So, we've got coder, animation/art, writer and a load of people with ideas... That sounds like we're getting somewhere! The forums are probably not a great place to organise ideas though. Perhaps a wiki somewhere...
structured acceptance testing is my profession, i'm offering my services on that if you'll accept. I can also be of use when working on the functional design.
Joe, reading the concept of pacifist i got a great idea. You could make it a single-player coop game, much like this one: http://www.nekogames.jp/mt/2008/01/cursor10.html That way you can distract guards with one guy, and get into the newspaper offices with the next. It would even make sense to give every "guy" a specific set of skills. One would be the perfect look-a-like of a celebrity, another has climbing abilities, and yet another is a good liar. The main message of the game would become one of planning, calm and clever actions, and rewarding teamplay. Switching back and forth over a timeline would allow you to create a unique experience every single playthrough, because all the guys running around are doing different things each time, because it's all you. To limit players you'd have to disable violence alltogether, or put the police in a city-wide frenzy when you do open up a can of whoop-ass on them Characters that can no longer perform a task that you made them perform because of messed up timelines would simply shrug and go back to the crowd to protest some more. It would be a cool game mechanic to make sure you don't hinder any of your previously "programmed" guys, forcing you to start over on that one too. A game that does this and goes ever back in time in this way would be even cooler, and an order of magnitude more difficult to complete, because everytime you start a new character and get a new task, you have to make sure all the previously completed tasks don't fall over too. </brainwave> Ok, brainwave ended. We don't have to use it all, but how about the general concept? I think the single-player-coop thing would work very well with the "pacifist" concept.
Never seen Gunslinger Girl then. Actually, that one's pretty absurd too. A game I'd like to see is something like Eve Online but based around system terraforming (you'd have to explore and discover suitable candidates and plan, co-ordinate and build/grow/develop, keeping in mind each planet's specific characteristics), or complex deep space rescue. Think of the Star Trek Corps of Engineers books and you'll get the idea.
If we're going to do this then it needs to be something simple. I'm fine with 2.5d if it can be done, especially since I have no code skills to contribute, but I think to play it safe we should think about getting a basic model set up first. Flat 2D, but with a very stylised (I think hand-drawn style) approach to help things get going. I'm confused on concepts here too - are we doing my Pacifist idea, the original Target idea, or one of the many mentioned in between? Maybe everyone who wants to be involved should suggest something, then we'll take a poll? High concept, simple approach - it's the best way to do this, which is why both Target and Pacifist would work well. The more I think about it, the more I think Target would be more fun to play though. Both games have an inventive, new kind of mechanic, but could have a very simple presentation that would be easier (relatively) to make than many others. If people are serious then I just want to caution against three of us trying to make an epic 3D MMO.
Definitely. I'm all for a 2d game. Hand drawn is good to. I saw this earlier today. Would love to do something in a similar style. http://vimeo.com/972472 I'm up for making it gritty rather than bubbly and vector.
Gritty works for me. Black and white with stark contrasts between simplicity and complexity, is what I had in mind. If we did Target then a character with very basic, fluid lines being chased by clunky, complex enemies would be good.
I'm a bit confused aswell, as there are probably about 6 converssations going on in this thread I think the Pacifist game would be the easiest to make graphically speaking. It all revolves around interaction between different objects, and not so much around the objects themselves. Target has an inherent need to be scary, thus requiring a bit more graphical and animation work to be convincing. If we do both, i think concept and story on Target will be first to finish, but Pacifist will see the first release. My vote is on Pacifist for a first go. They don't have to cancel eachother out though.
Flipside looks good, but I was imagining something more along the lines of a pencil drawn look, and less of a Captain Pugwash look. I like the pseudo-parallax thing, with the camera zooming in and out of the layers, that looks very cool and should be quite easy to achieve. I'm with Xtrafresh, I think Pacifist would be easier to do from a gameplay perspective, although I do like the idea of the Target game. Maybe we could work elements of both into the final game? I'd try to steer clear of a pure platformer though - if we're going for something story-driven (and I guess we are with Joe at the helm), pure platformers always leave out the bit about why the platforms are there and what holds them up, and how come you're able to jump twenty feet to reach them. I don't know about you, but I could only jump a couple of feet without massive springs on my feet. If we're going 2.5D then I'd rather see more of a maze than a platform, where the aim is to get out of the maze within a certain time limit, while meeting certain criteria (don't get seen, don't get shot, don't shoot etc.) That's just my thoughts on the matter. This is a co-operative after all, so feel free to jump all over them (with springs or without)...
