Game Ideas

I'm sure I've brought up a thread like this before ... but I really can't find anything and I don't remember it ever being really explored.

What I want to do is start a discussion about game design ideas. Just toss out an idea you think is cool for a game or detailing a game mechanic. Talk about why it'd be fun and try to be creative. (Spending a paragraph describing a game that amounts to Doom with bunnies isn't what I consider stimulating discussion material)

The goal is to get people discussing other people's ideas and imaginations going wild about possibilities and maybe give someone more ideas.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

My wife and I have been dabbling with an idea to try the MAKE MOD option in the Hammer Tools. I have wanted to make a Capture the Flag style CounterStrike like game.. So you have something other than Bomb and hostage rescue missions. The problem is do you set it up like DoD, where you cap and hold flags, or like Tribes where you cap and return flags? Both have merits.

I'm sure this has been done someplace before but I haven't seen it or played it and since its so simple it has to have been done already but, I'd like to play a gladiator RPG. Worldwide. No exploring like Fallout or WarCraft. Just endless tournaments like Conan did.

Yeah sounds repetitive but I think it could be made interesting if someone put their mind to it. Anyway, it couldn't be any more repetitive than driving a car around a track or beating on a drum and I see people doing that all the time.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

I always wanted to make a top-down survival game. It would have different campaigns ranging from getting lost in the woods to an urban flood to all out zombie apocalypse. It would have four stats that the player would have to maintain:

Mentality or Psychological State: You have to keep from going crazy.
Fitness or Health: Keep fit so that you can perform more strenuous actions and stay alive.
Hunger: Self explanatory.
Thirst: Same as health.

Then the player would have a chance out of 100 all the time of being rescued that could be increased by: marking landmarks, creating smoke signals etc. But if the campaign you are playing is escape and not rescue mode then all this will do is draw unwanted attention to yourself and you will have to find a way to get back to civilization on your own.

Now imagine you are walking around a city torn apart by a huge earthquake. You climb up a bent and broken fire escape to raid an abandoned apartment building. You hear a sound in the distance. The helicopter begins its sweep over the city. You quickly run into a bedroom and rip a bed-sheet out from under a fallen support beam. The chopper comes closer. You pull out your trusty lighter, wad up the bed sheet, light a section of it and shove it out the window. The chopper passes, you have forgotten that fires are a common sight in this ruined city. You grab what supplies you can salvage and begin your decent down the fire escape.

Yes I have thought this out before.

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Now remember kids. Asking questions is a good way to get censored by the government.

Somebody in my class game up with a game idea for the iphone. It's a virtual rock throwing game using gps and bluetooth for positioning and the touch screen to calculate the vector for the rock.

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Aaron's Stuff

I'll tell'ya another I'd like to play. You know that old movie where they took people and kidnapped them and told them if they could avoid being shot/killed they would be set free?
I'd like that type game. You get to be victim or killer and see if you can make it from point A to point B You'd be on an island or some such with boundaries you couldn't circumvent and either survive or die. The game would take hours but you could decide beforehand how much of a head start the victim can have and perhaps you could win more points if you survived with less leadoff. The victim would get some very basic weapons like a stick/club or a small knife or better yet the victim would get more or less points depending on if they chose a weapon or weapon type. The killer would get more or less points depending on if the kill was quick, clean, or however.

That would be a cool game.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Orpheus said:
I'll tell'ya another I'd like to play. You know that old movie where they took people and kidnapped them and told them if they could avoid being shot/killed they would be set free?
I'd like that type game. You get to be victim or killer and see if you can make it from point A to point B You'd be on an island or some such with boundaries you couldn't circumvent and either survive or die. The game would take hours but you could decide beforehand how much of a head start the victim can have and perhaps you could win more points if you survived with less leadoff. The victim would get some very basic weapons like a stick/club or a small knife or better yet the victim would get more or less points depending on if they chose a weapon or weapon type. The killer would get more or less points depending on if the kill was quick, clean, or however.

That would be a cool game.

Kinda sadistic on the killer's side imo, but a cool idea none the less.

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Now remember kids. Asking questions is a good way to get censored by the government.

Condus Mundus said:
Kinda sadistic on the killer's side imo, but a cool idea none the less.

Yeah maybe, but you could play either side or better, HAVE to play both sides to finish the game. Still it would be a long game depending on the skills of the participants.

But is this any more sadistic than throwing out a satchel and hiding until joe blow comes along and blowing him to tiny chunks?

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Orpheus said:

Condus Mundus said:
Kinda sadistic on the killer's side imo, but a cool idea none the less.

Yeah maybe, but you could play either side or better, HAVE to play both sides to finish the game. Still it would be a long game depending on the skills of the participants.

But is this any more sadistic than throwing out a satchel and hiding until joe blow comes along and blowing him to tiny chunks?

Now there's a nasty tasting idea I'll chew on for a while.

