New guy, new game idea
by Brodycat · in Game Design and Creative Issues · 07/19/2005 (1:21 pm) · 32 replies
Heya, Ken here. Big Tribes 2 player, looking into buying the TGE. I'm salivating over the possibilities.
Here's my idea. I had inklings for years of making a melee-based FPS. I've gone through the past threads and see that some people have already tried a few of those areas. So anyway, here's the specifics I wanted to work on:
1. Team-based combat, like Tribes. Most matches would be deathmatch, but quite a few objective-based missions could be run. The main issue is animation speed when you have many players close to you. How many players can fit into a small, bloody space?
2. I desperately want the missions to mean something for your team/country/empire other than a win. For this reason, I want to try and have a main/master server that keeps a master map that people can look at, maybe even on a website if people simply want to check up on the progress. Each win for a team means their "country" gains ground. On the main map, if the contested area is in a certain type of terrain, that is the next game a server can run. Hopefully the map will be big and varied enough to have multiple types of areas, even civilized ones such as medeival urban areas or the insides of castles. Of course, a separate storyline can be kept, perhaps by others on online forums or such. I just don't want it to get in the way of people who don't like exposition. We need just enough exposition to explain the body types, armor, and gameplay, though I surely don't mind other people taking the storyline as deep as they want to go.
3. I want a good amount of individualization without getting into the time-consuming BS of RPGs like having to collect gold to pay for a sword. Boring! (Sorry, they're just not my thing anymore.) Being in more combats means your character gets more power or skill automatically, and if you die you lose it all (not counting the experience the *player* gets from getting used to the controls.) This means the players should rightfully fear character death. I don't want players to obsess over what points go where. Yes, the character should be chosen from an initial body template; mixing that with armor and weapon types should make for many combinations to surprise your enemies with. However, I do not want any part of extraneous roleplaying; all the aspects of powering up and armor/weapon selection should enhance the combat gameplay, not simply be filler for a larger game.
4. There would be at least three countries to fight for, all with different skins, and maybe even weapon and armor types. There might be a southern plains people that are tall and can run fast, and then a swamp people that have pale skin and can sneak very well. These races may or may not be fantastical; I'm not ruling out making it either fantasy or pseudo-historical fiction. However, I am against magic, though I wouldn't mind seeing a dragon pop up now and then...not on anyone's side, just for eye candy.
5. Of course, the melee FPS combat system would be the biggest hurdle. How to make combat varied enough, yet fun to play and intuitive?
So, what do you think?
Here's my idea. I had inklings for years of making a melee-based FPS. I've gone through the past threads and see that some people have already tried a few of those areas. So anyway, here's the specifics I wanted to work on:
1. Team-based combat, like Tribes. Most matches would be deathmatch, but quite a few objective-based missions could be run. The main issue is animation speed when you have many players close to you. How many players can fit into a small, bloody space?
2. I desperately want the missions to mean something for your team/country/empire other than a win. For this reason, I want to try and have a main/master server that keeps a master map that people can look at, maybe even on a website if people simply want to check up on the progress. Each win for a team means their "country" gains ground. On the main map, if the contested area is in a certain type of terrain, that is the next game a server can run. Hopefully the map will be big and varied enough to have multiple types of areas, even civilized ones such as medeival urban areas or the insides of castles. Of course, a separate storyline can be kept, perhaps by others on online forums or such. I just don't want it to get in the way of people who don't like exposition. We need just enough exposition to explain the body types, armor, and gameplay, though I surely don't mind other people taking the storyline as deep as they want to go.
3. I want a good amount of individualization without getting into the time-consuming BS of RPGs like having to collect gold to pay for a sword. Boring! (Sorry, they're just not my thing anymore.) Being in more combats means your character gets more power or skill automatically, and if you die you lose it all (not counting the experience the *player* gets from getting used to the controls.) This means the players should rightfully fear character death. I don't want players to obsess over what points go where. Yes, the character should be chosen from an initial body template; mixing that with armor and weapon types should make for many combinations to surprise your enemies with. However, I do not want any part of extraneous roleplaying; all the aspects of powering up and armor/weapon selection should enhance the combat gameplay, not simply be filler for a larger game.
