Guess who? Yup! Patrick’s old enough to start mating now. At 1 hour, 20 minutes he started producing testosterone. Good for him!

When I checked on AppleJack, she was getting beaten up by the grendel! I debated getting an agent to stop him but managed to simply separate them.

I coaxed AppleJack off of the island and led her back home. She had other plans and decided to go to the top of the tree. She complained about being tired so I took her toys away and left to check on Patrick, who was asleep in the garden. When I came back, AppleJack was asleep, too! Hooray!

After they woke, it wasn’t long til they met up again. They started kissing right away and I got excited about having brand new baby norns from these two.

What followed was adorable. I herded them into the jungle floor area and they played with the beach balls that were there. They occasionally slapped each other but there was much more kissing than anything and certainly a lot of playing.

In just a few moments, AppleJack became an adult! When they saw each other, they kept kissing. One kisspop later… no pregnancy. They kept napping and kisspopping but I had limited success getting them to get pregnant.

After all that commotion, they seemed inseperable. They continued to take turns napping and seemed to want to play with the beach ball together. Now, Patrick couldn’t stop smiling but AppleJack complained about hunger.

They eventually parted ways and AppleJack headed to the house through the teleporter. Patrick ate herbs in the garden and soon, they were headed towards each other again. Soon, this happened.

Pregnant! Yay! It didn’t take long for this little egg to pop into Albion. I set it aside for later. AppleJack was pretty exhausted after giving birth and Patrick started to look for her again.

After some slapping and kissing, AppleJack decided she didn’t want to be bothered anymore. It seemed now like their roles have reversed.

Patrick was now exploring the islands. He isn’t the mama’s boy that he used to be! AppleJack on the other hand was now staying close to the incubator.

Little did I know what was about to happen! As I stoked the fire, AppleJack and Patrick got together again. I’d forgotten to pause the game and poof! Another little egg appeared! As it grew, AppleJack feasted on honey and it was time to call it a day.

  • Share on Tumblr
  •  

Get it? Jurassic Park? Anyone? No?

… Fine.

As it turns out, I’m far and away more stubborn than I thought. I hate not being able to blog because of things out of my control: getting sick because some jerk at the DMV didn’t cover his mouth when he coughed, moving to California away from my home in Okinawa, Japan for the hubby’s work and finally, the kicker, my computer giving up on me just before I started the next round of baby norns.

Still, I am incredibly stubborn so I found a way to get the blog on its feet. I nicked my husband’s small travel laptop (well, I asked him if I could use it and he said yes) and though Docking Station and Creatures 3 barely run on it, Creatures 1 still runs pretty well. On top of that, I’ve decided to feature another game. I don’t want to say what it is just yet, but I’ve got some work and research to do before I get started on it anyway.

Back to some Creatures 1, though! I’ve already installed the DDNA Analyzer and C1 Genetics Kit so I’m ready to go. I have a fresh world and the only agents (cobs?) I’ll be using are the Encyclopaedia Nornica and Hand Tickets. I don’t especially enjoy scooting around creating favorite places and I’m not very good at the whole teaching language thing. Not to mention I’d like my norns to be able to tell me how they’re feeling.

I’ve already taken the time to fix the norn genomes to allow them to die of old age and prevent anti-oxidants from increasing their Ageing chemical.

I picked out an egg from the hatchery and put it into the incubator. Next thing I knew, this cute little boy was crawling right out of the house and into the garden.

I’ve decided to name him Patrick (probably coz I was watching Spongebob at the time).

Receptors

231  40   0 Emb   B MutDupCut   2*Antigen5 + 1*Glucose => 1*Antibody5 + 1*Hotness; half-life = 88

Normally, the half life is 80 (5 minutes).

What the change here means is that this reaction should take place more slowly. 88 means that the chemicals will decay from max to 0 in about 10 minutes. What it means for this particular gene is that little Patrick will recover more slowly from Antigen 5. I don’t know whether this’ll also translate to his sickness being less severe when it happens but we’ll see.

I tended to his education by giving him each Encyclopaedia and once he’d learned his words, he was off. It didn’t take him long to make his way to the carrots. He started eating them right away and while he did, I installed a bridge across the ocean.

He didn’t take long to start making a beeline for the herb garden. He complained that he was hot and I successfully talked him into eating some feverfew! Hooray for me! Unfortunately, it didn’t take him long to decide to eat the Pyrethium next to it. I was glad he had some starch but I wasn’t happy about the pain and hunger he must have felt after eating it. Neither was he. He stomped in front of the elevator and made his way below. While we were there, I decided to encourage him to play with the helicopter toy that was there and that seemed to cheer him right up.

He decided to stay below for a while playing with the toy and eating the carrots that were planted there. I encouraged him to push food and he was happy for a little while. When he started to express how angry he was he took the elevator back up and before I knew it, he met his first grendel.

