I'm Bored?Let's (Actually) make a game!!!!!

[Bertylicious]

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Spoiler

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I don't have sound on this computer, am I right in assuming that they're basically doing the mario-kart thing I mentioned? This is just like the time I told a friend about an idea for a story and he told it was basically Metropolis.

Your idea sounds pretty rad though, like a better version of that Mastermind game on Newgrounds.

 

[Chairman Miaow]

Well, I'd like to think of myself as a pretty decent actor (been recognised from things I did years ago a few times, does wonders for your ego) so if you require any voice acting I would absolutely love to be involved.

Just a thought, but perhaps you should edit your OP to add what positions you are looking to be filled on this project and who has filled them?

E.G.

Sound design (2-3 people)
Thoughtful_Salt
?

Writing (3-5 people)
?
?
?
?
?

Numbers are completely made up of course.

 

[Thomas McMullin]

I added Chairman Miaow to my list of interested parties.

 

[Bertylicious]

While a lot of these sound like fantastic concepts. My only concern is there aren't as many coders as there are other interested parties. Rembrandtqeinstein seems like he'd be the fella able to become the head of Devs, if not because of experience, but because of availability. But this could turn out to be a lot of work if we try to start from scratch. I think the best idea is to find something that we can build on, like Multimedia Fusion, or RPG Maker, so those talented fellas that want to volunteer as a coder can focus on making what we have awesome, rather than trying to make something basic, then turning that into something awesome.

Excellent point.

I'd also be interested in doing some voice acting but my microphone is laughably antiquated and terrible so I'd have to physically attend another person's home to record stuff so I don't know how practical that would be.

 

[twosage]

I'd love to throw my hat into this ring. While I'd like to be involved in the writing/concept stuff, I think I could definitely contribute to the art/sprite design. Here are some early Work in Progress designs I made recently for a "Mass Effect on the SNES" video I was going to do for YouTube. I still need to do some color correction and the text is currently a placeholder font, so please understand that these are rough.

Character Loadout / Squad Select Screen:


Full Color Character Sprites for the characters and several alternate Shepards (Femshep Soldier, Engineer, Vaguard, Infiltrator, and canon Male Shep Soldier):
[img src="http://i.imgur.com/6IsiHFL.png"]


I have basically no game design knowledge, though. More than anything, I'm eager to learn and would love to actually do something with pixel art rather than just essentially doodling like this. I have some ideas for games that I'll post separately, but I wanted to get these images and my name in the thread as quickly as possible. Tell me what you guys think. :)

 

[Thomas McMullin]

Added your Details to my list Twosage.

That pixel art is actually pretty great. I'd kinda like to do a sci-fi rpg in the style of the SNES final Fantasy games with that kind of art.

 

[twosage]

As far as the game / story, I've had an idea kicking around my brain for a while that might fit the kind of gaming architecture I think I'm hearing from the thread so far. If any of this sounds good or sparks someone else to have a great idea: great.

I thinking of a very standard non-magical medieval setting (a village surrounded by a dangerous forest, for instance). The protagonist (probably a young adult) is attacked by wolves and then saved by a mysterious old man with unnatural abilities. The protagonist becomes the stranger's protege for a bit before the old man reveals that he is a time traveler and his powers are super-advanced technology. But he's not actually from the future.

You see, what happened was, the first time he went back in time, he screwed up the timeline, sending the world into a dark age (the protagonist's world) and now he's trying to fix it. "Fixing it" would undo the protagonist's timeline, so the game becomes a cat-and-mouse struggle between the two to affect this village by making changes in different eras.

There are certainly shades of Chronotrigger and Ocarina of Time here, but I think by focusing it on a single town through multiple generations, (with various different permutations based on choice trees), it could explore the philosophy and morality of time travel a bit.

As I said, this idea has been kicking around for a while, and I'm not sure what kind of game it would be better suited to (I feel turn-based is a bit dated and I've seen some poo-pooing of sidescrolling beat-em-ups). I think the most appealing aspect of this idea is that it is expandable. You could make a totally playable Alpha version with a few "versions of the village" while still working different eras and expanding that permutation tree. And it allows the game to have as many settings/styles/magic/sci-fi as we can find a rationale for.

