Item+List

=Items for the Build= (List for Beth)

Entrance Point

 * Three small 3d sets with poseballs for people to participate in the scene
 * Three sets are gorgeous field, great ravine with Hades chariot coming out, mountain
 * Open pomegranate with introduction and acknowledgement note
 * This pomegranate will have hovertext reading “Welcome and Introduction”

Set 1: beautiful fields, Persephone and Demeter poseballs to be holding hands walking in the fields. Narcissus flowers in the field. A pomegranate can be clicked to start the story (see brief for text) Set 2: fields at night, great crack in the earth. A chariot drawn by black horses is positioned half in the crack, one poseball is for Hades, sitting in the chariot, another poseball has Persephone caught up into his arms in the act of kidnapping. Pomegranate clicked for part 2 (see brief for text) Set 3: scene = mountaintop, poseballs are for Demeter (on knees, head in hands, upset) and Helios (goddess of sun, one hand on Demeter’s shoulder comforting her. Pomegranate clicked for part 3 (see brief for text)

The Village of Eleusis

 * village in crisis, covered in snow, bleak, dark, cold, dead and death all around (dead vegetation and a dead animal)
 * colour palette should be realistic but washed out with a blue tinge (including blue shadows) to symbolise the cold
 * A focal point of a town square / marketplace
 * The square has a Greek statue and/or a well in the centre
 * The town square / marketplace has 8 stalls (house with shopfront) around the square.
 * Each of these houses / stalls should reflect the personality and background of an individual person in the village.
 * Symbols in each of mythology
 * Examples are posters on the wall, decorations in the room, photographs of ancestors doing battles with monsters, posters or statues of Greek gods, an ipod with a song title playing
 * Heracles: Lion Skin, Golden-horned deer, many-headed Hydra, savage boar, man-eating birds, marauding bull, golden girdle, golden apples
 * Prometheus: Vulture eating a mans liver
 * Locked box (Pandora’s box) (any attempts to open the box could result in the avatar spinning out of control, off the sim)
 * Pan pipes (clicking to reveal sound of Debussy’s “syrinx” – actually I wrote the code for this for Robbie Dingo’s flute, maybe we could ask him if we could have some pan pipes and the code for that music in the musician’s house!)
 * Lyre and books of Greek poetry (Orpheus)
 * Wings (Daedulus and Icarus)
 * Snakes stolen from a gorgons head, a shield, an eye, a tooth (Perseus and the Gorgon’s head)
 * Thread (Thesues and the Minotaur)
 * A loom and weaving shuttles, woven wall hangings depicting Gods, a spiderweb and spider in the corner (Arachne and Athene)
 * Golden Fleece (Jason and the Golden Fleece)
 * Beauty ointment (Psyche and Cupid)

Pier

 * A pier to a fishing wharf – dead fish, iced patches on the wharf, crashing waves, stormy clouds.


 * Fields around the village – dead trees, dead crops, wilting flowers, lots of wind sounds, sleet coming down, needs to be hauntingly beautiful

Graveyard

 * A graveyard with freshly dug graves – these graves should not be too neat – their positions should be askew and some should be overgrown. Rusty iron lace can be scattered around and these can be the “seats”. Lots of mist should be swirling around. Candles can be placed on some of the central graves for gothic lighting effects. This is where the storytelling will take place. The graveyard storytelling circle.

Temple of Demeter

 * A small temple. place for sacrifices to Demeter, first clues to the quest. Visitors should go enter and pray to the Goddess – can we have on posing in prayer position, automatic text generated that is a message from Demeter (in brief).
 * In the temple should be offerings of flowers and fruit, food and drink (wine), candles, an image of Demeter and Hestia (two female Goddesses), and some incense burning

The River Styx

 * ferry with boatman, Charon
 * grey, black, dark green, misty and surrounded by dark withered looking trees
 * Some elements of life (a few plants) can exist on the “life” side of the river, but the river itself needs look murky and menacing.
 * one or two poseballs on the boat, people will ride it from one place to another.
 * windy ride around the edges of the village before going across to the other side
 * images of winter and sounds of sadness are seen and heard along the ride
 * The only way to activate the ride is to pay Charon, the ferryman.
 * The ride finally ends at an entrance to an underground cave: The Underworld.

(a) Entrance

 * The entrance is guarded by Cerberus
 * Body parts surrounding Cerberus: (lets have some bits be noob avatar pieces!)
 * On approach, Cerberus wakes from a sleeping state walks back and forth growling at you.
 * Cerberus should have two states: 1) pacing and snarling, and 2) sleeping.
 * Cerberus should be large enough to make it very difficult to walk through the small entrance while he is in state 1. If you walk too close, you end up dead and dismembered – maybe for 10 seconds and words from nowhere appear: You did not pray for the guidance of Zeus.
 * The only way to get past Cerberus is to lull him to sleep by playing on the lyre of Orpheus.
 * the activation of the notecard must also speak to the sleeping state of Cerberus.
 * 3 different possible songs. Song A makes 1 head go to sleep, Song B makes 2 heads go to sleep, but only Song C (Syrinx!) is the one which makes the entire beast go into sleep mode.

