Kaiju City Defense

Note: I may develop the idea further at a later date. If so, this post will be updated.


The base idea may remind you of many anime of yesteryear: Monsters attack the city one at a time, and it’s up to you to defend it. But unlike Evangelion, GaoGaiGar, or Go-Busters, you don’t have a giant robot. Instead, you have conventional weapons. Fighter jets, tanks, SAMs, etc.

You are awarded a certain amount of money at the end of each in-game month, minus repair costs.

There are three phases to the game.

The downtime phase is the default state of the game. This is when you buy and upgrade things. (Towers, units, structural armor, underground storage, outposts, etc.) Time passes in an accelerated manner, how fast is up to the player. At the end of every month, the player gets a paycheck.

The preparation phase has you placing any purchased units and making any other preparations such as ammo selection. You will also receive intelligence concerning your foe. Depending on how good your detection systems are, you will receive information on the enemy’s location, form, and maybe even weaknesses.

The defense phase starts when the monster comes within range of your defenses. This progresses in real time, as it heads toward the center of the city. Once it gets there, it starts to dig. Whatever it wants, it’s underground. This also happens to be where your headquarters is, so the longer it attacks the more it could get damaged.

• Towers can be swapped out during the defense phase, though this takes time.
• Monsters change tactics in response to player defenses
• Conversation segments where you have to brownnose diplomats for extra budget?

Infinite Raceworks

One problem I'd realized with Infinite Mechworks is that getting a mech to walk is actually pretty damn hard. And while being able to design your own mech is very cool, (some might even say awesome) it's not for the light-hearted. That said, being able to design your own machine is a very neat concept. And so, I thought the idea might be better suited to a racing game.

Specifically, a sci-fi racing game. Think of it as a mix of F-Zero, Wipeout, and Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts. In order to keep the construction from being too daunting, you have a small number of adjustable parts to construct a chassis. The rest of the vehicle's parts are logical; an engine, cockpit, thrusters, and a hull. Once assembled, the game draws power lines in the most efficient way it can think of. These lines can then be modified by the player if they so desire.

Once the vehicle has been constructed, the player assigns commands to buttons on their controller. (Or keys, if they're using a keyboard and mouse.) For example, moving the left stick left or would turn wind flaps on a hover vehicle, the right trigger would activate the force pads at a certain power and turn on the thrusters. A weight inside the vehicle allows it to bank, and is controlled by the bumpers. All of these commands are chosen by the player.

There are three kinds of vehicles, classed by their mode of transportation. Traditional vehicles race on wheels, modern vehicles use force pads to hover and jets for thrust, and hybrids hover but can strategically deploy wheels for traction. Like Infinite Mechworks, a simulator is available. One of the most important features of the simulator is a wind tunnel; aerodynamics can be extremely important, especially if you're using a hover vehicle.

Now for the game modes. You can participate in single races and tournaments as in any racing game, but various limited modes are available as well. In stock races, you are given the same vehicle as everybody else, and have to rely on pure skill. Fix-up races give you a stock vehicle, and some cash to spend upgrading it. Drag races give you a budget that you have to spend on making the fastest, most efficient machine possible. Darwinist races take place across several tracks, and racers have to exchange a certain number of parts between tracks. Survival races last until only one vehicle is left functional- vehicles are often modified with spike pistons and other weapons for this mode.

Standing on the Lip of the Canyon

I just now had a very evil idea for Obake. However, this idea requires some context.

In Obake, you have three weapons that can be fired at any time. Firing a weapon slows your ship down somewhat. Firing two makes you go slower, and three slows you down to a crawl. Normally, this would be an incentive to not fire all your weapons at once. However, you need to be precise in order to dodge some of the more complex bullet patterns the bosses throw at you.

However, firing also heats your ship. Get it hot enough, and your weapons cease to function until the temperature goes back to reasonable levels.

Your ship also starts going faster again, smacking you directly into whatever bullet you were trying to dodge.*

Now, there is a way to cool your ship if you don't have enough time or leg room to let go of the trigger. You can graze. That is, you get very, very close to bullets. This is what the title of this post refers to. The more weapons you have firing, the more damage you deal to the boss, and the slower you go. Yet, you need to constantly graze lest you overheat.

