My Take on Homestuck's Alchemy | SBEPIS Devlog 1

[@WackoMcGoose]

Funny enough, the concept of "item metadata" actually is semi-implied within the comic itself. Captchaloging different instances of an item doesn't turn them exactly the same despite having the same code, you for example could have two cards with a "worn out" pencil and a "brand new" pencil, still mapped to the same code. It's when you _create_ an item from a code that it'll always be exactly the same on every time it's created. So technically, the "order of combining ingredients to a given code" actually doesn't matter... but on the other hand, Jane playing with her Recipe Modus showed that different recipes resulting in the same code, would have different grist costs (potentially meaning different "item tags"?). Item codes themselves can also intrinsically have tags regardless of alchemization state. The main one that comes to mind is a [NO_READABLE_CAPTCHA] tag that certain Key Items have, like Sburb discs. You have to get an Intellibeam Laserstation deployed to get the code, but after that, the code is as usable as any other (the same eight-base64-digit format, presumably), and this item tag only affects the physical card the item is stored in.

[@vanderkarl3927]

If 20 questions is enough to narrow down just about anything a human can think of, then you'd certainly hope 48 would be good enough for a game, I guess

[@plasmaballin]

Usually when you're playing 20 Questions, you're not thinking of something as specific as a pogohammer or a Duttle. I imagine if you tried that, the others playing would call foul on you.

[@audiomanwithaudioplan964]

but the 20 questions are different each time. 48 has to cover every single thing

[@TheRadicalOneNG]

Homestuck fans being the most powerful creative force on the Internet again.

[@sarrakitty]

Looking at the state of modern technology and comparing it to when Homestuck was written, especially looking at the crafting/alchemy system, Homestuck/Sburb's crafting mechanic essentially seems to be based on a form of what we would now call generative AI. Two items get combined by the machine, it takes them as a prompt and mashes them together. Skaia/Sburb itself certainly seem advanced enough to produce this. Mix in a bit of paradox spacey "magic" and you basically have it how the comic handles it. AI being AI you would probably end up with as many awful mishmashed useless items if you actually tried to use that technology to make this, but quite frankly that sounds exactly like what would happen if Sburb were real and you could truly combine anything. Programming and tagging items certainly makes things far more "sane".

[@DragonFoxCollective]

Oh absolutely. Homestuck *is* written by an *intelligence*, so without using AI, algorithmic is the closest we can get

[@ialwayswatchyoutube812]

check out infinite craft since it literally just does this exact thing

[@sarrakitty]

@@ialwayswatchyoutube812 What do you think was my inspiration for that comment, lol. Yes, I basically think a true and accurate representation of how crafting works in SBURB would basically be infinite craft but with tangible 3d objects with abilities and functions inside of a game world.

[@autonomousanonymous6310]

This is reminding me of Noita in a way I can't really describe, specifically its wand crafting

[@angelsachse9610]

Same bestie! t. Noita player

[@average-neco-arc-enjoyer]

It's worth noting that not *all* items in homestuck are represented via the same captcha code system; some items have codes that are "too garbled and complicated" (pg 3026 of homestuck) for humans to decipher. Because of this I think that the 2^48 number only encompass the _craftable_ (craftable by humans without any Intellibeam Laserstations) objects in the universe as opposed to encompassing every single object in the universe. Furthermore I think that perhaps these unreadable codes might play a role in giving each item unique properties, but that's just my speculation.

[@DragonFoxCollective]

Imo they *have* codes, they're just gated behind the laserstation

[@tux1468]

One thing I thought of independently, the Hamming Weight (or population count) of an item could be used to derive a sort of "quantized complexity" which could then be used to measure how much more or less complex an item would get. ANDing an item would always reduce the complexity, while ORing would increase it.

[@minicrewmate7865]

To lower the amount of bits colors would take up, you could handle them by just doing RED, YELLOW, BLUE, WHITE, and BLACK. Black + Red, Yellow, or Blue makes a darker version, Red + Yellow makes orange, Yellow + Blue makes Green, and Red + Blue makes Purple, Red + White would make pink, which is just a lighter red. boom! 9+ Colors in 5 bits!

[@justice5752]

Man the idea of a custom Alchemy system for a Sburb ttrpg would be so fun.

[@QuantumPhanatic]

You have no idea how excited this got me. I read homestuck way back when it wasn't even done, and in my middle school dreams I hoped I could one day replicate the crafting system. I made one like it for a ttrpg, but you have finally realized one of my oldest wishes. Thank you, and I will absolutely see how you continue this system

[@pr2747]

I absolutely love the inclusion of homestuck music in the background

[@galvinvoltag]

Now imagine doing this with 3D printers and stuff. This is how I imagined the future would look like.