Sadly, this grendel wasn’t particularly friendly. When they met, he started slapping poor Patrick! I slapped the Grendel for him and it didn’t take long for Patrick to obey “run Grendel”.

After his retreat, he was exhausted and kept running from me and food alike. I kept asking him to sleep to no avail.

He stayed in the house now, though and before I knew it, he was 30 minutes old. Not wanting to keep him out of the sexual race, I decided to hatch him a little girlfriend.

Meet AppleJack! Oddly, there were no mutations in her whatsoever! Good for her! I do appreciate that kind of genetic stability(appearance aside).

It didn’t take long to get her lessons out of the way and when she and Patrick met, they were kissing right away. Patrick still complained about feeling hot but he was excited to meet his new friend.

Neither of them would eat so I used the elevators and teleporter to get AppleJack away to the garden. Once there, I punished her for eating a weed, praised her for eating herbs and praised her again for eating lemons. She was angry, probably from eating the weed since Patrick had the same reaction. Pain and hunger don’t make me happy either, after all.

It wasn’t long til she was marching her way up to the tree. She took the elevator down to the deathcap mushroom but didn’t even spare it a glance. She travelled up to the top of the tree and I took the chance to check on Patrick. I used the teleporter to move him to the garden where he ate some honey before complaining about how tired he felt. Soon, AppleJack was tired too but neither of them would sleep. I toggled between them asking them to sleep for a while when I was met with a pleasant surprise.

Patrick was sleeping! When he was done, he was so happy it was like I was dealing with a different norn! Look at that big happy smile!

He was feeling bored now but I guess he’d rather be bored than exhausted. I convinced him to play with the helicopter toy and suddenly he was angry again. I can’t figure it out, either.

When I checked on AppleJack again, she was no longer a baby! Not only that, she was trying to get some shuteye in the cave. I asked her what she was doing then left her to her nap.

It didn’t take long before there were Zs popping up through he submarine. When she woke, she decided to take a quick ride under the ocean to visit the island.

Patrick decided to stay by the helicopter toy and the carrots. He was easily less adventurous than AppleJack. He developed a cough but the observation kit said he was fine. Soon, he was napping again.

AppleJack, on the other hand, was busy exploring the island. While I was there, I checked on the Grendel below and fed him parsnips.

You probably know by now that I don’t have anything against Grendels and actually prefer them over norns sometimes. Creatures 1 doesn’t exactly make caring for Grendels practical in a vanilla world, though so I tend to let them do their own thing. I’ve decided not to name him, either. He seems harmless enough, though.

Soon, AppleJack was on the boat headed back home and I was done with the island for now. I checked on Patrick again to find him in the Garden, getting ready for a nap. He ate a carrot, grabbed a lemon and fell asleep with it in his hands. I’m starting to think he’s a bit of a Mama’s boy. It wasn’t long til AppleJack needed a nap. Like last time, I tried to give her some space to fall asleep. I checked on Patrick to find that he was sleeping again! He’s developed a real love for naps. When he woke up, I gave him a toy to play with and went back to AppleJack.  Whatever it was she was looking for, she decided sleep would have to wait til she found it.

Lucky me, I put her on an elevator for a short ride and she took the opportunity to nap.

By now, Patrick was an hour and 17 minutes old and AppleJack was behind him at 47 minutes. With Patrick becoming an adult soon, it was time to take a break and called it a night.

  • Share on Tumblr
  •  

Normally, I’d add this to the back-log, but I had to share this right away. I’m so excited to start looking at C1 genomes!

Hooray! Jessica of Discover Albia was kind enough to direct me to the proper download link of the D-DNA Analyzer, normally (and actually) hosted at Treesprite’s Creatures Grove.

Treesprite’s Creatures Grove

http://creatures.treesprite.com/

D-DNA Analyzer Download

http://creatures.treesprite.com/Slink/danalyze.zip

I have 8 norns to get through, so let’s just jump right in!

All of the genomes here are compared with the standard C1 genome.

Gertrude

Meet Gertrude. She’s the oldest in the group and one of the two girls. She’s first Generation so I wasn’t expecting to find too much. She is also an alright eater and is very adventurous. She hasn’t spent too much time with the other 7(!) norns but she seems very happy and happily obeys the hand.

At this point in her life, she is only 2 and a half hours old and seems too stubborn to get away from those darn bees. Maybe it’s the honey that draws her in?

Her adventurous streak has kept her from getting infected by a disease I had thrown at me early in the game. All the other norns came down with sickness, and I feared I would lose some of them, thanks to Histamine B. Still, everyone survived and Gertrude was completely oblivious.

Sections marked in boldface are the differences from the standard C1 genome.

