cant sleep, feel inspired

BlitzKrieg

so its around 5am, i cant sleep and i'm diddling away on my DS and i decide bugger it lets see if i think up a fun game idea that would work with the ds.

Soo to make it so that its not a complete waste of my brain power, i will leave my pitch here and you can review it and call me a silly w*nker.


Ok here goes.


I'm a huge sonic fan so i took sonic as my basis, so i boot up sonic rush and i mess around a bit. I start thinking of other sonic games, successful ones and failures and then i remember this little trinket.





And I think Sonic Arcade was cool, it was a much unloved sonic arcade game you controlled by franticly spinning a wheel as madly as possible in the direction you want to run. there were no bad guys just feinish traps set off by robotnik trying to kill you as you ran madly through the level (what annoys me is this sort of game mechanic would have been perfect for 3d sonic but nooooo). The worse thing about this game was your skin constantly got caught by the edges of the ball and the arcade cabinet and it hurt.


Sooo I decide to take this as my template (i dont necesarily want to make a sonic game here) and i apply it to the DS

Stylus instead of roller ball...MAD FUN! franticly trying to lead your character with the pen while rubbing it faster to make them run faster. I could enjoy that. And you tap on certain objects to make the character interact with them (swing ropes, switches, bad guys. boss weak points).

That could be a fun single player or wireless multiplayer game. You can apply a number of other mechanics onto that, long range weapons, power ups and what not and boom you got a simple but highly playable game.


Soo I still cant sleep, my mind is now festering with ideas and i start writing this. And I think how can I make it a true DS title a triple A quality product that takes full advantage of all the DS can offer.

So lets get more complicated. What about the other side of the game? I think Evil Genius and i have a brilliant idea. What if you were the robotnik character, and the bottom screen shows the the heroes coming down the tunnel towards your base and you have a selection of traps to set loose lined up on the top screen to choose from. Use the D-Pad to select the desired card and then with the stylus pick a point near or in front or behind your opponent hero and watch it be released. You could even set up bigger traps like floods and bulldozers further down the level and wait to spring it at the right moment. or be evil and combine small traps and big ones. Drop different type of bad guys in to hold off the heroes, to distract them slow them kill them.


And then I thought what if it was like a RPG sort of game, like pokemon and yu gh o etc (though i never really played them) you collect these cards of different bad guys and traps and create your own custom deck, different decks for different types of heroes.

Hell lets be really ambitous.

Its a Action RPG, you choose to be the hero, you can design him yourself and the game is a series of fast paced linear dungeon runs where you have to reach the *boss* avoiding traps and killing henchmen, collecting items, and XP, then you take the points you earned and give your character skills and new stuff etc. You can make your character faster, stronger and slower, more agile, long range close range, very powerful but slow reload all the rpg works.

the controls are the stylus to move your character and attack. THe left and right D-pad to select iteams in top screen. Up or down to use said item. I check how it feels on my DS (not lite) it feels comfortable, i could play like this on a train or a bus.

Its also a stategy RPG, play the villian First design your villian then set up your big traps on the level before the attack starts by selecting a combination of cards to drop down big traps that would take up entire areas of the level (floods, lava etc) then select your selection of traps and bad guys to use yourself during the attack. for each of the multiple heroes you kill off during the attack you get XP which you use to buy new cards for your domain Ranging from trap cards and henchmen cards. You also can pick up combo cards where if you join six of them together you unlock a new BIG TRAP. Also for an added bonus you can choose to pick up personal cards to improve your boss character for the final fight if the hero proves too strong (which the later ones will) for all your traps and you need to face him yourself (the game would then play like the above action RPG.

Controls again are the same The TOp screen shows a map (for both sides) of the dungeon (throw in multple paths in later dungeons?) your cards are shown above it left or right to select cards up or down to select them (multiple uses for traps?) and stylus to place them.



How about Wi-FI? 3 heroes attacking a dungeon master player who's hosting? and call back to old D+D days?


Its a comfortable fun designed game.

and i got this from sonic? :rolleyes:


My main con worry is that villian players would exploit the trap system to create a trap players cant escape from in multiplayer, but if we have a system similar to metroid, where you play players of the same level, then the heo should access to moves or powers to avoid most of these traps.

THe other way around it is to only let villian set the traps and henchmen and he cant touch the level design (I.e my worry is that some villians would make a big gapping hole and then put a load of spikes after it so its impossible to jump the whole without being killed.)


If it was franchised it could be the first sonic RPG (it has the speed of the series...but is a RPG.) IF it wasnt franchised one can take number of unusual settings for it.

-spoof 60's spy design
-futuristic cartoon evil lair
-classic D+D design (meh)
-Could go for a Contra.



There I have exthinguished my inspiration tonight. Now to try and get some sleep.

Retr0gamer

For the love of god don't put the god awful techno music from Sonic arcade in it. That King of the Ring song was a dodgy.

BlitzKrieg

ahh but sonic and tails was really cute song though...

Retr0gamer

I thought it was just as god awful as the rest of the music.

'we are tails and sonic,
sonic and tails,
friends forever...'

Or something like that. Vomit inducing stuff.

Where did you play Sonic arcade? It was an extremely rare cabinet and had a very limited release. Don't remember any in Dublin. I only know the music from internet videogame music radio. It usually gets turned off when any sonic arcade music comes on.

BlitzKrieg

well interestingly enough.

I played it in Segaworld in London back in 95 or 96 i think (along with Sonic the Fighters and whole host of other arcade classics)

it was around christmas and they had a deal on where you paid £15 in but all the game cabinets and rides were on freeplay.

on a side note the sonic arcade music is not actually in the game as far as I remember. (you can download a movie of the entire game at some website, cant remember where, but i have on my computer.)

also internet videogame music station linky please?

Retr0gamer

http://www.gamingfm.com/main/

Check that out for videogame music radio.

BlitzKrieg

cheers for that.

*whistles*

is it just me and you on this thread?

pity.

kaimera

I'd buy it

BlitzKrieg

kaimera wrote:

I'd buy it

thanks kaimera




p.s retro thanks alot for link loving it. and happy to see nights soundtrack popular on it.


though it tells me i have duplicate accounts though i never signed up before???

BlitzKrieg

sorry to dig this back up.


BUT GAUNTLET DS!

thats what this could be. Build your own gauntlet maze to let your friends run around in.