Listen to the Episode
Recording Script
EPISODE 1: START
SFX A CD-ROM is placed in a CD-ROM drive.
SFX Quid Pro Euro 96 launch music.
SFX Rain, sea, a steamer ship founders and is wrecked.
<CUT TO>
SFX Deserted harbour atmos.
GUIDE: Would you like to start a new game? Press YES [SFX YES] or NO [SFX YES].
SFX Mouse Click + YES.
GUIDE: Would you like audio narration? Press YES if you would like audio narration or NO if you are happy reading the text.
SFX Mouse Click + YES.
GUIDE: Would you like to play the TUTORIAL?
SFX Mouse Click + NO.
GUIDE: Remember: if you see something interesting, point at it with the mouse and click to find out more.
SFX A wooden frame creaks and breaks, falling to the floor.
GUIDE: Watch out!
SFX Dust settles
GUIDE [coughing]: Oh dear, this harbour’s seen better days, hasn’t it? In fact, this whole island looks abandoned. Look at the blooming rust on that boat. By the way, my name is… oh… um… oh dear, I can’t remember! It must be the shipwreck: all that cold water gave me amnesia! What do you want to call me?
SFX Character naming box pops up.
GUIDE: Point and click at letters to type a name. If you make a mistake, press the backspace key.
SFX Clicking letters.
GUIDE: Point and click at letters to type a name. If you make a mistake, press the backspace key.
SFX Clicking letters.
GUIDE: Point and click at letters to type a name. If you make a mistake, press the -
SFX YES + Click
GUIDE: That’s a good name, thank you. I’m a tour guide by profession. I think. It’s all so foggy. Yes, I’m certain! Look at my badge, it says Professional Tour Guide. So I’ll be your guide on this island! Although I don’t think I’ve been here before. I’ll have to do my best, can’t ask a fellow more than that, ey? God, look at the wreckage out there of our steamer ship. The second chimney is still sinking. We must be the only survivors, here on this mysterious island. Can you believe it had a thousand passengers? What a tragedy. Nice warm breeze, though! Hey, didn’t we meet when we first got on the steamer ship? Yes, I remember your face, I think. Yes, I’m sure of it. That’s right: you’re the journalist, aren’t you?
GUIDE: That’s right: you’re the journalist, aren’t you?
SFX NO + Click
GUIDE: Oh yes you are, don’t be shy. You wrote that article about crime. Wow, that’s impressive! Bet they got a few arrests. Now. How are we going to go home? Hmmm. Well, this is a harbour but… I can’t see anybody. And nobody’s going to rescue us from an abandoned island! And all these boats are rotten. I think… we’ll have to build a boat of our own. What do you think?
SFX YES + Click
GUIDE: OK! Is there anything here you can see that will help us build a boat? Let’s look around. I can see: a Welcome To The Island banner, a rotting gangplank, a red toolbox, and an interesting collection of seashells. What do you think?
SFX Click
GUIDE: You’re right. That collection of seashells is very interesting. Did you know that seashells are made of chalk? But I don’t see how that … shellps us build a boat ho ho.
SFX Click
GUIDE: The Welcome to the Island banner is falling to pieces. And the biggest piece is being used as a shell for a hermit crab. That won’t help us build a boat. What about the red toolbox?
SFX Click
GUIDE: Woah! Mind your feet! The gangplank is rotting and I don’t want to have to fish you out! The red toolbox is interesting, isn’t it?
SFX Click
GUIDE: You’re right: those seashells are still fascinating. Look at how they’re all different. That one looks like an ear. See the sparkly bit that looks like an earring? In fact… it is an ear! Gasp. Phew, I still have my ears. It must belong to one of the other passengers and washed ashore. Maybe they clawed it off while they were drowning. What do you think of the red toolbo-[x?]
SFX Click interrupts above
GUIDE: The red toolbox! Of course! That will definitely be a help. Oh no, it’s stuck under that device. How are you going to get it out? It looks like it’s jammed under the wheel of a… why bless my boots, it’s a television and video player on wheels - just like teacher used to bring into our classroom when we were too naughty to learn. And look, there’s a video on top of the video player. What happens when you put the video in the video player?
SFX Click… click
SFX Video put into video player
GUIDE: Look, the Play button is glowing.
SFX Click - TV turns on and begins playing atmos from the video but localised to the TV.
GUIDE: The screen turned on! Let’s have a closer look.
SFX QPE Swoosh and we zoom in to the TV screen.
NARRATOR
(SFX Forest + man walking through it)
Today: Books.
This is Torvald, a forest guardian in Dalarna. He loves nothing more
than patrolling the trees. Torvald is good at his job! Nobody’s stolen a tree under his watch. Torvald gave up living in a house and camps out every night in his beloved forest.
