The new world: caves, the sea, the bank and everything else
The new world: where to go and what to press
This page covers everything added to Life in Nature on the twenty-seventh of August: five new places, boats and diving,
the bank, carrier companies, cellars, the work board, the bakery, letters and neighbours, and the changes to homes, animals and cars.
Every section says where the thing is, which key opens it, what it costs and what you get. The same text is in the game:
open village life and choose new places and new work.
Two keys do almost everything. shift + enter works whatever you are standing on:
a gate, a jetty, a board, a counter, a cellar. enter on a ladder square climbs it. The object tracking key
finds things near you, and it now finds your cellar as well.
The sea, a boat and pearl island
• Buy a rowing boat in the point shop, or a sailing boat in the credit shop. Keep it in your bag; it is never used up.
• Walk to the southern harbour of the village. That is the whole long beach along the bottom of the village map, not one square.
• Press shift + enter anywhere on that sand, or simply use the boat from your bag. The harbour menu opens.
• Choose cross to pearl island. The crossing takes real time. The wind changes every hour and is the same for everybody:
with it behind you the crossing is short, against it you sit in the boat longer. You are told the time and counted down on the way.
• You land at the jetty. Stand on it and press shift + enter to sail back.
If a door, a stall or a plant is on the exact square you are standing on, that takes priority. Step one square clear and press again.
Deep water fishing
Only with a sailing boat. At the harbour choose take the boat out and fish the deep water. You need a fishing rod in your bag.
Tuna, swordfish, grouper, mackerel and sea bass come from out there and from nowhere else; they are large and a knife fillets them like any other fish.
There is a minute between casts.
Diving
• Buy an oxygen tank in the point shop, or a pack of five in the credit shop. The pack is used from your bag and opens into five tanks.
• Stand on the jetty on pearl island, press shift + enter and choose dive.
• One tank is used per dive. Six dives a day. Pearls, black pearls, coral, wreck timber, old coins and sponges come up with you, and now and then an old key.
You always surface by yourself when the air runs low. Nobody drowns down there.
The crystal caves
• Buy a miner's lantern first, from the point shop or the credit shop. Without one you can still go in, but the two deep levels give you nothing.
• On the mountain map, around three hundred paces along each side, there is a crack in the rock. Stand on it and press shift + enter.
• Three levels go down: the entrance galleries, the pillar chamber, and the crystal chamber at the bottom.
An iron ladder joins the first two and a rope ladder goes down to the deep. Stand on the ladder square and press enter, not shift and enter.
• Ore veins are richer the deeper you go: half again as much on the second level, twice as much at the bottom.
• The cave mouth at the north end of the first level takes you back out to the mountain.
The village cemetery
The iron gate is at the north of the village: stand on it and press shift + enter.
The memorial stone in the middle names the recent fallen. The book of names by the path lists your own deaths,
what took you, and what was taken from where you fell. The gate at the south wall takes you back.
The ghost village
In the belgrade forest, around a hundred and twenty paces along each side, a path opens between ten at night and five in the morning
and is simply not there in daylight. Stand on it and press shift + enter. Inside are eight empty houses, an old square and a dry well:
stand on the well and press shift + enter to go down it once a day, for old coins, a key, iron, or now and then a silver ring.
Nothing there will hurt you and the broken gate takes you back whenever you want.
The lost village
In the beautiful forest, around a hundred and fifty paces along each side, an old road opens once a week for two hours.
Everybody in the game is told when it opens. Stand on the road and press shift + enter.
Five buildings can each be searched once per opening: stand in the doorway of the storehouse, the smithy, the granary, the meeting hall
or the healer's house and press shift + enter. When the two hours are up anybody still inside is walked out safely.
The bank
• Where: the bank desk in the village, a few steps from the general store, or village life, work and money, the bank.
• What it takes: credits only, never points.
• Smallest deposit: 1000 credits.
• The lock: seven days. Nothing can be drawn out before that, and adding to a deposit starts the seven days again for the whole balance.