Lobes

121 6 0 Emb B MutDup Lobe #=7 State Rule: state PLUS type0 PLUS type1 end end end, WTA=1 Dendrite Type 1: Input Lobe=4, Min#=3, Max #=1, Spread=0, Fanout=0

Lucky me, this particular lobe was addressed by CDR (Creature’s Development Resource). What the bold part of this gene means is that her attention will not only be directed to whatever she finds most stimulating (or herself) but she’ll also listen to what the hand has to say. Lucky me!

Half-Lives

1 1 0 Emb B MutDup <159> 247

I’m… not exactly sure what this means, sadly. All I’ve gathered from the CDR and Genetics Kit is that the chemical half-lives are at between 26 and 52 real time years. I looked over the Creatures 1 Chemical list on the Creature’s Wiki, but I didn’t find an entry for number 159. This might not have any effect. I’m not sure.

Stimuli

99 10 0 Emb B Mut ‘Unrecognized word’ causes sig=16 GS neu=8(Audible event) int=128,,,Sensed Even When Asleep, Feature =16 -> 0*<NONE> + 0*<NONE> + 0*<NONE> +0*<NONE>

This was a bit of a grey area on CDR and I can’t make out what Feature=16 is supposed to mean. Unfortunately, I don’t have the knowledge or experience to figure this one out. Maybe one of you can help me?

103 14 0 Ado B Mut ‘I’ve Activated1’ causes sig=0 GS neu=255 int=0,,, => 3*Tiredness++ + 16*Boredom- + 0*<NONE> + 0*<NONE>

I was pretty sure that this meant that she didn’t become more tired or less bored from being selected until she became an Adolescent, as opposed to experiencing this from birth. This hasn’t seemed to cause any problems, so I’m not concerned about this particular gene.

Trent

 

Up next is Trent. He’s much less adventurous than Gertrude. Where Gertrude has circumnavigated Albia once on her own already, Trent has gone no further than taking the sub to the island and coming right back home to the garden and kitchen.

Once, when he was still a baby and after his first vocabulary lessons, he came down with a bad sickness and his health dropped from 60% to a dangerous 30%. He’s since recovered and his health sits at a more comfortable 77% now, despite the frightened norns around him and not eating much food.

A heads up about him, he does carry PMN genes in regards to dancing and alcohol. Otherwise, he’s come out of this with no mutations.

Janie

Up to bat now is Janie. She’s made fast friends with the Grendel on the island (where she now lives), who I’ve fittingly named ‘fig’. He knows a full vocabulary thanks to the Encyclopaedia Nornica COB (also available at Treesprite’s Creatures Grove, linked above).

She also got terribly sick when the world’s first infection hit. She got a dangerously low health force of 25% and I could only watch and wait while she spun with a carrot in her hand and didn’t eat. I really struggled but hoped for the best.

She’s a terrible eater but has somehow made it so far. Maybe her Grendel friend is shoving food down her gullet when I’m not looking? (And yes, I’ve checked. I don’t have the Starch glitch.)

Lobes

121 6 0 Emb B MutDup Lobe #=7 State Rule: state PLUS type0 PLUS type 1 end end end, WTA= 1 Gain State Rule: end end end end end end 0 end, Gain= 0

Like Gertrude, she also pays attention to the hand, rather than just what is most stimulating. I don’t know why she’s having trouble eating or doing what I ask, though. That 0 at the end means nothing since it comes after an end.

Reactions

146 30 0 Emb B MutDup 1*Glucose + 2*WasteH2O =>4*CO2 + 1*<NONE>; half-life = 24

Simply looking at it as a chemical equation, it only means that Glucose and Waste Water become CO2, which is expelled from the body. Hexokinase is also a waste product and would normally be expelled this way. Where Hexinokase can apparently reside as residue, Waste Water may either deplete naturally or cause behavioral problems, at least according to the wiki.

I don’t know enough about these two waste products to know for sure whether this is bad or not. Especially since one waste product or the other is being expelled anyway!

These genes don’t really point to or help explain any of her food eating problems. Maybe it’ll come to me someday.

Alec

Poor Alec. I don’t think I’ve seen him happy since he hatched! He’s always talking about how tired he is but has never slept. Maybe it’s the abundance of norns keeping him distracted from sleeping. I managed to get him away from other norns and across the ocean (you can see the sub) to get this picture, so maybe he’ll be lucky enough to take a nap!

This poor guy was also involved in the infection that spread through my norns. He was a bit older and managed to get through with hardly a sniffle, though! Lucky me, he’ll also eat on his own.

Lobes

122 6 0 Emb B MutDup Lobe #=7 State Rule: state PLUS type0 PLUS type 1 end end end, WTA= 1 Gain State Rule: end end end end end end 0 end, Gain= 0

Hooray! There’s that helpful “I can pay attention to the hand” gene that apparently isn’t present in all of my norns or in the standard genome.