(b) The Paths

 * the Underworld is somewhat surreal with dark path deep down into the depths of Hell.
 * We'll have the rest of the Underworld up in a skybox, with a small entry chamber which has some entry text (see brief) and then all sorts of paths going off from this point. See my sketch for this.


 * Path Type 1 (Paths that lead to the three bots/judges of the Underworld which each have clues for the quest

**
 * The path is mazelike but in an organic way, not sharp corners. dead ends are populated with the judges of the Underworld (Rhadamanthus, Minos, and Aeacus ) who offer clues on how to best rescue Persephone.
 * Visitors must collect the clues to rescue Persephone (and themselves) from the Underworld.
 * Clues include the three lines that must be spoken to Persephone and Hades to elicit responses to solve the problem of how to beat eternal death. Questions given by each judge Rhadamanthus, Minos, and Aeacus in the dead ends of the maze and the respective answers from Hades and Persephone include (see brief)

Path Type 2 (a few dead end paths to keep it interesting)
 * nothing needs to be here much, though elements from path 3 could be scattered about too, but only path 3 leads you to path 4

Path Type 3 (gallery of objects symbolising adversity)
 * cyborgs in the Underworld:capture a lovely meld of the kind of Underworld for a digital culture.
 * A screen with facts and figures of current day economic crisis
 * A hall of mirrors with distorted images of beauty / ugliness
 * A section devoted to phobias: spiders, narrow spaces (perhaps the avatar must crawl to get through one section), crowds (the avatar must walk through a group of people), germs (a giant germ) etc…
 * A section devoted to loneliness and depression: dark clouds, black dog,
 * A section devoted to superstitions (ladder, black cat, broken mirror,…)
 * Soundscape: dog howling, people crying
 * Note: the path is meant to be evocative, haunting, sad. Not Halloweenish.
 * a gallery of artworks which symbolise genuine and real adversity – sculptures that make people think. A woman with an empty womb, a disfigured child, some comment about race and prejudice, things that resonate with our times yet are universal. Maybe we could invite other artists to donate something that fits in with the theme of adversity for our Underworld “gallery”?


 * Path Type 4 (post secret path)**
 * A section of the path should contain a “post secret” script (think Robbie Dingo’s whisperbox script) where people add their own secret about the adversity or struggles or angst they must overcome in their own lives. The entire path then becomes a representation of the things that hold us back from living the best life we can.
 * On entrance into the post secret section visitors are prompted with the whispertext: (see brief)
 * Secrets are displayed in hovertext randomly, anonymously, and in the shadows. Instead of speakers like the whisperbox by Robbie, let’s use the same pomegranate as the entrance for spots above which the text will hover.

(c) Hades and Persephone's Grand Cavern

 * Upon walking through the post secret path turning a corner will bring you into the grand underground cavern of Hades – the cavern can be small but needs to suggest grandeur. Persephone and Hades sit together on a throne. On enter whispertext says (see brief)
 * If the visitor has collected the questions they ask them in correct order and then upon clicking the uneqaten pomegranate to release Persephone, they are transported to the final space, the Eleusian Fields.
 * If the questions are not asked, whispertext can prompt the user to return to collect them

(d) Hades' personal chamber
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 * Off the central cavern are two chambers. Hades' chamber has a bed, the cap, his diary. The diary will link out to Hades' blog (alan). .... http://hadeskap.wordpress.com
 * Cap of Invisibility http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cap_of_invisibility
 * He drove a black chariot, perhaps a whip?
 * Something that represents his control of Cerebus (3 looped dog collar?)
 * a cornucopia (horn of plenty) full of precious metals and jewels
 * rare minerals and jewels in general
 * He carries a sceptre; also a chief symbol is the bident; a 2 pronger version of Poseiden's trident (pic at http://www.theplatelady.com/figurines3/hades-6138.jpg
 * " The narcissus and the cypress are sacred to him."
 * people sacrifice black sheep to him

(e) Persephone's personal chamber

 * Persephone's personal chamber has a bed, her sketch book with some charcoals or inks, and a diary. Diary links out to her blog. Persephone was kidnapped so she did not bring anything with her to personalise the space really. Maybe a few dead flowers that she had been picking before being clutched.

The Eleusian Fields

 * Here are beautiful fields, Spring has sprung, everybody is happy and light. Some scholars make this the resting place of dead souls judged worthy and righteous. For us its just the idea of rebirth, regeneration and growth. It should look beautiful, swathed in shards of sunlight. Heavenly harmonious tones can be heard. Dancing balls available for dances of joy.
 * A flickr screen should be at the edge of the fields which streams in images (and captions) that visitors have taken whilst in the sim. It is both celebratory and reflective, and serves in the shared retellings of experience.
 * Reunion Scene
 * A final set of poses should have Demeter and Persephone in an embrace, to suggest resolution and link back to sets at the beginning of the story nicely.
 * NOTE: Larry has a dome that might work nicely here for this space so all that could be needed are the dome, a few dance balls, a hugging pose, and if possible the flickr screen.

Tartarus

 * A secret underwater torture chamber hidden away at the back of the entrance to the Underworld. See sketch for ideas. An anvil, some poseballs for torture, a dead bot drowned. One myth had some tantalising grapes overhanging the river and the evil person being tortured was stuck right underneath half immersed in water, trying to reach up to eat, but his struggles were in vain and he drowned to death without having eaten the grapes.