Why not create our own game?

[Jalif]

I'll write my idea here for now instead of clustering up the game forums. The ideas such as names and whatever are open for suggestions. Take the principle of the idea in your head and don't pick on the details. I will work that out ones you guys say that the idea has potential and will even create art assets.

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Name of Game: Scrapheap Arena Robots
Game type: Multiplayer FPS
Game Engine: Unity (for now)

Synopsis
Instead of having a realistic shooter I want to create a more "less serious" approach with little combat robots that duke it out in a Arena. It should have the feeling of a gladiator game where it is all about the game. Like many games all robots will have a standard layout. Arena's are symmetrical (most of the time). There is no such thing as personal score, the game will be team based and so will be the score. You could see it as a Teambased FPS Trackmania

The art style will be simple to give more room for creating extras. The art style is similair to the upcoming title of Planetary Annihilation which give it a bit of a cartoony look. Obviously it won't be exactly the same but there is no need for over the top complicated textures. Neither there won't be large amount of polygons. This is easy to create, maintain and will run on any computer. Including the map will have repetitive elements so that making new maps is easy. With enough development even custom maps will be an option

Weapons of the robots is a Main Gun and A Mini grenade launcher. No knifes and pistols.

The upcoming ideas are stretch goals and they don't have to make it up all the way to the end. It is up to us how far we want to go.

Stretch Goal 1 - Win Conditions

  Spoiler:

Everything has been explored regarding FPS. Few games can already create their own custom weapons, characters & maps. However non of them have custom win conditions during a game. Within this game you can even have multiple win conditions that have to be completed together or on its own. The best way to show what I want to achieve is by giving examples. These rules would be setup along with maps on a server.

Example 1 - An AND example. You have to complete both to win.

Capture 3 Flags
AND
Kill 150 Robots

Example 2 - An OR example. You either have to complete on of the both.

Get 200 Beacon Points
OR
Kill 200 Robots

Example 3 - A simple death match

Kill 200 Robots

Example 4 - A complicated match

Kill 200 Robots
AND
Get 200 Beacon Points OR Capture 3 Flags

Example 5 - A funny difficult match

Die 50 times
OR
Capture the flag 3 times

*In other words, the game won't be a mass kill spree, you will have to look out who you will kill.. cause if you kill to many.. you will loose .

Stretch Goal 2 - Customise maps
See Arena and Art style, there is not much I can add to it beside the fact that each map needs a location for spawns, flags & beacons to allow all kind of game plays with different win conditions. But even if we have 10 maps created by the developers, it will give a huge amount of game options anyway. So this isn't even needed so much.

Stretch Goal 3 - Customise Weapons
We don't have to go this far, but if you like the ideas so far... we could.

  Spoiler:

It is a different customisation then what you would see in todays FPS. Currently you got stuff like silencers, fore grip, heavybarel, scopes and whatever. I'm going for a different type and that is with sliders or points.

It is similar like attributes within eve. You can choose where you want to put your points. Within this game you can do the same thing but with the weapons that the robot is carrying. Something along these lines.

Main Weapon

Damage Atributes
- Accuracy
- Rate of Fire
- Damage per Bullet

Reload & Ammo Atributes
- Ammo Capacity
- Reload Time
- Recharge time (Robots in this game recharge their Ammo Charges over time, there are no ammo crates in this game)

Options which don't require points
* Single Action, Burst Action & Automatics
* Different Type of Scopes

Mine Grenade Launcher

Damage Atributes
- Knockback
- Web
- Smoke
- Raw Damage
- Effective Radius

Other
- Reload Time
- Amount
- Recharge Time
- Megazine

Extra 2 or 3 points that you can give to anything

Stretch Goal 4 - Customise Robot

  Spoiler:

Yep, even customise robot could be possible.
This will also have energy points which you can distribute.
[QUOTE]
Shield/Health
- Shield Amount
- Shield Recharge
- Shield Remote Recharge? (maybe - constant AOE)

Mobility
- Forward Speed
- Sideways/Banking
- JumpHeight (will need mechanics to prevent to the extreme bunny hopping)
- Fall Damage Reduction
- Knockback reduction (see grenade above)

Extra Points if you want better mobility or Health.

