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So I knew coming in to this course that graphics were my weakness, which makes this assignment a particular challenge for me. But here goes nothing:

Idea 1: In a world of very basic geometric people, your life is very bland until this very exclusive club moves into town. You are faced with the options of continuing your boring life or trying to get past the bouncer and see what’s inside.

Idea 2: Stick figures at a party. You play as a college freshman at his first party, where you discover that consuming alcohol temporarily gives you the ability to read minds. This would be a very dialogue-centered game where your social abilities can propel you to great heights, or perhaps great depths.

Idea 3: Seven minutes in heaven. This would definitely be the most challenging game to do technically, but given my skill set, may be the most viable. Maybe. The only visual is a black screen and a dim light that shines from the other side of the closed door. You are trapped in the dark with someone you can’t see, and you have seven minutes until the game ends. My idea is to have a voice actor read the script and record it, and come up with an interesting enough personal narrative that people will want to play more than once. Another way to develop it could be to develop a string parser and go more along the lines of facade, which could be possible in Python.

Idea 1:

You play through the character creation screen of your typical RPG, picking features and equipment for your character. However, you also have to convince her to actually fight for you.

Idea 2:

You’ve been hired to babysit the “difficult” child on the block. They don’t listen, they’re hyperactive, they freak out over random things, they don’t shut up. Your goal is to make it to getting paid without any tantrums. Who knows, maybe it’s just a matter of understanding what upsets the kid?

This is a bit of a sketchy version but it’s the same overall style.

Jerald and Kohler Escape from Zombie Prison!

Jerald has been in his cell for a little over a year, still without a clue why. He is a scrawny man of timid nature and ambiguous racial identity. He finds himself in fits of anxiety and self-disappointment, but is always comforted by Kohler. Kohler, who you play, is Jerald’s best friend and cell mate; you’ve been in that cell since you can remember, and have made acquaintances with all of its residents. Jerald is the only one who’s ever spoken to you, however, because, well…. You’re a toilet seat. And Jerald is clearly out of his right mind. One day, Jerald awakes to the discomforting sound of flesh-munching. He quickly realizes the zombie apocalypse is upon the earth, and it has started at this very prison. As Kohler, you must guide your dear friend towards escape and salvation.

Example conversation:

As Jerald awakes and comes to grips with the situation, you can converse with him to change his mindset towards:

• Optimism, terror, confidence, apathy
• Tell him to stay in his cell for safety
• Take you and bust out of the place

As he is his own man, he can decide not to listen to you; filling him with confidence may make it easier to convince him to break out of the cell.

Throughout the adventure, you may meet other prisoners who are not yet zombies, have to fight through the hordes while Jerald uses you as a weapon, so on and so forth, all the while guiding his actions and conversing with him to influences his effectiveness/decision-making.

 

 

 

 

Sonance

You play Sonance – the lead vocalist of a local post-hardcore band turned superhero. Because of your vocal and physical prowess, you are the man that the HCPD (Harlot City Police Dept) trusts to get the answers they need while keeping their hands clean. Every interaction with a suspect/inmate/criminal/mobster will have the same four options:

• General Question (WHERE ARE THEY!?!)
• Accuse them of lying (DON’T LIE TO ME!!!!)
• “Convince” them to answer you/Intimidate (TELL THE TRUTH!!!!!!)
• Interrogation/Action Move (break his wrist… etc).

Yes, if you were wondering, it’s almost a play on the overdone but effective Batman tactic; I do plan on changing it sufficiently to make in original, and the dialogue options will change between every interaction.

Every person you interrogate/question will reveal their personality through how the react to your presence and choices. Based on what kind person you discern they are (sociopath, tough guy, coward/rat/squealer) you will choose the best options to get what you want. A coward may not last long/get knocked out if you beat him up to much, but may respond well to lots of yelling and intimidation.

The story may progress linearly (the more successful interrogations, the further you get into figuring out what is happening/who’s in charge/ etc).

Example:

You are told of a small businessman who works for a mob boss who is smuggling drugs into the city. You meet him in an alley way at night, and pin him to the ground with your NetGun. He’s not too tough of a guy, and is already wetting his pants. Punching his chest will cause him to faint, but asking questions and accusing him may work wonders to get what you need. With the info he gives you, you know your next target will be the head of a local shipping and transit corporation.

