Pathways (HTML5 Game, Shout Out UK)

Web · Shout Out UK

The infamous Pathways game released by the UK government, in its entirety. I modified two of the scripts to allow access to the two previously inaccessible scenario 6 branches. The original, unmodified versions of those scripts are also included with the suffix _original. Outside of that, the game is unmodified. The game doesn't require a backend to play. It's built off of HTML5 and JavaScript. So just open story.html in your browser, and you're set. My writeup about the game: So I dug into this wild game due to seeing several posts about it, and wanted to verify/debunk some of the claims I'd seen for myself regarding the actual tech side of the game. For the two most common claims I've seen, as of now, no. The game has not been taken down. And no. Amelia hasn't been removed. Not sure where either of these statements came from; but they're both false at the current time. One of the other funny claims I've seen is that the game reports you if you answer wrong. This simply isn't possible due to the tech the game is built on. The game is built off of HTML and JavaScript. There's no backend system behind it capable of sending a report (at least in a way that wouldn't be obvious). The game was made with a tool called Articulate Storyline. This made wading through the scripts fairly nightmarish, as they were very obviously programmatically generated. Not written by a human, nor meant to be human readable. I don't have Articulate Storyline, nor do I know if you can even feed a finalized project back into it; so I dug through scripts manually until I had enough of an understanding to make some changes. Funny things I learned: Every slide has a unique script tied to it, and there's a separate male and female version of each slide. The female character was originally supposed to be named Lilie... or Lili... or Lily.... Depending on which script you look at, her name is spelled at least three different ways. Couldn't even get that consistent. But I guess they didn't want to pay for each line to be voiced twice; so the poor girl lost her own name and became Charlie 2. The choice system is very simple. The game internally refers to the options as Most Safe, Less Safe, and Least Safe. So I'll be using those terms. Most Safe option: Pointcount += 3. Less Safe option: Pointcount += 2. Least Safe option: Pointcount +=1. So after scenario 5, you'll have between 5 and 15 points. Scenario 6 is where things get weird. No matter what previous choices you've made, the teacher always tells you you've made the right decisions if you're a male character, and that you won't be in trouble if you're a female character. After this, you get the screen with "What if Charlie had made more harmful choices?" What happened? The "What if Charlie had made more harmful choices?" slide is actually intended to be another choice section, where you choose how to respond to the teacher offering help. In the script for this slide, all 3 response branches exist; but the game is scripted to just play the Most Safe branch and give you 3 more points. That's why when you click next you get the "Charlie accepted they may need support" slide. The other two response branches are inaccessible without modifying the script. Onto the epilogues. These play after the CONGRATULATIONS slide. The exact requirements for the different epilogues are as follows: Most Safe: Pointcount >= 16 && Pointcount <= 17 Less Safe: Pointcount >= 12 && Pointcount <= 15 Least Safe: Pointcount <= 12 (Because the Less Safe check is >= 12, this effectively makes this check be Pointcount < 12. The game always prioritizes the Less Safe branch at 12 points.) Now, here's the funny part, there's a fourth branch that's requirement differs depending on which character you chose. Male MC: Pointcount = 21 Female MC: Pointcount = 18 Hitting this branch requires you to get a perfect Most Safe score. But for no reason at all, male characters are just given an extra 3 points at the workshop screen; so they had to bump up the branch to 21 from 18 to account for these 3 random extra points. Female characters are not given these, and it has some funny consequences for the other paths. Male characters can get the Most Safe epilogue by choosing the Less Safe (2 point) option every time. As they're given 6 points in scenario 6, they'll end up at 16 points rather than the 13 female characters will end up at. Now, some of you might have noticed something else because of these extra 3 points. You can end up between 18 and 20 points, and there's no branch for that condition. So what happens when you try to play the epilogue? Nothing! You get softlocked at the CONGRATULATIONS slide because there's no branch handling a point value between 18 and 20. Clicking the next button does nothing when you're between these values. Alright, but what's our reward for the perfect score anyway? Surely we get the best epilogue, right? Well, as it turns out, you just don't get an epilogue at all! A perfect score avoids playing an