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Yet another game idea from Not_Sure.

Discussion in 'Game Design' started by Not_Sure, Mar 8, 2017.

  1. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    Okay, yeah. I'm ridiculous, I know. But hear me out on this one.



    The General Idea


    MOBA + RTS + FPS

    You have 2 teams with 3 players on each side for a total of 6 players. Both teams have a base and are on a map trying to wipe out the other base. In the middle is a neutral tower and there are various jungle camps around the map.

    The 3 players on each team are 3 different classes with radically different play mechanics and different camera angles.





    The Player Roles


    The players can pick a Builder, a General, or a Hunter.

    The Builder has a top down (bird's eye) perspective and is responsible for making structures such as walls, towers, and barracks. But rather than a curser, the player has a character that has to move to those locations to build the structures.

    The General has a 3rd person view and is responsible for the minions and giving them equipment. The minions are constantly being produced for free by the barracks and come out of the castle in waves. The minions will automatically run down the middle of the map and attack the center tower then moving on to the enemy base. However, the General can gather them up and direct their attacks while buffing them and attacking the target themselves.

    The Hunter is first person controlled and is only responsible for killing jungle camps and dishing out damage where it is needed. They may lay one time use traps.



    Leveling Up

    The players do not have XP, but rather they only have Gold. The gold may be spent on equipment to raise the stats of the player, on leveling up their various skills, on structures (for the Builder), or on improving the troops (for the General).

    Builders will typically spend most of their gold on structures and little on equipment.
    Hunters will typically spend most of their gold on equipment and little on traps.
    Generals will typically spend their money equally on equipment and on their troops.

    All equipment will be available from the start of the game with straight purchases (rather than the trees found in most MOBA's) and the costs will compound with the items' power.

    Example:
    tier 1 item is ~$100 and does +10 damage.
    tier 2 item is ~$200 and does +15 damage.
    tier 3 item is ~$400 and does +20 damage.
    tier 4 item is ~$800 and does +25 damage.

    This is to assure that purchase decisions are meaningful in terms of risks versus rewards of saving up.



    Earning Gold

    Each player has their own way of earning gold that is a portion is shared with the other team mates in a 25/25/50 split.

    Builders earn gold every 5 seconds from the base. They can improve the how much gold is generated with structures.

    Generals earn gold by raiding structures. Every time a tower is destroyed they get 1/2 of the structure's value. Meanwhile the central neutral tower will regenerate after it is taken down increasing in level and gold with each kill. The pot is awarded to the side that has the last hit.

    Hunters earn gold through jungle camps. And just like with the central tower, the monsters become stronger and have a larger pot with each revival.

    Finally, player kills will result in a payout.

    I am undecided if it will be a bounty based on the target player's KDA ratio, or to have a mechanic similar to Quake 3's head hunter. Basically each kill drops a trophy (such as a head) and players gather them up. If they are killed they drop their head and every one that they are carrying. When they go to base they cash in the heads and are rewarded a compounding value based on how many heads they have.

    Obviously this the KDA one will rubber band, while the head hunter option with make for some randomness in the victories. Either way, it will give newer players a leg up to stand a chance.

    MINION KILLS WILL NOT RESULT IN GOLD. This is to assure that the general is not forced to consider this when building an army and planing attacks.



    Monitization

    I would have a list of characters that players can unlock, as well as skins, emotes, and voice packs.



    Things I am not sure about

    Should the game be on a grid that the structures fit nicely into?

    If not, how will I change up the path that the minions walk?

    How can I give the game verticality?

    What setting/genre should it be? Scifi? Fantasy? Modern?

    If it's modern, should the hunter have the option of getting vehicles instead of traps?



    Any suggestions?
     
    Last edited: Mar 8, 2017
  2. mgear

    mgear

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    first thoughts,
    - hard to find matching players, probably everyone plays hunter.. maybe could have option to switch in game, "go to building mode, or fps fight mode.."
    - map cannot be huge with many camps and forests with so few players.. (someone just hides in the corner and game never ends?)

    maybe should have much more players per level.. (so that can play even if 1 person drops out etc)
     
  3. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    I was thinking that the player could pick a game type, then it would pop up how many people are waiting to play which class and you chose the class. THEN enter the queue. That way it would even out when people see that there are 200 people in line for hunter and 10 in line for the general.

    The game ends when the base is destroyed. If someone is hiding in the corner they are just one less person helping. Also, deaths are not permanent. And people are going to be drawn towards what makes them money. The General will be trying to get the middle tower then the enemy base. While the hunter is going for the jungle camps and other players.