LOL emo hair

Click on the picture to see him go (WordPress won’t accept animated SWF’s)! I want to remake a hentai visual novel, changing the graphics to be acted charades-style by this guy. His reactions will range from excited hand gestures to senile non sequiturs.  Your responses will be taken word for word from the hentai game text.

 

Idea 1 – This was the first character face that came to me as I began my work.  I wanted an expressive robot that used hinges and joints to move parts of the face around.  I dont consider this the final look if I worked with this idea.  I dont have an interaction in mind for it yet.  Perhaps the interaction could be either assembly or disassembly of the robot to help it find the perfect expression.  Advice on how to make it more expressive or more hinge and joint reliant would be useful.

Outcomes: The robot has found the perfect expression with your help OR You leave the robot’s face horribly scarred and disfigured.

Idea 2 – The second idea I had was interacting with a brain hooked up to a simple emotion display unit, which is just a smily face on a screen.  For this interaction I wanted to explore a character that in normal circumstances would be very intimidating but now reduced to just its thoughts and a dumbed down face, how does this change the players interaction with the character.  One idea I had was this brain once was a criminal master mind and is now being preserved and interrogated in order to fix the criminals last scheme.  Any other suggestions on an intimidating character mind would be helpful.

Outcomes:  Solve the crime by successfully interrogating the brain OR The brain perishes because it took to long to get it to talk.

Idea 3 – A guardian bodhisattva has returned to the world to help you find the path to enlightenment.  The problem, it is rather judgmental of your choices in life.  Through a series of questions and interactions with the bodhisattva enlightenment can be revealed to you.  How many lives will you have to live in order to reach the ultimate state of nonexistence. Or will you frustrate your guide to the point of abandonment.  This character would use color and sound to respond to the players choices revealing either progress or frustration. The eyes in the image above are a cultural symbol of Buddha’s enlightened mind.

Outcomes:  Enlightenment is attained without having to live an excessive amount on lives OR The bodhisattva abandons you because you cannot see past your closed mined ways.

So both of my characters come from pretty dark places and the goal for me is to make the player uneasy.

1) Player’s Imaginary Friend Jeremy

So Jeremy is your imaginary friend since your childhood and has convinced you that he is your only friend ever and that if you ever leave him that he will hurt you. He reveals things about your past that you don’t know if it is true or not but is pretty horrific. He changes color based on mood. There really isn’t any winning to this game. Jeremy wants you to kill everyone and endings can be you doing his bidding or killing yourself.

2) You

I want to base you off of schizophrenia since it is a really interesting topic to me. I want to include some things like paranoia and changing the surroundings around you. Something like you have a spider on your back. Talking to you would be interesting since it is you. You are talking to yourself but at the same time it is a being that it is still you. This one would be a bit more complicated and I would have to do a bit more research to know exactly what I would want it to be. There would be no winning in this one either.

Idea 1: you’re talking to a face in the wall, it doesn’t know anything, but the more you talk to it, the more it grows and develops eyes, nose, mouth, limbs, etc until comes out of the wall.

Idea 2: you’ve recently graduated and are interviewing to get a job at a hot new company called #FORK.  Everything you say seems to be the wrong thing to say…

 

1) What Did You Witness?

For this idea I was inspired by Paolo’s demonstration in class of creating characters from manipulated simple shapes.  But in this case, the player will be “designing” the character.  The game starts off with a pixelated background of a dark alley, a building, and a vague silhouetted figure.  Then Policeman Bob will show up to inform you that you have just witnessed a crime and need to describe the perp.  Policeman Bob will ask questions relating to the perp’s physical appearance, specifically: lower body type (boxy, round, v-shaped), lower body size (long, squat, proportional), upper body type (boxy, round, v-shaped), upper body size (long, squat, proportional), head shape (oval, rectangular, heart-shaped), head size (long, squat, proportional), gender, skin color, hair color, hair type (curly, straight, wavy), hair length (long, short, shoulder-length), clothing color, and shoe color.  At the end, the player will brought to the police station to identify the perp they described.  The player “wins” if he found identified the correct criminal.

