Portugues
Starborn
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About the game
Your mother was pregnant when the starship Magellan left for Epsilon Eridani, so you were born on board, millions of kilometres from Earth. Now the Magellan is back and docked at a space station in orbit, and through the observatory window the planet you have heard about all your life looks close enough to touch.
There is one problem. A body that grew up weightless was never made for gravity, and the ship's doctor is very clear about what Earth would do to you. Tonight your cousin Kevin, who was born down there a month before you, is sleeping in your room after his first long day in space.
Starborn is short and quiet, more a story than a puzzle. It can be finished in a few minutes, and it is worth reading slowly.
Playing it here
Click Play now and the story starts in the player. Starborn does not use the usual verb-and-noun commands. Words that matter appear in capitals in the text; type one of them and press Enter to look at it, think about it or go there. One word at a time is all the story needs.
Commands
| Command | What it does |
|---|---|
| keyword | follow any word shown in capitals, such as cousin or hallway |
l (or just Enter) |
list the keywords and exits available right now |
setup |
list the ways keywords can be highlighted; then option and a number picks one |
prompt off / prompt on |
hide or show the > prompt, useful with screen readers |
undo / restart |
take back the last step or start over |
save / restore |
keep your progress in this browser and load it back |
A few things worth knowing
Follow your curiosity. There is no wrong order. Exploring a keyword often reveals new ones, and places appear in the list of exits.
Read the descriptions. The story is told almost entirely through what the narrator thinks about the things around him, so the details are the point.
If highlighting is hard to see, type setup and pick another style with option, such
as brackets or a colour.
Credits and licence
Starborn was written by Juhana Leinonen for a New Year's Speed IF event and revised in January 2011; the release played here is the third. It is released under the MIT licence. The cover art of the original file was built on photos without credits, so it is not distributed here. The licence text is linked from this page.