Zombie Apocalypse

[fusion_power]

Uh ,sorry if this sounds stupid but isn't the Title screen currently the most unimportant part of this project? ^_^" I could imagine that mock-ups from the game itself would be a better way to use the time. Afaik if the project is really serious, the work should stard with drawings, scetches of the Game look etc...
If you stuck onto title screens, this Game may come out in 50 Years or so. ^^"""

 

[plopperz]

Uh ,sorry if this sounds stupid but isn't the Title screen currently the most unimportant part of this project? ^_^" I could imagine that mock-ups from the game itself would be a better way to use the time. Afaik if the project is really serious, the work should stard with drawings, scetches of the Game look etc...
If you stuck onto title screens, this Game may come out in 50 Years or so. ^^"""

A title screen will set the tone of the game, and is a very important part. I could understand if 20 of us were just making title screens, but this is only one person. I'm working on some concept art right now, and should have that up tomorrow, if I can ever figure out how to use GIMP.

 

[JakeK]

Hahaha well I think a zombie survival game sets its own tone. I don't think it could differ very much. While this title screen is good, it doesn't change anything about the game and I'd be pretty sure that the title screen is one of the last things made.

 

[plopperz]

Alright, alright. No more title screens.
Although there are plenty of different tones this game could have: horror, comedic, etc.

 

[___]

Okay, I really think you guys have a point saying that the title screen is not that important yet, but we are in a design phase here and anything that might decide on the style and direction this game will go is important now. I am contributing by finding a style for myself that I think might work well and I am sharing it with the rest of the gang to see if people like it or not. The title screen itself does not give the tone of the game but it indicates and helps developing a graphical concept. So if you are only complaining that nothing happens about the project that you think matters, go and change that! Start making up more then hot air and whip up some serious concept art/papers/designs. I put my name for help on GFX. The rest still needs to be decided on but graphics and mockups of how the whole thing could look are a good start. So instead of making fun, give me your opinion Jakek! Do you like it with the white background? Should the game design be bright and sterile sort of like they did with the "Dawn of the Dead" remake? Should it be taken with a grain of salt and be more trash-horror like? That's what I am trying to find out. I don't need to wait until someone ports an engine, I am not a programmer. I try to deliver concept art so people can get inspired first.

 

[JakeK]

I understand what you mean, but I don't think we have even decided on the perspective of the game. My only issue with the titlescreen is that when looking at it it doesn't look 'crisp.' Otherwise I think it encompases the horro theme very well. I wasn't making fun, it just seems we always seem to deviate away from the issues at hand instead of dealing with them.

I know I can't code or anything but I'd like to see this game get on its feet because it is a great idea and I believe you guys can do a fantastic job with it.

 

[closetwam]

In regards to the "tone" of the game, I'd prefer something not terrifying. There's plenty of games based on fear/anxiety or shock/gore. I'd opt for something a little more adventurous, but with a definite hint of horror, just not something that makes me jump every five seconds.

I like the idea of a wildly different graphical style (like having all the skins/sprites drawn in colored pencil or some other imperfect medium).

Sounds should be high quality, but perhaps not too realistic. Maybe either kind of corny, or else hyper-realistic. And background music should be light/ambient in most situations.

As far as tactics go, I'd like to see something a little like "I Am Legend", where you can put up a pretty good fight, but soon you will be overwhelmed if you don't take some real defensive action.

 

[A_SN]

In the main story-line

Usually homebrew games which mainly focus on a story sucks because unless it's written by someone with real story-telling skills (which most of the time isn't the case) the resulting story is both unoriginal, boring and flawed. I mean I don't care about a game's story if the person who wrote it couldn't make a nice novel out of it.

This being said, I think your best option is to drop the story (although you can still go with a back story that no one will care about, all games have one anyways, except pacman? idk) and focus on a fun endless sandboxy gameplay.

 

[BenTolputt]

And aside from gunning down slow-moving zombies, what else could you do in the sandbox? Sandbox games are fun, but there are a limited number of "scenarios" that you can use for them.

Forgive me if I think shooting hordes of slow-moving undead (by itself & without story-based context) is not fun. Whilst I agree stories can (& do) suck in alot of homebrew / indie games; I'm not in game development to write things for Popcap.

--BenT

 

[A_SN]

And aside from gunning down slow-moving zombies, what else could you do in the sandbox? Sandbox games are fun, but there are a limited number of "scenarios" that you can use for them.

Forgive me if I think shooting hordes of slow-moving undead (by itself & without story-based context) is not fun. Whilst I agree stories can (& do) suck in alot of homebrew / indie games; I'm not in game development to write things for Popcap.

