Talk:Tranquility (video game)

Untitled
I'm proposing to move this page to Tranquility (computer game) and placing a disambig page at Tranquility. Although I'm no so sure anyone will write an article on tranquility anytime soon, at the moment most of the articles which are trying to link here are really looking for Tranquility as in Peace.

Alternatively we could move the Peace and quiet section from Peace to form a new start for a Tranquility article. -- Solipsist 20:30, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Move the page.
Works for me. Hunting up "Tranquility" in an encyclopedia and getting this is... ummm... well, it's hard to find the right word, since I was actually looking for this game's entry... but "Tranquility, Sea of" among other things really ought to be in here somewhere. I'm a newbie here in case it's not obvious.

Not too sure
I'm not sure that "peace and quiet", or the word "tranquility" by itself would be something found in an encyclopedia unless it referred to this game. Please note that "tranquility" as it is used here is trademarked.

On the other hand, I could see why something like "Sea of Tranquility" would be found in an encyclopedia, and if I were a researcher looking for this, I would probably type "sea of tranquility" in the Search field.

Now, if we're talking about the "tranquility" reached by someone studying transcendentalism or any number of new age philosophies, why wouldn't the word "tranquility" be a sub-topic of the parent "transcendentalism" or "new age movement", etc.?

Also, could someone help me on this: the article is definitely more than a dictionary definition. Does anyone know why it has been classified as "stub" instead of "start"?

TranquiliC
 * Up until today there was not much in terms of referenced information in the article. Now that you've added some information I think it may be approaching full article quality. I think the only last thing that should be addressed is to make sure we nail down why this game is notable at all. Right now the whole article is ripe for a self-righteous deltionist's purge. -Thibbs (talk) 00:51, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Don´t tell people they get a free lifetime account
>> Fitting with tranquility's non traditional approach, the cost of the game varies from month to month, but gentle requests to the support staff often result in a free lifetime account.

Probably just delete this part of the sentence? People (including me) were told not to spread the word about this by the creators of the game... people are supposed to find out on their own. Greets, enc --80.171.26.198 09:52, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

>>Please note that William Romanowski, the game's developer and marketer, states, "Personally, I would just like people to play and enjoy the game. Ask for a free account on the tqworld.com website support page, and I will respond personally to your request." TranquiliC

Article re-write
I have just attempted a mid-level re-write of this article since it was suffering from WP:NPOV, WP:WEASEL, and WP:OR violations. I still think it could do with a good deal of improvement and other editors more familiar with the subject are encouraged to follow WP:BOLD here. I have tried to reduce the number of unsubstantiated claims in ths article by removing or at least rewording several sentences that I don't believe are of central importance. For portions of the article that I couldn't remove or modify while retaining their original meaning, I have added citation and dispute tags. The citation tags should be self-explanatory but I will explain my concerns with the disputed line: Again, this article is still not of a very high quality and I would encourage more knowledgeable editors to help us out while keeping the wikipolicy cited in mind. Cheers, -Thibbs (talk) 14:16, 20 June 2008 (UTC) 67.161.41.3 (talk) 03:23, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
 * Advancement through the game is done in groups of 3, 7 and 21. There are 7 spinners per level, 3 levels per "rank," and 7 ranks in 21 "realms." - I find this claim to be unlikely unless the term "realm" and the term "level" mean the same thing. I take it that the sentence is arranged heirarchically such that realms encompass ranks, ranks encompass levels, and levels encompass spinners. Understood this way, it appears that the realms must advance faster than the ranks. Either the sentence should be rewritten to reflect the proper terminology and heirarchy or the numbers should be adjusted to be accurate.
 * The above description of advancement is nearly correct, but is imprecise with respect to the definition of "levels". From the description at http://score.tqworld.com/ (leftnav: training -> scoring) and from my score after several years of playing (leftnav: member login -> your cards), I can state that:
 * There are 21 realms in the game. The first five are "Path To Understanding", "Exalted Plane", "Living World", "Evening Sky", "Radiant Sun".
 * Each realm consists of 7 ranks. The seven ranks are "Neophyte", "Adept", "Overseer", "Commander", "Sublime Sage", "Cosmic Guru", "Master".
 * Each rank consists of 3 sets of rooms. Progress through the 3 sets of rooms is denoted by "XX% of the way to the next level", where XX% is either 0%, 33.33%, or 66.67%.  Progress is saved when a set of rooms is completed.
 * Each set of rooms consists of 7 rooms. To complete the set of 7 rooms, you must catch the spinner in each room.  Progress is not saved until the spinner in each room is captured.
 * Each room is a procedurally-generated space containing approximately one spinner and many pieces.
 * Now, to explain levels:
 * Linear progression through the game's realms and ranks is indicated by "Level XX". I am currently at level 17, realm "Living World", rank "Overseer".  Completing one rank increments your level by +1.
 * To correct the statement currently under dispute, while leaving it structurally intact:
 * Advancement through the game is done in groups of 3, 7 and 21. There are 7 spinners per level, 3 levels per "rank," and 7 ranks in 21 "realms.
 * becomes:
 * Advancement through the game is done in groups of 7, 3, 7, and 21. There is 1 spinner per room, 7 rooms per set of rooms, 3 sets of rooms per rank, 7 ranks per realm, and 21 realms.

