I know there hasn’t been a lot of posts this summer, in truth there has not been a lot of news to share in the topics I usually blog about.  In between various distractions, I have been working on Something’s In the Air, and have now finished story 5 of 5, with story 4 only half way done and story 2 only existing in bits and pieces.  As promised, I would introduce the main characters as I completed their story.  I introduced Rachel (story 3) almost 6 months ago, and Ariane is story 1.

While playing some Japanese Date Sims, there are these typical tropes among the datable women. Ariane is “action girl”,  Rachel is “geek girl”, and Paula is primarily defined as “smart girl”: a certified genius and scientist, she doesn’t bother with makeup, and has a low maintenance hairstyle.  She is probably the type of girl you are unlikely to meet in a bar, which is why she has a second defining characteristic: she’s a “gamer”.

While writing Something’s In The Air,  I have had to make “you the player” a character in the story.  At the beginning of the story, you are defined as a single guy who moved to town about a month ago for work, and in that month you have only met and dated one girl, Ariane.  Since SITA is a game, I am assuming that “you the player” also play other games, so meeting another gamer like Paula is a possibility.

She is a natural red head, age 25, single by virtue of being too busy for a social life. Since I made her a red head, may as well give her freckled skin, and a Scottish sounding last name Brannigan (yes, after the character from Futurama, though they share absolutely nothing in common).  I also gave her the facial features of another beautiful scientist, Natalie Portman.

I also showed you this picture of her in my last post.  Even though gaming is the primary setting for story 5, the theme revolves around science and mystery.  To emphasize that fact, I threw in some tropes from my favorite science/mystery TV show Fringe, including introducing locations with floating letters, and a guy who looks like an observer making a cameo (but irrelevant to the plot).  Story 5 is the end game that unlocks after you reached key ending points in the other 4 stories.  Once unlocked the story involves a series of gaming puzzles that once solved reveal the big ending.

I do something similar with all five stories to separate them thematically.  Next up is story 4, which has a comic book theme.  It is set in an outdoor comic convention, which means another crowd scene, and this time with a bunch of “cosplay” characters that cannot be trademarked, so I have to make up some new ones.  I knew this story was going to be trouble when I wrote it.  I do like to challenge myself!