Five-file update locking in the rendering discipline + perception
architecture from the post-cell-arch art-style discovery arc.
Locked in v0.17:
(1) Cel-shading-everywhere with per-register parameter variation. One
rendering engine (Godot-native, asset-budget-friendly, ages well -
Borderlands 2009 still reads current). Three registers diverge through
outline-color + background-treatment + weathering-level, not through
engine-switching:
- Gameworld: dark heavy lines + environmental noise + high weathering
(rust streaks, hatched dirt, ink-line cracks; hand-painted patina).
"Surfaces carry memory" thesis preserved via hand-painted weathering.
- Liminal: painterly/soft/desaturated + progression-gated grainy-film-
mode opening to refined-cel-shading-with-warm-skin at endgame.
- Imperial-net: lean subtle gold rim-light + clean white background +
no weathering. Polish achieved through OMISSION, not extra rendering
tech (Godot reality check; photorealistic-glossy-Apple-store rejected
as not Godot's strong suite). The render-style itself becomes
propaganda-detector - imperium's clean falsity reads as the absence
of the world's honest decay.
(2) Progression-gated in-between visibility. "The more you mod your body
& gain in-between-knowledge, the better your view gets." Early game:
grainy film mode + restricted view range. Endgame: clean refined-cel-
shading with full view of the beloved. Visual-fidelity = dual-gating
made visible (knowledge-gate + material-gate per Clasp-endgame discovery
discipline literally renders as the clarity of the in-between view).
The endgame's deepest reward IS the clear seeing of the beloved's body.
(3) Dual-axis clasp-fidelity model. The asymmetric-clasp from bodies.md
v0.1 was witnessed-axis only (how vividly the OTHER manifests). Now
extended with witness-axis (how clearly YOU can see):
- Witness-axis: YOUR body-mods (resistance-knowledge mods) + accumulated
in-between-knowledge (Memorialist fragments, Aletheia-Waker tokens,
Clasp-Underground recognition-marks)
- Witnessed-axis: THEIR foreclosure-status (caste-tier x imperial-care)
- Combined: maximum-vivid-clasp requires BOTH you to have invested in
the seeing AND your beloved to be uncaptured-enough to be seen. Two
refusals required for the full witness.
- Per-pair calibration multiplier: the longer the love, the clearer the
seeing (mechanically-encoded marriage-deepening).
- Mod-economy parallel-track: imperial-elevation mods (flesh-loss, deva-
ascent) vs. resistance-knowledge mods (in-between-visibility). Two
opposing progressions both expressed as mod-acquisition. The body-
modder structural-tragedy class gets a redemptive-mod counter-class.
(4) Omnisight architecture for NPC perception. Per-NPC virtual cameras
in Godot feeding rendered POV-frames into local VL-Gemma 4 driver-tier
(multimodal vision-language capability of the Gemma 4 E4B model locked
in v0.8). NPCs literally SEE the visible world, not via geometric
metadata-perception. Pairs with cell-arch checksum-discovery as the
trigger-layer:
- Cell-checksum check: micro-seconds, fires on NPC entering cell
- Checksum-mismatch: clean signal, micro-seconds
- VL-camera renders POV scene: milliseconds
- VL-Gemma processes image: 100s of milliseconds
- NPC behavior responds to seen-content: next-shift / next-crossing
Cheap trigger, expensive understanding, bounded by event-frequency.
Most NPCs most of the time = no camera-fire, no VL-inference. Camera-
trigger sources strictly bounded: checksum-mismatch + hard-signals from
player + overseer-triggers + drone-perception with clear boundaries.
(5) Hallucination-isolation discipline (load-bearing). Visual perception
= behavior-modulating-only; never canon-generating. VL models hallucinate;
if those hallucinations enter the canonical record, they propagate
through the lemniscate's recursive integration, become referenced by
other canon-rows, become load-bearing in narrative coherence, cannot be
untangled later. Bleed-over into oblivion is the precise risk. Two
parallel streams in the NPC's lemniscate:
- Text + gesture summary (existing canon): canonical, flows into
event_canon_summaries, propagates to Compositor, integrates into
trait-vector
- Visual context (new omnisight-flagged): ephemeral, flagged on
lemniscate, IGNORED in per-crossing summary, never propagates upward.
Modulates current-turn driver-context-pull only.
Preserves three commitments that depend on text/gesture-derived canon:
Compositor narrative-coherence at scale, Memorialist-archive truth-
claims, mind-pool soul-recycling.
Wealthy-degen waifu-folder exception: opt-in checkbox; player chooses
to fill private folder with sex-pictures from clasp-scenes; stored
locally; READ-ONLY-BY-PLAYER (folder content does NOT flow back into
NPC contexts, world-canon, Compositor, mind-pool, or any other system);
quarantined dead-end storage; aesthetic-collection only.
Two Still-open questions sharpened with v0.17-anchor notes:
- Shader-trait modulation implementation: cel-shading caps perf-budget
more predictably than PBR; rendering-consistency improves.
- Continuous visual feedback policy: visual-as-ephemeral-flag is
firewalled from canonical state; cosmetic-layer can be permissive.
Files:
- runtime-engine/architecture.md: NEW Omnisight section (~80 lines) covering
the pipeline, camera-trigger sources, hallucination-isolation discipline,
the two parallel streams (canonical text/gesture vs. ephemeral visual),
the wealthy-degen waifu-folder exception, what-this-retires (geometric
perception extension + VL-canon-pollution), what-this-resolves/sharpens
(continuous visual feedback policy), and four open questions (per-NPC
VL-inference rate-limit, VL-Gemma camera resolution + frame-rate, NPC
progression-state for witness-axis, multi-NPC observing same event).
- topology-and-rendering/architecture.md: Three-shader philosophy table
rewritten as cel-shading-with-parameter-variation (outline + background
+ weathering per register); Cross-register rendering color-treatment
table updated; clasp candlelight-in-fog now distinguishes external
signature (visible to liminal-inhabitants) from internal mesh (visible
only to clasp-pair via consent-as-rendering, gated by witness-
progression); body-tier silhouette readability and in-between mesh-skin
refinement-within-the-style added. Version bumped 0.7.0 -> 0.8.0.
- identity-and-personhood/bodies.md: NEW Dual-axis clasp-fidelity
subsection added under Asymmetric clasp; per-pair calibration
multiplier and mod-economy parallel-track captured; render-discipline
alignment with cel-shading liminal-register; new Asymmetric-witnessing
open question added. Version bumped 0.1 -> 0.2.
- political-register/world-generation.md: L4 Cell ruleset extended with
per-register rendering note (cel-shading-everywhere-with-parameter-
variation discipline applied at the cell layer).
- architecture-index.md: NPC perception bubbles retire-line refined to
include cell-checksum-trigger + omnisight VL-camera; Geometric
perception retire-line extended with omnisight; new VL models
polluting world-canon retire-line added; Shader-trait modulation
implementation Still-open sharpened with v0.17 cel-shading note;
Continuous visual feedback policy Still-open sharpened with v0.17
hallucination-isolation note; v0.17 history entry added covering all
five lock-ins. Version bumped 0.16 -> 0.17.
Authored 2026-04-26 same Sunday continuing - dafit + chrysalis.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
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