Excellent work. I just re-read your description of the leveling structure and it makes complete sense now. I made a few POV alterations and grammar fixes as well as re-inserting the links to "music game" since it meets the definition of a generative music game (i.e. one aspect of the game is that the music seems to be generated in part by the movements of the player) and "art game" as it was included as a demonstration in 1991. Thanks for the much-needed update. It's a big improvement. -Thibbs (talk) 22:35, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

<<Please note per William Romanowski, the game's developer and marketer, that this game does not meet the criteria for a "music game". The music is generated by its own music engine, and there are also reactionary sound effects when the player bounces off objects in the environment. This is no different from the reactionary sound effects found in many other games, such as Super Mario Brothers, etc. If the music engine were dependent upon game play, a tranquility jukebox would not be possible.

One of the most unusual and unique parts of tranquility is its unique music engine. This was written soley by Romanowski, who is himself a musician, and is meant to enhance the immersive quality of tranquility game play. On a side note, Romanowski has received requests for recordings of the music from the game, but has yet to act upon any of these requests. - TranquiliC>> —Preceding unsigned comment added by TranquiliC (talk • contribs) 00:04, 22 January 2009 (UTC)


 * I'll leave the part about music games off for now, and ask you to provide a source for your Romanowski quote, but I have to say your wholesale reversions are completely unwarranted. I'm not sure why you want the dead link for the former image displayed or all the whitespace. I feel like you're not really engaging in a collaborative process here. Please remember that Wikipedia is a collaborative effort and not supposed to reflect only your view of the preferred layout in violation of the standards set out in the editing guidelines. I notice you've de-wikified a subcategory. Again, why? You've added "Category:Video Games" which is really much much too broad a category. None of these edits are constructive at all. You're returned all of the redlinks which I removed despite the fact that if they were notable subjects there would be an article on them already considering the age of the article. I'm glad you're interested improving this article, and it seems you know what you're talking about to a certain degree, but please at least look at what I've done before you start large scale reversions. There is a 3-revert rule in effect at wikipedia and I notice you've made two reverts. I have also made two reverts so this is fast becoming an editing war. I will use up my last revert to restore all of the typographic and structural errors which you have returned for a second time to this article. Please review what I have done in detail before reverting me for the third time. This is becoming very tiresome. -Thibbs (talk) 00:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Thibbs, I'm doing the best I can, being a new user. I apologize for any toe stepping I have done, and ask for your patience. I did not mean to engage in any kind of "war" or violate any kind of rules.

As far as the white space in the edit page, I am visually impaired, and it makes it easier for me to see what I'm doing. Since the white space doesn't carry over to the actual article, I'm not sure why this should be controversial.

The dead link for the image--Mr. Romanowski said he downloaded the image to the Wikipedia. We don't know why the image is no longer available. It wasn't pointing to somewhere offsite. This is a mystery to me. He is going to retrieve the image from a backup file he has and I should be able to get it loaded back on by the end of the day. I asked him if it was OK for me to put the reference there until we got the image up, and he indicated that it was fine.

I didn't intend to do a "reversion", and I'm not sure that is what I did. Aren't reversions something that you have to do by selecting actual line items after clicking from the list of versions for the article? Help me out here, please.