Receptors

NEW 50 7 1 Emb B MutDupCut Creature, Drive Levels Sleepiness, chem=Sleepiness, thresh=0, nom=0, gain=255, features=Analogue

I’m not sure what this means. I’m very much a newbie. I have read about receptors in CDR and after looking at the other drive genes, it looks like this one was just a copy of another gene. The only difference that I see is the gen#, which is set to 1 instead of 0. Does that mean that this is the copy? I don’t know!

Reactions

71 32 0 Emb B MutDupCut 33*SexDrive++ + 1*<NONE> => 1*SexDrive + 1*Punishment; half-life = 8

Wow. That’s quite a different number than 1. I’m guessing that this means that instead of 1 Sex Drive creating punishment (and 1 sex drive), it takes 33 Sex Drive to create 1 punishment (and 1 sex drive). I guess this means that his Sex Drive is going to be prone to a lot of ups and downs, though the good news is that he isn’t punished so quickly for having a high sex drive. Good news!

Brendan

Next is little Brendan. He’s got a crush on Janie and just won’t leave her alone, even at the cost of not eating any food. I wish I could tell my norns that love conquers all but death, but I know they wouldn’t listen anyway.

The infection actually started with him and he’s fared pretty well! He looks a bit sad on the island now and is always complaining about food, but doesn’t listen to my pleas of “push food” and, like all the other males, is more interested in pushing Janie.

No major mutations, though I did notice 2 new genes (or, actually, genes that aren’t in the standard genome).

Reactions

321 60 0 Emb B MutDupCut 5*Geddonase + 5*Glucose => 5*Geddonase + 1*<NONE; half-life = 72

322 61 0 Emb B 2*Geddonase + 3*Glycogen => 1*Geddonase + 1*<NONE; half-life = 88

I actually haven’t been playing C1 enough to know what Geddonase poisoning is until now. What perplexed me is that this wasn’t shown in the other PMN above. The description in the Gene Editor says it’s a normal gene, however. I couldn’t find any other explanation of where it’s from and they aren’t copied. Still, I started to understand why Geddonase is dangerous.

There are no other mutations.

Farrel

Farrel is next, and I hate to admit it, but the other norns kept me so busy that I couldn’t learn too much about him! Now’s my chance, I suppose. Unless I remember incorrectly, he wasn’t born when the infection took hold of the other norns, so every norn below him wasn’t part of that issue, either.

Strangely enough, the only mutation he has is the “listen to hand” mutation I talked about in some of my previous norns.

After I looked into it some more (on CDR, of course) I read that the Plus type1 mutation was supposed to exist in all versions of the game but in the UK, it was released with only Plus type0 which made Norns hard to talk to. Go figure, right? Turns out not having this ‘mutation’ is the odd thing!

That said, he has no mutations to speak of.

William

William came next! He was a quick learner and he spends most of his time on the island with the other males. Really, the only male who doesn’t spend most of his time there with Janie is Trent, who prefers to stay at home with the hand.

Because he’s part of the ‘mob’ it’s hard to learn about him. He and all the boys spend their time playing with the lift and not eating or sleeping.

Like Farrel above him, he has no mutations.

Verne

Goodness, we have a lot of boys. We also have a lot of PMNs! 3 out of 8 norns are male PMNs! Go figure.

This little one is a lot easier to pull out of a crowd than the other norns and I’m glad he listens well. He does have problems eating and sleeping like all the other norns, unfortunately.

Oh well. I manged to get him all the way back to the herbs to help him get some food and sleep.

Receptors

126 16 0 Emb B MutDupCut Brain, Concept, Chemical 1, chem=conASH, thresh=0, nom=4, gain=251, features=Inverted Analogue

Normally, this number would be 255. As CDR doesn’t have any information on this, I don’t have anything to say. At least the change is small? I have learned that this particular gene does prevent the Concept Lobe from atrophying, though.

Reactions

158 31 0 Ado F MutDupCut 1*Gonadotrophin + 2*Oestrogen =>3*Gonadotrophin + 1*<NONE>; half-life =40

Since he’s male, this won’t do anything to him. However, Gonadotrophin prevents female norns from getting pregnant once they become pregnant. What this does is it actually produces more gonadotrophin than usual. This’ll really prevent any daughters who inherit this gene from getting any unwanted pregnancies while they’re pregnant. Honestly, though, I think this is pretty neutral.

There. With the last of my 8 foundation norns accounted for, I can close the D-DNA Analyzer and The Genetics Kit. It was a lot of fun learning about the differences from the standard gene that my norns had and how the different gene lobes work. I’ve still got a lot to learn but I’m enjoying myself so far!

  • Share on Tumblr
  •