The Stranding

THE DIRT IS A CURRENT THAT RUNS BETWEEN US.

An experimental spaceflight AI finds itself trapped in a human body.

Worse, that body is stranded in post-climate disaster Shetland. With no way out in sight.

Explore. Adjust. Confront the wonder of the land, and the horror of being involved. Or simply wait for a rescue that will never come. The decision is yours.

The Stranding is a short game made in Twine. It is designed (and optimised) for desktop browsers, but can also be played on mobile. If there appears to be no way forwards then, like Vessel, you may have to wait a while. Features content that can only be exhausted in multiple playthroughs, with a main ending and a bonus ending.

CREDITS

Audio:

• The song ‘Mad Girl Drowning’, written and performed by Kimberley Chiu (2021). Used with permission. More of Kim’s music can be found here: https://soundcloud.com/chiukayann
• Straget, ‘Waves at Shetland Islands 1’, FreeSound.org. https://freesound.org/people/straget/sounds/436965/
• BrainClaim, ‘Bass Rumble In The Distance’, FreeSound.org. https://freesound.org/people/BrainClaim/sounds/273805/
• Code from Harlowe Audio Library: https://twinelab.net/harlowe-audio/

Text:

• An excerpt of The Wanderer, an Old English poem from the Exeter Book (late 10^th century). Translation by R.M. Liuzza. Can be accessed in full here: https://www.csun.edu/~sk36711/WWW/258/Wanderer.pdf
• An excerpt of The Waste Land by T.S. Eliot (1922).
• Fragmentary references to Richard Siken’s poem ‘Landscape with Fruit Rot and Millipede’ (from War of the Foxes, 2015) and The Last Battle by C.S. Lewis (1956).

Some concepts/phrases – while mine – were developed collaboratively in a 2020 game of Microscope (https://www.lamemage.com/microscope/). Special thanks to Kester, Leah, and Robin.

Paper textures from https://pixabay.com/.

Title font is ‘Roman New Times’, https://www.dafont.com/roman-new-times.font

Radio font is ‘Radio’, https://www.dafont.com/radio-2.font

Playtested by Kester and Sally.