This is my idea for now... Let me know if you guys like it and work it out.

[Lana Torrin]

I see stuff as Stardrive, Minecraft, Prison Architect & FTL being build by just one (/two) person with complex mechanics & rather complex ai. Creating a game doesn't seem to be "difficult". The most difficult is to present/market/create a good idea.

Oh and to make a serious post: It's because those people often put all their life into their projects, over months and years. One dedicated bedroom programmer equals probably an indefinite number of lolvideogames theorycrafters who don't have that stamina.

Rather obvious rant here, but the post still made me facepalm a bit.

But you're right, if we do something it should be rather small so it can be finished in maybe 1-2months. Then go from there

This is a "good idea".. I still think we would fail at that size of a project. We are awesome that way.

How do we feel about developing for a tablet? I have an idea for a simple tablet game...

Edit: Also, being honest, I don't like giving my ideas away. Occasionally I have a good one and I kick myself every time I realize its good and im doing it for free.

[Jalif]

See the above.

Regarding developers locking up their room for months and years. Well... if we get a big enough team on FHC and make it some kind of open source project kind of idea then we can work on it for a few months and see it from there. It doesn't hurt to dream a bit... Maybe something big comes out of it, maybe notting... but for me it is worth trying cause you simply never know.

[balistic void]

See everyone has ideas for games, but noone actually wants to write difficult code.

[Lana Torrin]

See everyone has ideas for games, but noone actually wants to write difficult code.

TBH if you don't mind the code coming at you in the 3 or 4 oddball languages I know (none of which are C or perl) I have no issue writing hard code. I'm best at Delphi.

[Blutreiter]

Hm... not in favor of doing an FPS straightaway. I would consider modding an existing game.

Excellent stuff to use would be the Quake 2 engine, even if it is old - it's pisseasy to get started (speaking from experience - i was involved in quake 2 and 3 mods with models, graphics, sound and coding). The reason why I would use such a base is - I think you can already grab standalone SDKs and tons of engine improvements and you have a fully working gamebase in terms or art assets, maps, netcode, yaddayadda.

[Jalif]

See everyone has ideas for games, but noone actually wants to write difficult code.

When I created with somebody else Kethane mod for KSP... it was also massively difficult. However he managed to code it within 2 weeks a really good solid while I created the art assets. There are people who love to make difficult codes.

As long as somebody has an idea and can make other people inspired, then notting is impossible.

Don't get me wrong, if people don't like the idea at all then I'm fine with it. But I presume many of us would love to make a little game where we can help each other. That is the reason I started the thread as I see "potential" within the community. Yeah, maybe bit too much of a positive attitude :P

[Tajidan]

i dont think it should be a personal wishlist of ideas where everyone likes his one the most. we should make one from the ground up so everyone can be involved in the fun part of fleshing out an idea. genre (FPS, RTS, serious/hilarious, etc.), scope of the game, final vision.

[Jalif]

Hm... not in favor of doing an FPS straightaway. I would consider modding an existing game.

Excellent stuff to use would be the Quake 2 engine, even if it is old - it's pisseasy to get started (speaking from experience - i was involved in quake 2 and 3 mods with models, graphics, sound and coding). The reason why I would use such a base is - I think you can already grab standalone SDKs and tons of engine improvements and you have a fully working gamebase in terms or art assets, maps, netcode, yaddayadda.

Thats good too, no objection. I can make just 5 art assets in the shapes of simple blocks (flags & beacons excluded) and the standard robot. With that you can create maps already. Sure there won't be much variarity between maps... but you got to start somewhere.

[balistic void]

See everyone has ideas for games, but noone actually wants to write difficult code.

TBH if you don't mind the code coming at you in the 3 or 4 oddball languages I know (none of which are C or perl) I have no issue writing hard code. I'm best at Delphi.

You pick a language based on the tools etc available. It's all about javascript on both the client and server side these days.