4. There would be at least three countries to fight for, all with different skins, and maybe even weapon and armor types. There might be a southern plains people that are tall and can run fast, and then a swamp people that have pale skin and can sneak very well. These races may or may not be fantastical; I'm not ruling out making it either fantasy or pseudo-historical fiction. However, I am against magic, though I wouldn't mind seeing a dragon pop up now and then...not on anyone's side, just for eye candy.
5. Of course, the melee FPS combat system would be the biggest hurdle. How to make combat varied enough, yet fun to play and intuitive?
So, what do you think?
About the author
#22
It was an interesting system, particularly in that you could link together combos. (Believe it or not, I taught a class on this before at www.thejediacademy.net. The game had to do something right to spawn an Academy. lol) It was a little funky at first and you often caught youself running with your swings, which results in zig-zagging all over the place... But when you get used to it, you find you can just tap in the swing direction, run in a different direction and repeat as necessary to form a combo while maintaining control of your running.
'twas a cool system.
08/09/2005 (5:37 am)
Well, in JK2 and JK3, the saber control was interesting. (The saber being the only truly melee weapon, not counting the shock stick and the fairly weak half-implemented punching.) Basically, it allowed for 7 different basic swings based on the direction you were moving when you hit attack. Forward, backward and standing still all did the same swing, while Forward/Left, Left and Backward/Left did three different swigns to the left. (The right did the same, but had different swings still.)It was an interesting system, particularly in that you could link together combos. (Believe it or not, I taught a class on this before at www.thejediacademy.net. The game had to do something right to spawn an Academy. lol) It was a little funky at first and you often caught youself running with your swings, which results in zig-zagging all over the place... But when you get used to it, you find you can just tap in the swing direction, run in a different direction and repeat as necessary to form a combo while maintaining control of your running.
'twas a cool system.
#23
An example of arbitrary assignments would be Mortal Kombat. You have to pull back to sweep kick, and pull down to uppercut. These were actually shortcuts because of the necessity to do more things with the up direction (jumping) and down direction, but I remember someone telling me I had to do those things in order to pull off the moves. They weren't intuitive.
Similarly, I do want to be able to pull off as many different melee weapon attacks as possible without arbitrarily mapping moves. I already struggled over the fact that LMB is stab, RMB is horiz. slash, and there's just no way to make a vertical slash without mapping out extra buttons. The animations I am creating for slash, slash while dashing, slash when dashing then crouching, prone slash, and so on are instinctive and numerous, to give players a variety of moves. Heck, I'm even worrying about having two separate buttons for crouching and prone. I'm so anal!
08/09/2005 (1:08 pm)
That's a cool concept. The issue in my mind, though, is that the swing types I could assign are almost arbitraily assigned. An example of arbitrary assignments would be Mortal Kombat. You have to pull back to sweep kick, and pull down to uppercut. These were actually shortcuts because of the necessity to do more things with the up direction (jumping) and down direction, but I remember someone telling me I had to do those things in order to pull off the moves. They weren't intuitive.
Similarly, I do want to be able to pull off as many different melee weapon attacks as possible without arbitrarily mapping moves. I already struggled over the fact that LMB is stab, RMB is horiz. slash, and there's just no way to make a vertical slash without mapping out extra buttons. The animations I am creating for slash, slash while dashing, slash when dashing then crouching, prone slash, and so on are instinctive and numerous, to give players a variety of moves. Heck, I'm even worrying about having two separate buttons for crouching and prone. I'm so anal!
#24
I think Im just going to use clicked icons. :P
08/09/2005 (1:35 pm)
Im just thinking that a modern game with so many options has too many keys to configure....unless you expect people to get a gamepad or a ps2 controller.I think Im just going to use clicked icons. :P
#25
08/11/2005 (6:28 am)
The F keys always go to good use in MMO games, so I don't see why it couldn't work here. You could give them "hotbars" to customize with various attacks and actions. If there's enough to do, you could even make multiple hotbars.
#26
We're going to have a ton of moves for the melee folks (ammo is fairly scarce in a post-apoc environment but not so much that you cant shoot something coming at ya).