[@ratsquireofscrap6081]

This. Is a really clever solution to the Alchemy issue. Keep up the super cool work!

[@lilyegg6185]

Absolutely amazing. Can't wait to see more!

[@avianoffire1576]

1:49 WAIT WHAT THERE’S A MINECRAFT AND PROJECT OVERSEER??? Yooo I can fulfill my fantasy of making possible op stuff or maybe even just a fan adventure too. I’ll edit this comment the further on if I have thoughts 2:54 Oh not a pickaxe as my first thought… I need two pointed to in theory make a pickaxe and not hopefully not something else! 6:56 Gonna follow this devlog because god damn it, you dragged me into homestuck again.

[@DragonFoxCollective]

Indeed, two pointed. "Bifurcated" even ;3c (in the plans)

[@bennygairns2235]

Combination ideas (please let me know if any of them are already done): Katana+blowtorch Crossbow+medkit Chainsaw+horror movie Pistol+love letter Megaphone+speaker+collection of music CDs Monochal+laser pointer Air Fryer+Barbecue Any vehicle+Mecha anime CD or Mecha manga Nostradamus+quantum computer Ill think of more for the next video.

[@atomykebonpyre]

You should check out Textalks homestuck analysis series (especially his episode on alchemy), which deconstructs homestuck and sburb in terms of computer science, which would likely be very useful considering you're trying to create a sburb video game. The series: kzbin.info/aero/PL-Pvay5y1y9WkvVZDwcyG1GRFA1jT-2Po The alchemy video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/p5u9pXVonp2piJIsi=0Qbufc8YS67IBKjH

[@DragonFoxCollective]

This is a great resource, thanks!

[@SharpForceTrauma]

I see that Yeag shirt, Lilith, you can't hide from me!

[@EmmaRulz]

Aww i wish these videos were longer

[@DragonFoxCollective]

Me too 😔

[@stm7810]

I love it, it's like the game 20 questions, which is the exact sort of kids game that would be referenced, great system! Congrats :D

[@row6666]

i've spent some time thinking about how this could work and it completely agrees with this video.

[@gabe8763]

I see. (I don’t know shit, but I am invested)

[@inkticious5787]

Hey there! just wanted to say there are actual combos in Genesis Project, they're just very weird and complicated. One example is the bass guitar axe, you make it by taking the bass guitar, punching it by itself, then you punch a hatchet by itself, then you put the punched bass in the A slot, and the punched hatchet in the B slot, and you press the arrow which is pointing to the left and has the two lines like this ||, once you do that, you put the punched bass guitar into the totem carver by itself, carve a totem, put it in the crustification thing [ i dont know how to spell it ], and BOOM, you should of just made a bass guitar axe. What makes it weirder is recipes like the fire aaaaaaaaaaxe, where you have to punch a fire axe by itself, and a katana by itself, then put the put the axe in the A slot, and the katana in the B slot of the carver, if i remember properly,,, hold on lemme double check- i forgot to check, i dont feel like re-opening the game, but uh,,, just ask the TPG discord if you need help

[@Orangyy_]

I'm very excited to see where this project goes! All the best of luck to ya!

[@nathanblackburn1193]

With how Sburb already know that the players in the session will play it, as seen with the beta session Prospit and Derse having the 4 towers for John, Rose, Dave and Jade's prototyped kernelsprites while the alpha session had no towers on Prospit or Derse as no pre-entry prototyping would happen, it's likely Sburb's alchemy is them same, only including items the players bring with them, will find on their planets or will be made via alchemy instead of including all possible items in the universe, in fact Sburb's alchemy might even dynamically change based on what items the players actually have access to as it's not likely that any player will memorise hole patterns or totem shapes so Sburb could reuse hole patterns for different items based on whether or not they are possible to create

[@regi5436]

at this point is it too late for me to discover homestuck because it feels like i've missed out on a whole different world

[@DragonFoxCollective]

It's never too late for Homestuck :D homestuck.giovanh.com/

[@lilyegg6185]

It's never too late! We'll happily accept you with open arms

[@quantumblur_3145]

It's never too late to step on a beartrap, no

[@regi5436]

@@quantumblur_3145 i am currently terrified for my life

[@radiation8000]

nah dw, i just got into it 2 months ago... its never too late to get into it :)

[@acuddle]

Impressive brainstorming ! Lovely and original avvie too. 🤗

[@funkyknuckles6855]

A meat tenderizer would be handled, weighted, and have MANY points. Which, oh great, another descriptor to take care of Not only that a pointed hammer like the one you first described can be found in the beginning of Vampire Hunter D

[@ataraxianAscendant]

MINESTUCK MENTIONED!!! RAHHH

[@windbugg_]

Super impressive! Excited for more devlogs!