There are lots of JS game engines: http://www.reddit.com/r/javascript/c...munity_effort/

On the server side you can easily use Node.js or whatever to make a server. Using the same language for client and server makes part of the codebase shared.

I'm not a JS expert at all, this stuff is all new to me. Here is an opensource example I am looking at -> http://browserquest.mozilla.org/

[Jalif]

i dont think it should be a personal wishlist of ideas where everyone likes his one the most. we should make one from the ground up so everyone can be involved in the fun part of fleshing out an idea. genre (FPS, RTS, serious/hilarious, etc.), scope of the game, final vision.

Yeap you are right, keeping the idea there tho - Maybe people can project their own ideas on it (keeping it simple). Got to start somewhere.

[helgur]

I'm not really familiar with Unity, what kind of language is embedded with that? C#?

Also 3D FPS? Really? Aren't you setting the bar a bit high already?

[Jalif]

I'm not really familiar with Unity, what kind of language is embedded with that? C#?

Also 3D FPS? Really? Aren't you setting the bar a bit high already?

C++ or C# I think. I used it during KSP modding and was good fun. As far as I'm aware, there are already some FPS templates that you can get from Unity. Wouldn't be a good start from there to build it up? Replace the models and maps and you could start getting a shape.

BUT I'm ok with dropping it for now and we could make a 2.5D simcity game ourselves hahahaha.

I'm open to ideas, really.

[Tajidan]

unity is C# mostly i think, yes.



>SpaceRailwayTycoon

i'd like to do something silly with space. a setting we are most familiar with

[Blutreiter]

Just throwing an idea out here - since we have a nice server host with FHC (god bless our overlords) why not try to do something browserbased?

[Lana Torrin]

See everyone has ideas for games, but noone actually wants to write difficult code.

TBH if you don't mind the code coming at you in the 3 or 4 oddball languages I know (none of which are C or perl) I have no issue writing hard code. I'm best at Delphi.

You pick a language based on the tools etc available. It's all about javascript on both the client and server side these days.

There are lots of JS game engines: http://www.reddit.com/r/javascript/c...munity_effort/

On the server side you can easily use Node.js or whatever to make a server. Using the same language for client and server makes part of the codebase shared.

I'm not a JS expert at all, this stuff is all new to me. Here is an opensource example I am looking at -> http://browserquest.mozilla.org/

Yeah don't know java either. I'm really quite useless in a team programming environment..

[Jason Marshall]

Collectible Trading Card Game.

[Blutreiter]

See everyone has ideas for games, but noone actually wants to write difficult code.

TBH if you don't mind the code coming at you in the 3 or 4 oddball languages I know (none of which are C or perl) I have no issue writing hard code. I'm best at Delphi.

You pick a language based on the tools etc available. It's all about javascript on both the client and server side these days.

There are lots of JS game engines: http://www.reddit.com/r/javascript/c...munity_effort/

On the server side you can easily use Node.js or whatever to make a server. Using the same language for client and server makes part of the codebase shared.

I'm not a JS expert at all, this stuff is all new to me. Here is an opensource example I am looking at -> http://browserquest.mozilla.org/

Yeah don't know java either. I'm really quite useless in a team programming environment..

I hate Java with a passion. Just because it runs everywhere does not mean it's good. You could also say that anal is great because it works on both genders. You just don't go there.

Meh. Java is probably fine for development because there is a shitton of libraries available and tools. But I still fucking hate Java.

[FatFreddy]

unity is C# mostly i think, yes.



>SpaceRailwayTycoon

Space Road Truckers game

2D

Interstellar Highways, valuable cargo, pirates, loneliness

occasionally a dirty sandwich from the truck stop - think futurama style

scenario could imo easily be a roguelike

[Pacefalm]

"look at the success of FTL! Let's make COD..."

I kid, I kid. In all seriousness a shooter should not be the way to go. I have very little programming experience but can try to help out if needed. But I agree we should start somewhere simple... Maybe at best a fast paced 2D shooter à la Soldat. Modding an existing game, or hell even some rpgmaker bullshit, should help people get the feel for it we want to actually go through with this.