With regard to "wholesale revisions", I noted that it was stated that revisions that were experimental should be done only in the sandbox, so I went through the entire article before I saved my work. I don't know if this is considered to be a "wholesale revision" but I did do this with Mr. Romanowski's approval, and I should hope that would be enough.

Hey, by the way, there is one more thing I could use some help with: I don't seem to be signing my input correctly. Could someone please point me to the reference that tells me the code to use to get my signature properly inserted so that I don't end up with a bot sig? Thank you very much. TranquliC —Preceding unsigned comment added by TranquiliC (talk • contribs) 00:59, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
 * OK, no problem. I don't mean to sound as though I don't appreciate your input. Now that I understand your need for the whitespace, I suppose I have no real problem with it. It is contrary to the style guidelines and will probably be undone by another editor, but as you say it doesn't show up in the final product. I don't mind if you want to return it. Unfortunately I'm not sure of any good way to cite a spouse's words appropriately. I'd suggest examining WP:CITE, but I'll try to give it some more thought in a few days. I'll trust you for now and hold off on adding anything about music games. The only reason I say wholesale reversions were done is because every single edit I made was undone even when it was as simple as the proper titling of a given source. If you went through it line by line I'd have to assume that you noticed my minor typographic edits as well and undid them. I don't believe that's what occurred. Anyway, no real harm done. I'll try to help you as much as I can. Finally, to sign your posts simply type four tildas in a row like this: ~
 * That should sign the post for you. Cheers. -Thibbs (talk) 01:22, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Man, I am not a huge fan of this editor but it's way better than writing to Encyclopedia Britannica or World Book and asking them to change a reference.

I didn't go through line by line; I copied it into Notepad and made my changes there, then pasted it into the editor. Then I saw that one of my references was missing, and not sure if I did something wrong, I went back over what I did, and added the reference again. I did look at the reversion tool and saw that it was line by line and thought, "Wow. This is not something I really want to tackle right now," then went on my merry way.

For the reference...If I were to write an article about Mr. Romanowski and put it on my website, I would have to reference that I interviewed him. What if the reference is the person writing the article. For example, it was Mr. Romanowski who added the original statement to the article. He was his own reference. I know this can't be the only time something like that has happened. Does anybody know what is done in a case like that? I'll look up the citation information you referenced and see what I can find.TranquiliC (talk) 01:37, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Look, I'm sorry you aren't one of my fans, but please try to understand that there is a system that has developed on wikipedia in order to facilitate the creation of a useful (verifiable and accurate) encyclopedia. I have been editing here for a little while and I am used to operating within this system. As a new editor you are unfamiliar with the system and are naturally expected to make some errors. I don't hold this against you. I believe you are trying to turn this article into something useful and I applaud your efforts. As I said, I will try to help you do this, but in return you must not take my criticisms and corrections personally. I am here to help. With that said, here are some observations I have concerning your edits:
 * Editing within a notepad is often a dangerous activity because it runs the risk of your erasing the edits of editors who have edited the article since you left to write the notepad. This is what happened here. While you were writing your notepad version, I was editing the article. When you copy&pasted on top of my edit it had the effect of undoing everything I had done. I understand that you didn't mean to revert me and I supose you could say it wasn't an "actual" reversion. It was, however, a "constructive" reversion and this would count against you for the 3-revert rule normally. I understand what you did now, though, and I'm certainly not going to report the incident. Just try to be aware of the danger that might occur if other editors edit while you're away from now on.
 * The fact that you're citing your husband means that this is is dangerously close to an autobiographical piece. This is strongly discouraged on wikipedia, but it is not forbidden completely. The danger here is that it's very likely that you'll (accidentally) insert biased material into the article. The other problem it brings up is that of "notability." I'll tackle that part of it in the next bullet point. Anyway I've been waiting for someone to expand this article for a while and you're the best source of info we've had yet so I won't kick up a fuss if you want to make edits. In fact, I'll provide oversight and try to remove any bias as I see it. It is a requirement, though, that we provide citations that prove what you're writing is true. Otherwise some unscrupulous game manufacturer could simply make false claims and use wikipedia as a marketing tool or an advertisement. I'm unwilling to relax my standards in this regard. This is an essential part of the encyclopedia and if you cannot provide a reliable published third-party claim that corroborates your claims then they will not be allowed to stand (or they will at least have to wear a [citation needed] tag). I'm sorry to be such a stickler in this regard, but this is how Wikipedia works. Given your relationship to the creator of the game, there's no way I can trust that you will not be biased and provide only selective reporting or commit other reporting errors. I don't think you'd do such a thing on purpose, but still we really need to make sure we use proper citations whenever possible.
 * Notability needs to be discussed. Right now, the only notable thing about the game from what I can see in the article is that it appeared in 1991 as a demo included with Silicon Graphics computers. This fact needs to be sourced. Also, hopefully there are more notable things about the game. To be notable, a game should "be 'worthy of notice.' Such notability is distinct from 'fame,' 'importance,' or 'popularity,' although these may positively correlate with it. A topic is presumed to be sufficiently notable to merit an article if it meets the general notability guidelines, or if it meets an accepted subject-specific standard." (quoted from WP:N). The general notability guidelines are listed at WP:GNG. I say this not to be mean but because the article is in great danger of being deleted if these issues are not addressed. I can attest to the fact that there are many editors on wikipedia who love nothing more than deleting peoples' articles.
 * Anyway, I'll try to help out more if I have the time, but I'm rather busy right now. Good luck, and please believe me when I say I'm trying to help. -Thibbs (talk) 02:13, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Premise - Music Video Game or something completely different?
Hey, I need your thoughts on this. A music video game is, by Wikipedia definition "where the gameplay is meaningfully and often almost entirely oriented around the player's interactions with a musical score or individual songs". In other words, the score is guiding gameplay. A good example of this would be Guitar Hero, however, this does not describe tranquility. With tranquliity, the musical score is generated on the fly based upon the player's past, current, and future interaction with the game environment. I did say something that was erroneous earlier. I indicated that the music was independent of the play. After speaking with Mr. Romanowski, I find this is not true. What the user does has a direct effect on the musical score. They are, in a sense, writing their own song. The Jukebox is generated on the players past play, or even a seed of a song that is then mutated according to past play.

