I suppose I'm writing this out to see what people think. I'd rather know that at least some people would be interested in playing a game like this before I actually go out and slave away turning this thing into a reality.
The game is a hybrid between a retro-styled rpg and a medieval sim. The main concept behind it is that everything about it, including the main story itself, is randomly generated each time you play. Not at start-up, however, but gradually morphing into whatever the story it is to become through the use of random events and player interaction. This is how the engine works after the land is generated:
First, Much like an rts, a random number of races are created and a mustering_hall for each one is randomly placed within the main room.
Each mustering_hall acts as a main building for each kingdom. They have a king and it is also the gathering point for villagers with nothing to do. Speaking of villagers:
Villager's are very important to the game's engine. Without them, kingdom's would never develop and the main story would never progress. An interesting feature (that I've already implemented on a tiny scale) is that each villager has stats ie (atk, range, magic, good/evil, vit, etc) They also have individual needs. Needs need to be met otherwise the villagers will die. No need for alarm though for villagers take care of themselves mostly. To sum that up, Its through the villager's needs and them taking care of themselves that kingdoms are developed and due to random events that occur, villager needs are always changing.
This happens as follows: Say the season in the game is winter. The villagers are freezing to death and, in a state of panic, the king/lord/whatever of the kingdom decides that they need a fire to stay warm. The king then sends out a villager who then goes out and posts this "need" as a contract in the contract office. Another villager would then go to the office and build a camp fire. Its through either the player or the npc's themselves completing contracts that kingdoms develop. These contracts act as generic quests. I like this concept because it allows for easy quest generation. And, there will of course be other sorts of quests ie talking to people, finding ana item, etc. But as far as kingdom development, all can be found at the contract office. (I'll eventually come up with a more medieval name
)There's more to it-
completing contracts = kingdom development, sure, but the player can choose which contracts he or she does. Contracts require certain skills so someone who's built up their character as an assassin taking out targets cannot complete the "Build court house" contract (unless they also have the prerequisite skills for that as well). This leads to the player being able to control the story a bit. It also lets them work towards a profession which hopefully adds more immersion to the game.
Moreover and to point, the main-story conforms to the gamer's playing style without losing direction. There's also something always taking place being that everything is in real-time.
Example of story-oriented quests:
On start up, you are placed in the wilderness with your map and need to survive. Your character is given a randomly generated quest by default which will take them to the nearest town. Once that quest is finished, the player will find themselves in the midst of an event. This event could be anything but to make things interesting, let's say interaction between kingdoms has already taken place. Diplomacy is in the works and you are the courier for a very important scroll. IF you succeed in your task, giving the scroll to the npc that it was intended for, then yay! quest complete and the two kingdoms are that much closer to becoming allies. Say you were to fail however. You lose the scroll, you die, you insult the targeted npc, ect. Something bad happens and the two kingdoms are at war with each other. Because king's have a primitive "motives ai" the game's engine would then build up a strategy for the king. With randomly set values -say, evil = 90%, likes to lie = 100%, etc. He chooses to hire a kidnapper to kidnap the princess of the other kingdom. That king would then of course send out a contract to save his daughter and only those brave enough would dare go out and try to save her. Note: If you were to accept this quest, keep in mind that at the same time that you're trying to save her, the other king is trying to keep her and, with the use of contracts, the villagers of the other kingdom begin to build defenses. The difficulty of the quest can also be determined by your standing with the kingdom which has the princess. If no one really knows you that well, sneaking in and grabbing her wouldn't necessarily be an easy feat but still much easier than if all occupants of that kingdom were on high alert searching for you because you've messed wit them before.
That quest is a bit advanced and for the better half of it still all theory-based but I'm fairly sure its doable, however tedious and an epic undertaking it may be.
Anyway, that's how the game's going to work.
What do people think of this sort of concept?
Feel free to post any feedback whatsoever
thanks!
Hidden within the game's engine are a multitude of significant events that can be called out randomly. In other words, some events can be triggered in many, many different ways. These events, when triggered, will be significant because they cannot be easily un-done. Its the one part of the game's engine that's nearly set completely in sone (the only part not in stone being the chance that it doesnt happen) -they may not be triggered at all depending on whether or not that particular random, significant event was called/initialized during start-up when the game's engine creates everything. As a benchmark, I'd like to have at least four-hundred of these events, each being very diverse than the others. They'll take time to create but hey, I like writing/story telling so it shouldn't be too hard, just tedious -as will be most of this project.
