My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

[Zezeta]

*UPDATED* 3-2-05

All the treads about RPGM 1 gave me flashbacks to the fun times I had with RPGM, so i found my copy and started playing. After a couple of minutes I had an idea for a game. Tell me what you think.

Title: Don't have one just yet. If you have an idea let me know.

My game is about your plane or ship (haven't decided really) has crashed on an a lost island. There are 6 different characters each with a unique job. Your objective would obviously be to get off the island.

The 6 different jobs are:
Navigator: better chance of finding more locations on the island
Hunter: when you go hunting you will see more animals to hunt.
Chef: can cook meat and fish to help you regain more health.
Carpenter: your buildings are built better
Doctor: can heal your people from animal bites and other diseases.
Professer: knows about some of the plants and animals in the area and also knows various languages.

The 6 different locations:
Beach
Cave
Mountain
Cliffs
River
Small Island off the big Island


Some gameplay elements:

• Your people lose health everyday so you have to go out and hunt
• There are 6 different starting areas and depending on who you start as depends on where you start
• Depending on which job you choose depends on how many people are with you and how many supplies you are able to find after the crash.
• Your MP is your # of supplies.(so obvisouly some jobs can hold more supplies)
• Hunting and Fishing are now going to be done through a minigame. I just need to think of how I'm going to do these minigames.

Story: You are going to Japan on a business trip for your job. As the sun begins to set you can see storm clouds in the horizon. Within an hour the storm is ontop of you. The plane shakes violently and tosses you around in your seat. There is a huge flash of lightning and the next thing you know you've been thrown from the plane. There are other people around you. Most are dead but you can still hear life coming from some of them. You only have time to save so many people, so you need to choose wisely. After that you go to get anything you can salvage from the plane. You get your personal things and some supplies right before the plane catches on fire and explodes. You are left with the people you saved and know it becomes a game of survival and rescue.

Character Development: You pick one person to play for the entire game. As stated before depending on that person's job you will have 1-3 more people on your team. You will learn about this person through his or her actions and also through flashbacks. You may also learn a little about another character when playing as another character, but you will need to play as that character to get the whole story.

I'm planning on working on the game this weekend, but seeing how school sucks I might not be able to.

[Caciss]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

I think you should do some sort of custom system for the fishing and hunting.

Otherwise, sounds pretty interesting.

[Czechs Mex]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

I think you should do some sort of custom system for the fishing and hunting.

I second that. If you're going to force people to go hunting every day, using the battle system probably isn't going to cut it.

This reminds me of a Gilligan's Island RPG I started making a few years ago. One thing I found was that I was so overly-obsessed with making all these features (day/night system, calendar system, daily chores, customizing houses, etc.) that I never really stopped to consider if any of them actually made the game more fun. A lot of them probably weren't worth adding, and that's really disheartening.

So yeah, this sounds like it could be a great game, but before you start adding these different features, you might want to think about, for instance, how enjoyable building a fire will be.

[Zezeta]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

I think there use to be a guide on how to make a fishing minigame for RPGM a long time ago. I wish I could find it. About the building a fire. I think you have a really good point. Maybe I could make a minigame that you have to find the things to build a fire, and then after that you can build a fire any time you want. Now that i'm thinking about it I'm probally going to add minigames for accomplishing things and then after that you don't have to keep doing the minigame (unless you want to). I think I'm going to need to add minigames for Hunting and Fishing, Finding New Locations on the island, trying to get saved, and maybe there can be some minigames that let you find out about the islands history and that can lead to great rewards. If you have any ideas for minigames, or if you see any areas that you think might need a minigame to make more fun i'd love to hear them. I wish I could find a way to let the player build their own base, but i don't know how that would work. I'll think about it though. I'd love to be able to have you build your own base.

[Ryner]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

I feel bad for the translator, he must be pretty unskilled to get a job like that.

Hunter: Hi, I'm Hunter, I supply us with food.

Doctor: Hi Hunter! My name's Doctor, I keep us healthy.

Translator: Nice to meet you. I'm the translator. In the unlikely event we crash on an unknown island where the natives speak a language only I somehow know, I'll make sure we can communicate!

[Gustaff 13]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

I think there use to be a guide on how to make a fishing minigame for RPGM a long time ago.

Yeah, but it wasn't very fun.