But the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union states that every European citizen is entitled to time off. And a caravan. Torvald doesn’t sleep in his caravan; you can’t see the stars on a fibreglass ceiling unless you paint them on and Torvald can’t paint. But he can: read.
Look, there he is, nose in a book. Come back nose! That’s why he’s turned his caravan into a mobile library, which he drags behind him on his patrols.
What’s on your bookshelves, Torvald? What a lot of atlases! Torvald loves to relax on the forest floor with a good map. Look, here he comes, already in his pyjamas and holding his favourite book: A City Map of Ancient Rome With Illustrations, Suitable for 12 and Up.
TORVALD
[Sigh.]
NARRATOR
What’s wrong, Torvald?
TORVALD
Alla mina böcker är så tråkiga!
NARRATOR
Oh dear. Torvald has read his collection so many times, he’s bored. He is going to need to start a new book.
Are you thinking of starting a new book? Do so with care. Starting a new book can promote anxiety. Or worse: many xieties! When you have grown used to the confines of a familiar paperback, every night turning on your bedside light in order to visit another world in another time, that other world will grow familiar. Comfortable even! Very comfortable. Maybe too comfortable. Without realising it, in the process of reading you have gained a new friend group, a new home, a new family. All fictional, of course, but real to the author and real to you. When you finish that book and close the cover, stare at the wall for a bit, and begin searching for a new one; is the process really so different to committing multiple murders in your household? Legally, maybe. But try saying “legally” to: YOUR BRAIN!
Your brain consists of the cerebrum, which is responsible for choosing which book to read, the cerebellum, which is responsible for keeping you from becoming a ghost, and your limbic system, which is responsible for bonding you to characters born of someone else’s imagination. As far as your limbic system is concerned, to forsake your fictional friends in, for example, the Rotterdam amateur chamber music scene of 1958, in favour of a new and strange group, waiting mysterious in pages behind creepily unbent spines, of, perhaps, Amsterdam’s church choir singers of 1960, is indistinguishable from the process of burning all of your clothes, giving up your lease, running away from your lover (without saying goodbye), jumping on the first train to the end of the line, buying a ticket for a long distance bus, stowing away in the luggage compartment of a different long distance bus, falling out at a motorway petrol station, stealing a car, running out of petrol, running through the fields, and finally collapsing, exhausted but safe, crouched on all fours and [throwing up on a jetty of a cold harbour city where the police haven’t heard of you yet.
So no wonder it’s difficult for Torvald to pick a book! He has come to a library and he’s looking indecisive. What have you got, Torvald? Ah! A driving map of Southern Spain. That’s a good one!
But now that he’s overcome his limbic system, Torvald has a new problem. To borrow a book, he has to become a member of the library and fill out the paperwork. But Torvald doesn’t have an address. You can’t fill out paperwork without an address! He leaves the book behind.
Back in the forest, what’s going on?
Torvald is using his extremely lucrative state salary as a forest guardian to cut down all the trees and build a house. Good idea, Torvald! And what a big house!
Now that Torvald has an address, he returns to the library and checks out his new book. Good work Torvald! Have fun discovering the motorways of Southern Spain!
Top Tip: When choosing a new book, check that it’s on the European Union Reading List.
SFX On last line, zooming out back to island atmos then TV turns off.
GUIDE: Hey, he’s got a good voice! And wasn’t that interesting? I never knew that starting a new book in the European Union was such a process! I’ll remember that from now. You should too. Could come in handy if we see any books on boatbuilding. I hope we have more opportunities to learn about the European Union on this island. GASP. And look, now that we watched the video, the toolbox has come loose!
SFX Toolbox creak. You solved a puzzle jingle.
GUIDE: A screwdriver, and some nails. Those will be useful for building a boat! Well done. You solved the puzzle! Right. Come on, let’s explore this island. I’ve a feeling we’ve a few more adventures coming our way. Ready?
SFX Click + Yes.
GUIDE: Great. Hey, why not save the game first? To save the game, press CTRL or CMD BACKSPACE and F1 and choose SAVE.
SFX CTRL BACKSPACE F1.
GUIDE: Would you like to SAVE, start a NEW GAME, LOAD an existing game or QUIT?
SFX Click.
GUIDE: Saving in Slot 1.
SFX Saving. Ding!
GUIDE: Would you like to PLAY ON, LOAD another saved game, or QUIT?
SFX Click + Quit (same as NO)
GUIDE: OK. Goodbye for now. See you back on the island next time you play Quid Pro Euro 96! Quid Pro Euro 96 is a European Videos game.
SFX Quid Pro Euro 96 shuts down. CD-ROM removed.