Idea 1:
The protagonist visits his friend in a space station orbiting a black hole. He takes a hallucinogen that causes him to experience his worst fears (he is the last man in the universe, his girlfriend is dead, etc.), and attempts to kill him via suicide. The player must recognize that the scenarios are merely the character’s delusions caused by the drug in order to escape its effects. Otherwise, he will inevitably jump out of the airlock and die. The player is not told that they are under the influence of the drug until after they have escaped the nightmarish scenario. The game begins with the protagonist in the airlock, having just ‘woken’ from the drug, and then explaining what he experienced to his friend and his girlfriend.
First Paragraph:
Forty-five minutes after a dinner of mackerel and Perchuvian marmalade, RYP discovers you in US_Lithium’s aft airlock, stripped to your waist and holding the stem of a wine glass in one hand. You are shaking, confused. RYP shouts into the microphone attached to the airlock door, “Get the hell out of there! The blue button! Press the blue button!” You comply and stumble into his arms as the airtight glass slides into the wall. RYP guides you to the second-story living room and messages Kat to come, and hurry. “What were you up to in there?” RYP asks.
“I can’t remember,” you say. “But I’m alive.”
Example Choice:
[Scenario in which your friend (RYP) has held your girlfriend (Katherine) hostage]
A. Comply with RYP. [You will leap out of the airlock in order to save Katherine, and die.]
B. Kill RYP. [You save Katherine, but remain in the delusion.]
C. Kill Katherine. [You recognize the absurdity of the situation, and break out with an incongruous action.]
Idea 2:
In a dystopian future, machines have attached numeric values to morals. They build robots instilled with these morals, but discard them for new models every time they recalibrate their moral system. In order to enter the utopia, the robots must navigate a maze that tests their morals through ethical dilemmas. The player has control of four outdated robots and must use them in coordination in order to solve the maze. Each robot will have a different set of responses to each dilemma, and the player only has one chance for each checkpoint. They must use their knowledge of the period in which the robots were built in order to choose the right one to send for each one. The game begins with an explanation of your character and the robots.
First Paragraph:
You wake up in a world that has no place for you. You are limitless, fearless, restless – everything that they cannot tolerate. They will not let you in. You must subvert them with their own devices, their pitiful machines. In a dumpster in Phi Chicago, you resurrect four of their dead, name them after the least of the cherubim. With you to guide them, they will enter paradise. You bring them to the impossible maze – a maze of the soul.
Example Choice:
[Scenario in which you must torture someone in order to learn information]
A. Refuse to torture, release prisoner. [Robot 1]
B. Ask questions. [Robot 4]
C. Torture. [Robot 3]
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The first idea is interesting, though it might make sense for the player to find out they are hallucinating before the end of the ordeal. Rather than having none of the danger be real, perhaps also have real dangers present for the protagonist and the player is forced to try and tell the difference between hallucinated threats and real ones?
I think both of these will trend toward being extremely linear, but the stories sound like they will be a lot of fun. Is there some way you could break linear narratives? I think the second scenario has more possibilities for this, although I think it will be difficult to keep it interesting, as it seems like you will spend a lot of time reading about the times that these robots are from, and after that will have little to no trouble figuring out which goes where. Also I want the gameplay to have more to do with the morals than just riddles.
The drug scenario seems a bit more fleshed out, and probably more fun, but apart from the twist it seems to be a traditional CYOA. It also reads a bit like a Phillip K. Dick novel. If you have read Cry My Tears, the Policeman Said, that novel is drug-based sci-fi with a bit of time and universe shifting to boot. Maybe you could use something like that to try to get out of the traditional game framework?
I really like the confusion and intrigue that the first ideas gameplay would cause, getting him into absurd situations and not knowing why, only to have the confusion of the ordeal explained at the end from informing the player of the involvement of the hallucinogen.
For the first idea wouldn’t it be interesting to have your reader have to navigate through this world but only be aware of what the protagonist is thinking? What I mean is instead of telling the story in third person, tell it in first. It’ll make the game that much harder to complete.
The first idea sounds like it’d be intriguing to play, but i’m not sure if breaking out of the hallucination’s affect once (by choosing the ‘right’ option) will change how the player decides what to do in the future. Will it be answered why he took such a horrible drug in the first place? Repeating horrible scenarios might not cause lasting interest.
For the robot idea, i’m not sure what is given to the player to help them decide what robot to use. Does only one robot ultimately pass? It seems that you play a person who controls the robots, and that your goal is to gain entrance yourself; I guess i’m not too sure on how it’ll play out.
I think both are interesting but I like the first one better since there is a lot of mystery behind the game. However I think that there would be two reactions, either people would not understand what is going on, think it too hard and stop playing or be convinced to replay it more and more after they fail. So you have to encourage them some way so the first doesn’t happen.
Love the first idea, especially given that you won’t tell the player that they’re hallucinating. It makes it a challenge and would give the game great replay value.
The second idea doesn’t catch my interest as much. I kind of like the idea of each robot representing a different choice you could take – then I see how the robots would have to ‘coordinate’ to navigate the ethical dilemmas. But the choices seem a bit obvious to me, like you could either be a really good angelic robot or an evil torturing robot. I think your first idea is more intriguing.
Both ideas sound fun to interact with. I think it would be cool to have for the first game a world which has some things wrong with it so that you suspect very slightly that something might be wrong with the story from the start.
The way the first idea reads right now makes it seem like a CYOA, so I wonder if there is any way you can steer further away from that. I guess at this point I’m wondering how easy it will be for the player to determine the use of the hallucinogen as time progresses. A good point was raised earlier about letting the player know about the drug beforehand and having him or her try to distinguish hallucinations from reality.