Idea for a harsh, yet player changable landscape

[Callan S.]

I tried haven and hearth the other day, after someone I know talked about it. Found I was just slowly starving to death as I wandered around, though.

I was thinking of a game where you spawn on a map - food sources are around, but where they spawn and you spawn might mean you'd just starve to death anyway.

BUT

You start with some seeds. And can find special spots where they can be planted (for best effect)

The more you plant A: Either you will run into plants you put in in a previous life and B: The more you plant, the more seeds your new character will start off with (to a certain maximum)

As said, you might get lucky and find food in the corner of the map you randomly spawn into. But if you don't, there is something you can do towards survival next time.

Yes, it's rough in that you'll most likely die. But I'm looking at how players can work toward adding to the map and so changing things - instead of just starting out with food spawned everywhere.

[Jackolantern]

Sounds interesting! Maybe you could soften the blow by instead of the player dying over and over, you could frame it like the player is being dropped off on an alien planet with basic supplies to try to develop the planet. If the player can't get food going, they can call for an emergency pick-up. Then another astronaut is sent to continue the job, with the goal of one day being self-sufficient on the planet.

That could soften the game a bit, since being picked-up would not have quite the same feeling of failure that a death would, even though it is the same style of play.

[MikuzA]

Hah, yeah, like building a civilization one by one.

Start with an explorer -> playtime 15min. Mark locations of interest.
Architecht is deployed -> playtime 10min. Mark building/structure/roads locations, create 'blueprints'.
Builder is deployed -> Builder to be placed on one of the 'blueprints', playtime will end once place found. Builder also able to give resource estimate on the building for completion, this changes regarding a random skill of the builder.
Resource-gatherer deployed -> Gatherer to be placed on any KNOWN resource found, examples trees, rock, basics. Can only harvest one type per gatherer.

And so on, and so on. Perhaps even make the playtime per person a bit longer so that every person actually 'matters' for the player, In order to him/her be an massive organiser of this new civilization.
Then when you have 100 people in your town, you should have somewhat working community, where people benefit of other and when time goes on. New 'types' of people are spawned to the world for you to control their start with.

Perhaps I broke the root idea, but just to brainstorm on this interesting idea of yours

[Callan S.]

Jack,

It's funny - before I read your post I had the idea that maybe your first character can go into a sort of hybernation starvation mode, where it takes quite awhile for them to die but you can't play them - you play a second character (with more seeds if the first planted some) and that character can find and give food to the first. Though you might end up with a few starving characters! Ie, it's a bit like your notion of softening the blow, so I was thinking along the same wavelength as you!


Mikuza,

I like the idea of populations of NPC's who are actually characters you played for a certain time, so if one is a vendor, when you go to them, they aren't just an NPC - you could actually remember some of the things you did with them before they became an NPC vendor.

[Jackolantern]

Yeah, pretty much anything except death. Death pretty much universally means "failure" in video games, but by changing it to almost anything else, it could help players understand that this is just another phase of the gameplay

[Callan S.]

Weeeeeelllll, I'm up for a delay on death. But rather like nethack, yeah, you might brutally have several characters die, when starting out. Though keep in mind I would play the game myself at the start - which would add more plants that other players could get food from. So I'd play 'at the deep end' and make it a bit less deep that way.

[Xaos]

I'm thinking then"death" Will be a lot easier if that's an understood premise of the game.

[Sharlenwar]

I enjoy death in games that have it. Have any of you tried Don't Starve? That is quite a fun game, and one where I have died many times in. It is always fun to die and start over I find. See if you can do things better and faster than before.

[OldRod]

I've toyed with this concept in various game ideas over the years. Actually had a design document written for a hardcore type world.

My problem I always came back to was what happens if the player dies due to something outside their control. For instance, you get attacked and you lose internet service briefly. You log back in and you are dead through no fault of your own. Or a storm knocks out power for a few hours and you come back to find your character dead, etc. (I live in Kansas - these things happen )

The problem is, if you put in safeguards to prevent these circumstances, then players will abuse the safeguards to prevent dying.

If I ever get time to work on my game again, I fully intend to explore this. I want a game with consequences, where my character actions have meaning in the long term, and if I run across someone stronger than me, there is a good chance I can die permanently. I want that thrill. I am almost to the point of putting in permadeath and just seeing what will happen. Of course, I have so much other stuff to do that having anyone attack my character is a looooong ways off, but that's the plan

[Xaos]

I've toyed with this concept in various game ideas over the years. Actually had a design document written for a hardcore type world.

My problem I always came back to was what happens if the player dies due to something outside their control. For instance, you get attacked and you lose internet service briefly. You log back in and you are dead through no fault of your own. Or a storm knocks out power for a few hours and you come back to find your character dead, etc. (I live in Kansas - these things happen )

The problem is, if you put in safeguards to prevent these circumstances, then players will abuse the safeguards to prevent dying.

If I ever get time to work on my game again, I fully intend to explore this. I want a game with consequences, where my character actions have meaning in the long term, and if I run across someone stronger than me, there is a good chance I can die permanently. I want that thrill. I am almost to the point of putting in permadeath and just seeing what will happen. Of course, I have so much other stuff to do that having anyone attack my character is a looooong ways off, but that's the plan

I started a thread very similar to this. I think it's I'm general Dev. Might be worth a look