Now for the evil bit. There is a score multiplier that changes, depending on how hot your ship is. If the meter reads 53% for example, your multiplier is x1.53. Thus, the player is encouraged to keep their heat gauge high, putting themselves in even greater peril because of the promise of a bigger reward. Granted, most players don't care about score. I am certain that a good portion of Obake's audience will, however.

*JackMackerel suggests; "If you overheat, have a trollface flash really really quickly on the screen." I'm tempted to put this in.

----

Edit: Shlapintogan mentioned something interesting that I overlooked. Keeping your heat high increases your multiplier, but discourages you from grazing. We managed to come up with a workable solution for this mutual exclusivity, though. Grazing has its own separate multiplier, which isn't as lucrative as the heat multiplier.

To prevent the player from having to look away from the play field to check their multipliers, sound cues are used. For example, there is a tick sound played every time you graze a bullet. As your graze multiplier increases, the pitch of the tick changes. Likewise, the heat meter has its own sound and pitch changes.

Thus, the player has three options.

1) Play it safe, and don't worry about score. Graze only when you need to, and keep your heat low.

2) Graze when you can, and get a small bonus.

3) Keep your heat up, and get a large bonus.

4) Attempt to juggle both, possibly net record scores, get bitches, and lose a bit of sanity.

The last option would be impossible for all but a small set of players, so Shlap suggested this. Have a region (45 to 55% or so) that if you stay in for both bars, nets you a bonus. Once both bars are in the sweet spot, the player is notified via a chirping sound. As the player sustains the bonus, the chirping gets more rapid, culminating in a ding that tells the player they have completed the bonus. Look to Beat Hazard for refinement and inspiration.

Obake -crazy bullets

Ponicalica showed me a tech demo he made recently for what i'm calling crazy bullets. Here's a short explanation from the man himself.

"Every frame, they set their horizontal velocity to one of -4 and 4 and their vertical velocity to one of -3.5 and 4.5.

Basically, it's one of these except tweaked a bit to get the bullets to drift down."

I'm not sure how to write these into the fluff just yet. I was thinking that what the player sees is an abstraction of what's actually out there, for the player's and the PC's convenience. This doesn't change the gameplay at all, but provides a good explanation for why the bullets are so visible. The crazy bullets appear a lot bigger than they actually are in gameplay, though. The circle that the player sees is just where the bullet is likely to be at that given moment. It's dangerous, but you can plow through a field of crazy bullets and not get hit.

This doesn't seem like something a lot of players would risk, though. Perhaps area denial is a better role for the crazy bullets? It'd tie in with the fluff, as well. UAVs can't be sure exactly where these bullets will be, so they steer clear entirely.

Opening for an RPG idea

The player starts in an office, at a computer. The PC is reading an article titled Cartographer I project delayed, researchers refuse to explain why. We hear a door opening, and the PC quickly alt-tabs to a program with various data on it. He swings around to face the person that just entered the room. It is a man in his late twenties, wearing a lab coat.

PC: Yes?

PERSON IN LAB COAT: Well, since we're going to be using your soul for the project, we thought it would only be right for you to decide the physical features of the host body. I've uploaded a program to our intranet. You can use that to decide what you'll look like in your next life. It's in a hidden folder in the main directory, so you should be able to find it pretty quickly.

PC: Thanks. I'll get right on it.

PERSON IN LAB COAT: I'll leave you to it, then. (beat) By the way, your reaction times have slowed. I managed to read that headline before you switched windows.

PC: (muttering) Dammit...

The PC opens a terminal window and opens the program. Another window pops up, and this is where the player designs their character. Options are body shape, skin tone, facial features, sex, etc. The player also names the PC here.

Once the player is done, fade to black.

The player sees nothing, initially. After a few seconds, the player's eyes open to reveal a white room with a door. It takes a few seconds for their eyes to focus. The PC is on a bed, and gets up. The PC stumbles for a bit before regaining its balance.

VOICE: Ah, you're awake. Glad to see that, I am. How are you feeling? Good, I take it? If not, feel free to rest.

PC: What's going on? Where am I?

VOICE: Hm. Seems you haven't recovered any of your personal memories yet. At least you know our language. Anyway, you are the result of an experiment to capture a soul and put it in a dormant body. As you can tell, the experiment was a success. You are free to leave the room now. If you have any questions- and I'm sure you do, feel free to direct them to anyone who's not working.