• The interest: one per cent at the end of every full week, week after week, up to 200 credits of interest in any one week.
• Taking it out: after the lock, everything at once, capital and interest, with no fee.
Your own carrier company
• Village life, work and money, your carrier company. It costs 500000 points or 1500 credits and you name it yourself.
• Set the fee you charge for one shipment, and the share your staff keep of what they deliver.
• A customer walks up to you or your staff, presses shift + enter, picks the goods, how many, and who it is for, and pays the fee there and then.
The money waits on the shipment: it is not yours until the goods are delivered.
• You or your staff find the person, stand next to them and hand it over from the company menu.
One tenth of the fee goes to the governor's treasury; the rest is yours, less the staff share if somebody else carried it.
• A shipment nobody delivers within a day cancels itself and the customer gets the goods and every point back.
Carrying pays no wage of its own and does not count towards a trade's day's work. The money always comes out of the customer's pocket,
so no amount of shipping between friends makes points appear.
The work board
In front of the general store in the village, and in village life under work and money.
Pin up what you need, how many, and what you will pay; the money is taken at once and waits on the board.
Anybody can fill the notice by choosing it and handing the goods over: the goods reach you wherever you are and the money goes to them,
less a five per cent board fee that leaves the game. Three notices each, 50000 points at most, refunded in full if nobody fills it in three days.
The cellar: wine and cheese
• Buy a cellar kit for points or credits and use it inside your own home, standing on the spot you want it. You get six shelves.
• Crush ten grapes in a pot for grape must. On a shelf: young wine in six hours, aged wine in a day, vintage wine in three days.
• Four lots of milk in a pot make a cheese. On a shelf it matures in eight hours and turns old and sharp in two days.
• Nothing spoils down there. What is ready simply waits for you, and every step up is worth more.
To find your cellar again, use the object tracking key: it is in your surroundings scan, and your home menu tells you it is in the building.
Your own field
A private field is sold in the credit shop for 1000 credits. Use it on open ground and a fenced field with a gate goes up there.
Stand on the gate and press shift + enter to walk in: a plot twenty-five paces square with worked soil, where you may keep
eight more crops than you could outside, with room for a barn and a beehive in the corners. Your husband or wife works it with you,
and anybody you trust may come through the gate.
Street food stands
Village life, your own street food stand, 2000 points, set down where you are standing.
Chalk up dishes you can cook with a price on each. A customer stands on the stand, presses shift + enter and orders;
they pay at once, but the money reaches you only when you cook the dish and hand it over at the stand with both of you there.
One tenth of every sale goes to the town hall of that map. An order not handed over within the hour cancels itself and the customer is refunded.
The bakery
Take dough to the order counter at the bakery in the village, at the far end of the room, and leave it with the baker.
Twenty minutes later collect two loaves for every lump, up to ten lumps at a time. Nobody else can take it: it is your name on the tray.
Letters, neighbours and the notice board
• Letters: write to anybody, in the game or away; the letter waits in their box until they read it.
• The postman: comes to your door once a day if you have a home, and leaves gossip, a small payment or something to eat.
• Your neighbourhood: everybody with a home on the same map. You can see the street and send one word round it every quarter of an hour.
• The notice board in the square: short notes, one every ten minutes. Names are not shown, but they are recorded.
• Your own book: the things you did for the first time, in the order you did them.
Waiting for you, and the wheel
The first entry in village life is waiting for you: dry plants, letters, orders at your stand, shipments to carry,
interest at the bank, a barn not collected from, a house that wants sweeping, all on one screen.
The wheel by the notice board gives one free spin a day. Anybody who has been away fifteen days or more comes back to a welcome bag.
Home, animals and your car
• Sweeping: a home not swept for a week gathers dust. Sweep it from your home menu and sitting down does you good.
• Invitations: from your home menu you can invite somebody in for a week, villas included.
• A bigger barn: build it out one animal at a time up to six, 30000 points a step, from the animals menu.
• Breeds: animals are ordinary, good or prize beasts; the better ones give extra when you collect.
