Digital Assets and World Binding Architecture
Within Nimi's digital world framework, content assets are structured across four well-defined conceptual tiers: Resource, OwnableAsset, Bundle, and Binding. Rather than treating everything as generic files, this modular design provides precise governance for ownership, composability, and monetization.
Four Core Asset Entities
1. Resource
- Concept: Foundational content bytes (e.g., textures, 3D meshes, audio clips, narrative text files).
- Invariants: Bound to content hashes and MIME types, but holds no ownership or authorship metadata, enabling safe deduplication and reuse across higher-level assets.
2. OwnableAsset
- Concept: Standalone digital property with recorded ownership and creation provenance (e.g., an authored sword model, avatar skin, or musical score).
- Invariants: Permanently records Owner, Author, and creation lineage; advances through standard lifecycle phases (
DRAFT → READY → ARCHIVED → DELETED).
3. Bundle
- Concept: An ordered composite grouping of multiple
OwnableAssets(e.g., an entire costume set bundling a hat, cloak, and boots). - Invariants: Encapsulates assets without merging them, preserving the independent authorship and ownership of each member asset.
4. Binding
- Concept: Semantic relationship attaching an asset to a host entity (e.g., attaching a laser sword (
Asset) to the weapon shop (Scene) in Cyber City (World)). - Binding Kinds:
PRESENTATION: Mounted purely for visual decoration or ambience.USE: Usable as an interactive object within the scene.IMPORT: Linked as a structural dependency for world rules.
Strict Validity Binding Matrix
To prevent invalid or incompatible asset configurations (e.g., mounting raw audio files as drivable vehicles), Realm enforces an explicit validation matrix:
- Only permissible combinations of
[Object Type] × [Host Type] × [Binding Kind]are admitted. - Unregistered or conflicting combinations fail closed, preserving world logic and visual coherence.