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Now remember kids. Asking questions is a good way to get censored by the government.

The more I think about it the better I like it. Course it would take a powerful engine to play it to be anything close to realistic. You'd have to see footprints left by your quarry. You'd have to see a stream turn muddy if someone tried to enter it to escape in the water. You'd need foliage that bent or broke over if you squeezed past in a space to narrow.

Yeah, I like this game. Lets have our resident Oregonian code it and we'll playtest the dog shit out of it.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Before I get nominated for any more needless work, allow me to interject.

Orpheus, the game your describing will likely be one of the most boring games ever made. Because 1 on 1 hunting ... is boring. It's boring in real-life with spurts of adrenalin and then nothing. And games, still, don't work that way. I don't think anyone wants to sit at their computer for four hours staring at a log because they saw a shadow and the target is hiding there.

You'd have to alter the gameplay mechanic in SOME way to make it interesting. You could make it one small team of hunters and a LARGE group of targets and they're all human players. You could create two single player campaigns that are gripped on a personal narrative where you're being hunted because you're a deadbeat who can't pay his loan shark ... or a sadistic millionaire who hunts people to deal with the murder of his parents when he was a child. The point is ... these make it engaging.

There's a reason why war games aren't realistic ... they'd be boring as shit. It's different in real-life, because ... well you could die. But even if you made it so you could only play the game one time ever ... it would never have the same brevity. As a result, you can't just take something that would be exiting in real-life and translate it to a game. It sounds more like a starting point of a game idea rather than something you're going to tell me to go spend the rest of my life making.

HOWEVER, you did give me an idea ... but it feeds into one I've had for awhile. It's also WAY more sadistic than your idea, but I think it'd be very interesting.

In the same sort of style as more simulation RPGish type games, what if your character was a serial killer ... along with the complex past and narrative to go with it. The game would consist of several gameplay mechanics. You'd have to keep your nice appearance status in check. You know, not allowing anyone to find out about your extra curricular activities and what not (relationship simulation is possible here) Then you have segments where you have to do research. This is where you figure out who it is, what's their habits, where they live, how'd you do it, ect. then there's the more action oriented segments where you'd actually do it.
Leading back into relationship simulation with police investigations and things like that ... I think, because the people playing it are not ACTUALLY psychopaths, this would be pretty unnerving, but I think that's actually a good thing. Then again, most players turn oddly murderous and sadistic when they start playing games namely because shit doesn't matter.

There's also the possibility you can take the same basic mechanics, and create the game from the investigating detective's perspective.

You could then weave in another plot thread where you play as someone from one of the victim's families.

And it all sort of intertwines. I know this sounds a little like Heavy Rain, but what I'm thinking of is very different ... especially because you don't play as the actual killer in the game.

It'd be interesting to see a game where you do play a psychopath (nothing new), but the game isn't immature about it.

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Crono said:
Before I get nominated for any more needless work, allow me to interject.

Orpheus, the game your describing will likely be one of the most boring games ever made. Because 1 on 1 hunting ... is boring. It's boring in real-life with spurts of adrenalin and then nothing. And games, still, don't work that way. I don't think anyone wants to sit at their computer for four hours staring at a log because they saw a shadow and the target is hiding there.

AGREED

You'd have to alter the gameplay mechanic in SOME way to make it interesting. You could make it one small team of hunters and a LARGE group of targets and they're all human players. You could create two single player campaigns that are gripped on a personal narrative where you're being hunted because you're a deadbeat who can't pay his loan shark ... or a sadistic millionaire who hunts people to deal with the murder of his parents when he was a child. The point is ... these make it engaging.

ZOMBIE MOD for HL games, sounds like what your describing here.

There's a reason why war games aren't realistic ... they'd be boring as shit. It's different in real-life, because ... well you could die. But even if you made it so you could only play the game one time ever ... it would never have the same brevity. As a result, you can't just take something that would be exiting in real-life and translate it to a game. It sounds more like a starting point of a game idea rather than something you're going to tell me to go spend the rest of my life making.

If you made it that way, it would never sell, who wants to spend money on the chance you make it to the end? Wait Vegas mindset, never mind.

HOWEVER, you did give me an idea ... but it feeds into one I've had for awhile. It's also WAY more sadistic than your idea, but I think it'd be very interesting.

DO TELL!

In the same sort of style as more simulation RPGish type games, what if your character was a serial killer ... along with the complex past and narrative to go with it. The game would consist of several gameplay mechanics. You'd have to keep your nice appearance status in check. You know, not allowing anyone to find out about your extra curricular activities and what not (relationship simulation is possible here) Then you have segments where you have to do research. This is where you figure out who it is, what's their habits, where they live, how'd you do it, ect. then there's the more action oriented segments where you'd actually do it.
Leading back into relationship simulation with police investigations and things like that ... I think, because the people playing it are not ACTUALLY psychopaths, this would be pretty unnerving, but I think that's actually a good thing. Then again, most players turn oddly murderous and sadistic when they start playing games namely because shit doesn't matter.

