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Post by Nerissa on Mar 27, 2008 14:57:26 GMT -5
This thread for discussing possibilities for designing a brand new game that is not just a clone or knock-off of a previously existing game.
What games do we want it to resemble? What game play elements should be included?
Discuss!
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proto
New Member
that dog won't hunt
Posts: 2
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Post by proto on Mar 27, 2008 15:15:22 GMT -5
i think we need monkeys
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Post by jothki on Mar 27, 2008 21:54:35 GMT -5
We have the advantage of being able to trivially hide things from players and make the clients do whatever we want, so we might as well take advantage of that. I'm wondering if it's possible to make a board game based on heavily limited information.
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Post by MrBlarney on Mar 28, 2008 3:34:02 GMT -5
With the use of computers, we can do things that are computationally infeasible in a traditional environment. I was thinking a little bit more about the idea I posted in the Projects thread (link goes to my post) and spun off of it a little bit. Do you remember the game Drugwars? I remember my roommate freshman year of undergrad had a PC version, and apparently TI-calculator versions are popular according to the Wiki page. If you don't know what I'm talking about, go ahead and read about it, it won't take long at all. OK. So now take Drugwars, and make it multiplayer. And in space. Interstellar Traders (tentative name) places players in the role of newly founded, competing interstellar trading companies, starting off with only a small amount of starting funds and a single low-grade carrier ship. A number of commodities are available for purchase: certain worlds will produce these resources; others will have a high demand as consumers. Players will need to make smart decisions in purchasing units at low prices and taking them to other worlds to sell at higher prices without wasting too much time moving about in space. And space isn’t without its own risks and dangers. Wormholes can allow for quick travel across the galaxy, but black holes block off regions where players may travel. Raiders lurk in the darkness of space, waiting for the chance to take players’ precious cargo. Depending on the chosen race, special abilities will help their ability to purchase and sell goods, build faster or cheaper transport ships, or be able to negotiate with pirates. Accumulated wealth can also be used to manipulate events on the map. After a set number of turns, the player who as accumulated the largest net worth is declared the winner. I hope I haven't lost anybody so far. The game board will be composed of a hexagon grid; each hex will contain a world, a special feature, or empty space for travel. The board will probably randomly generate for each game for variety. There will be a list of about six to eight different commodities, and worlds will either be producers or consumers of low or high amounts. This will affect the prices that players will have to pay to purchase the resources, or the price that the world will buy the products. At the start of the game, players will select a planet as their headquarters and an alien race to play as. All moves are performed simultaneously. Each race will have different special abilities that will give them various benefits throughout the game. On the starting planet, they get their starting funds and their starting ship, perhaps with different setups depending on race. On each turn, players have a number of different actions to perform. For each ship in their fleet, they must outline where they will be moving. If that ship is on a planet, players can also decide whether or not to buy or sell commodities, loading onto or off their ships. Different ships will have different movement rates and different carry amounts, which again may vary by race. On the planets, players can decide whether or not to build a production facility for ships or build more ships for their fleet. On the starting world, the production facilities are provided for free, but on other planets, facilities must be purchased. As each turn is resolved, random events may occur. War may break out between worlds, blocking off regions of the map, raiders may strike carriers causing loss of materials, and sudden changes in the world economies may affect prices on a scale far beyond normal or expected fluctuations. At the end of a set number of turns, the game ends and the player with the most assets is declared victorious. I haven't written up the details yet, but the ideas are becoming more clear. If we want to add a PA-style spin to it, we might be able to ask for tuxkamen to integrate the game into his Ad Astra Per Phalla universe. but one thing at a time - does this seem like a good idea? And does it seem like a feasible idea?
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Post by technicality on Mar 28, 2008 4:52:49 GMT -5
Sounds good! My thoughts on what you've said so far:
-Make sure its fun and works in its simplest form before focusing on features. By this I mean in my experience the game mechanics need to support it being a fun game with the bare minimum (eg. 1 race, 1 ship type, 3 types of goods, a few planets and no random events) or all the extra content in the world won't help. I'm not saying you haven't got this in mind (as you said all the details aren't written up), but I thought I would point it out.
-At its simplest I can see the core game revolving around the balance between gathering/trading intel, and making money off this information by keeping ships strategically placed to take advantage before the other players do. Each shipment would be a gamble on where you know/predict the opponents ships are and if he knows about the moneymaking opportunity. Is this along the lines of what you were thinking?
-Assuming the above is correct, I think a quick and easy system of trading and doctoring information is key to the game. Then you have the opportunity to trade info you are badly placed to take advantage of, or mislead opponents after gaining their trust.
-Since its on a computer having a spider diagram type board would be as easy as hexes (and look nicer I think).
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richy
New Member
Posts: 13
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Post by richy on Mar 28, 2008 13:03:41 GMT -5
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richy
New Member
Posts: 13
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Post by richy on Mar 28, 2008 23:05:43 GMT -5
But seriously Blarney, your game sounds pretty interesting. I'd play that.
One thing does bug me. It sounds long. Trading, accumulating wealth, building a fleet and a trading empire... How does that fit with "After a set number of turns, the player who as accumulated the largest net worth is declared the winner." Either the set number of turns will be extremely high, or players won't have time to built their trade empire to its full potential.
Also, an idea: you should let players build war ships as well, to defend against raiders and pirates (and possibly attack other players).