    Yeah, I think that several map types with different player layouts would be a good idea. I'm just using this as an MVP.
     
  4. Kiwasi

    Kiwasi

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    Asymetric designs are always challanging. Inevitably players will prefer one role over another. Especially with such dramatically different games. It's hard to design a good FPS which is also a meaningful RTS.

    Before you go worrying about setting or monetisation or grids, you should prototype. On paper is fine. Get six people together and work through the roles. Does it actually work? Can you keep everything balanced? Can you keep everyone involved?
     
  5. Fera_KM

    Fera_KM

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    It sounds a lot like the game Savage.
    Which was actually a lot of fun, the only thing I'm not so sure about is the 3 vs 3 aspect which would put a lot of stress on each player.
     
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  6. MD_Reptile

    MD_Reptile

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    Heroes and generals and bob the builder :p
     
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  7. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    That's the second time I heard that 3v3 is off putting. Alright then.

    Yeah, I would need to prototype for sure.
     
  8. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    The more I think about it the more I realize that top down perspective and first person just don't mix.

    You would need elevations to have a point in being first person, but then no over hangs so the top down player could see.

    And then how does aiming work? How is it fair that one person has to aim up and down, while the other only worries about around?
     
  9. Martin_H

    Martin_H

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    You should play some Natural Selection 2
    http://store.steampowered.com/app/4920/
     
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  10. JoeStrout

    JoeStrout

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    I like it. Yeah, balancing it all will be tricky — but if done right, it sounds like a lot of fun.

    It reminds me of an idea I kick around with the boys from time to time, where you play the crew of a starship. Everybody has their own jobs: pilot, gunner, engineer, science officer, etc., each of which plays quite differently. To be effective you all have to do your jobs well, and you have to work together well. Your game would be similar in that respect.

    I think it could bring together players who normally don't find much to play together.

    I wonder if it could be expanded to more roles?
    • Gardener: plants crops/flowers/whatever that can be harvested for gold; buys better plants; plants can be destroyed by minions or hunters (if not protected by walls or friendlies); maybe advanced plants can defend themselves, PvZ-style?
    • Magician: runs/flies around and performs acts of magic that change the battle in odd ways (weather control, terrain changes, minion buffs, zombie raising, etc.); spells require gold and can be more powerful with the help of obelisks built by the Builder
    • Miner: digs tunnels under the map (invisible from any overhead view, except for entrances and exits) which can be used by minions or first-person players; tunnels can be locally collapsed by Builders
    Of course I realize you (quite sensibly) want an MVP, and I think you've defined that well. Just brainstorming about future enhancements.
     
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  11. Fera_KM

    Fera_KM

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    while on the subject...
    (going to try not to trail off too much)

    I've been thinking about this for a very long time, and it's one of those games I would really like to see fleshed out at one point or another (I have zero faith that Ubisoft can do anything even remotely innovative, eg. Star Trek Bridge Crew)

    I find myself really intrigued by games like,
    Artemis Spaceship Bridge Simulator
    AirBuccaneers
    Blackwake
    Guns of Icarus
    Moonbase Alpha
    etc..

    I really like the idea of game that tries to unite a group of players with a common goal, while still have vastly different roles.
    But, I'm not really into the "killing other people" aspect of it.

    So I think the major topic here is if the game is first and foremost a cooperative game or a competitive game,
    and then figure out if you should balance the game on a team basis or on an individual basis.
     
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  12. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    IDK, maybe I should switch to a more broad solution and move from roles to classes.

    Maybe Scifi with classes like:
    -Engineer (Defenses)
    -Recon (Scout / Spy)
    -Commando (Assassin / Jungler)
    -Soldier (Warrior / Laner)
    -Support (Medic / Tank / Basically anyone that does better on a team)

    Then have it to were all of them can drop a plethora of structures to build, each unique to the character, including:
    -Towers
    -Turrets
    -Minion Factories
    -Vehicle Factories
    -Traps
    -Gadgets (Teleporters / Jump pads / Jammers)

    The towers could have a barrier link up between them while they're up to prevent enemies from crossing them.

    And drop the tile map and keep all the other mechanics I mentioned.
     
    Last edited: Mar 9, 2017
  13. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    I, personally, always wanted to see Sims like mechanics added to some genres. Where you need to manage the dynamic of the group. Maybe that would work for a Spaceship game. Or a pirate game. Or a Zombie survival game with Xcom combat.
     
