Upon googling for more info about Habitat, I found the below article scanned @ The International House of Mojo. I looked further and was unable to find a searchable-text version, so I transcribed it for your reading enjoyment.

The parallels are uncanny. The mention of Steve Jobs is cute. But above all, this was published in RUN magazine a little over exactly 20 years ago. And it's still relevant and good to be taken to heart today.

As noted, I didn't originally write the article, nor did I take the photos. All rights belong to the respective rightholders. I'm merely the messenger.

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ENTER THE ON-LINE WORLD OF LUCASFILM

By Margaret Morabito


Definition

Habitat: A make-believe world inhabited by small, colorful creatures, called Avatars. Human beings may visit Habitat and move freely about its regions, interacting at will with Avatars. Human beings reach Habitat by traveling many miles through tiny telephone line sand entering through a large gateway, called QuantumLink.

Once a human being enters Habitat, he or she takes on the visual form of an Avatar, and for intents and purposes becomes one of these new-world beings. In the world of Habitat, people can play games and go on quests, but mainly they meet other people and have fun.


Lucasfilm's Vision

We all know Lucasfilm as the company that created such blockbuster films as Star Wars and The Return of the Jedi, but Lucasfilm has done much more than make movies. For several years, the company has invested in an extensive research and development effort, conducted by the Lucasfilm Computer Division. Its primary aim is to develop new technology for filmmaking and to discover what kinds of interesting things might be done in the entertainment field by applying the technology that exists for manipulating information.

Their efforts have promulgated a new computer graphics technology and new off-shoot companies. One Lucasfilm project in computer graphics spun off into a company called Pixar, now owned by Steven Jobs. Pixar has developed the newest state-of-the-art graphics computer in the industry.

Lucasfilm is involved in projects dealing with film editing using videodisc technology, and in digital-audio projects for film sound editing and sound effects. The company also develops game software for a variety of home computers, Commodore included. They now have four games that are marketed by Epyx: Ballblazer, Rescue on Fractalus, Koronis Rift and The Eidolon.

The people at Lucasfilm have a vision. As stated by Chip Morningstar, the principal designer and architect behind Habitat, this vision is "that films and television and computer games and interactive technology are all on converging paths."

In all cases, the intent is the same: to convey ideas, stories, and sensations to people. But the boundaries between various forms of technology are becoming blurred as people, like those at Lucasfilm, start doing experiments with interactive theatre and computer animation.

"At some point," says Aric Wilmunder, graphics programmer on the Habitat project, "there will be a merging. There is already a crossover. We're going to see it very soon with the compact disc interactive projects — CD-ROMs."

Stephen D. Arnold, Director of Lucasfilm Games Division, sum it up this way: "Habitat is another way to make interactive technology teach us about what's possible and what's interesting and what's fun for people and for us to do. Our charter is to anticipate the synthesis of interactive technology and film-making; to experiment with it; to craft it into better entertainment experiences. Habitat is another piece of what we hope is the ability to move ahead in entertainment technology all across the board."


Accessing Habitat

Habitat is only available through QuantumLink (1-800-392-8200) and requires that you have a Habitat program disk and an object database. Q-Link was chosen by Lucasfilm because the network was best set up to handle the graphics, sound and interaction that Habitat relies on.

Also, there are six million C-64s in the real world, and the price of the new 64C is so low that just about anyone can afford to go out and buy this computer, a modem and a sign-on to Q-Link, which is now a captivating network for Commodore owners. Lucasfilm programmer Randy Farmer handle the communications between C-64 program development and Q-Link's mainframe.

To find Habitat on Q-Link, you make menu selections. (Its exact location was not determine date the time this article was written, nor was its exact name finalized.) Once you are on Q-Link and decide to enter Habitat, you'll be prompted to take out your Q-Link disk and put in your Habitat program disk.


Visualizing Habitat

I got a chance to preview Habitat with the Lucasfilm people at the Consumer Electronics Show in Chicago last June.

The Habitat realm is unique. It is actually like a cartoon world in which you get the chance to play a permanent part. You are able to select your looks, your home (turf), your clothes, your furniture, your pets — all those things that are inherent in our own real world.

You live in your home, have a telephone and your own mailbox. You can walk around just like a real person. You can see other characters and yourself on the computer, and others can see you. You can also speak to others, interacting with them through this huge game, and can become involved in adventures, fantasy and special quests.

