mrpquest/DESIGN.md

MORPQUEST — Record Store Day

A Beyond Morp graphical adaptation for MRPGI

You're on a quick cat-food run. Your Uncle's list is in the glovebox. The record shop's front door is a wall of Taylor Swift superfans. Morp is not cruel; Morp is accurate.

Adapted from the Beyond Morp text adventure (RSD storyline). Fourteen screens, one day, five words, one white label.

The map (room / exits N,E,S,W — as built, matching the art)

[4 Toilet]--(W door)--[3 Alley]--(N)--[5 Yard]--(E, vine)--[6 Roof]
                          |               |
                         (S)            (N, side door)
                          |               |
[0 Car]-(E)-[1 Car Park]-(N)-[2 Entrance]  [7 Kitchen]
                              (E->alley)        |
                                               (N)
                                                |
              [9 Rock]-(E)-[8 Shop Floor]-(E)-[10 Dance]-(N)-[11 Listening]
                                 |
                                (N)
                                 |
                          [12 Counter]-(N, beads)-[13 Back Room]

#	room	N	E	S	W	music
0	Your Car (interior)	–	1	–	–	calm
1	Car Park	2	–	–	0	calm
2	Shop Entrance (BeckyWall)	–	3	1	–	tense
3	Alley — "Scenic Rim"	5	–	2	4	eerie
4	Toilet — "Pacific Rim"	–	–	3	–	spooky
5	Yard behind shop	7	6	3	–	eerie
6	Roof — "Above the Rim"	–	–	–	5	calm
7	Kitchen	8	–	5	–	tense
8	Shop Floor (hub)	12	10	7	9	jolly
9	Rock Aisle	–	8	–	–	jolly
10	Dance Racks	11	–	–	8	jolly
11	Listening Station	–	–	10	–	calm
12	Counter	13	–	8	–	tense
13	Back Room	–	–	12	–	spooky

Progression is gated through flags, dialogue, and the win condition — plus four real flag-gated exits (engine feature added for this game): the car door (seatbelt-freed), the kitchen side door (side-door-open), the vine climb (noticed-vine), and the beaded curtain (back-room-open).

Scoring: 250 points on offer (max_score in game.json), Sierra-style — takes, first successful uses, and dialogue-choice flag flips all pay out. Deaths: the mouldy kebab (eat it despite two warnings), and improvising the five words at the hive (the Becky-grue). Death restarts the day. Vanishings: the poster fragments exist only after the frenzy (visible_flag), and the Beckies leave the entrance for good after dispersal (hidden_by_flag). The lollipop is consumed when given (consumes).

Main chain (flags in order)

1. Car: take paperclip (under seat). seatbelt needs paperclip → seatbelt-freed. Take car-keys, wallet, 45-adapter, tote-bag. (Kebab: examine-only warning.)
2. Entrance: Becky Theologian dialogue → ask which variant is canon → poster-frenzy (the hive shreds a Taylor poster).
3. Entrance: shredded poster fragments use requires poster-frenzy → knows-yard-door-secret (fragments spell YARD DOOR SECRET).
4. Toilet: take elastic-band (cupboard). Yard: vinyl vine use requires knows-yard-door-secret → noticed-vine ("It isn't a ladder. But it's climbable.") — narratively unlocks the roof (east edge).
5. Roof: door-shaped absence use → seen-door-outline.
6. Entrance: Dave dialogue, choice gated on seen-door-outline → side-door-open ("Yeah nah. That was NOT there." He shoulders it anyway.)
7. Kitchen: take consolation-lollipop (sink bench, under a soggy flyer).
8. Listening Station: turntable needs 45-adapter → station-working. sad balloon needs elastic-band → eyepatch-made.
9. Shop Floor: take clean-sleeve (by the crates). half-sleeved record needs clean-sleeve → shop-tidied ("Clerk notices. Pretends not to. But it counts.")
10. Counter: Clerk dialogue — favour 1 gated on shop-tidied → clerk-warm; favour 2 gated on eyepatch-made (node reachable once warm) → back-room-open ("The beaded curtain is no longer purely decorative.")
11. Back Room: hidden seam use requires back-room-open → found-grail; take white-label + delay-notice (they were "always there"; the seam look points at them).
12. Counter: card terminal needs wallet → paid.
13. Entrance: notice board needs delay-notice → notice-posted. Becky Crier dialogue: read-the-notice choice gated on notice-posted, then lollipop choice → beckies-dispersed.
14. Car: ignition requires beckies-dispersed, needs car-keys, wins.

True-ending layer — the five words (strict order via flag chain)

use each surface; each requires the previous word:

• Car rear-view mirror → word-rsd ("RSD", scratched in the plastic)
• Toilet lipstick mirror requires word-rsd → word-first
• Kitchen greasy splashback requires word-first → word-global
• Listening spinning record requires word-global (and station fixed, narratively) → word-ambassador
• Counter receipt spike requires word-ambassador → word-version

Becky Crier's final node: bonus choice "SAY THE WORDS" requires word-version → curse-broken → the hive blinks awake ("…why are we here?" The door is a door again.)

Side quests

• S1 Rock Aisle: take mystery-disc from the chud box; yellow Daly-Wilson sleeve needs mystery-disc → break-ancestor-revealed; Clerk dialogue bonus choice.
• S2 Dance Racks: overstuffed crate needs tote-bag → made-space; DJ Someguy dialogue choice gated on it ("Keep your face normal. Your face is loud.")
• S3 Mirror liturgy is the word chain above.

Voice rules (from the tone bible)

Second person, present tense, parser-deadpan. Short declaratives; the last beat turns. Colon-verdicts. Parenthetical counter-voice. Morp is accurate, not cruel. Never zany, never explains a joke, never punches down, no exclamation marks in narration.

Build pipeline

• tools/gen_art.py — nano banana (OpenRouter) backgrounds + NPC sprites, squeezed to 160×168 (the GUI shows 2×-wide pixels, so art is generated wide).
• tools/gen_items.py — deterministic tiny item sprites (PIL, hand-placed pixels).
• Engine quantizes PNGs to EGA on load; walls/priority painted as strokes over the art.
• Playtest: mrpgi-headless --script tools/playtest.jsonl --game .