V. Story Overview..............................
Atomic Samis the story of a young boy, separated from his parents for the first time,
who must rise to the challenge of discovering what has happened to them. Though
Atomic Sam’s focus is as an action/adventure game, the humorous and touching story
sets the game apart from many other console action games.
The setting ofAtomic Samis the Earth of the future, but not exactly the future as
we imagine it now. This is the future as foretold in the first half of the twentieth century
by magazines likePopular ScienceandThe Electrical Experimenter, as well as by futur-
ists like Norman Bel Geddes and Buckminster Fuller. Certain innovations that we see
as obvious today never came to pass, such as jet airplane travel; instead, people still
travel aboard giant propeller craft and zeppelins. Similarly, the personal computer and
certainly the Internet are unheard of, while super-intelligent and always helpful robots
are ubiquitous. Man has even colonized the Moon and found the extraterrestrial life
that lives there, the “Moonies.” It is in this whimsical and fun future that the story of
Atomic Samtakes place.
One day, young Sam returns from school to his parents’ apartment only to discover
them mysteriously missing. Sam’s parents are both scientists at Zeffir Zoom, a trans-
portation company, but they always make it a point to be home when Sam returns from
school. Distraught, Sam decides to go looking for his parents. He dons a red jacket and
puts on the atomic rocket-pack they gave him for his birthday, and renames himself
Atomic Sam, gaining courage through his new alter ego.
Sam travels through the city of Gargantuopolis toward his parents’ office, but along
the way is attacked by robots who try to block his progress. Sam finally reaches their
office, only to find them missing from there as well, with only a mysterious note
remaining. A friendly robot soon arrives, however, and escorts Sam to a towering build-
ing right next door. Sam travels up to the top floor and meets a strange woman who calls
herself the Electric Priestess. She tells Sam that, though she does not know what has
happened to his parents, she will help him find them. She offers Sam transportation to
three locations where Sam may try to discover their fate.
Sam will travel to Benthos, the city beneath the sea. There he will meet Xeraphina,
the flying girl, who will help Sam locate his parents’ private office. Next is Harmony, the
robot city, where Sam will try to look for Ike, the robot who was his parents’ loyal assis-
tant for years. Along the way Sam meets Scrap, a plucky young robot who strangely
doesn’t want to “grow up” and go to work. Finally, Sam travels to New Boston, the
Moon colony, searching for another friend of his parents, Dulo the Moonie. At each of
these locations, Sam is attacked by merciless robots out to defeat him and stop his
inquiries. After having fully explored each of these areas, Sam finds a piece of a wax cyl-
inder which, when all of its pieces are assembled, can be played back to reveal what
happened to his parents.
The cylinder contains a warning message from Sam’s parents: they think they have
stumbled on a safety problem with the monorail system being developed by Max Zeffir,
their employer. Unfortunately, Zeffir does not want to fix the problem because of its
prohibitive cost and, as a result, has kidnapped Sam’s parents to keep them quiet. The
Electric Priestess will now be able to lend Sam an auto-gyro to take him to the Ikairus,
Zeffir’s massive airship. There Sam will battle still more robots before confronting and
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