Phonodeck
Interactive stories you play with your voice.
A no-build, AI-run text adventure powered by Google Gemini. Say how much time you have and the feeling you want, pick a curated story or a plot-free experience (or just upload a photo), and a Game Master builds a world just for you, keeps an eye on the clock, lands a real ending, and grades the result with a report card. Play by typing or hands-free by voice.
Curious how it works under the hood? See the flow charts in How the Phonodeck Works.
Features
- Play by the clock, not by turns: choose 10 minutes to 2 hours. The app learns your pace, estimates how many replies are left, starts wrapping up about three replies from the end, and lands a storybook ending in time. Having fun? +10 min in the header stretches the session.
- The feeling comes first: describe the feeling you want to come away with in your own words (or press Suggest some feelings, which builds on anything you have typed). It goes into the bible and is the Game Master's main goal.
- It notices when you're happy: every turn the memory pass also reads your mood. When the feeling is landing or you are clearly enjoying a character or place, the plot steps aside: no interruptions, no new complications, and threats don't follow you 200 light years away. Walk away from the plot and it lets you go.
- Two ways to play: a curated story (a hidden roadmap timed to the session, which bends or waits for you) or an experience simulator (no plot points at all: a richly painted world, your own goal, and the feeling).
- Personal details: your name, gender and who you're interested in (both free text, in your own words) and your birth year live in Settings > Personal details and are filled in for every new experience (change them for any one story).
- Choose your narrator: the first time, the set-up offers six Gemini narrator voices (three women, three men); tap one to hear it. The choice is saved, so the step is skipped after that (change it in Settings > Voice & sound).
- About you, and an age-appropriate story: the set-up asks your in-game name, age and gender (they can be made up, and are saved in Settings); romance is asked later, for adults only. Invited guests skip this step: the name and gender come from the invite (set on the admin page), or stay blank. A 10-year-old gets a G-rated, simple, playful story with no romance; teenagers get PG; adults get references pitched to their generation.
- Curated experiences, or build it yourself: pick a hand-made experience (its description shows and can be edited; Build my world starts it), or tap Build the world myself for the feeling you want, how you want to play, an optional photo, and the detailed questions, whose suggestions follow your earlier answers (children get their own options).
- Named characters, introduced one at a time: a 10-minute story has at most two named characters (plus a named antagonist), rising to three (plus the villain) at 30 minutes and up. Everyone else is known by their role (the pilot, the conductor) until the player asks their name.
- Names are revealed, not announced: every character has a real name, but someone you have not met yet goes by their role (the stranger, the old man) until the story reveals it or you ask. The World tab keeps the name hidden until then, and a new character is always introduced so they cannot be mistaken for you.
- Paint the world from a photo: upload a picture and the phonodeck works out the place, the time and the people, writes a detailed description of the world, adds lore, and fills in the rest of the questions.
- Living lore: when something changes in play (a relationship, a location, a secret revealed), the lore entry is updated, with earlier versions kept in the World tab. Each entry has a stable id, so a stranger who later gives their name updates their own entry instead of gaining a duplicate. It rides on the existing memory call, so it costs no extra requests.
- Short sessions that read like short stories: 15 minutes or less is told clean and simple (one goal, a small cast, a payoff ending), and its suggested settings stay on Earth in familiar times.
- Same cast, new story: after a story you love, start a sequel, a "years later", a fresh start or a prequel with the same characters and world.
- Long-term memory: story bible, lorebook, chapter summaries and hybrid keyword + semantic recall keep long stories consistent.
- A plan behind the curtain: secret roadmap, hidden GM secrets, and a "director" that varies pacing and flags repeated phrases.
- Report card: two grades from a discerning high school teacher: How the Phonodeck did (did it deliver the feeling and your goals?) and How you did (your own choices and play).
- Hands-free voice: dictation (say make it so to send; the phrase glows while the mic listens), Gemini narrator voice, soft background sound, and automatic cleanup of misheard words.
- You stay in control: edit the Story and World tabs mid-story (your edits win over earlier narration), undo a turn (memory included), watch the cost meter, save adventures as plain JSON files.
Quick start
- Get a Gemini API key at https://aistudio.google.com/apikey and set up billing for it (a small prepaid balance works).
- Open the app (see below) and paste the key on the welcome screen.
- Press Save key and start.
No key yet? Choose Try the offline demo to look around with a fake Game Master.
Billing: the game needs a key with billing set up. Without it Google refuses the Pro story model; the app checks the key when you first enter it (and on Test connection), and a free key gets a full-screen warning that blocks play until you paste a key with billing or choose to continue anyway on the Flash model.
This is the beginning of the README. Read the rest at the original. Read the full README ↗
