This game NEEDS to be made. I'd love to see an indie developer take a stab at it because then there wouldn't be a huge 'big-budget' risk and they can really experiment with the concept =)
Extra Punctuation: An Invisible Protagonist
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
- Start date
Sounds kind of boring. If you were invisible, why would you want to use stealth ? I got gear that gave me 100% chameleon in Oblivion and you know what I did ? Killed everything in sight with no repercussions, and even less resistance. Yeah the game could always be one of those, you can't kill anything and your near godlike powers are expected everywhere you go but then...well actually that'd be about par for the course for today's games so yeah it'd suck ass.
Nah, man. Being invisible means you manipulate people. MGS4 had a little bit of fun with this, where if you're cloaked and you mess with a guy, after a while he sometimes just bugs out and faints. It's still a gamebreaker in that game of course, since MGS4 is so shooty, but that's the sort of direction to take it.Trolldor said:
I'm a huge kleptomaniac, so I always go for full stealth in Bethesda games so that I can break into people's houses and steal their shit. But they're all lifeless animatronics. They don't do anything when they're off the clock, and you can't scare them. Even tagging one with frenzy loses its novelty after a few hours.
What we're really talking about here is a game that's built around this mechanic, and around AI that models how people react to surprises and things they can't explain. It would be unspeakably awesome.
I'm surprised you didn't mention Hitman: Blood Money, which grades you based on things like how many people you knocked out, how many people saw you acting suspiciously, and even what equipment is left behind.
There was a really old game called messiah, Its pretty much hijacking people with a cherub and sheathing about, I recommend it for like wise stealth lovers,
One game I know of that did the whole "make it look like an accident" thing really well was the Hitman series. The great thing about Hitman in general is that even though they give you a whole assortment of weapons you can still complete a mission with nothing but the basic equipment (fiber wire, a bomb and the syringes of poison and anesthetic), in fact, it's the best way to complete a mission because it means you have to think about things a little more carefully and plan out your actions, therefore making it more likely that you'll get the "stealth assassin" rating.
Even though I had unlocked all of the more ludicrous weaponry, I always find it a lot more fun to try to get that perfect kill. It's incredibly satisfying when a plan comes together, which was always my favourite part of the game. I would listen to the brief, then play a dummy run through the mission just to see where everything/one was and the best ways to get to them in the most efficient way possible, then I'd reset the level and try to figure it out.
I always saw Hitman as more of a puzzle game than an action game, as it rewarded forward planning and lateral thinking more than simply going headlong into everything guns blazing. The fun was never in the kill, it was in all the little moments that lead up to it.
Even though I had unlocked all of the more ludicrous weaponry, I always find it a lot more fun to try to get that perfect kill. It's incredibly satisfying when a plan comes together, which was always my favourite part of the game. I would listen to the brief, then play a dummy run through the mission just to see where everything/one was and the best ways to get to them in the most efficient way possible, then I'd reset the level and try to figure it out.
I always saw Hitman as more of a puzzle game than an action game, as it rewarded forward planning and lateral thinking more than simply going headlong into everything guns blazing. The fun was never in the kill, it was in all the little moments that lead up to it.
Not to be a stick in the mud but I believe the game Geist for gamecube tried this to a certain degree trying to create and army of ghost agents to take over the world and failed because the main protagonist (meaning you) went rouge and you are pissy pissy that along with it they stole your body...
I never got to finish because I keep dying in a boss fight....
Regardless I still see the point is the main execution that I myself im worried about....
Aside from borrowing heavily from the movie Invisible man 1&2. How do we go about answering the remaining questions?....
1. Main Plot: Take over the world, eliminate an alien race, Be voyeuristic, throw an invisible party, anything that would give the player a purpose to continue....
2. What platform/style of game play?: First person shooter is the only one i can think of that would fit with the theme "look down and see nothing"...
3. How many elements can be added before it becomes "over burden/shadow"?: Meaning aside from enemies, traps, gimmicks, and the usual, what are some other things that can be added to help or impair the progress of the player before it becomes too much...
4- etc. Well to many things to list. But you get the picture. In all seriousness I bet WE talked about it we could create a good game of an invisible protagonist.... at least in paper.
I never got to finish because I keep dying in a boss fight....
Regardless I still see the point is the main execution that I myself im worried about....
Aside from borrowing heavily from the movie Invisible man 1&2. How do we go about answering the remaining questions?....
1. Main Plot: Take over the world, eliminate an alien race, Be voyeuristic, throw an invisible party, anything that would give the player a purpose to continue....