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Post by Peterdevore on Mar 29, 2008 16:07:19 GMT -5
I wish to share one of my more ambitious and experimental game concepts. It's probably too ambitious as a PA project, but you might like my idea for controlling characters. A persistent isometric perspective RPG set on a massive reliquary space station. You do not control your character directly, but rather plan out their actions on a timeline. Typical actions include what you can do in Urban Dead, like making fortifications, searching for weapons and researching. Think of a multiplayer Dwarf Fortress and Space Station 13 put together for the general idea. Actions can take pretty long, but since the world is persistent and you cannot log out your character, you can plan long actions ahead on the timeline. Aliens, robots and failed experiments will roam the space station, so you have to find or fortify a safe haven for the longer actions. Banding together enables players to share resources/ingredients and repaired machinery/tools. It would also be nice to enable some kind of character sharing within groups. When you are playing and an emergency arises, you can take control of characters within the group who are not currently controlled by their player and alter their timeline. Main aim is to 'legalise'/solve two interesting problems in multiplayer games: botting and account sharing/sitting (the benevolent kind, where you allow someone else to keep your character out of harms way/up to snuff). I still have to work out how character creation and the game world blend. It would be fun if the world was truly massive (DF size), allowing you to plan out long journeys on the timeline. I liked the feeling I had traveling to the PA settlement in Wurm online, getting lost with someone and being assaulted by bears. Explorations and expeditions into the unknown are something that a lot of people like about massively multiplayer games, but isn't given a lot of consideration when designing games, I think.
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Post by MrBlarney on Mar 30, 2008 4:40:05 GMT -5
Sounds good! My thoughts on what you've said so far: -Make sure its fun and works in its simplest form before focusing on features. By this I mean in my experience the game mechanics need to support it being a fun game with the bare minimum (eg. 1 race, 1 ship type, 3 types of goods, a few planets and no random events) or all the extra content in the world won't help. I'm not saying you haven't got this in mind (as you said all the details aren't written up), but I thought I would point it out. -At its simplest I can see the core game revolving around the balance between gathering/trading intel, and making money off this information by keeping ships strategically placed to take advantage before the other players do. Each shipment would be a gamble on where you know/predict the opponents ships are and if he knows about the moneymaking opportunity. Is this along the lines of what you were thinking? -Assuming the above is correct, I think a quick and easy system of trading and doctoring information is key to the game. Then you have the opportunity to trade info you are badly placed to take advantage of, or mislead opponents after gaining their trust. -Since its on a computer having a spider diagram type board would be as easy as hexes (and look nicer I think). I agree, it's worth looking at a simple version of the game with no special abilities from races, and three resources that can be bought or sold. Probably the first thing to do in prototyping, especially to test the economic systems. It's a shame I don't know much about economics, otherwise I'd already have a better idea of how things will work. Your other comments give me the idea that one of the things that people could produce is central offices that give intel on the local planetary markets. My initial idea was that each world would have the following information about each resource: whether it was a low/high producer/consumer, the current price, and the recent trend of the price. All of this could be public, with no other information. Randomness beyond natural expectations would be caused by special events or actions, both environment-produced and player-created. Rivals' actions will affect the galactic economy, and if you aren't on top of what your opponents are buying and selling, that could be a potential problem for your trading company. As for the hexes vs. free coordinates vs. spider diagram thing, I liked the hexes since it was simple yet flexible. If your cargo ship cannot make it to its destination in one turn, then you can set it on a path that is between two other worlds. That way, you might be able to see if anything changes between turns such that you can react to them without having to make too drastic of a shift in course. Players should be able to trace out where each individual ship goes in each turn. But seriously Blarney, your game sounds pretty interesting. I'd play that. One thing does bug me. It sounds long. Trading, accumulating wealth, building a fleet and a trading empire... How does that fit with "After a set number of turns, the player who as accumulated the largest net worth is declared the winner." Either the set number of turns will be extremely high, or players won't have time to built their trade empire to its full potential. Also, an idea: you should let players build war ships as well, to defend against raiders and pirates (and possibly attack other players). There's this game called Ultracorps that is currently in beta testing at Steve Jackson Games, that I have taken a lot of inspiration from in the Interstellar Traders idea. In a nutshell, it is a galactic conquest and empire building game played on a simultaneous-turn schedule and with a large number of players playing in the largest games (numbering in the hundreds). Each turn, units are built and fleets are sent out to do battle; typically, turns run on a daily schedule, sometimes every other day. A standard game lasts about 30 turns, or about a month. Interstellar Traders is more or less a simpler take on the Ultracorps game, but with a different focus. In Ultracorps, the main idea is conquest: there aren't many tools for trade or cooperation. Players cannot coexist on the same planet, and there are only two resources available. In addition, for these resources to be any good for production (which really is a major part of the game, in terms of supporting the top level goal of conquering your opponents' empires) they must be on a world - two turns are wasted loading population and 'ultranium' onto cargo ships and then unloading them at the destination. I left out warships in my original post since I wanted to emphasize the trading core of the game. There will be the possibility for players to purchase escort ships to protect their transport ships and privateer ships to act as extra pirates, but their roles should be limited. I don't want people to be building more than five to ten ships by the end of the game; limited numbers of units will make the game simpler to handle and also increase the amount of strategy people will have to use in managing where their ships are. I think that 30 turns at one turn a day is a reasonable thing to expect from a game like this. Games of Diplomacy can take quite a while in an online environment, even at an accelerated pace of one phase every other day. If a turn only requires a few minutes to manage at the least, a half hour or so at the most, then I think people will tolerate (or as one would hope, enjoy) a game of this design.
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