  14. Martin_H

    Martin_H

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    Based on my experience of how hard it is to assemble a full team of 5 players for competitive counterstrike, which pretty much is one of the most well known / most played FPS on earth, I think it will be next to impossible to get a full team of people together that each might only like a certain fraction of the game. Getting them to buy the game in the first place would be quite a challenge already. Also how do you make sure everyone gets to play a kind of role they like, if they are vastly different and a broad selection of roles in a team is needed to win? Not to mention the problem that random online players on public servers generally are terrible at team-play, and if something that could lead the team to victory would cause the mildest inconvenience to a player, they usually won't do it.


    Seeing really dedicated objective focused teamplay, is like finding money on the street, it's nice but very rare. I've once witnessed someone in Arma3 doing nothing but transporting players from the base to the combat-zone with a helicopter. He flew back and forth, at max speed and doing some crazy stunts along the way. I've never seen a pilot on this skill level in the game, and I hope he was having fun, but I'd have been totally bored doing that, because I play military shooters to shoot people. Like I'd rather play a different game than do this. But due to his transports we had like 2-3 times the amount of reinforcements at the objective compared to the other team, and of course we crushed them. But is this really good gamedesign, when one person basically can decide the match by doing one high value but boring task over and over again? Piloting helicopters isn't easy and imagine the rage you get when you crash and kill half a dozen other players you're carrying. How fair/fun is it, that the other team basically had no chance (assuming roughly equal shooting and tactics skills), just because they had no one able and willing to focus on heli-transport?

    The more you make the roles asymmetric and balance the design around a need for cooperation, the more people will feel like they lost the game because of other players, and that fuels toxicity in online gaming.
     
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  15. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    This is a good point.

    I know that when I played Smite, games where the ADC's were bad ruined the entire experience.

    So it seems that over-lapping of roles is necessary.
     
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  16. JoeStrout

    JoeStrout

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    I definitely agree that a game like this wouldn't work very will with random teams. It would require people to form actual, at least semi-stable teams of people who specialize in roles and learn to work together, taking pride in the team achievements rather than individual ones.

    There are ways you could encourage this, e.g. by not having any (official) individual stats or achievements; require everyone to be a member of some team, and do all stats & awards on a team basis. And you'd need a lobby area that makes it easy for teams to post player-wanted ads, and for players to post team-wanted ads.

    But, yeah... it will be hard to get your gaming group together often enough. Maybe a team size of 3 is actually a good idea. The bigger you make it, the more rarely teams will assemble to play.

    Of course you could fill in with AIs. Perhaps training AIs to do the jobs you can't find anyone to do could be a key part of the game, rather than an afterthought.
     
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  17. Fera_KM

    Fera_KM

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    @Martin_H This was the problem with Savage 2 as well, the commander (playing in C&C perspective) had such a large impact on the game comparative to a unit player.

    It would probably be better to be able to que into a game with a predetermined role, instead of separating the roles afterwards. I think it's also interesting how in Heroes of the Storm, effort amounts to team experience and not direct experience/levels/money per player.

    It would probably be an interesting exercise in game design for submissive players vs. commanding players.

    edit: On a personal level, I enjoy more cooperating teamplay rather than individual performance.
    And I think that is somewhat missing in, most of, modern multiplayer design.
     
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  18. MV10

    MV10

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    I was looking for a local coop game to play with my wife and those are even more difficult to find.

    I found a site that lets you search games by various types of co-op modes.

    http://www.co-optimus.com/
     
  19. MD_Reptile

    MD_Reptile

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    I love that site
     
  20. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    Same.

    My wife and I live by it.
     
  21. Serinx

    Serinx

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    The first thing I thought of when I saw this was Age of Empires on a team with shared resources/control (Minus the hunter). I think that would be an incredible idea - an RTS where resources are shared by the team except everyone manages a different area.

    The General could decide which troops are built, where they should strike, and what upgrades they could receive
    The Builder build determine which structures/defences to build etc
    I think more roles in the RTS side of things could be interesting - like a resource manager? can't think of a good one though!
    Perhaps instead of a "Hunter" you could have several "Heroes" which are player controlled and can assist the generals armies or lead a small group of AI controlled units. This would open up games to be variable in the amount of players per team - maybe you'd need at least 3 - but up to 8 or something.

    Breaking up the building/defences/general/resources would allow you to make them more intricate too since individual players would be focusing on the different areas. I love this idea - even if I went a little off-track from where it looks you're heading with it :p
     
  22. Master-Frog

    Master-Frog

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    This can be built in the StarCraft 2 editor and tested, and SC2 is now free to play so anyone could download and try the map.