2. What platform/style of game play?: First person shooter is the only one i can think of that would fit with the theme "look down and see nothing"...
3. How many elements can be added before it becomes "over burden/shadow"?: Meaning aside from enemies, traps, gimmicks, and the usual, what are some other things that can be added to help or impair the progress of the player before it becomes too much...
4- etc. Well to many things to list. But you get the picture. In all seriousness I bet WE talked about it we could create a good game of an invisible protagonist.... at least in paper.
Hey, maybe ask some friends in the AAA industry, I know a lot of people who would play that game, myself included 
This is the first game idea I think you should pitch to somebody. it could have the Hitman blood money mechanic where the later levels are harder if you're lazy in earlier missions.
It is indeed very difficult to sneak up on someone and move around unnoticed, even if they aren't looking at you. I mean, I've done it several times myself by accident, with family members not realizing I was standing around behind them until they turned around and were startled by my presence.
I think a significant factor in this hypothetical game would be learning to mask all sensory clues to one's presence. The player wouldn't be allowed to run all the time, because heavy breathing is a dead givaway. As is what may very well be a distinctive scent resulting from the invisibling process, meaning the player would need to avoid (or make use of) guard dogs or cats.
Oh, and darkness would be your worst enemy, because when a guard is in the dark for a period of time, they start to rely on their other senses to navigate around. Also they get paranoid, even without the idea of an invisible man running around. So the player would counter-intuitively need to keep himself and the enemies in light as much as possible.
Unless of course it's a ploy to make the quarry question their sanity. In that case, lights flicker away!
I think a significant factor in this hypothetical game would be learning to mask all sensory clues to one's presence. The player wouldn't be allowed to run all the time, because heavy breathing is a dead givaway. As is what may very well be a distinctive scent resulting from the invisibling process, meaning the player would need to avoid (or make use of) guard dogs or cats.
Oh, and darkness would be your worst enemy, because when a guard is in the dark for a period of time, they start to rely on their other senses to navigate around. Also they get paranoid, even without the idea of an invisible man running around. So the player would counter-intuitively need to keep himself and the enemies in light as much as possible.
Unless of course it's a ploy to make the quarry question their sanity. In that case, lights flicker away!
Because I'm imagining a case where only the outer tissues have this magic property of invisbility and it doesn't work by letting light pass through the object but by conducting light around the object and projecting it on the opposite side as if had actually gone through the object. Pupils won't have this and light falling on them does come through and into the retina. When you close your eyelids they start doing their whole wave conducting effect and create a continous outer layer of invisibility with your cheeks and forehead and whatnot. The eyelids will then not be letting any light fall into the pupils and the person will see black, just like you regularly do.Tin Man said:
This could work in almost any way, and it's a wonderful idea.
Still, adapt a source mod or something to do it, but I always liked the idea of something like a Ninja simulator.
Picture it, you've been given a task, kill a local daimyo, but how? He's well guarded, but through talking to the local townsfolk after gaining their trust you learn he's not popular with some of them, there's even been talk of mutiny among his guards... So you forge documents that make it seem like he is planning to off many of his guardsmen he considers disloyal, then they kill him out of defence? they flee, leaving him guardless and easy to kill? Or you poison his drink and make it seem like the guards doing?
Or any other assassin simulator, I always remember playing M2TW and wanting so badly to be the assassin or spy in the cutscenes, instead of a manager of incompetant troops.
EDIT: And before anyone says it, i'm not some kind of weaboo, It's just that ninja assassination is the first thing that came to mind.
Still, adapt a source mod or something to do it, but I always liked the idea of something like a Ninja simulator.
Picture it, you've been given a task, kill a local daimyo, but how? He's well guarded, but through talking to the local townsfolk after gaining their trust you learn he's not popular with some of them, there's even been talk of mutiny among his guards... So you forge documents that make it seem like he is planning to off many of his guardsmen he considers disloyal, then they kill him out of defence? they flee, leaving him guardless and easy to kill? Or you poison his drink and make it seem like the guards doing?
Or any other assassin simulator, I always remember playing M2TW and wanting so badly to be the assassin or spy in the cutscenes, instead of a manager of incompetant troops.
EDIT: And before anyone says it, i'm not some kind of weaboo, It's just that ninja assassination is the first thing that came to mind.
I am glad I am not the only one who saw the connection between Yahtzee's ideal of how a stealth game should work and the stealth game that Yhatzee made.Magnesium360 said: