Treba's Adventures

Happy new year everyone!

All right, let's get back into this: as you might remember from my last post, I've been playing around with this new Norn of mine, Treba. You can read about her here. So far there hasn't been too big a difference between her and other Norns I've raised, but so far she's only been alive for half an hour and most of that time was spent in the company of other Norns, so it's too soon to really say whether or not the changes I've made will have had a big impact on her behaviour itself. So, it's time for the next instalment in Treba's life.

Treba the One-Drive Norn

Looking through some of my recent posts... I haven't done a crazy genetic experiment in a while! Time to change that.

A while ago I was reading one of Jessica's posts on Discover Albia and it got me thinking: what would happen if you ticked "Winner takes all" in the drive lobe? It would mean the Norn could only feel one drive at once, but how would that actually affect the Norn in a practical way?

I think you know where this is going...

So, in this Norn I'm only going to make one single change: switching the drive lobe to WTA. If you're not familiar with what that option does, it makes it so that only one neuron can fire in the lobe at once, and the neuron which has the strongest value will be the one to fire. In the context of the drive lobe, it means that only the most pressing need will registered by the Norn.

Meet Treba, a cute little Cheri Norn whose wellbeing and happiness I have probably just permanently destroyed. But we'll see how she turns out.

Carrot Love

At first, this might seem like Monty is just feeling a tad peckish. Don't be fooled. I'll admit that he was hungry at the time, but he wasn't actually eating this parsnip. Just staring at it lovingly...

Alas, it was not to be. He gave into the hunger pangs. Well, it was fun while it lasted, I guess, and it seems to have sparked a craze with all things carrot-like in Albia. Not only did Monty find a cave carrot to obsess over afterwards, he even went so far as to share his newfound love of carrots with Quella, who was happy to join in with him.

And Monty and Quella weren't the only ones to get caught up in this new trend. Over at the island, Erin couldn't keep her eyes off a parsnip. And the lift. And the parsnip. And the lift. She couldn't decide which was worth focusing on so she spent a good minute or two just swapping between them. I suppose it simply fascinated her.

Beach Party

They grow up so fast!

Here's Cosmos, already forty-four minutes old. It feels like time just flew by. His download is now up so if you'd like to play with him you can get him from here.

In sadder news, Michelle passed away aged 9:28, sooner than I'd expected. The odd thing is that when Asper - her mother - died it was of old age and she died surprisingly early too. I wonder if this is in some way linked to their modified genes? Whatever it is, Hat stayed with Michelle the whole time, as you can see from this picture.

Recently I was thinking about the Norns in my other world and I realised that it's been a long time since I visited them, so I thought I'd drop by and see how they all are going. And they seemed to be doing pretty well, all with life forces higher than 70%.

But why is it that every other time I play this game someone ends up eating deathcap? It barely made a dent in Erin's life force as she ate some cheese right afterwards, but you'd think Norns would learn. Though I suppose every Norn has to try it at least once before they realise it's not a good idea.

I'm really quite proud of Tessa for this. Despite the changes I made to her poses, which didn't at all do what I wanted them to and made it incredibly hard for her to walk, she made it all the way to the lift instead of just being stuck near the incubator. And then she fell asleep. I guess going places is hard work for a Norn like her.

If you've been keeping up with this blog you'll remember that Monty, Erin, Cornelius and Quella were actually part of a genetic experiment to try to make Norns dislike each other's company. In my notes about it, the project is labelled 'Lonely/Lone/Lonesome Norns' because I couldn't pick which version of the name I wanted to use. I don't have time now to go into their genetics and what about them didn't work, but it's the next thing on my to do list, especially as this is a genetics project I intend to finish one day.

One last thing: beach paaaarty!