Veritaminal

A terminal-based document verification game where players act as border control agents, verifying AI-generated documents to approve or deny travelers. Test your judgment, attention to detail, and critical thinking as you navigate through an immersive narrative experience.

🎮 Game Overview

In Veritaminal, you play as a border control agent stationed at various checkpoints around a fictional world. Your job is to review travel documents and decide whether to approve or deny entry based on the current rules and regulations.

Key Features:

• Immersive Narrative: Experience a compelling story that evolves based on your decisions
• AI-Powered Content: Uses Google Gemini API to generate unique documents and storylines
• Progressive Difficulty: Face increasingly complex decisions as the game progresses
• Multiple Border Settings: Work at different border checkpoints, each with unique challenges
• Save System: Save your progress and continue your career later
• Career Tracking: See how your decisions impact your career stats over time

📋 Gameplay

Core Mechanics:

1. Document Verification: Review traveler documents including names, permits, and backstories
2. Decision Making: Choose to approve or deny each traveler
3. Narrative Consequences: Your decisions affect trust, corruption, and the overall story
4. Career Progression: Advance through a 10-day career path at your assigned checkpoint

Commands:

• approve - Approve the current traveler's entry
• deny - Deny the current traveler's entry
• hint - Request a hint from Veritas (the game's AI assistant)
• rules - Display current verification rules
• save - Save your current game progress
• help - Show help information
• quit - Exit the game

🔧 Installation

Prerequisites

• Python 3.7 or higher
• Pip (Python package installer)
• Google Gemini API key (sign up at https://aistudio.google.com/apikey)

Option 1: Direct Installation from PyPI

pip install veritaminal

Once installed, run the game with:

veritaminal

Option 2: From Source

1. Clone this repository

   git clone https://github.com/maverickkamal/veritaminal.git
   cd veritaminal
   

2. Run the setup script

   # Windows
   python setup_veritaminal.py
   
   # Linux/Mac
   python3 setup_veritaminal.py
   

3. Set up your Google Gemini API key when prompted, or manually in a .env file:

   GEMINI_API_KEY=your_api_key_here
   

🚀 Running the Game

Windows

• Double-click on veritaminal.bat, or
• Run in command prompt: veritaminal.bat

Linux/Mac

• Run the shell script: ./veritaminal.sh

Any Platform with Python

• Run with Python: python run_game.py (or python3 run_game.py)

Command Line Arguments

The game supports several command line arguments:

• --debug: Enable debug logging
• --load [SAVE_FILE]: Load a specific save file
• --skip-menu: Skip the main menu and start a new game immediately

Example:

python run_game.py --debug --load saves/veritaminal_save_20250312_222841.json

📁 Project Structure

veritaminal/
├── __init__.py         # Package initialization
├── run_game.py         # Entry point script
├── setup_veritaminal.py  # Setup script for API keys
├── requirements.txt    # Python dependencies
├── game/               # Core game modules
│   ├── __init__.py     
│   ├── api.py          # API interactions for content generation
│   ├── gameplay.py     # Core gameplay mechanics
│   ├── main.py         # Main game loop
│   ├── main_menu.py    # Menu system
│   ├── memory.py       # Game state persistence
│   ├── narrative.py    # Story management
│   ├── settings.py     # Game settings and configuration
│   └── ui.py           # Terminal user interface
├── saves/              # Directory for saved games
└── utils/              # Utility scripts

⚙️ Game Mechanics Explained

Document Verification

Each document contains:

• Name: The traveler's full name
• Permit: An identification code that must follow specific formats
• Backstory: The traveler's reason for crossing the border
• Additional Fields: May include seals, issuance dates, or other information depending on the border setting

Rules System

Rules evolve as you progress through the game:

• New regulations are introduced on specific days
• Border settings have their own unique requirements
• Trust and corruption metrics affect game outcomes

Narrative System

The game features a dynamic narrative that responds to:

• Your decision patterns (strict vs. lenient)
• Specific story events triggered by days or decisions
• Trust and corruption metrics

Game Endings

Multiple endings are possible based on:

• Trust Score: How much the government trusts your decision-making
• Corruption Level: How often you've bent the rules
• Days Completed: Whether you completed your 10-day assignment

🛠️ Development

To install in development mode:

pip install -e .

This allows you to make changes to the code and have them immediately take effect when running veritaminal.

Adding New Border Settings

Border settings are managed in game/settings.py and consist of:

• Name and description
• Document requirements
• Common issues
• Special rules

Requirements

The following Python packages are used:

• prompt_toolkit: For interactive terminal UI
• colorama: For cross-platform terminal colors
• requests: For API calls
• python-dotenv: For managing API keys

❓ Troubleshooting

Common Issues

1. API Key Issues:

   • Ensure your Gemini API key is correctly set in the .env file
   • Check that the key has proper permissions

2. Display Problems:

   • The game uses colorama for cross-platform terminal colors
   • If you see incorrect characters, ensure your terminal supports UTF-8

3. Save File Issues:

   • Save files are stored in the saves/ directory as JSON files
   • If loading fails, check file permissions

Debug Mode

Run with --debug to enable detailed logging:

python run_game.py --debug

The log file veritaminal.log will contain detailed information about game operations.

📝 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

🙏 Acknowledgments

• This game was inspired by "Papers, Please" by Lucas Pope
• Uses the Google Gemini API for document and narrative generation