So there you go. Feedback and criticism is, of course, welcome.

 

[DrOswald]

I'd love to throw my hat into this ring. While I'd like to be involved in the writing/concept stuff, I think I could definitely contribute to the art/sprite design. Here are some earlyWork in Progress designs I made recently for a "Mass Effect on the SNES" video I was going to do for YouTube. I still need to do some color correction and the text is currently a placeholder font, so please understand that these are rough.

Character Loadout / Squad Select Screen:


Full Color Character Sprites for the characters and several alternate Shepards (Femshep Soldier, Engineer, Vaguard, Infiltrator, and canon Male Shep Soldier):
[img src="http://i.imgur.com/6IsiHFL.png"]


I have basically no game design knowledge, though. More than anything, I'm eager to learn and would love to actually do something with pixel art rather than just essentially doodling like this. I have some ideas for games that I'll post separately, but I wanted to get these images and my name in the thread as quickly as possible. Tell me what you guys think. :)[/QUOTE]

Those are good sprites. Have you done any work before? If so, do you have it available to see online?

 

[twosage]

Those are good sprites. Have you done any work before? If so, do you have it available to see online?

Literally none. Part of the reason why I wanted to do the SNES Effect video was to stretch my pixel art legs and see how it goes. That said, I've always been a quick learner and I try to take advice to heart. Even among these sprites, I feel like the later ones (the Engineer/Vanguard/Infiltrator FemShep) are substantially more dynamic and engaging than the earlier ones. If this project gets off the ground, I would imagine that I could improve further.

I was also being very diligent to match the power of the SNES and only used 15 colors per sprite. I feel like that tied my hands (in a good way), but sprites for a Steam game wouldn't have that sort of limitation (unless we intentionally wanted to evoke the SNES). Backgrounds my be a bit difficult for me. I've just never tried them so I don't know.

 

[DrOswald]

Those are good sprites. Have you done any work before? If so, do you have it available to see online?

Literally none. Part of the reason why I wanted to do the SNES Effect video was to stretch my pixel art legs and see how it goes. That said, I've always been a quick learner and I try to take advice to heart. Even among these sprites, I feel like the later ones (the Engineer/Vanguard/Infiltrator FemShep) are substantially more dynamic and engaging than the earlier ones. If this project gets off the ground, I would imagine that I could improve further.

I was also being very diligent to match the power of the SNES and only used 15 colors per sprite. I feel like that tied my hands (in a good way), but sprites for a Steam game wouldn't have that sort of limitation (unless we intentionally wanted to evoke the SNES). Backgrounds my be a bit difficult for me. I've just never tried them so I don't know.

Well, it's good stuff, especially for a first attempt. I would recommend you develop this skill even if this doesn't get off the ground. People are always looking for good spriters.

 

[indigo945]

Yo, I'm a CS student from Germany and vaguely interested, so I could help with programming. Over here, it's summer break right now, so I have decent amounts of time for the next few months. I felt like making a game anyways, so if this gets started at all, I'm in. However, because I dislike joining projects that will probably crash and burn anyway: we should really make sure that we have an idea of what we want to make before we start, and an ideally specific document that describes the features that the game engine has to have. Expanding later tends to clutter the code, and any coder knows that cluttery code slows down projects immensely, and introduces bugs.

Languages I speak, in descending order of proficiency:
-Python
-Java (not a fan)
-C#
-Racket
-C

I don't really care what game framework we use, I have toyed around with various ones, but done serious work with none. Panda3D felt like an excellent engine (for Python) when I tried it, though.

@twosage: I like the story idea, but I feel that it would take a lot of story-writing to make this work. If you/others can do that, that's fine, of course. Myself, I'm more of a formal language person.

I take that if we took that story idea, the game would be an RPG? I feel like a side-scroller with so much depth would be odd, and kind of a waste!

