idea for a game to be made?

[sotu1]

okokok, had a wikid thought, based on Jamie's thread "I don't want to be an assassin any longer".

what if....you're not an assassin....you're the target? you spend the game running away from assassin(s) and try to fend them off?

I think it would be a wickedly tense game! and with so many scenarios/eras to try out!

your thoughts please!

(this idea is now a copywrited idea of sotu1! if anyone thieves it i'm going to sue!)

[Xtrafresh]

lol, fun idea.

Although there are already lots of shooters where you are fleeing the scene at some point. Always good gameplay element, but very hard to balance.

and you cant copyright this, it's like copyrighting forgetting your carkeys. It's been done before, and will be done again

[sotu1]

meh, true. well can they make this game anyway? I'd like to play it. kinda like Resident Evil Survival horror tension. Not all out action indiana jones escape.

[acron^]

Clock Tower?

[sotu1]

clock tower looks good....but i don't have a PS/PS2.....shame

[Fod]

splinter cell 4, resident evil 4.

[modgodtanvir]

games based on the bourne trilogy?

[CardJoe]

It would be good if you had a properly designed interface - otherwise you'd be running blindly, then BOOM - sniper takes you out. This is exactly the reason they cut the Hydra from HL2. Here's this wicked monster who can move through stone and metal, is made out of energy and can pick people up and throw them around. It sounds exciting. You watch the old demo vids of the game and it looks awesome. The Hydra head is picking up Combine, throwing them around, ripping them to pieces. The Hydra is scary and beautiful.

Then, when you had to face it in battle, all you'd see if a blue thing flash to the center of the screen and then you'd be dead. Not fun.

Of course, the game idea I'm currently working on (see sig) has similar problems.

And, on topic, if you want to see a really thrilling "I'm being chased sequence" then play Call of Cthulu: Dark Corner of the Earth. Utterly terrifying as you use furniture to block doors and so on. The later stages of Beyond Good and Evil have some great being chased sequences too and you get loads in Thief if you slip up at any point.

[z3rb]

Originally Posted by sotu1

well can they make this game anyway? I'd like to play it

Sure, I'll get right on it!

[sotu1]

Originally Posted by z3rb

Sure, I'll get right on it!

ta! how long will it take? how much is your production budget? do you need some pregame hype cuz i'm sure i can pull somethin up! hehe...

ok..call of cthulhuthlu...i'll try n find me a copy

[Bauul]

Originally Posted by z3rb

Sure, I'll get right on it!

Count me in! Give me notepad, two hours and some bubblegum and I'll have it ready.

[z3rb]

Originally Posted by sotu1

how much is your production budget?

[Bauul]

Originally Posted by CardJoe

This is exactly the reason they cut the Hydra from HL2. Here's this wicked monster who can move through stone and metal, is made out of energy and can pick people up and throw them around. It sounds exciting. You watch the old demo vids of the game and it looks awesome. The Hydra head is picking up Combine, throwing them around, ripping them to pieces. The Hydra is scary and beautiful.

Then, when you had to face it in battle, all you'd see if a blue thing flash to the center of the screen and then you'd be dead. Not fun.

I always wondered about this. I've seen the beta vids and read the design book you've got, but to be honest it seems far more that Valve just weren't any good at realising the Hydra properly. I've played many games with enemies that have a tentacle attack such as the Hydras, and none of them have struggled with getting it to be fun the way they did with the Hydra.

The problem with it are three fold. a) the attack is a stabbing attack, which is hard to spot as you have no depth perception in the game. linked to this is b) it's thin so hard to spot and c) it's see through, again hard to spot.

Right, now lets see if we can fix this. a) make the attack run along the floor/over the head of the player, so they can more easilly percieve the distance change, or make it a whipping attack instead of a stabbing attack. b) make the tentacle thicker. c) give it a solid core.

Oh wait, that was hard wasn't it? I feel my brain has imploded from the sheer mental effort of fixing these totally simple problems. I still can't get my head around why they struggled so much with it. Even Sega managed a good tentacle boss in House of the Dead 3, and that's saying something.

[MikeTitan]

I like the bourne aspect of this game. You kinda start out woozy and no Idea where the hell you are, maybe covered in blood or something. You make your way out of a dark alley or any dark area, then BAM, some thugs try to surround you. Then something snaps, and you enter the tutorial. You learn your hand to hand combat and literally own the socks off the thugs, grab one of their weapons (knife or something) and some of the money they have, and you go to a nearby motel. Have some scary dream where people break into the motel and try to kill you. You wake up, hear people outside. Go into berserk mode, kill them, steal their weapons. Question the last guy before shooting him. He tells you that you messed up, and now you're the target.!!!

-- Basically lots of stuff from Bourne, but some more super-natural aspects such as clairvoyance and slight Telekinesis.

Man I could write up a story for this in no time

[sotu1]

Originally Posted by MikeTitan

I like the bourne aspect of this game. You kinda start out woozy and no Idea where the hell you are, maybe covered in blood or something. You make your way out of a dark alley or any dark area, then BAM, some thugs try to surround you. Then something snaps, and you enter the tutorial. You learn your hand to hand combat and literally own the socks off the thugs, grab one of their weapons (knife or something) and some of the money they have, and you go to a nearby motel. Have some scary dream where people break into the motel and try to kill you. You wake up, hear people outside. Go into berserk mode, kill them, steal their weapons. Question the last guy before shooting him. He tells you that you messed up, and now you're the target.!!!

-- Basically lots of stuff from Bourne, but some more super-natural aspects such as clairvoyance and slight Telekinesis.

