I ask about the development hardware and frame rate target, suggesting to try a cinematic 24fps as we glide over highly-detailed rock formations, and applying LOD techniques to optimize the geometry.
About the time I became annoyed with the camera operator trucking sideways I gained control over the movement of the game, navigating closer to the surface of the terrain, noticing details like craters and crop circles.
I wondered and asked whether these features were interactive, as a kind of mapping mechanic, when I noticed that most of the craters were filled with mossy vegetation, while some were empty, here and there.
I followed the empty ones when I answered my own question, reaching out to a moss-filled crater; the green lichen dissolving to the rim of the crater, and extending a little beyond its circumference.
With a kind of hand-over-hand locomotion I continued following the dot-to-dot trail of cleared craters, discovering a square opening in a sheer cliff face. The trail of craters became a string of dried puddles.
Gliding through the square opening, I continued following through a cave system, spotting the continuing trail of pock marks dotting the walls, floor, and ceiling.
An unmistakeable large cavern contained a rectangular abstract skull inset into the floor, while a suspicious blank panel faced it from an opposite wall. Near the panel lay a glass beaker half-full with a neon magenta liquid among a few more empty ones.
I didn’t hesitate before lifting the beaker and consuming the liquid.
Nearby, another assortment of beakers lay with different-colored liquids inside: black, white, green, yellow. I mixed liquids until achieving the same neon magenta color in the first beaker.
The demo ended there.