[@jujuuhbaa]

I think AI could help a lot in this endeavor, there is a recent game called infinite craft that got quite popular that uses ai to mash 2 concepts together, you could make something similar but with sburb rules (and a profanity filter)

[@jujuuhbaa]

I also think asighning a single bit to every characteristic is too little, like, you can only have 48 characteristics? It seems like a lot, because it permutates into a lot of items, but if you want to encompass everything that exists, or at least every melee weapon, its better to have all 48 characteristics as bytes, instead of bits. Like, the weighted, it could have "off" and all other 7 subcategories could be like, where and how much its weighted

[@bengoodwin2141]

I actually had an idea for this a while ago: Suppose that the captcha pattern looking image on the back actually contained extra data about the item. Take your "spear" example, the code alone would make a generic spear, and the texture on the card describes *which* spear it is. Or perhaps more broadly, which "handled pointed object" it is.

[@DragonFoxCollective]

Good idea!! :3 the intellibeam could probably read the texture then, although you couldn't type it in directly

[@bengoodwin2141]

@@DragonFoxCollective The second half of this idea would be that the universe (game) would just "know" which textures you've seen for certain things, and copy those details automatically whenever it makes sense? There was some way of doing this that I thought of but I can't remember exactly what it is.

[@ezerox7778]

my brain

[@ezerox7778]

good video and very interesting though

[@binnersaw]

Can sweet bro and hella jeff type jawns have a tag that overrides all other tags with some mathematically ridiculous number

[@sillypinkmoth]

cool avatar ! ! i kind of want to get smthn liek that one day ,.,

[@sillypinkmoth]

SO ! ! i kind of did !!! except its not low poly :3

[@Luigicat11]

1:55 Oh hey, I've been part of a discussion on the MSPFA Discord server about that kind of code combination, which we've dubbed 64AND and 64OR, as they were analogous to the binary AND and OR, but in base 64. 64AND would probably have to be calculated manually like XOR (though much more easily since you can just look at the codes and choose the lower digit between the two for each corresponding digit), but 64OR could be accomplished by double-carving a totem (assuming the code tells the Totem Lathe how far to carve each of eight segments). How exactly this would effect the resulting item is up in the air, though.

[@DragonFoxCollective]

Why 64-bit instead of cards' 48 bits? Also yeah I've thought of double-carving and decided it would probably take the greatest digits between two dowels, similar to Tablestuck

[@Luigicat11]

@@DragonFoxCollective Oh derp, I misspoke. Base 64 (like how the codes are represented), not 64 bit. As opposed to binary (base 2).

[@DragonFoxCollective]

Oh! Then yeah you should check out Tablestuck too, iirc punching two items takes the lower digits, and carving two items takes the higher digits, and the digits themselves directly determine item type and abilities. It's *really* intuitive, and always makes a good combination of two items :D

[@gracecckids]

i think that order and repetition should matter

[@aimfulRenegade]

one of the bits should be allocated to charles dutton.

[@Forcoy]

Sorry if I skipped something, but how does the game determine when to replace parts with other parts (the hammer head with the spike)? Wouldn't it just add on the spike by default?

[@DragonFoxCollective]

The hammer is configured so that the next part should replace the hammer head :3

[@Forcoy]

@@DragonFoxCollective Wouldn't this mean a lot of the bit flag presets would have to be configured for specific occasions like this? Or is it just the weighed attribute model itself that consistently gets changed, in which case, wouldn't combining the model with anything else just replace said model?

[@DragonFoxCollective]

Every object has *some* part that gets replaced with the next part. For the hammer it's the head, for the spear it's the point, for most other things it's an empty filler object on a surface. So it's about the objects, not the bits

[@Forcoy]

@@DragonFoxCollective Oh! Thanks for the elaboration!

[@ezdispenser]

neato!

[@23grt]

Yo this sounds awesome. Do you have a patreon or something like that? EDIT: YOU DOOOO awesome.

[@zacharymacleod1146]

I would think the most feasible way of representing Homestuck alchemy in a video game at this point is to connect to a GPT-4 API and get it to generate items and descriptions through prompt. And then using a trained stable diffusion model to generate item art.

[@thefourpointedstar4928]

Fuck yeah!!! good job!!!

[@mithril5869]

But what are the questions? That is question?

[@BaranErdeser]

Do not limit yourself with 48 bits since listing 48 different adjectives would be too simple even if there are a lot of possibilities with it.

[@DietermiGamzD125]

You make the game then lol

[@BaranErdeser]

@@DietermiGamzD125 are you mentally ill.

[@XYZB0RG]

THAT THING IS FUCKING HORRIFYING!

[@lemonjumpsofficial]

OMG DO Y'ALL HAVE A DISCORD? I gotta show you something once it's partially working, OMG