• Grazing: take them out once a day and they settle, gain heart and sometimes shake off an illness.
• Illness: an animal left unfed falls ill and gives nothing until treated with animal medicine, or by a player whose trade is doctor standing beside you.
• Moving: your barn can be moved to where you stand for 2500 points, a beehive for 1500.
• Car service: every twelve hours, from the car menu. From 400 points, rising the longer you leave it; more than a day overdue and the engine will not start.
Trades, the first coffee and the night watch
From work and jobs you can send one line to everybody working your trade, once every quarter of an hour.
The first coffee of the day clears your head. Between ten at night and five in the morning you can walk the night watch round once for a quiet wage.
The twenty-eighth of August: games, standing, and a great deal else
Everything below was added on the twenty-eighth of August. As before, every section says where the thing is,
which key opens it, what it costs and what you get. The same text is in the game:
open village life and choose new places and new work.
Village games
Village life, people, village games. Whoever opens a game sets a stake in points, or none at all.
The winners share nine tenths of what is put in and the last tenth leaves the game. Ninety seconds to join, at least two must be in,
and everybody must be on the same map.
• Capture the flag. Two teams, two flags set down on the map; you are told how far each is from you.
Stand on the other team's flag, press shift + enter, and you are carrying it. Carry it to your own flag and press
shift + enter again: that is a capture, and three wins. Your own flag must be on its post for a capture to count,
and if anybody from the other team comes within a pace of you while you are carrying, you drop it where you stand.
• Hide and seek. One of you is drawn as the seeker and counts for a minute. After that the seeker is told,
every twenty seconds, roughly how far the nearest hider is and which way. Stand within two paces of a hider and choose to catch.
Everybody found and the seeker wins; seven minutes gone and everybody still hidden shares it.
• Tug of war. Two teams on one rope. Every few seconds the call comes: heave. Pull within a second and a half of it
and your pull is worth three; at any other time, one. Thirty over the line takes it. Hammering the key does nothing at all.
Your standing in the town
Village life, your standing. Standing is not money and it cannot be bought. It comes only from what other people
do for you or because of you: somebody thanking you, a notice on the work board filled, a shipment carried, an apprentice taught.
Being arrested takes it away again. You may thank any one person once a week, and only while they are standing beside you,
so that a thank you means something. Standing gives you a title and a place on the board. It never gives you points.
The three paths, and the long tales
• The three paths (village life, your standing): a life of your own, a trade of your own, a name in the town.
Five steps each, and the next step only shows itself when the one before it is done. Each step is claimed once and pays once.
• The long tales (village life, today's tasks): three stories in five steps each — the lamp of the deep,
the table at the inn, and the road and the sea. Nothing here runs out and nothing is timed. There is a prize item at the end of each.
• How hard you want your days (same menu): today's three tasks can be set easy, ordinary or hard.
Hard means nearly twice as much to do and nearly twice as much for doing it, so nobody gets ahead by choosing it.
It takes effect from tomorrow's tasks.
The dress show
Four days: two to enter and two to vote. You enter wearing whatever you have on at that moment, and what you were wearing is written down,
so changing afterwards changes nothing. It costs 3000 points to enter, everybody may vote once and never for themselves,
and the winner takes nine tenths of the entry money and is named the best dressed in the town.
Your money book, and your album
Village life, your standing, your money book. Every sum of any size that came to you or went from you, newest last,
with a total at the bottom: wages, sales, shipments, the bank, the shops and the games. Small change from picking things up is not written down.
If you are married, the same menu holds your album: a book the two of you keep together, either of you writing in it and both of you reading it.
Illness, and the doctor
Five illnesses go about here: a chill from cold water, an upset stomach from going too long without food or drink,
a dusty cough from the deep caves, a fever, and a bad back from working past the end of your strength.
None of them is dangerous, none lasts more than a few hours, and none takes anything from you.
To be rid of one at once: drink a herb remedy, or a herbal salve for a bad back, or
ask a doctor to see you from village life, kitchen and health. Your name goes on a list every doctor in the game can read.