The Lucasfilm team has provided the ability to perform most of the activities that you are normally accustomed to performing in your everyday life — but you perform them via your computer.

Sound strange? Well, at first it is. It's actually a huge leap beyond what you usually think you can do on a telecommunications network. In the words of Wilmunder, "What you should visualize is making a play — and you're the set designer. Imagine a little cardboard tree on a little stand that you can walk behind. The world graphically is based around a backdrop like those they bring down at the rear of a stage. The Avatars are to a great extent very much like actors inside this world.

"Right now, a lot of people use the chat system on telecommunications networks, and they create their own personalities. To a great extent, Habitat is super-chat, or a great extension beyond chat."


How Do You Get Born?

All the objects of the Habitat universe are on your disk in a large database. They have been designed by Lucasfilm's artist, Gary Winnick.

When you join Habitat, you have access to the same objects as everyone else. From these, your first task is to decide what you will look like to others. You may be male or female, of course. You can pick the shape of your head and your facial features.

Once you've designed your physical person, you can then pick those objects that you want to have as part of your own world. It's just like going to a store and shopping for your clothes, your furniture and other items that you want.

In addition, there is an Official Avatar Handbook, which tells you such necessary information as great moments in Habitat history, do's and don'ts of social behavior in Habitat, how to assemble an impressive wardrobe, great Habitat movies and the mandatory reading for all Avatars. There are other goodies in this handbook that are bound to elicit a chuckle as you become familiar with the Avatars' world.


How Do They Do That?

The Lucasfilm programming and design team have brought cartooning technology into the creation of these objects. For example, your body is composed of different parts. To create animation, your torso remains the same, while the legs and arms are changed in sequence.

The big difference between Habitat and other on-line social interaction is not just that you can see who you are speaking with, but that you can move freely through a huge world populated by other people and recognizable real-world things.

The animation on Habitat is fluid, and the graphics are all bit-mapped images, so that you see smooth circles and curves around the images. Also, this world has color and sound. You can move objects around, people can walk and things make sounds. Some of the objects in the world are just for decoration, but many are functional.

For example, your telephone works like a real phone. When you pick it up, you hear a dial tone. When you dial a number, you hear it ring. When the other guy is already on the phone, you get a busy signal. To find out someone's phone number, you consult a telephone book. To get your name in the phone book, you contact the telephone company.

Every house has a mailbox out front, where you can send a receive messages. The bureau in your room has drawers that open and close, and when you open the drawer, you can see whatever is inside and pick out what you need.

To travel within Habitat, you can walk, or for long distances, use the teleport. This is like a telephone booth, but instead of your voice traveling somewhere, your body goes there.

The Habitat world is composed of many screen regions, or places. When you move off the side of one screen region, it is replaced by a new one. The idea is that each region is connected on all four sides to other places, and those in turn are connected to still others.


The Oracle

Habitat is not a world left alone to its own devices. There is an extraworldly presence that oversees everything and everyone. This is the Oracle.

The Oracle is available to those who seek him. You can ask the Oracle for advice, file complaints against evil-doers and nasty people, and otherwise be in touch with Habitat's Almighty One.

The Oracle grants wishes and sends Avatars on quests and adventures. It occasionally plays tricks on Avatars. It can step in at any time to intervene in the various dramas that are being played.

Conflict is an important element in drama, and Habitat is rather like an ever-evolving drama. The creators have deliberately included objects in the world that will evoke fear and motivate Avatars to band together for their common good. The inhabitants of Habitat have a strong respect for life and community and are careful not to upset the Oracle.


How Do You Control Your World?

You control the activities, movement and speech of your Avatar throughout Habitat with a joystick and keyboard typing. There are five simple, yet powerful commands that you have at your beck and call: Go, Do, Get, Put and Talk.

If you want to move your Avatar, you tell it to Go. You place the cursor at the spot to which you want to move, press the joystick button, toggle the stick to the Go position and release the button. Your Avatar then walks to the cursor position.

The Do command makes your Avatar perform the action dictated by the object at which you are pointing your joystick. To close the door, you point to it, press the joystick button, select Do and release the button.

To pick up objects in the Avatar world, you Get them with the joystick. To place objects down somewhere, you Put them.

The Talk command does not require the use of a joystick, as do the other four. You speak to other Avatars by pointing at them with the cursor and typing your words on the keyboard.