    I am currently working on a game, but I always have time for SC2.

    Lemme know.
     
  23. Dynatics

    Dynatics

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    I actually like this concept, and its also an easy one to make. By easy, I mean comparatively easier than other games out there. Although, there's a teensy weensy problem, @Not_Sure , it's that... TOO many games have this kind of design/concept. I myself have played around 3-4 games like this. Of course, some names would be switched, and maybe something else different, like a new currency, but this one game should have a clinching feature, that separates it from all those other similar games out there. It should be something unique. Got any ideas?
     
  24. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    This is totally at the heart of why I've been on a RTS kick.

    I've had that same thought that multiple players on one team may work, but it fails to address other issues with RTS games.

    From my perspective the main problems with RTS games are:
    -It puts WAY to much emphasis over command speed than strategy.
    -It focuses WAY too much on making giant pile of units and throwing it at the enemy base before they do it to you.
    -It lacks team cooperation.

    I think that MOBA's have done a lot to address these issues, but only by bringing in their own issues:
    -Resource gathering makes no sense, since all resources come from enemy troops.
    -Resources are split between XP and Gold in nonsensical ways.
    -There is no building structures or modifying troops.
    -Every game feels like two teams trying to push a boulder in opposite directions on top of a hill. As a result every game feels like a blowout and very rarely does it feel like a fair fight. As a result of that, people are naturally going to be toxic when there's honestly little to nothing that could have been done.

    This is also why I was interested in Dungeon Keeper's mechanics, which has a heavy focus on macro-management.

    Another way I thought you could solve these issues is with a game that splits the combat from the building, much like Xcom does. Master of Magic did this and it worked fairly well, but the combat was kind of a chore more than an exercise in tactics. So maybe throw in real time combat with roshambo strategy, like Myth. So basically Civilization with Myth combat. Of course, that makes multiplayer impossible.

    So the next evaluation to the idea would have to make it real time even for the building phase. But how do you deal with giving the player too much to do?

    So then I thought, what if rather than cursors the player used a hero units that leads the armies and builds. Basically, the whole kingdom runs it's self fairly well on its own, but you moving about improves the area you're focusing on by make building build faster, or fighting it out in combat.

    So now it's Diablo + Civilization + Myth + Dungeon Keeper.

    And that's what you would call "scope creep".
     
    Last edited: Apr 11, 2017
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  25. Master-Frog

    Master-Frog

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    Someone tell me exactly what to make so we can all be rich.
     
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  26. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    Meth. :mad:
     
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  27. Joe-Censored

    Joe-Censored

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    If you're strictly requiring just 1 of each class per team before a game starts, and games cannot start until all classes have been filled, I would not let the player choose their class at all. I would assign a class at random to each player. Otherwise you're going to end up with large numbers of games waiting to start due to them all missing a specific unpopular class.
     
  28. lizifox

    lizifox

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    how about every player has a team of three game-characters that work for them.
    a hunter, a general and a builder. the player gets to decide in the start of the game, which char he wants to play. the other chars are played by 2 AI bots.
    if a player wants to play with friends, these friends each take over 1 of the bots. (if 1 friend, 1 bot remains)

    this way, people who have no friends to join can still play your game. you can still have matches of 2 teams fighting each other. each team is comprised of 3 game-chars: a 1 human player and 2 bots or 2H+1B or 3P+0B
     
  29. lizifox

    lizifox

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    forgot to say: i really like your idea of having a total different game-experience according to the role you play, including the top-down vs. fp view.
     
  30. Not_Sure

    Not_Sure

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    Thanks!

    I still like the idea that at the start screen you pick your role and see what the queue looks like.

    So you can play whatever class you want, whenever you want, but the more popular one will simply take longer to wait and play.

    Also, I would give paying players a fast lane, but allow mooch players a fast lane once a day. I know that may rub some people the wrong way, but oh well.

    And I may have instant passes for sale, but that may straight up lock up one of the classes.

    Then once a game is played, give the team an option to play again as the same team so they can skip the queue process. This would encourage good sportsmanship. Less people burning down teams and instead being encouraging.
     
  31. JoeStrout

    JoeStrout

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    I like this idea. One of my few complaints with Splatoon is that the teams are randomized each match, so I never get to know anybody, or have any feeling of being a team really — we're just four random individuals who happen to be working towards the same goal. So, anything to encourage people to stick together, and learn to work together effectively, is a good idea.