2) Enchanted Wilderness

In this game, the player would be hiking and stumble under an “enchanted” forest with legendary animals.  He then gets to choose which animal he wants to follow and learn about , make friends with, or capture.  The three animals he can follow are a dragon, a unicorn, or a phoenix.  I want each of the three characters to have unexpected qualities: for instance, if the player decides to follow the unicorn, he always views it from the profile, and at the end he sees it head-on and it actually has two horns and is an evil, devil-type character.

Meet Graba Cho the manically depressed tree frog:

As Graba you have a serious problem. A lot of the time you don’t feel like doing anything. In fact it is so bad and you are so lazy that you pretty much can’t get anywhere or do anything and if you don’t find some good drugs you pretty much just want to lay down and die. And, it is very possible you will. On the other hand, sometimes you just act like a complete ass. You say things that piss people off. You take the insects other frogs were going to eat without asking; you basically don’t have a filter. You want to be normal, but to do that you have to find a drug that’s right for you. The only problem is there are so many different types. Sometimes when you take a drug you end up curled up in a ball sitting under the water that trickles off forest leaves just crying your eyes out. Other times you think you are Super Frog and can do anything, including jumping between trees that are way too far apart (splat). What you need is that drug in the goldilocks zone, the one that’s “just right” and to find it you will just have to experiment. Hopefully you won’t die along the way.

 

 

Illustration soon to come: Vergatis the equation with a heart of gold

As Vergatis you want people to understand you. But, like game theory, super string, advanced calculus, and many other subjects, most people find you daunting (only more so). You know that if people could just open their minds they could use you to unlock the secrets to life, the universe, and everything (42). Unfortunately you seem to be destined to a life of under utilization where you only get to socialize with stuffy post docs and ancient math professors, non of whom really understand you. Until, one day you meet a high school freshman who just gets you, and she makes you the happiest equation in the multiverse. Can you save her from having her life ruined by the CIA as they seek to exploit her to open wormholes to everywhere they want to go?

SUPPLEMENTAL

Conceptualizing Vergatis motivations and Interactions:

Notes/things to think about:

People use equations differently.

The vast majority of integrals can’t be solved (maybe irrelevant).

As a 4D equation. No one can represent you in less than 3 dimensions.

So I’m thinking about an equation in 4D. This could explain why the girl is the only one who can understand you as the equation. She is able to perceive time in a way that is not strictly linear. You are a completely non-linear entity dealing with linear characters. When you interact with humans you have to force yourself to exist in a linear time frame. Most humans can only perceive a small piece of you, the static piece. Most equations are either none sentient or don’t care about being understood so their extrusion into the perceptive universe of humans, or into linear time is normal to them. However, your motivations are different. You have been endowed with passion, a sense of exploration, and you are lonely. So you are constantly striving to communicate with the only beings that seem to share these qualities with you, linear beings.

When you look at a mathematician you are hoping to find three essential qualities:

• Intellect
• Curiosity
• Love and Empathy
  • This last quality must be a dual quality because some people can love without being empathetic people.
    • Example, some mathematicians love Euler’s identity , but are incapable of understanding the emotions of other humans.

As an equation you could communicated by manipulating the flow of time through the wormholes that those who can first solve you can create. This will create a song which can only be perceived by those who can understand you, and those who can understand you are only those who can wrap their head around non-linear thinking in the truest sense. A person who has some sort of non-linear perception could do this, or a super-computer (created specifically for this purpose by the CIA) could. But the later could never understand the beauty of your song. Those you can solve you can sing back to you if they know how by introducing variables that counter and alter your song, and this can change your actions. But, you can also act allow time to change within your wormholes. You can use your wormholes to change the density of the matter that corresponds to the subspacial or hyperspacial matter the wormhole passes through. With this you can become a force to be reckoned with, you can create wormhole weapons of mass destruction, or time machines, or simple squeeze and enemy into spaghetti no thicker than an electron. But you don’t want to do any of that, you want to help your friend experience the universe, you want to sing.

http://www.superliminal.com/cube/applet.html

http://hypercube.milosz.ca/