like someone wanted an indigenous amphibious assault unit, couldn't think of anything, and so made it a generic "sea monster".  Totally not fitting any of the other biolife stuff that's talked about in the game.  My explanation is "it's kitchen sink junk thrown in there".

Miriam talks about "evil lurks in the Datalinks as it lurked in the streets of yesteryear, but it was never the streets that were evil" both when you select her for your faction, and when you aquire D1 Information Networks.  That tech lets you build a Network Node.  The Datalinks are clearly very basic networking stuff.  Planetary Networks are more advanced, D2, sort of like the internet.  Inventing little terms for things that would otherwise have a fairly ordinary name by 1998 standards, is done elsewhere a few times.  Yang talks about "the successive frames of a watchvid".  Um, yeah, that's a video program or a film by any other name.  Inventing terms makes the game feel like its own world, rather than our world.