Im going to go with the idea that players have a usb ps2 controller.
Im sure the programming staff is going to love me :)
08/11/2005 (7:01 am)
Right. Im thinking of a combination between a ps2 controller and icons.We're going to have a ton of moves for the melee folks (ammo is fairly scarce in a post-apoc environment but not so much that you cant shoot something coming at ya).
Im going to go with the idea that players have a usb ps2 controller.
Im sure the programming staff is going to love me :)
#27
I think I'll try to map moves based on combinations from already-mapped out buttons, such as direction, jumping, crouching, dashing, etc.
08/11/2005 (8:42 am)
Hotbars, for an FPS? It'd be a bitch to switch them mid-combat, so I am hesitant.I think I'll try to map moves based on combinations from already-mapped out buttons, such as direction, jumping, crouching, dashing, etc.
#28
movement keys at RDFG, A= run/dash, S= crouch, Z = prone, space = jump
mousewheel scroll = cycle through weaps, hand to hand being one choice
mousewheel click = held vs throwing action for melee weapon (if not h2h)
How to execute move -
1. Scroll to hand-to-hand
2. Click and hold Right or Left Mousebutton
3. Hit 3 button combination of movement keys
4. Release mousebutton to execute
This would give us 4*4*4 x 2 (mousebuttons) = 128 number of moves to give players!
And it would be fast enough for the twitch crowd to do on a keyboard.
No controller necessary :)
I feel like we've talked this to death but thats whats necessary for good design right? :D
08/12/2005 (7:39 am)
Actually, Ive come up with an alternate system in part, based on your suggestions:movement keys at RDFG, A= run/dash, S= crouch, Z = prone, space = jump
mousewheel scroll = cycle through weaps, hand to hand being one choice
mousewheel click = held vs throwing action for melee weapon (if not h2h)
How to execute move -
1. Scroll to hand-to-hand
2. Click and hold Right or Left Mousebutton
3. Hit 3 button combination of movement keys
4. Release mousebutton to execute
This would give us 4*4*4 x 2 (mousebuttons) = 128 number of moves to give players!
And it would be fast enough for the twitch crowd to do on a keyboard.
No controller necessary :)
I feel like we've talked this to death but thats whats necessary for good design right? :D
#29
Hm, holding the button down is an interesting concept...and yes, feel free to use anything I spout out here on the board! All the really cool concepts I keep to myself, heheh...
08/12/2005 (9:53 am)
Oh, I am of the opinion that we'd only be just getting started talking about it, if we were fleshing this out in a game! Hm, holding the button down is an interesting concept...and yes, feel free to use anything I spout out here on the board! All the really cool concepts I keep to myself, heheh...
#30
08/16/2005 (10:12 pm)
I bet a joystick would work really good for melee fighting
#31
It should allow for quick input and no extra devices necessary.
Of course the animators are going to hate me with so many combinations :)
08/17/2005 (5:18 am)
It probably would, but now that ive worked out my new system (above) I think that's what we will use.It should allow for quick input and no extra devices necessary.
Of course the animators are going to hate me with so many combinations :)
#32
I understand it is extremely similar to the Jedi Knight stuff.
08/17/2005 (4:37 pm)
Quote:How do you want your melee system to work?Phantasy Star Online has my favorite 3D melee system I have played.
I understand it is extremely similar to the Jedi Knight stuff.
Torque Owner Brodycat
My system, hopefully, will be mostly about hit location. The two mouse buttons will give you the basics of stab and slash (with slash recovery times longer than quick stabs), but it will be set against player movement (RDFG) and jumping (space) for dodging, and a keyboard button for blocking. So, the system will bring (in my mind) many coin-op fighting skill-sets into it. In addition, attack height will matter, by way of mouselook and crouch and lay prone buttons. You can even attack from above, if there is a ledge or stairway you can jump from. This allows many different areas of attack, also with the chance to defend. For example, a player's shield or blocking weapon would be centered by mouse look also, so you'd have to keep your eye on the attacker.
Of course, this is all in my head, and has not been fleshed out in the least.