The concept of the generated score was not present in the original version of tranquility, which used a simple, looping new age sound track. A generated musical score is not considered an "official" component of what makes up a rendition of tranquility. The official components are a star field; a floor; moving platforms; and the concept of gravity and platform bouncing being the mode of navigation through the environment. Secondary components are new age-style audio and the abstract first-person viewpoint.

So what is tranquility? Does it belong to an entirely different genre of entertainment, and if so, what is it? It's not a platform game, it's not a first person shooter, it's not a board game, it's not a card game, it's not an MMO, it's not hokey, it's not baseball. It's not an echo of any real-world activity. It was very much, by design, defined by what it is not. It is an "anti game".

One of you mentioned that to avoid a broad-sweeping delete, this article needs to reflect what makes tranquility unique or special. The fact that tranquility is an "anti game" is the very thing that makes it unique. There are no guns. There are no predators. There is no way to die. Movement through the levels is always in a positive, forward direction. Though there is a hierarchical flow of Rank and Realm, tranquility is no more a game than throwing a pebble into a pond is a sport. TranquiliC (talk) 02:42, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Other users will disagree and have disagreed with me on this issue, but I do think that this is an interesting aspect of the game. I think that this is pretty notable. I also think if you look at other music games like Rez and Otocky for example you'll see that tranquility (in its current configuration) is what is known as a "Generative music game." I had earlier categorized it as an art game also since it is an unconventional game whose main point seems to differ from strict platformers. I tend to think of the game as more of an open canvas for artistic expression with the option of playing a goal-oriented game if the user chooses. The Eaton article you linked seems to support this as the author speaks of playing the game as if it were an instrument. Anyway, perhaps we should rethink adding those tags ("music game" and "art game"). -Thibbs (talk) 02:54, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Just to further explain what I mean about "generative music games," a generative-form hybrid music video games often make the concert music resulting from the interaction between performer and in-game dynamics a goal of the game. According to the Eaton article, "The developers have created a relaxing and ever-changing musical score that’s a remarkable part of the game. Whenever you bounce off or through a platform, the game responds by playing rich, harplike tones. It’s as if you’re playing the platforms like musical instruments" (emphasis added). To me this indicates that the player's interaction with the music is intended as a central element of the game. The designer, you have mentioned, is a musician. I think it is likely that he intended the player to be able to play the game as a non-game but rather to treat it as an ambient musical experience. I am not alone in this. Another eidtor had previously listed this game as an arrhythmic music video game (presumably in distinction from "rhythmic music video games" like Guitar Hero). I have compared the gameplay here to that of the game Rez. To explain what I mean by this, in Rez the game takes the form of a simple rail shooter, however by integrating sound effects created by the actions of the player (as he completes the normal tasks of rail-shooting) with the soundtrack as a whole, the game is intended to permit the player's direct interaction with the soundtrack and to encourage the creation of a synaesthetic experience. In this situation I believe the game takes the form of a platformer, but is intended to allow the player to experience the game on a purely musical level as well. Does this make any sense? From what you have now brought up, that "the musical score is generated