Gameplay
Seven systems, one school year at a time
This is the game as it is being designed. Some of it already works in the development build, some is in progress and some is still a plan. Each mechanic says which.
Lessons, exams and the work between them
Status: In developmentAcademic Life
A school day at the academy is made of real periods. You sit in a lesson, read the notes and worked examples, and answer questions yourself. What you got wrong is kept, so revision has something to work with.
Quizzes and mock exams let you find out where you stand before the papers that matter. Official examinations are graded, and the results follow you: they shape your standing, what opens up to you, and how others see you.
Knowing the material also makes you useful. Tutoring a classmate before an important test is a way to help someone, and a way to be owed something.
Screenshot · Classroom · Build 0.0.0
Mechanics and where they stand
Interactive lessons
Status: ImplementedTimetabled periods with notes, worked examples and questions you answer yourself, with feedback.
Quizzes, mock exams and official exams
Status: ImplementedPractice papers to prepare with, and graded examinations whose results are recorded.
Study and revision
Status: ImplementedA notebook that keeps your saved material and past mistakes, so you can review before a test.
Tutoring classmates
Status: ImplementedHelp other students prepare for the tests they are worried about.
Long-term academic consequences
Status: In developmentPerformance that carries across terms and changes what the academy offers you.
The world does not wait for you
Status: In developmentA Living Academy
The ambition is an academy with hundreds of characters, each with a schedule, interests, relationships and routines of their own. Stand still and the campus keeps moving.
Not everyone is visible on the map. A student in a lesson is inside the school building; someone studying is in the library. If you cannot find a person, there is a reason, and the reason is where they actually are.
Routines are not fixed rails. An appointment you made, a story event or something unusual happening on campus can pull characters away from their normal day.
In-game campus art · Night
Mechanics and where they stand
Characters travelling across campus
Status: ImplementedStudents appear on the campus map while they are walking between real commitments.
Indoors means out of sight
Status: ImplementedCharacters who are in a lesson, a club or a building are not shown wandering outside.
Weather, seasons and time of day
Status: ImplementedThe campus changes mood with the calendar: spring blossom, rain, snow, sunset and night.
Individual daily routines
Status: In developmentSchedules that differ from character to character, driven by their interests and obligations.
Events that override routines
Status: In developmentMeetings, missions and special events that change where people are and what they are doing.
An academy of hundreds
Status: PlannedScaling the simulation to the full student body, teachers included.
Progress you have to earn
Status: In developmentCharacter Development
You cannot be good at everything at once. Time spent in the library is time not spent training, and the academy notices which student you are becoming.
Growth happens over meaningful stretches of in-game time. There are no instant level-ups: improvement comes from attending, practising and following through.
In-game environment art · Sports facilities
Mechanics and where they stand
Academic ability
Status: ImplementedKnowledge that improves by attending lessons, studying and repairing past mistakes.
Physical condition and training
Status: In developmentEnergy, fatigue and conditioning that respond to training, rest and how you look after yourself.
Social ability
Status: In developmentGetting better at reading people and being someone others want to deal with.
Skills that unlock opportunities
Status: PlannedOptions in conversations, events and the story that only appear once you are capable enough.
A campus worth walking around
Status: In developmentCampus Exploration
The campus is a map you move around, not a menu. Buildings have opening hours, activities that only happen there, and people who tend to be found inside.
Between lessons the day is yours: study, borrow a book, train with a club, buy something for a friend, or sit in the café and see who turns up.
Screenshot · Campus map · Build 0.0.0
Mechanics and where they stand
Explorable campus map
Status: ImplementedA full campus you can pan and zoom, with destinations that open into their own scenes.
Library
Status: ImplementedBorrow books, read and study, and run into the students who spend their afternoons there.
Your dormitory room
Status: ImplementedA private room for studying, resting, checking your phone and keeping what you own.
Shops and café
Status: ImplementedBuy food, drinks and gifts, or take a table and spend time with someone.
Sports clubs
Status: In developmentJoin a club, attend practice and play matches. Some clubs are available, more are to come.
More campus destinations
Status: PlannedFurther facilities, leisure activities and places to meet.
Nothing you do is neutral
Status: In developmentChoices and Consequences
Characters remember significant interactions. A promise kept or broken, a favour, a slight: these stay with people and shape what they are willing to do later.
Storylines can change routines, relationships and locations. And things happen that have nothing to do with you. You are part of a larger world, not the only person in it doing anything interesting.
Mechanics and where they stand
Authored story scenes
Status: In developmentWritten scenes that introduce the academy and its people, with choices inside them.
Characters who remember
Status: In developmentA record of what has happened between you and each person, which later scenes can draw on.
Missions and social conflicts
Status: PlannedLonger story threads built around problems you can solve in more than one way.
Independent and dynamic events
Status: PlannedThings that unfold on campus whether or not you are involved.
Branching outcomes
Status: PlannedDifferent paths through the academy years depending on your choices and standing.
There are only so many hours
Status: In developmentTime and Scheduling
Time is the resource everything else is paid for with. The timetable fixes part of your day; the rest is a series of trade-offs between studying, training, people and rest.
The same clock governs everyone. A classmate is only free when their own schedule says so, a venue is only open during its hours, and an appointment you accept is a commitment with a start time.
Screenshot · Dormitory room · Build 0.0.0
Mechanics and where they stand
School timetable
Status: ImplementedDays structured around real lesson periods, with attendance that matters.
Calendar and appointments
Status: ImplementedDay, week and month views, with meetings that respect venue hours and travel time.
Character availability
Status: ImplementedOther students can be busy, in class or unavailable, and conflicting commitments are refused.
Pacing of in-game time
Status: ExperimentalHow quickly days pass, and how in-game days relate to real ones, is still being tested.
See where each of these sits on the road to release.
02
Trust is slow. Reputation is slower.
Status: In developmentRelationships and Social Strategy
The people around you are not there to hand out quests. They have their own motivations and their own view of you, and a conversation can move that view a little in either direction.
Relationships build gradually. Meeting someone, exchanging contacts, keeping an appointment, remembering what they care about: each is a small step, and none of them alone makes a friend or an enemy.
Because the academy is competitive, the social side is strategic too. Cooperation, favours and rivalries all have a cost and a use.
In-game environment art · Library
Mechanics and where they stand
Branching conversations
Status: ImplementedDialogue with decisions in it, where what you choose changes how the other person responds.
Contacts, messages and appointments
Status: ImplementedAn in-game phone for the people you have actually met, and meetings arranged for a real time and place.
Gradual trust and friendship
Status: In developmentRelationships that develop over many interactions and remember how you have behaved.
Rivalry and reputation
Status: In developmentHow the wider academy sees you, and the students who decide you are in their way.
Strategic cooperation
Status: PlannedAlliances, favours and agreements between students that open or close future opportunities.