The player hears a click, and a light just above the door handle changes from red to green. Once the player exits the room, they are free to explore the lab. Talking to the staff lets you learn more about the project, and the surrounding world. You can also visit an obstacle course and a firing range, as a combat tutorial. It's about lunchtime when you wake up, so there are a lot of people with free time. The in-game clock doesn't advance until the player exits the lab, by the way. This section of the game is basically a tutorial, so the player isn't required to talk to all of these people and is thus skippable. I'm looking at you, Custom Robo.

At the firing range, the player has access to various firearms and is allowed to train with them. The guns available are mostly (BORDER NATION) weapons, but a few (CYBERPUNK NATION) and (MAGIC NATION) weapons are there as well. You are allowed to fire at targets, and can choose the range. Moving targets are available as well.

The person at the firing range has some knowledge he's willing to spare you for, mostly about weapons. Which weapons are best for what situations, the differences between various manufacturers, etc. He talks at some length, and you have the option to request (politely or not) that he stop.

He also mentions a challenge he has for you. Give him however much money you're willing to bet. Complete the challenge, and he'll double it. Try as many times as you want. The challenge is designed to be impossible, but you can win it. You'll just have to cheat. Sneak in your own weapon, mod it, use special ammo, rig the course, etc. If he isn't going to play fair, you don't have to either. Bet a small to medium amount, and you'll get double if you win. If you bet a lot, he'll still accept, thinking that you can't win. If you beat him, he'll admit this and offer you everything he has on him. Since this challenge was off the books from the start, and he tried to con you, you have a lot of leverage. Thus, you have a few options.

1) Give me the money.

2) Bullshit. You're holding out. (He is. If your speech skill is high enough, you get the extra cash. If not, you get the regular amount and he hates you a little more. May be this could tie into a later quest?)

3) Keep your money. I'll take a favor. (He thinks you're talking about a sexual favor, which the PC corrects. I'm not sure what to do with this option. Maybe have it tie into the same quest? Any advantage this gives you should not be required to complete said quest, but would make it easier.)

4) Keep your money. I'll take a gun. (He can't give you one of the range's weapons, since they're all licensed to the range and kept in stock. If one of them went missing, the bureaucrats would know. Instead, you get to choose from his collection. All the guns have women's names. Mabel, Vera, Beatrice, Jayne, Seras, etc.)

Whether you take the challenge or not, you can pay this guy to mod your weapons.

In the cafeteria, the player can ask about the outside world. If they do, they're directed to a specific person. In-game, this is because he knows a lot about history, politics, etc. Design-wise, it's so a bunch of dialog doesn't have to be recorded several times over by different VAs. Once the player talks to this person, they can discuss the following topics.

- What is the soul transfer project? (An experiment to capture and transplant a soul into a dormant body. The project director's health was failing, so he offered himself as the donor.)

- I remember the name Cartographer I. Do you know what that is? (The Cartographer I is the first man-made satellite, currently under development. Its main purpose is to see what's behind the Fog Wall.)

-- Fog Wall (A border of fog surrounding the continent, about three miles from the shore in every direction. Nobody that has gone into the Fog Wall has ever returned. The player doesn't learn this for some time, but it's actually utility fog.)

- What's outside the lab? (Player's question is answered, and conversation turns to the political state and how it got there. From then on the player can ask about any of these topics.)

-- (MAGIC NATION)

--- Magic (Not as diverse as the magic you'd find in a "normal" fantasy setting, but very powerful. The downside is that you're literally using your soul as ammunition. It's also possible to absorb memories, adding them to your soul. This results in more "ammunition" for spells, but is likely to drive the receiver insane. Since this isn't like regular fantasy magic, maybe I should call it something else?)

---- Sleeper agents with false memories

--- Political state

-- (BORDER NATION)

--- History and founding (Born out of the latest of many conflicts between (MAGIC NATION) and (CYBERPUNK NATION). The two nations have been fighting for as long as anyone can remember. )

--- Political state

-- (CYBERPUNK NATION)

--- Prosthetics (Think Ghost in the Shell. Prosthetic eyes are common, as are minor body mods. In the poorer cities, you can't afford a good prosthetic. Thus, infections and rejection from the body are common problems. Moonshine is a common antibiotic.)

--- Political state

Gameplay correction for Mach Racing

http://kotaku.com/5520839/one-little-change-to-how-cars-will-fight

I'd thought of how powerups might stack, but I think this would probably work better. Alt-fires are good, anyway.

Now I just need to decide how or if the player can strafe...