Man I could write up a story for this in no time

Afraid I'm not so keen on the whole "i got inherent kick ass powers that PWN everyone else", kinda defies the whole fear thing. let's face it, bioshock wasn't scary once you developed super powers... And as director on this project i say no!

Project log:

Bauul joins team with notepad and bubble gum
Dr Evil provides budget of a million/billion dollars (depending on which decade he's in)
zr3b doing something i'm not quite sure about!
MikeTitan writing up stories that I am currently rejecting!

[Bauul]

I'll do the soundtrack too! Me on Guitar, Joe on Kazoo, everyone else on rubber-bands-over-tissue-box. We'll win an Oscar!

[MikeTitan]

Originally Posted by sotu1

Afraid I'm not so keen on the whole "i got inherent kick ass powers that PWN everyone else", kinda defies the whole fear thing. let's face it, bioshock wasn't scary once you developed super powers... And as director on this project i say no!

Project log:

Bauul joins team with notepad and bubble gum
Dr Evil provides budget of a million/billion dollars (depending on which decade he's in)
zr3b doing something i'm not quite sure about!
MikeTitan writing up stories that I am currently rejecting!

Oh I agree for the most part, but hence the 'slight'. I think it would be hard to do without being annoying, but if you were somehow able to see something happen of say, you getting mauled by a bear or something. Then you happen to be in the woods and notice a tree looks familiar so you whip out your largest caliber weapon and low and behold, here comes Smokey.

As far as Telekinesis, I'd make it something chargeable. So you can charged up a full blast, then have enough force to knock someone back a few yards, but it takes a bit to recharge. You can levitate a small object or pull something towards you, but you'd only have a charge to pull something x amount of feet depending on it's size. Larger object would use said charge faster.

However, overall I'd have to say once you get some of the weapons and skills in Bioshock the game is easy as can be. One thing I'd like to revolve around is ammo conservation, and weapon availability. To make the game good, you'd need a relatively good storyline, but great combat and a little bit of free roam to complete your tasks. Maybe the main guy has some random tidbits of info he can then go to a internet cafe to do some research and start an investigation.

Hence the reason you'd be wanted is that you're probably property of some organization which wants you back, maybe even have some searches flag the company/bad guys and leaving the Internet cafe may cause you to run into another assassin after.

[CardJoe]

Originally Posted by Bauul

I always wondered about this. I've seen the beta vids and read the design book you've got, but to be honest it seems far more that Valve just weren't any good at realising the Hydra properly. I've played many games with enemies that have a tentacle attack such as the Hydras, and none of them have struggled with getting it to be fun the way they did with the Hydra.

The problem with it are three fold. a) the attack is a stabbing attack, which is hard to spot as you have no depth perception in the game. linked to this is b) it's thin so hard to spot and c) it's see through, again hard to spot.

Right, now lets see if we can fix this. a) make the attack run along the floor/over the head of the player, so they can more easilly percieve the distance change, or make it a whipping attack instead of a stabbing attack. b) make the tentacle thicker. c) give it a solid core.

Oh wait, that was hard wasn't it? I feel my brain has imploded from the sheer mental effort of fixing these totally simple problems. I still can't get my head around why they struggled so much with it. Even Sega managed a good tentacle boss in House of the Dead 3, and that's saying something.

The Hydra was also made of energy though, capable of phasing through solid objects. It's not just a big wavy tentacle, it was supposed to be a big underground energy creature that reached up through the ground. It didn't stab you per se as much as phase through you and kill you.

The problem wasn't just animation though, but also a matter of AI. The Hydra was something you'd see for ages before you fought it in a long section of the game set in an underground base. Because the nature of the hydra required it to be underground, when that section of the map was cut then the hydra was cut too. It was all apparently designed by one guy, who spent six months getting the model and animations and so on right, but in the end the monster was very tough to animate and difficult to fight.

Giving it a whipping attack when it was supposed to be this energy impaling monster wouldn't really make sense in the long run, so as the problems mounted and that entire section was cut from the game (along with The Air Conditioner, The Cremator, The Borealis, the Assassin Combine and the entire Arctic section) they decided to leave the hydra out too.

It was a case of cost to benefit I think. For the hydra to be in the game would require an entirely new section of the game designed with that one creature in mind, plus all the modelling and AI and so on. They tried to incorporate a similar kind of monster in the Antlion King, but that too was later cut from the game in favour of the more traditional Antlion Guard at the end of the Sand Traps level.

More on topic, I am actually about to start looking at making my own (very simple initially) game soon, possibly using XNA. Think there's room to make it a community project with a few seriously interested parties? I have no experience with coding, so all help is appreciated

[Flibblebot]

I think that's a totally cool idea.

I mean, we have enough coders, artists & other creatives around here to be able to do something like this. After all, if Gabe & Tycho can write a game, why can't we?

There are a couple of options available for writing the game, such as XNA or DarkGDK, and VS Express is free for those unwilling to fork out the couple of hundred quid for the full versions of VS.

Not sure whether there is a cost associated with XNA though - I'm just reading through MS's pages to find out.

Bagsy I get to be project manager

Ninja Edit: XNA is free for the PC, but costs $99 per year if you want to develop on the Xbox. I'd plump for Windows at the moment, because it looks prohibitively complicated to share games on the Xbox (at least until the end of this year). It also looks as though XNA is based around C#, which is a language I have no experience of. More info here

[CardJoe]

The question is how to orchestrate such a thing without it becoming a second job for everyone and keeping the goal realistic but fun enough. If anyone is interested or has suggestions fire them up here or make a new thread and we can mull it over as a community.