You could use a few custom graphics and make a "side-scrolling" fishing game kinda like in Link's Awakening. Use invisible events in every space of the pool and monitor the lure's position with switches to prevent the lure from going back out or down creating the illusion of reeling in. Depending on the bait you use, some fish my move toward your lure, others away, or remain indifferent.

But what should happen if you get a bite? Hmm, well I can't think of everything for you.
Sounds like it has potential, good luck.

[Zezeta]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

Translator: Nice to meet you. I'm the translator. In the unlikely event we crash on an unknown island where the natives speak a language only I somehow know, I'll make sure we can communicate!

Yeah I know what you mean Ryner. Maybe I can give him a better skill, or just replace him with another job.

Thanks for the advice Gustaff. I'm really going to have to think on the fishing and hunting game because if it's going to be such a big part of the game it needs to be fun and innovative.

Now in the game I want to have atleast a small story and character development. Which do you guys think is more important? Character Deveolpment or Storyline? I'm thinking about using cutscenes after certain events to tell the story. Should I use flashbacks to tell the people's story like in "Lost" or is that too cliche'd? I think flashbacks and small cutscenes would be the best way to tell the story.

[ErikaFuzzbottom]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

I usually prefer to focus on the story. Unless the story calls for good character development, then I'm certain to work hard on that.

Now, I have one question for you.

You'll have certain number of days to try to get off.

Why?

[Ryner]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

Personally, I'd considering dropping the whole time limit situation. You dont want anything in your game that could reduce the fun and make the game seem more like a chore...

"Gee, this sure is a fun mini-game, but I only have three days left to get off the island, so I guess I better stop playing and work on cutting this stupid tree down"

[Zezeta]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

Personally, I'd considering dropping the whole time limit situation. You dont want anything in your game that could reduce the fun and make the game seem more like a chore...

That would things less complicated on my part. Also it would make a story easier to create and present throughout the game.

Also I'm going to drop the translator and make another job instead. Not quite sure yet, but it won't be hard to think of one. I think i'm just going to make a minigame where you would have to find something that helps you understand the native lanquage on the island instead of having the translator.

One more question for right now. Would you all rather play as a default character (like one with no specific job), or would you rather be able to just pick one of the 6 jobs? Or better yet. What if you could pick from like 8 different looking characters for your team and then you could pick what job they have. Now I just need to update my first post.

[Caciss]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

I think you should be able to choose everyone who's on the island with you.

Adding replay value, or whatever.

[Zezeta]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

I think what I'm going to do with the characters is to let the player pick one of the 6 characters. Then you are able to pick the other 2-4 people on the island with you. Also who ever you pick you get to see flashbacks of that person's past. That way if you wanted to know what everyone's history is you would have to play through the game 6 times. This means that I'm not going to make the game too long.

I think I've found out what I want to do with the gameplay. I'm thinking that the game could be mission based. Like each day is a new mission. So on day one you would have to build a fire, build a shelter, and one or two other things. To complete the objectives many of them would be minigames. Also I want the player to be able to do other things that aren't an objective for the day. So when the player completes all the objectives of that day the player can decide to move onto the next day, or just do other things for awhile. I would advance the story through cutscenes during the day. I think this would work better then what I had before.

[Czechs Mex]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

Okay, I'm liking this idea a lot now. Those are some quality additions that really make the game unique.

As for the translator character you dumped, you could make him into some sort of professor/inventor or something, and then the language translating skill wouldn't seem so contrived.

[WilliamKirk]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

http://www.gamefaqs.com/console/psx/game/258251.html

The mini game making faq is where the fishing mini game walkthrough/faq is. It sounds cool as of now. I really like the inventor idea too. Gl

[Zezeta]

Re: My RPGM 1 idea. Any suggestions would be nice.

Thanks for the website WilliamKirk! I go to gamefaqs all the time, but I totally forgot that the they had FAQs for RPGM. Hey Czechs Mex can I use your Professor idea? I really like it and I think it fits in really well.

Also I decided that I'm going to have who you pick decides where you land on the island. I know it takes away from the chance to pick where you want to start the game, but this way it's easier for me, and then I can release each character as a seperate game. This way I can focus on one person at a time, and release the game for that person and then focus on another person.

I'm going to give you guys a chance to pick where you want the people's story to take place. All you need to do is pick one character and one location, and don't pick a person and location someone else has picked. This way I'm somewhat letting you guys pick where you start. Look in the updated post at the top for the 6 people and 6 locations.