Video game ideas that you're sure others would think are a good idea

I think 'What's mine is yours!' is pithier.

Also I can't resist asking you to consider '(I can solve my problems with a chainsaw, and) I never have the same problem twice!'

The Revolution Will Not Be Tropeable

A Massive Multiplayer Crossover comedic action game about The Hero and The Villain having their game cancelled for being a Cliché Storm. You see, it was a generic "Legendary hero takes down an evil sorcerer" type plot, the kind of which you've seen a million times before. So an executive steps in to tell them that their game sucks and they are being sent to a literal Development Hell. There, the two find a book that lets them to enter other games' worlds, which they then try to take over as their own game. All the while, they are being chased by Development Hell's overseer before Fridge Logic finally kicks in and they realize they've had a game the entire time. Obviously, it doesn't take itself seriosly, and is rife to the brim with lampshades, Self-Deprecation, and meta humor. Think Nippon Ichi style.

So what do you think about that Wall of Text?

edited 24th Jul '11 3:08:50 PM by MegaRock35

Building off that, why not a Disgaea-esque tactics game which is also a Massive Multiplayer Crossover? Control people from TV series, anime, video games, comic books, literature, etc.

Of course that would take a lotta work but hey, that's what dreams are for.

That would be licensing hell, but it would be so worth it.

I'm still wondering a few things about Blake Hawk:

• What should he look like? Can he be an 80s-style badass action hero parody without looking like a Duke Nukem or Serious Sam ripoff?
• Whereas Duke plays the whole Pop-Cultured Badass with Testosterone Poisoning thing straight, Blake is supposed to be a parody of action heroes. I made his enemies Ninja Pirate Zombie Robots because it was the most ridiculous thing I could think of, but at this point I'm not sure whether it would be better to be an Affectionate Parody or a Deconstructive Parody where Blake is a loser at first and has an epiphany of some sort, at which point the story throws the Decon-Recon Switch.

A The Protomen video game.

The Protomen enhanced my life.

Surrendering enemies in FPS games.

I've had this idea since playing Time Shift, where you could freeze time and disarm an enemy. Once time was unfrozen, the enemy would (iirc) drop to his knees and put his hands up, which I thought was a neat touch.

With cannon shot and gun blast smash the alien. With laser beam and searing plasma scatter the alien to the stars.

Armed enemies surrendering when they realize they're just that boned? It was discussed in the very first page of this thread, SWAT for instance. I can also think of a few other examples of stealing weapons to make enemies flee, like in the last two Dark Forces games where you can force pull weapons from somebody's hands or in Deus Ex where you can smack them in the gun arm to make them drop it.

Eric,

Yeah, I was guilty of Thread Hopping. But I was thinking of a dedicated surrendering mechanic rather than simply stealing the enemy's weapons or manually disarming them.

Something along the lines of the AI calculating its survival chances, and choosing to surrender when it concludes it will simply die if it keeps fighting.

edited 26th Jul '11 6:59:12 AM by pagad

With cannon shot and gun blast smash the alien. With laser beam and searing plasma scatter the alien to the stars.

That's what SWAT has.

Eric,

But SWAT is directly simulating police work, where the objective is to apprehend criminals alive if possible in the first place.

I think that in something more combat-orientated, it'd be refreshing.

With cannon shot and gun blast smash the alien. With laser beam and searing plasma scatter the alien to the stars.

So there was this ambitious young programmer who set out to make the best game ever. He decided to do it by including a little bit of every genre of video games he was a fan of. Being kind of a ditzy genius, he successfully made a game that incorporated all these genres he loved, but the game itself was horribly marred by glitches and the like.

Of course, he's only about to begin playtesting, but feeling kind of lazy he decides to use a program some other genius geeky programmer invented: playtester.exe. Which does exactly what it sounds like it would do. What our ambitious young programmer doesn't know is that playtester.exe can only test whether a game could be conceivably finished by a human.

Hero, the... hero of the game, realizes that he's going to get deleted if playtester.exe decides otherwise, so he decides to take matters into his own hands. Problem is, his game world is such a messy mishmash of genres that the rules of the game change constantly.

tl;dr Excuse Plot.

So how does the game work? The basic mode is akin to a 3d platformer; At its most basic, the game world is "infested" by a number of zones, each representing a different genre. However, Hero can collect pixels for building zones (if not entire zones at the get-go) which he can then "plant" into unoccupied areas of the game world. There are also zones that can override a preexisting zone.

Hero can only enter panels that he's equipped to deal with. If he has no Mons, for example, he can't enter Mons zones. If he doesn't have an ATB gauge and some battle menus he can't go inside RPGs. Thankfully he can get stuff like that in any zone.

Having trouble beating up a martial artist in a fighting game area? Push him into an FPS panel and rain lead on him. Stuck in a particularly frustrating car chase sequence? Plant a turn-based tactics zone a la Advance Wars and work your magic. Stealth sequence too hard? Turn it into a Visual Novel, and all you'd have to do is pick the right choices!