--BenT

Yeah so suddenly wrapping it up in a lousy story makes it so much more fun. If you think the gameplay on its own is lacking then don't try to make up for it using something else like a story, give gameplay some thoughts. tens of horus of thoughts. Hundreds of hours of thought. Think about how shooting slow moving zombies could be made fun. Maybe the player would himself be quite slow moving? Maybe he's carrying someone or something heavy? Maybe he's trying to defend a building so that the zombie's walking speed doesn't matter so much? Or maybe the player doesn't have a lot of ammo left, there are zombies holding the place where he can find ammo and he can't shoot them all so he has to find a trick to get to it anyways? Maybe he world is a huge infested city with a few survivors left and the goal of the player is to find as many of them as possible, keep them a live, organise defense by giving people orders (like "look into this area for guns and ammo and people" or "stay here and defend the place" or "clean that building") and the goal would be to make as many survivors as possible reach the evacuation zone (same some gate or helipad), and the game would end when you would decide to evacuate yourself and the goal would be to save as many survivors as possible. And each game would last roughly 10+ hours so it would feel more like a campaign and like you're building something, which would greatly make up for a written scenario. And that would be truly a game about heroship (because heroship is about putting your life on the line to save people, not surviving)

See, I gave it only 5 minutes of thought and I came up with something vastly more exciting than your idea of being a selfish survivor who only cares about staying alive.

That's the problem with people these days, they wonder which graphics engine they're gonna use before giving their entire idea some thorough thought. It's like people just don't think before making a game, they just go "I'm gonna make a game that will be 70% Resident Evil, 20% Final Fantasy and 10% Grand Theft Auto, with a twist!" and there you go.

By the way that was a single player suggestion, you're not planning to make a MMO are you?

 

[closetwam]

I'm not looking to be a hero. Selfish survivor ftw!

Stories can & do suck in a lot of commercial games too.

Bent said, "I'm not in game development to write things for Popcap"

Nobody said anything about a "lousy" story.

 

[plopperz]

Or, as I've said many times before, you chould choose to be a hero, or you could be a 'selfish survivor'

 

[JakeK]

We don't have to have just one type of zombie, if you look at the many films you will see multiple types of zombies too shake it up a bit. There isn't much you can do with just hordes of Zombies, the only situations you could really apply them too is being in one of those tight situations where they are coming and you need to do something.

Hell A_SN we could probably have all of that in the game!

 

[plopperz]

Good idea.
What was that movie with the super fast zombies? I think it was 28 days later, but I could be wrong.
Anyway, we could have a similar type like those, as well as the extremely slow, but super powerful zombies. It'd be cool if there were some smart ones aswell that could operate weapons and machinery

Also, is any form of multiplayer been ruled out? or is that still an option? I'd still like to see single player and multiplayer (even if it is just a DM)

 

[A_SN]

Nobody said anything about a "lousy" story.

The story WOULD be lousy, no matter what anyone says, I can bet money on that. The point of my post was, if you think the gameplay you're thinking about isn't fun on its own, think it up again.

Or, as I've said many times before, you chould choose to be a hero, or you could be a 'selfish survivor'

Well if we apply my idea you'd win the game, but score only one point

 

[JakeK]

Good idea.
What was that movie with the super fast zombies? I think it was 28 days later, but I could be wrong.
Anyway, we could have a similar type like those, as well as the extremely slow, but super powerful zombies. It'd be cool if there were some smart ones aswell that could operate weapons and machinery

Also, is any form of multiplayer been ruled out? or is that still an option? I'd still like to see single player and multiplayer (even if it is just a DM)

Dawn of the Dead also had fast zombies. The zombies in the 28 series were really fast, but all you need is a helicopter .

As for multiplayer, if wanted I'd suggest that the single player gets done completely and then add multiplayer later since you have the base to work off.

Here's an idea: We seemed to be stuck on the perspective of the game. We should simply just list what perspective you want so that an idea of what is wanted is seen.

I want an isometric shooter.

 

[A_SN]

I want an isometric shooter.

What I had in mind was a 3D FPS/TPS shooter with randomly generated buildings/city (but not necessarily, but making a random building generator would be more realistic and interesting than actually creating an entire city by hand)

 

[JakeK]

I want an isometric shooter.

What I had in mind was a 3D FPS/TPS shooter with randomly generated buildings/city (but not necessarily, but making a random building generator would be more realistic and interesting than actually creating an entire city by hand)


I'm no developer so I wouldn't know all to much about this stuff but I assumed that you wouldn't be able to make a 3D game without it looking like Quake III on the Pandora.

 

[A_SN]

I'm no developer so I wouldn't know all to much about this stuff but I assumed that you wouldn't be able to make a 3D game without it looking like Quake III on the Pandora.

-It's not because you use the Quake III engine that it'll look so much like Q3 (by all means don't have any HUD)
-Since when is looking like Quake III such a bad thing?
-Considered you'd use practically nothing from Quake III how would it look like Quake III?
-Who said you HAD to use the Quake III engine?

 

[JakeK]

I didn't say you'd have too. Looking like Q3 is such a bad thing because it is so outdated when you could change the perspective and have more than decent graphics. Not really good but good enough graphics to so that it can look semi-decent.

I assumed that since Craig and Co are using Q3 as there benchmark (I think that is the right word) for the Pandora that it couldn't look that much better.