The words appear in a message bar at the bottom of your computer screen. When you want to send your message, press the return key. Your words will move from the message bar to the top of the screen where they will be held in a colored balloon, reminiscent of a newspaper comic strip.


As the World Grows

The Habitat creators are dedicated to letting the individual express creativity. The entire system has been designed so that all participants can implement their own individualized appearance, places and activities.

The designers and programmers have provided the ability to create a visual impression for the users that will make them feel as though they are actually doing something in the world — that they are real people inside that world.

When Habitat goes public in August, it will include close to 2000 different pre-made regions, or backdrops. And there will be hundreds of objects with which you can adorn those backdrops. But even with all of this, the design team is anticipating the need for more regions and objects.

"The intent is that the world will be a constantly growing and evolving place," says Morningstar. "It will be constantly changing, with new things being added to make this an interesting place that you'd want to visit. Habitat is very much like our real world, but with one big difference… it's rigged to be fun."

"The reason that QuantumLink has been so successful," says Wilmunder, "is that it's very much in tune with its audience. An the same will be true with us. If the audience says we need this or that widget, we have to have the system there to do this. So, we're putting in the hooks so we can create more objects after the world's been around a while."


A Trip Through Habitat

Let's take a little trip through Habitat. The photos accompanying this article were taken while Habitat was still in its developmental stages, but they'll help you to visualize this world.

Our Avatar is Phred. We start off with Phred in his "turf" (Photo 1). He is a simple, unassuming guy, who doesn't go overboard on internal decorations, like some of the other Avatars. He is content with a bureau, a floor lamp, a Turf Sweet Turf picture, and his faithful cat, named Friday.

Friday lies on top of the bureau and patiently waves his tail as he waits for Phred to put on his shirt and get ready to go outside. When Phred is ready, he moves to the right side of this room, opens the door and goes outside, where he stands in front of his house taking in the clean fresh air and the view.

Walking down the sidewalk, Phred meets his friend, Spike. They stop and chat for a while in front of Spike's house (Photos 4-7).

Spike is an erudite fellow and welcomes the opportunity to speak to RUN's readers. (I wonder if he ever found his bike.)

After a bit of chit-chat, the friends go their separate ways. Phred has to go to the bank. He has been planning a trip to a tropical vacation island for several weeks, and he has to pick up his travel money at the electronic teller (Photos 8 and 9).

I wonder if he ever noticed that key on the ground under the lamp post. When he gets to the island, he'll kick himself for not picking it up.

After getting his money and hanging around downtime for a while doing other errands, Phred heads off for the island (Photo 10). It's a great place to be. Phred loves palm trees and lying in the sun. This is just the break he needed from his hectic job at the daily newspaper.

The island is fun, but Phred wants to get back into civilization. He teleports himself back to his hometown, meets a nice girl in the park and introduces himself to her (Photos 11-13).

This is a typical Avatar park, with its fountain, mailbox, street light and of course, a trash can. You may notice that Phred is now carrying a boom box. He stopped off at the store on his way back from the island and bought it.

A little later, Phred will walk back to his turf, if he doesn't get sidetracked along the way.


Implications of Habitat

Habitat is a direct outgrowth of the fat that social interaction is a primary use of telecommunications in the home today. If you look at CompuServe's CB Simulator and Q-Link's own People Connection, you'll see a demonstration of this large-scale social element.

"Habitat," stats Stephen Arnold, "offers a lot of the social aspects that people now enjoy in a telecommunications environment, where you're just talking to each other, relating to each other as human beings. It will have the additional world-simulation dimension of having characters and graphics environments that will allow you to experiment over the phone lines with dimensions of shared interactivity other than those you can experience with text."

What makes Habitat different? In Morningstar's view, the current online interaction on systems like the CB Simulator and People Connection is very transient. People talk; they come and they go; but it is very much a stream-of-consciousness activity, focused on the present. There is no sense of continuity from time to time; no sense of place.

"One of the things that we want to achieve," says Morningstar, "is a sense that Habitat is actually a world where you can have a lasting effect, where you can make changes. Your changes will be things that other people will come in contact with an experience. You can affect other people in a lasting way through your interaction with the environment you're in — which I think is much more satisfying."

"In a simulation, it's a different experience to have a world that cares whether you're there or not," says Arnold. "Habitat has a lot of promise for adventuring and gaming and the social aspects of exploring imaginary worlds. If it comes to matter to people as another world that they care about, it will add an experience that hasn't really existed before."