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По русски должно звучать типа "Согласно Каину". Это тоже детективное расследование, как и Deadline из моего предыдущего поста. Если Deadline это 1982 год, то "According to Cain" появилась в 2022 году. Мне хотелось оценить, как изменилась концепция за прошедшие 40 лет. Разница заметная, как по удобству игры, так и по глубине художественного замысла. Игра "According to Cain" получила награду «Выдающаяся игра года» («Выбор игрока») на конкурсе IFDB Awards 2022.

Тема расследования необычная: Каин против Авеля. Собственно, что произошло и кто виноват мы и так все знаем. Но вас посылают в самое начало времён выяснить все детали.

"The question has bedeviled the Academy's Scholastics since this institution was founded. What is the Mark of Cain?"

"Recall that Eve birthed two sons," the Provost told you. "Cain, the eldest, tilled the fields. Younger brother Abel tended the flocks. Until..." He trails off.

"Cain murdered Abel," you said to complete his thought.

"The first murder in all of history. As punishment, the Creator cursed Cain to wander the Earth to the end of his days. Cain was marked to prove he introduced murder into our world. The mark served to protect Cain from others taking vengeance upon him."

"Why do that? Why protect such evil?"

The Provost emitted a gravelly murmur. "Vengeance was the Creator's."

Можно играть онлайн: iplayif.com. А можно скачать игру (cain.t3) и запускать на своём коипьютере в одной из игралок: QTads (Windows, Линукс) или Spatterlight (мак).

Здесь можно найти карты и подсказки: plover.net/~davidw/sol/a/accor22.html

Чтобы уметь обращаться с древними артефактами, вам придётся освоить магическую алхимию. В вашем распоряжении воск, кровь, маточное молочко, мышьяк, пепел, ромашка, ртуть, сера, соль, шалфей и другие компоненты. Всё это нужно добыть, научиться комбинировать и уместно применять.

Понадобится освоить азы психологии относительно Адама, Евы, Каина и Авеля. Кто из них был холерик, сангвинник, флегматик или меланхолик. Потому как от этого зависит, какие алхимические компоненты к ним применимы.

Вы выясните, что после изгнания из рая у Адама слегка двинулась крыша. Со слов Каина:

Father believes with enough contrition, the Creator will permit us to return to the paradise Eden. He has begun a hard fast, consuming only sips of rainwater and nibbles of honeycomb. It has made him weak. His ribs press into his skin and reveal the cage encasing his heart.

Fasting, hard work, and daily exhortations to the Creator have driven Father to the precipice. His eyes bulge egg-like from their sockets. White foam flecks the corners of his mouth. He rarely speaks, but when he does, he rants and raves, permitting none of us to get in so much as two words.

Unlike Mother, he refuses to discuss his time in the garden paradise before their sins drove them out. Hard work is his silent contrition for his error -- daily, grinding, maddening hard work.

Вы узнаете, что Ева женила Каина на своей старшей дочери Аван, не спрашивая их согласия:

Mother commands me to marry my sister, Awan, as well as Second Daughter when she is of age.

To me, she says: "As the eldest, you are responsible for Abel and your sisters. When your father and I are no longer of this world, you will be patriarch."

To my brother, she says: "Abel, you will serve your brother, to ensure the family of Mankind prospers and spreads."

Our sisters gather in a tight brood far from the Fire. The dancing flames illuminate their horrified expressions.

"Cain, you and your sisters will produce twelve children," she says.

I plead with her. The sheep and swine do not breed brother with sister. "Eve is in charge of family matters," is all Father will say.

Abel announces: "If Cain discards Awan, I will marry her." But Mother will have none of it.

That night, Mother drapes over the bed a veil of muslin and linen. She perfumes the bed with rare oils and essences. Awan and I are led to this bower and instructed to lay together. We are left alone in the hovel.

Pressed together for warmth, my sister's thick mane pillows both our faces. She whispers to me: "Please...no...please do not..."

Вы обнаружите, что Авель регулярно издевался на Каином при каждом удобном случае:

Cain toils in the field for hours exposed to the stark white sun. Abel passes by on several occasions, cool and refreshed, with a puckish smirk and a mischievous air about him.

"Have you not your flock to attend to?" Cain snaps. He has labored all morning with a shovel to dig an enormous egg-shaped rock out from the field.

"You are the keeper of your field," Abel says. "My flock is my business."

Throughout the sweltering day, Abel passes by several more times, never offering assistance. Cain toils against the stubborn rock. The egg-shaped rock does not budge.

Abel taunts him. "The river is cool today. I swam while my flock quenched their thirst. What have you been doing with your time?"

Temper sapped, Cain throws aside the shovel and storms off. The rock in the field remains embedded in the ground. Abel grins, shakes his head, and saunters off.

Напоследок окажется, что и Аван беременна вовсе не от Каина, а от Авеля:

On my knees, I work the shovel to pry this stubborn rock from the field. Abel approaches with his right cheek and eye socket still mottled from the bruising I gave him in the mountains.

"I will marry Awan," he announces. "Just as Mother and Father were wed in their garden paradise."

"You will not take my wife and child from me."

"The child Awan carries is mine. She would tell you so, but shame holds her tongue." He leans down to me. "What troubles you, brother? This rock? The crow thieving your grain? Or is it the swarm of locusts sleeping underground, waiting for their moment to rise and overwhelm you?"

It is difficult to speak in measured tones. "What troubles me is this: I perceive the world was created in goodness, but it is not governed according to the fruit of good works."

"You misperceive. In judgment there is no respect of persons. My sacrifice was superior to yours, and I am rewarded."

I say, again, with difficulty: "Then there is neither judgment nor judge, nor even another world."

A brash smile bursts across his face. "There was a judgment, brother. There is a better world, and it is reserved for Awan and me."

I strike the blade of the shovel across his face. Taking him by the neck, I wrestle him to the dirt. My vision washes umber--I smash the back of his head into the rock repeatedly, as though by killing him I am killing this stubborn blister among my wheat.

Abel lays sprawled across the ground, lifeless. My violence has cracked the rock in two. The black earth I've nourished now drinks my brother's blood.

What have I done?

Впрочем, у Авеля было своё оправдание:

Since I was young, Cain worked the soil and tended to his plants with a patent joy. My brother was more alive around his plants and flowers than around us.

Our parents leaned on him for all their problems. When Adam was too sickly to dig the well, Cain completed it. When Eve suffered bouts of her dark moods, she asked Cain for tea and a comforting word. Adam taught Cain how to work metal, how to build tents, how to light the Great Fire.

What was I responsible for? Feeding goats and lambs. Walking them to the river. Slitting their throats when they grew plump.

He would always be the eldest son. I could never surpass him.

А что же насчёт "Каиновой печати"? Вам удастся бросить всего один взгляд на Каина в изгнании:

Up until now, the man's face has remained outside your view. Now he turns to you. Finally you can put a face to the voice of the man you've heard so often since your arrival here.

It's the cragged face of a regretful man. Dust and dirt outline the face's wrinkles and folds. His watery eyes are veined red, and his mouth seems incapable of any shape but a deep frown.

The Creator marked this man so he would never be harmed. Who could attack someone with such a piteous expression?

You begin to speak to him -- you have many questions...

The сrow lets out a berating caaaw, causing your head to snap around. The great black bird launches from its perch and flies toward the misty horizon.

When you turn back to Cain, he's gone. Among the trees down the hill, you catch sight of his knapsack slung over one shoulder as he trudges on to his next destination...and then he disappears into the wilderness.

Полный протокол пройденной игры можно посмотреть здесь: transcript.txt