Thanks for telling, what if you did it from two perspectives, one of the killer with voices whispering to him, and the other of a cop who's job is to get in the mind of this killer to catch and stop him. or some variation of that?

There's also the possibility you can take the same basic mechanics, and create the game from the investigating detective's perspective.

Damn I should of read on.. great minds and all..

You could then weave in another plot thread where you play as someone from one of the victim's families.

And it all sort of intertwines. I know this sounds a little like Heavy Rain, but what I'm thinking of is very different ... especially because you don't play as the actual killer in the game.

Humm it could work. Could be like a Jeckle & Hyde deal you could be the killer but when your in game your Jeckle... when you log off and back on it has a random crime that was committed while you were away from the game ( Sleeping ) etc.. so your not aware it was you or someone else who committed this act?

It'd be interesting to see a game where you do play a psychopath (nothing new), but the game isn't immature about it.

Good ideas..

Nice to see that my rambling can bare fruit. But seriously all I want to see in future gaming is a bit more realism. How many maps have plants but they never break when you pass through them? How many never have foot prints? How many never have muddy streams?

And you're right, it would be long, BUT I think not too boring if both players had to play both sides. Players 1 and 2 finish the game in say.... 6 hours. Its a big fucking island. They avoided all the pitfalls placed by the 100's of other people who supposedly ran this course, and the ones placed by the owners of this island.

Then the swap places and the clock runs backward from 6 hours. If it reaches zero before the second victim is killed he auto-wins.

I honestly think that given the cumulative experience we all have that we could come up with a reason to get that poor asshole to stop looking at the log.

But in the end, we're just supposing here, right?

Besides, I liked the long one on one hunting style. I played it a lot with HL1. Of course, nothing lasted more than 10 or 20 minutes but HL1 wasn't set up to play the way I described so nothing approaching 6 hours was ever gonna happen. But I think it prudent to point that out. Slow stalking kills can be satisfying ones. Especially if you are forced to avoid pitfalls and traps to achieve them. In HL1 there was no kill more satisfying than sneaking up on a fucking CAMPER and blowing him to bits. I HATE CAMPERS!!.... Oh, sorry I had a flash back..

[EDIT] Back to this log notion, the only way this would happen is if the players somehow forgot it was a game. And this games goals were not just to live through the experience but to get from a starting place to an ending place on this island. Preferably in a timely fashion. Also the starting and ending places would be randomly generated to forestall any learning of the islands layout. Promoting replayability.

Now don't get me wrong, your idea sounds intriguing but it also sounds like more of a single player idea with AI opponents and/or preset AI controlled ones. I was leaning more on multiplayer live people. Also, I see no reason to not broaden both ideas in order to remove the shortfalls of either. If that log is gonna pose a problem then by all means fill it with fire ants and deter that layabout from being near it.

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The best things in life, aren't things.

Who says the killer, cop, and victim's relative couldn't all play together in real-time coop?

All I'm saying is, if you want a game about manhunting ... it's going to be boring. You need to be doing SOMETHING else. There needs to be like ... objectives or something not something as simple as get from point a to point b, because people will exploit it.

There are games that have these elements. Metal Gear Solid on the PS1 had footprints that could alert guards to your presence. Crysis has nearly entirely destructible vegetation. As for, specifically dirt in the stream. You know, simulating it isn't the only issue there. How many games do you know of that actually give you the right about of control over your character to simulate realism? I don't know of a single one. They always do SOMETHING that you're not intending. So, making it so you can't even walk very close to a stream because your character will step a certain way and cause you to blow your cover ... will NOT be a fun experience.

To create the type of realism your talking about ... which is happening, I don't know why you think it's not ... would require quite a bit more resources than what we currently have available. I mean to make it truly act realistic what needs to happen is everything needs to be soft-body physics simulated and have an entire particle system. Currently, only minor things are real-time soft-body simulated. (Note: Soft-body simulation is where the surface of the mesh is made up of very small surfaces and are connected internally with a function that acts like a spring. This gives the illusion of fluidity in the surface. You can control how this object should act with the tension of the springs. Less tension the more it'll wobble. But in reality ... if you slow down the image you're looking at enough, you'll see that EVERYTHING wobbles, it just happens faster than we can see) And, from there, you'd have to have the ability for objects to break from each other and become new entities or get spawned into a particle simulation (dust/ashes) ... this is not going to happen any time soon.

Muhnay, yeah, but just because an FPS exists doesn't mean you're not going to make another one right? As long as it's not the exact same game I don't see the issue. (And people still make and release the exact same game)

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Blame it on Microsoft, God does.

Funny. I never realized my idea of fun was so fucking lowly.

aaannnyway.

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The best things in life, aren't things.