A doctor charges what they like; that is between the two of you.
The kitchen shelf
• The spice rack. Five spices, bought ten pinches at a time for 900 points. One pinch goes into whatever you cook next
and makes it fifteen in a hundred more likely to come out well. Every pinch is used up. Choose one and it stays chosen.
• Your recipe book. Every dish writes itself in the first time you make it, with the day you first made it,
and you may add your own note against any of them.
• Your diet. The five kinds are meat and eggs, fish, bread and pastry, fruit and vegetables, and sweet things and drinks.
Eat from four or five of them across your last twenty meals and every meal does you a little more good than it otherwise would;
eat one thing over and over and it stops going as far.
Horses, cats, young ones and the animal show
• A horse, 45000 points at your own barn, comes in from the fields most days with something caught in its mane.
• A cat, 12000 points: the house stays clean twice as long and you sleep better with one about.
• Young ones. Keep two of the same kind in one barn, both fed and both loyal above eighty, and one morning there is a young one in the straw.
Once every three days, and never past what the barn holds.
• The animal show. Bring one beast out for 5000 points. The judges look at its breeding, how well it is kept,
whether it is fed and sound, and whether it has a name of its own. First place takes nine tenths of the entry money.
The seasons, properly
The season follows the real calendar and is the same for everybody.
• Spring, March to May: the woods give a little more than usual.
• Summer, June to August: the heat makes you thirsty faster.
• Autumn, September to November: by far the best season in the woods.
• Winter, December to February: you go hungry faster in the cold, and the woods give up very little.
The first five days of every season are the turn of the season, and the daily gift is doubled while it lasts.
Each season also has one piece of work of its own, done once, and it pays six or seven thousand points.
The stall board, the window and the town crier
Work and money, the market, my stall. Chalk a line on the board over your stall and anybody who opens it hears it.
Put one thing in the window and passers-by hear it named before they open the stall at all.
For 4000 points the town crier calls your stall round the whole town, once an hour at most. That money leaves the game; nobody receives it.
Police ranks and the patrol round
An officer is a constable, then a sergeant after five arrests, then a chief inspector after twenty.
Rank changes nothing but the title and what the round pays, so nobody has any reason to arrest unfairly for it.
Every day there are three points to be seen at on your own map. Walk to each and choose to report in from the work menu.
All three done and the town pays you 800 to 1500 points depending on your rank, once a day, and it counts as a day's police work.
Taxi receipts and the drivers' board
Getting about, taxis. Your last thirty rides are written down: when, who drove, where from and to, how far,
what it came to, what you paid and what went on the tab. The drivers' board shows who has driven most,
what they earned by it and what their passengers thought of them.
Your car's horn and plate
From your own car's menu you can change the horn between three sounds and put a plate of up to eight letters on it.
The plate shows when anybody looks the car over. Neither changes anything about how the car drives.
The arena book
Village life, the arena book. While a fight is on you may put between 500 and 50000 points on one of the fighters,
so long as you are not fighting yourself and there are three or more in it. Everything staked goes into one pot;
whoever backed the winner shares it in proportion to what they put in, less a twentieth that leaves the game.
If nobody backed the winner, every stake is handed straight back. For cards, dice, roulette and the wheel, the Golden Acorn casino has its own table games.
Settling up after a separation
Family, the paper and learning a trade, settling up. When a marriage ends the joint chest is counted out and halved on the spot,
and a written settlement is drawn up for both of you listing what each keeps: the home, the cars, the barns and animals,
the stall, the stand, the cellar and the bank. If either of you thinks that unfair, you may offer the other a sum of points to settle it,
and it passes over only if they take it. Nothing is taken by the town.
The town book and the town vote
Village life, the town book. Every penny that goes into or out of a town's treasury is written down and any resident of that map may read it.
The mayor may also put a question to the town: any player with a home on that map may answer yes or no, the vote runs a day,
and the result is announced and written into the book.
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