...I think this is way too complicated, huh?

edited 27th Jul '11 3:30:30 AM by fillerdude

Super Robot Wars with western films
Hitchhikers Guide visual novel

This level of trolling is reasonable for Commander Obvious. What do you think of this, everyone?

I'd be down with that. It looks like it's building to a fourth-wall breaking ending where Hero realizes that he's done his work well, because he's been playing a perfectly stable game this whole time.

And make the VN NintendoInfocom Hard like the original.

Eric,

I'm wondering if it might be more interesting if Blake Hawk had fewer weapons, but each one had two modes of fire. If so, his arsenal would look something like this:

• Chainsaw: Continuous melee attack. Alternate fire performs a wide horizontal swipe with a 180-degree range.
• Raygun: A 50s-style sci-fi handgun that fires energy ball type things. Hold and release the trigger to charge up more powerful shots that ricochet off walls. Holding down alternate fire will fire a continuous stream of shots at the gun's current charge level, with the higher levels having slower firing rates.
• Shotgun: Fires shotgun pellets. Alternate fire shoots two shells' worth at the same time, but has a wider spread.
• Gatling Gun: Primary fire has a firing rate of about 600 RPM and little spread. Alternate fire has a firing rate of 1200 RPM with a slightly wider spread, and the gun may overheat if fired too long in this mode.
• Grenade Launcer: Fires bouncy grenades that explode on contact with an enemy. Alternate fire sets down proximity-triggered mines that stick to the surface (or enemy) they land on. Hold down either fire button to launch farther.
• Rocket Launcher: Fires explosive rockets that travel in a straight line. Alternate fire will launch homing rockets that do less damage and have a smaller blast radius. The wielder will take less splash damage than usual if he successfully performs a Rocket Jump.
• Freezeflamethrower: Primary fire emits a short-range stream that engulfs enemies in flames. Alternate fire has a longer stream with less spread that will freeze enemies solid.
• Lightning Gun: Shoots a continuous bolt of lightning with unlimited range. Alternate fire shoots multiple bolts with limited range that can hit up to four enemies at a time.
• Shrink Rifle: Primary fire shoots a projectile that will shrink the target, greatly reducing his firepower and mobility, and allow others to squash him for a kill. Hold down alternate fire to look down a long-range scope, and release to fire a round that will kill on a successful headshot.
• Light Zapper: An ancient weapon made of plastic, believed to be used to hunt ducks and clay pigeons, and used in shooting galleries and quick-draw duels. When fired, the whole screen will flash white for an instant. The Zapper has only three shots, but any of them will instantly kill. Alternate fire will use up all three shots (provided none have been spent) to kill everyone in the wielder's field of vision.

Addendum: What do you think of Idiosyncratic Difficulty Levels? I was thinking they could be, in ascending order, Chicken, Sparrow, Eagle, Hawk, and Vulture.

edited 27th Jul '11 2:15:41 PM by Cysma

A Sonic game where you can revive characters from fossils.

• Back Fossil-Mighty
• Gun Fossil-Gamma
• Leg Fossil-Tikal
• Tentacle Fossil-Chaos
• Coat Fossil-Heavy
• Tail Fossil-Ray
• Fuse Fossil-Bomb
• Palm Fossil-Maria

I am completely, utterly, and thoroughly done with Sola Sonica and 2D

I got this idea from a Youtube video of some of Machinima Respawn's Creature group, specifically Paragon Nova, Kootra, and Gassy Mexican, playing Left 4 Dead 2. Nova suggested a zombie survival MMO, and my brain took that idea and expanded on it.

Character Customization: You can design you character's looks, clothing, and stance in the beginning of the game. Clothing can be changed by going to stores and finding different pieces of clothing that you can mix and match. The stance is similar to the one in DC Universe Online. It shows their personality. The stances are serious, which is an unflinching, bold looking stance, for someone taking a zombie apocalypse seriously; scared, which is fidgety and has your character flinch a lot, for someone scared during a zombie apocalypse, but who continues to fight; psychotic, which is hunched over and constantly moving, for someone driven insane by the zombies; and a few other stances I haven't thought of. By leveling up, you can earn points to increase stats. Stats can improve your speed, your melee attack strength, ranged attack strength, and your health.

Zombie Types: There would be two types of main zombies, and then many more superior zombies. The main ones are the slow zombies, and the fast zombies. Slow zombies aren't much of a threat unless you stay still for too long. Fast zombies will run after you, obviously. These zombies would have different skin tones to show which one is which. Other zombies would have special mutations, like in Left 4 Dead. They would be pure Body Horror, and have different powers than normal zombies. They would serve as bosses and mini-bosses.

Weapons: You start out with just your fists, the weakest melee weapon, so it is important to find a weapon before you encounter any fast zombies. Weapons are separated into two types: Ranged and Melee. Ranged weapons are usually guns, but others like a crossbow or a bow-and-arrow appear. Melee weapons are the most diverse. You can have baseball bats, katanas, bo staffs, crowbars, chainsaws, chairs, and many more. Rare, powerful weapons can be found in black market shops, which are basically the only reason to get money that I have thought of so far. Weapons will wear out after a while, and as you level up, you can increase the number of items you can carry. Also, vehicles can be used as weapons.