on the fly based upon the player's ... interaction with the game environment" (emphasis added), I have removed the claim that the "gameplay is [not] meaningfully ... oriented around a player's interactions with a musical score." I'm strongly inclined to re-insert the material about it being a music game. Do you have any objections to this? -Thibbs (talk) 18:23, 22 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I apologize if you think I'm jumping the gun a bit here, but I've re-added the music-game-related material based on my above analysis, your statements regarding the game, and what I have seen in the third-party sources. I don't consider this to be a final decision right now, but I thought it might help if you saw it in context. I just reworked the whole article for smoothness and clarity, and as it stands now I think the nature of the game is explained in fair detail. Does it seem OK to you? I'm not trying to claim the game is a "rhythm game" like Guitar Hero at all, but I do think the musical portion of the game is notably central to it, and with so much suggestion that the game is intended to allow the player to experiment, I think it really is quite comparable to "generative music games" such as Rez and Otocky. Thoughts? -Thibbs (talk) 20:50, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Cool, Thibbs. I think we have it pretty much nailed down now. Oh, by the way, when I said I didn't like the editor, I mean I didn't like the wiki editing tool :-) You're a very helpful guy, in my book, and much appreciated.

I did add one additional reference for clarification's sake. Does anybody have anything else they need to discuss at this time?70.162.109.27 (talk) 05:45, 23 January 2009 (UTC)
 * Oh ok then. Thank you. I see your additions and I think they are great. Thanks for all the good help here. -Thibbs (talk) 07:08, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

A correction and a comment
A couple of minor corrections. 1. In many worlds the floor is not solid - you can pass through to play on the other side. The effect, the first time, was rather like scuba diving. 2. There was not 'approximately 1 spinner' per level - there was exactly 1 spinner per level, apart from the very rare bug that allowed another one to creep in. I challenged the creator on the residual bugs, but he was pretty clear that coming to terms with the bugs was a step on the path to acceptance of the imperfections of reality.

A comment - I feel that the article somehow misses the most important points of tranquility. I at least found the music extremely irritating - electronic bong-bong music that simply drove me wild. I played through the whole thing (all 21 realms) 13 times in total and had the music switched off the whole time. What never palled however was the sheer overwhelming beauty of the game, particularly at the topmost levels. It's hard to convey in words, but the slow movements, vivid colours, profound sense of flying amongst complex solar systems in a giant galaxy were always immensely seductive. It was also amazingly simple to play - effectively the only action one could take was to bounce off or through a platform - 3 minutes to learn, and many hours to perfect. It's this sense of it being slightly trippy, transcendental, new age, that made it such a standout achievement - any attempt at haste or aggression just made it harder to play fluently. Utterly unlike any other game that I'm aware of of that period. Even now, I keep hoping someone will kickstart if off again - hint, hint.

UnNovel (talk) 21:38, 6 November 2012 (UTC)

Archive of Levels
I hope it's OK to talk about the desire to archive old levels. Before the servers were shut down, some levels would be stored locally. I managed to find two levels, one is the Daily Demo for May 10, 2011 at state "Neophyte on the Path To Understanding", and the other is a local level at state "Sublime Sage of the Zodiac". I won't put a link here but they're on GitHub at "tranquility-levels". These can be played in the game. I'd be very interested to see late-game levels. —Flicky1984 (talk) 21:20, 31 January 2023 (UTC)