 

[God'sFist]

I would love to try and voice act some characters if that comes to mind I also can partially help write a script or story.

I'd like to be officially signed up as interested in both of these things, too. Maybe you and I could work together on the writing, that could be really awesome. Not sure if this is gonna have voice acting but if you need a British voice I'm up for that.

(I know I keep posting but I REALLY would love to be involved with something like this.)

I said partially and I meant it so working with someone is exactly what I'm talking about. Really it just depends on the kind of game we might be working on. If we are doing an rpg then what kind of rpg, what feel do we want the characters to generate etc. also if pay is something we are tossing around my opinion is that if the game makes money pays is nice but working on the game would be enough.

captcha: Spectacular Offers wow captcha you are really on the ball

 

[twosage]

@indigo945

Well, I've always said, if it's worth doing, it's worth overdoing.

I guess it depends on the type and scale of game people want to make. A more restrained game like a racer would be dependent on coders for mechanics and balance and all that (I assume), while an RPG would put more workload on the artists and writers to pad out the game's length and tell a full story arc.

While I'm happy to contribute to the project in any way I can, I'm also aware that we all need to be rowing in the same direction. The clearer the vision as early on as possible the better. I'll gladly take a back seat on what we decide to make, as long as we do actually make something.

Edit: As far as pay goes, I think anyone joining at this early stage should get some kind of money if the game makes any, but no one should be thinking about getting paid in advance of there being money incoming to the project, be it through sales or some kind of crowdfunding.

 

[Saetha]

Um, I could try to help? Maybe? I'm a decent artist and writer... but I've never been involved in a project like this before, and with summer break drawing to a close, I might not have enough time to really contribute. I can try and see what I can do to help out, but... yeah...

 

[Thomas McMullin]

Added Indigo to the list. And Saetha

 

[twosage]

Quick, someone think of a really memorable and quirky mascot character that will make Kickstarter fall in love with our scrappy little up-and-coming project.

Perhaps... some sort of ultimate warrior?

 

[SteveTR]

I would like to help out with the writing, too.

I actually have an idea for a game. It would be a platformer where you would explore ancient temples from different eras. It would be mostly an atmospheric kind of game. I haven't really thought of a goal for the player character yet. Maybe you could have a different mission in every level? A situation I had in mind was the main character coming across a cave with cave paintings, where the paintings show the rise and fall of an ancient civilization.

The gimmick of the game would be that it's basically a game about history, but with robots. Everyone in the game would be a robot (maybe except for the animals). It's either an alternate universe, or an alternate history, where robots from the future travelled to the past and established their own civilization. The joke of it all would be that in that world, humans still existed, they were just replaced by robots.

EDIT: I'd also be willing to provide artwork for the game.

 

[SonofaJohannes]

I know how to use basic Ren'py (like, REALLY basic), though I'm not sure that might ever become relevant. If you need another voice actor I'll be happy to help though. Or writing, but you seem to have quite a few of those guys already.

 

[twosage]

"Dressed to Kill"

An action platformer where you play a pair of boxers shorts and each level you must collect your clothes and equipment. You must collect each article of clothing and secret spy gear (adding each one to your ensemble) until you are a full super-spy tuxedo ready to shoot baddies and woo ladies...

Edited one last time. The original idea was better. The floating boxer shorts mascot would just be great for marketing.

 

[Mathew Losefsky]

FYI, Conception(I can elaborate, but pretty much everything) and Design(very rough t-o decent concept arts for just about everything), Basic Composition/Lyricist/Singer, Promo Materials(textual), Level Design, Basic Templative Programming, Writer.

I've been interested in game design for the past 10 years and concepting my own original IPs for about 5. My stable currently sits at around 20 concepts for both Tabletop and Digital gaming, many of them possible in either format.

I specialize in epic scale, so I can't be the Lead in anything or things will get very out of proportion very fast. I require a collar and chain to work as part of a team... ;P

And all these willing helpers makes me feel obligated to suggest a site you might all be interested in: Gamesprout.com...