WOULD THIS WORK ON RM ?

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I'm a big fan of the Elder Scrolls games and there's an idea I've been taking care of lately and I'd like to have some feedback as if it would be doable, fun and would work in a single player game.

It would be an heroic-fantasy type of game. So it'd have a large open world in which the players could wander freely. There would be short prologue or introduction sequence in which the player would create his character and then go through the only linear part of the game which would be short (maybe 15-20 minutes of short gameplay sequences and cutscenes to detail the context in which the character would be evolving) after that the player would start at a certain place heavily filled with pointers of different quests to grab the player from the start.

So the concept would be to wander the world, fill the quests. The quests would be rather long and complicated but there would be slightly less of them and they would often present moral dilemna to the players which would affect his alignment (good or evil). The more his alignment would be in either way, new dialogue options and new way to end quests would appear.

Battles would be a classical turn-by-turn combat system and it would be possible for the player to get new party members to help him under certain circumstances. Sometimes they would stay with him after the quest through dialogue options.

Player would have to complete big quests to change class and go through a Class Tree and specialize his character even more.

But I'm wondering if it'd be fun for the player, what would hook them to keep playing aside from big world, rich in long quests and good customization options for the character).

What do you think ?
I dunno... sounds ambitious, but also sounds like something that's been done to death, even here on RMN. The whole open world, quest-based gameplay. Sounds boring to me, but some people eat that stuff up.
Thiamor
I assure you I'm no where NEAR as STUPID as one might think.
63
You really don't have the 'customizable options' for characters, hardly at all, in the way the OP is mentioning.
Customization. Check
Open-endedness. Check
Non-linear. Check

You've got some major selling points but it is really freaking ambitious.

Also, as Narcodis said, it's been done to death. Well, more like it's been attempted to death for RPG Maker. If you think you can, go for it.

Interesting quests, fun battles (actual strategy), and some major customization branches are really your selling point here.
The concept sounds familiar indeed. I didn't play many MMORPGs but aren't they all like that? The biggest risk would be boredom so you might want to spice things up a little bit, especially the battle system in my opinion. You'd also need a great variety of events, quests, minigames and all the rest to keep the players interested.
The amount of eventmaking and forks would be overwhelming too. You'd have to be quite persevering and/or build a big team of coworkers to complete such a game. But it would definitely be doable.
Someone else did this. People complained about not knowing what to do or where to go.

I've been making a big world where you walk different maps between towns instead of a small overworld map. I'm 31 50x50 maps into making the game.

If you do quests... I do have my random quest generator :-)
It does seem really ambitious... but it also sounds like something I'd enjoy. I like the Elder Scrolls, too.
Try Fallenwood if you want an RM example. It has an open-ended WRPG style to it. I do not remember if it was good or not, but it's good to see it in action.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
You are describing a pretty major subgenre of RPGs - sandbox RPGs - and asking if there's merit in making them? Well, yeah. That's why they're a pretty major subgenre of RPGs. Tons of people love them.

I dislike them personally, though. They feel so... aimless. There's no real goal, so they feel like toys instead of games. I grew out of toys around age seven. So if you're asking what would make *me* interested, the answer is making something more like Zelda or FF12: where there's a lot of exploration and sidequests, but you also have a very clear primary goal that takes up a very major portion of the game. To me, this also makes all of your sidequests feel like they have a real purpose: to help you beat the main quest.

But honestly, my best advice is to decide the type of player you want to make a game for, and then make your game as much fun as possible for that type of player. You want to make a sandbox game with no story, lots of exploration, and real-time combat? Go for it. Don't change your game just to appease people like me who dislike the whole premise. There are plenty of people who love that sort of game.

Hell, if it's good enough, maybe I'll like it anyway. There are some games that I love despite the fact that they're sandbox games.

And ignore the people saying it's overdone. It's a major subgenre of RPGs, geez, of course a lot of games fall into that description.
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
I tried a game with this basic format (different genre). I failed to remain motivated to continue working on it. Part of the reason has to do with my own creative ADD. The rest? Too ambitious!

Making a videogame solo? Already really fucking hard. Making an epic sandbox videogame all by yourself? Verges on the impossible.
Not only it's not very original, but it's got all the ingredients for never-gonna-happen.

1 - Way too ambitious.
2 - Not enough inspired. You're very likely to have another idea along the way, and drop it.

I say that because I've seen many many game concepts like that, but definitely not many successful games.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
I don't really think this sounds necessarily any more ambitious than a standard JRPG. It doesn't have to be 100 hours long. It has a few major custom systems, but so does any game worth its salt.
So it'd have a large open world in which the players could wander freely.
The quests would be rather long and complicated
Player would have to complete big quests to change class
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
Well, it depends how many quests he has.

10-15 quests that each have their own dungeon, and a world that is big enough to include all these dungeons? No problem, same length as a typical JRPG.

40-60 quests that each have their own dungeon, and a world that is big enough to include all these dungeons? Yeah, that's a problem. I assume no one would actually do this outside of an MMO, because your game would be 200 hours long.
I think I know how to do this... The Zelda method. 1 town in the center... 5 map radius out from it. Like a grid of 11 x 11 maps. The town has the quests. Fighter's guild, mage's guild, theives guild and a main quest. Or even use the zelda town formula where the town is always in the far west to make the stuff in the east more of a journey to get to.

Here's 1/3rd of my open world. You may notice the forum in the background.


So what if it is ambitious. To hell with this self-defeating attitude, its poisonous and annoying as hell,so what if he does or doesn't complete it ? Its the path that counts. I would rather fail at making a big game, where I LEARN something trough the process, then make some crappy small game no one will ever play, but I made it and learned nothing at all. Its not about the goal, its about the path. So go for it, but really you need to get more inspired.
Max McGee
with sorrow down past the fence
9159
I would rather fail at making a big game, where I LEARN something trough the process, then make some crappy small game no one will ever play, but I made it and learned nothing at all. Its not about the goal, its about the path. So go for it, but really you need to get more inspired.


No offense, but...have you ever actually done either?

I've done both, a lot, hence why I felt qualified to speak to this issue.
About ambition.... I say as a first project... start with 1 town and 1 dungeon and 1 quest. Then from there go to 5 towns, 5 dungeons and 5 quests. Until you do the 1 dungeon and 1 quest don't bother anything more :-)

Or really just do what you want. If you want to map. Go map. If you want to make 50 quests with no map, do that too :-) If you want to do an open world game. Go for it :-) No one can stop you :-)
author=Bonehead11
So what if it is ambitious. To hell with this self-defeating attitude, its poisonous and annoying as hell,so what if he does or doesn't complete it ? Its the path that counts. I would rather fail at making a big game, where I LEARN something trough the process, then make some crappy small game no one will ever play, but I made it and learned nothing at all. Its not about the goal, its about the path. So go for it, but really you need to get more inspired.


how do you not learn something from completing a small project and releasing it? since when does the length of a game govern peoples interest in it?
@Max Mcgee
Yes, I tried to do big ambitious project, but yet I failed in the process, because I had the lack of knowledge of almost everything, but thanks to experimenting in the ambitious game and some minor side stuff, I have some knowledge to successfully complete the game i am trying to make...I hope. I know you want to share your experience, wich I don't doubt, but if he won´t try it, he won´t learn a thing.

@Darken
I should have wrote it more specific...I meant big as more features like CMS ,CBS, more dungeons etc., I didn't meant the length. And by small I meant everything default, no experimenting, just rips, rtp. Sure you will learn more by doing a small game with lot of custom stuff, rather than doing a lengthy game full of default and rips. The problem was defining what is small and what is big.
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