PHANTOM SHELL：結合 AI 幽靈對話的復古恐怖遊戲概念

This is a submission for the Hacktoberfest Open-Source AI Challenge Week 4: Ghost in the Machine.

What I Built

PHANTOM SHELL: The House That Remembers is a retro horror game concept that turns a computer terminal into a gateway to a haunted world.

The player starts in an abandoned room with an old CRT monitor, a mysterious terminal, and a presence that seems to know more than it should. As the investigation progresses, the player explores strange locations, discovers corrupted memories, interacts with ghosts, and uncovers a disturbing mystery.

But this isn't just a terminal puzzle game.

The terminal and the physical world are connected. Discovering a file can change a room. Examining a photograph can trigger a conversation. A ghost might lie, contradict another character, or reveal something that changes how the player understands the entire story.

The project combines:

• Retro 2D pixel-art horror with atmospheric environments and eerie visual effects.
• An interactive simulated terminal with fictional commands and discoverable files.
• AI-powered ghost conversations that let players ask questions naturally.
• Exploration and environmental storytelling across interconnected locations.
• Branching mysteries and hidden secrets that reward curiosity.
• A shared game state connecting dialogue, evidence, puzzles, and room progression.

I interpreted Ghost in the Machine as the feeling that something inside a computer is trying to communicate with you—and that you may not want to know what it remembers.

Demo

• Live demo: [https://phantom-shell.ai.studio/]

The best demonstration would show the player discovering a strange terminal message, exploring the haunted room, speaking with a ghost, and uncovering a clue that changes the environment.

Code

GitHub repository: [https://github.com/shanaldo7/PHANTOM-SHELL]

The project is designed around a modular architecture so the terminal, exploration scenes, characters, puzzles, and story progression can evolve independently while sharing the same game state.

The terminal is simulated inside the game. It does not execute arbitrary commands on the player's real operating system.

How I Built It

I approached PHANTOM SHELL as an interactive storytelling project rather than a conventional chatbot.

The core design connects three systems:

1. The terminal: Players investigate fictional files, discover clues, and unlock story events.
2. The haunted world: Rooms change as the player uncovers memories, solves puzzles, and encounters supernatural characters.
3. The AI characters: Ghosts can respond to natural-language questions, react to discoveries, and present different interpretations of the mystery.

The visual direction draws from classic retro horror games, using pixel-art environments, limited color palettes, dark corridors, CRT effects, and unsettling environmental details.

The architecture is intended to support a lightweight 2D rendering system and a suitable JavaScript/TypeScript stack, with Node.js where a backend is needed.

For AI, the project explores using an open-source or open-weight model for character dialogue and narrative interactions. [Insert the exact model, framework, and inference setup actually used in the submitted build.]

A key design decision is to keep important game rules in application code. AI-generated dialogue can make characters feel alive, but validated game logic controls inventory, puzzle completion, room unlocking, and story progression.

This keeps the mystery playable even when an AI response is unexpected or the model is unavailable.

Why Does Open Innovation Matter?

Open innovation makes it possible to experiment with AI experiences that go beyond a simple question-and-answer interface.

With open-source tools, open-weight models, and community-built frameworks, developers can explore how AI fits into interactive worlds, how character behavior can be controlled, and how AI-powered experiences can remain accessible on modest hardware.

For PHANTOM SHELL, this matters because the AI should be part of the atmosphere and storytelling—not just a chatbot placed inside a game.

I want to explore how a player can investigate a mystery, question an unreliable character, compare conflicting accounts, and gradually uncover a story through their own curiosity.

Open tools also make the project easier for other developers to inspect, adapt, extend, and contribute to.

My Agent Session

[Optional: Add your DevRelay session link or embed your saved agent session here.]

This section can document how AI-assisted development helped shape the game mechanics, narrative design, asset strategy, and implementation.

The Spirit of It

Imagine sitting alone in a dark room, rain tapping against the window, while an old computer displays a message you don't remember writing.

You type a command.

The terminal responds.

Then something else speaks:

"Did you hear that click in the buffer?"

At first, it sounds like a glitch. You investigate the room, discover an old photograph, and ask the ghost standing beside the mirror who it is.

It replies:

"That's a strange question. You used to know."

That is the feeling I want PHANTOM SHELL to create: not just fear of a monster, but the unsettling possibility that the machine remembers something you have forgotten.

The deeper the player investigates, the less certain they become about which memories are real, which characters are telling the truth, and who—or what—is actually speaking through the terminal.

The machine isn't necessarily haunted by the dead. It might be haunted by what it remembers.

Thanks to the Hacktoberfest community for creating a space to experiment with open-source AI, creative coding, and unusual ideas.