Story: Zombies have overtaken the planet, but no one knows why. Your character, and thus everyone else's character, has the goal to survive the zombie apocalypse and discover the story behind it. A handful of NP Cs exist in the world, one of them being a scientist living in seclusion who knows about the event. When approached, he'll tell you to go away, but audio logs of his can be found across the game world, showing what happened. A wealthy businessman, dying and searching for immortality, turned to a terrorist organization claiming to have the answer. He ordered his pharmaceutical company to manufacture a serum based on there designs in hopes it would work. It killed him, but a month later, he rose from his grave as one of the most powerful boss zombies, and attacked. In this, after you are bitten, you have between one and two days to live before you die. After that, the virus kicks in, and you return as a zombie about a few days later (the virus strain mutated between the first and the latest zombies). These terrorists developed a virus that would change so it is unstoppable, with the intent just to watch the world crumble. The player characters eventually encounter this organization, in hiding, and will attempt to fight them.

With Other Players: This game would be full Pv P to show what a zombie-torn world would be like, but killing other players isn't encouraged. Reputation can be gained by helping others, while it can be taken away by killing them. Others can see your reputation, and that will help them decide if they should ally themselves with you.

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Would you have to gather supplies like food and water?

Is it necessary to take care of excretions? Is it necessary to sleep?

Is it possible to be action-movie gung-ho, or is avoiding fights the "wiser" option?

What are the penalties for dying?

I honestly think you'd need more types of grunts aside from slow and fast. Have some that wield weapons, some that wear some kind of armor, maybe some that can even hide their "presence"...

Instead of money, why not have different kinds of currency? Maybe you'd have to barter with the regular folk, but at other times you might be able to justify some sort of currency. Have a drug addict sell you stuff for weed, or maybe have some scientists give you stuff in exchange for various drugs, or give some food to a mechanic too afraid to step out into the world. Err, in other words, Fetch Quest shops wherein the quest is sort of always activated.

Oh, and there isn't any job classes?

edited 4th Aug '11 5:37:56 AM by fillerdude

^^Sounds like something that needs to push emergent gameplay to get the real people to make a lot of the extra conflict stuff, so some kind of grouping system to promote human social behaviors would be a must. First things that come to mind if you allowed players to make their own factions would be raiders/gangs and holdouts or whatever, the latter needing some kind of building mechanic so that players can make towns in the middle of nowhere.

"Never let the truth get in the way of a good story." Twitter

those are good ideas, but I don't think it would be necessary to eat, sleep, or shit. You don't have to do those in most video games, even MM Os. But maybe food can heal you like in Dead Rising. There could be zombies with special powers not strong enough to make them bosses that are encountered regularly like normal zombies. You'd get XP for killing zombies, thenanount depending on the weapon you used, and by performing missions for NP Cs, that vary from delivering supplies, rescuing another NPC, or killing enough zombies in certain ways. Dying might just be similar to other MM Os, where someone allied with you can heal you before you die completely. If you die, you'll respawn, but there will be a zombie lookalike of you where you died if bitten by a zombie. And I've never really played anything with job classes and doubt they'd be necasarry for a zombie game.

Groups of survivors would be great because it would be like zombie movies, where surviving people try to stick together, so factions are a good idea. I suppose you can get extra XP while in a group, and even get missions exclusive to teams. I imagined, but forgot to mention, that there would be several large safehouses across the game world, where players can stay safely. Even though this isn't exactly what you suggested, Im not too sure about adding a building aspect to a game where zombies have taken over leaving a bunch of empty buildings everywhere. Players can hide in these and close the door, and makenit a temporary base.

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I know some zombie games where job classes such as "Engineer" and "Doctor" exist, which is why I asked. They mostly seem to determine what kinds of skills your character can build up, or what skills your character can improve the fastest.

See, with PvP always on players are bound to rack up higher body counts than the zombies. By forcing them to specialize there'd be more incentive for teamwork and cooperation. Which brings us to factions.

So I guess it'll be possible for anyone to start up a faction of their own (probably when they reach a high enough level or something)? What features would factions offer, aside from teammates?

edited 5th Aug '11 9:42:32 AM by fillerdude

Safehouses would also be a good idea instead of building. I'm thinking you'd have to fortify the safehouse if you find an abandoned one (with just quick walking up to, say, a door, and activating it, then a menu is like "would you like to bar the door?), though, and also keep sentries and the like.

"Never let the truth get in the way of a good story." Twitter

Then job classes could be useful. Each person can perform a specific role in the group.

And about the safehouses, there are the main ones, which are large and are where NP Cs give you missions, and the abandoned building that can be made into a temporary base by fortifying it to withstand attack. These can be abandoned easily, and will reset to their default, unprotected form after a short time without anyone being inside.

The world map itself would be diverse, with cities, towns, forests, highways, malls, and stuff.

You guys like Let's Plays? You guys like shameless plugs? Well, come on down!

If I knew how networking worked, and if 3D games weren't so damn hard to develop, I'd probably start working on this project.

"Never let the truth get in the way of a good story." Twitter