Okay, so we have a concept, a group of people roleplay about being gods and decide what lives and what dies, while subtly scheming to be the god who gets to rule the new world.
Also apparently there’s a video game called “Godfall” so hey, out the gate we get to ditch our cringe first draft name! Who says the creative process has to suck?
So, we’ll get to the name later. Now we gotta figure out the core of the game.
I came across a lovely little tweet that was actually a handy guide for making a game. True it was for video games, but good design is good design and I’ll be honest she’s a hell of a lot more positive then the white box essays.
Heck, for how stupid I am the white box essays are saying the same thing and I’m too dumb to see it, so what the hell do I know?
So let’s take a look at the tweet (Link here: https://twitter.com/moreelen/status/1329083625720090625)
See where I screwed up?
I haven’t even set what my game play pillars are, and jumped straight ahead to game play elements.
But this wouldn’t be a worthwhile process if I didn’t make mistakes and learn something.
So pillars.
We have a game about playing a god at the end of the world. How do I want my players to feel?
Well, they’re playing gods so I want them to feel powerful. That every act they take not only matters, but does something large and forever changing. It’s not enough that they debate things like every other aspect of real life. They have to feel like they are GODS. Creatures of myth and legend that tower of the human experience.
Two, I want the players to feel a strong sense of self-preservation. At the end, they want to be the one to live. Now, this doesn’t necessarily mean that they have to resort to what we’d call “dirty” tricks to get that, but there’s an implication there. That being said their time is running out, and there is an impending dread. So yeah. Let’s say Dread for the second.
Third. I want a motherfucking debate. I want players to feel the need to compromise against each other, the frustration of wanting it all and not getting it. To want to scheme and plan against each other in anticipation. And possibly come to a reasonable negotiation in the process. So what is the best word for that? Stymied? Frustrated? We’ll go with frustrated for now.
So that seems like three decent pillars.
- All-Powerful.
- Dread.
- Frustrated.
So then, what’s our game play loop?
We’ve already parsed out part of it, but let’s do this motherfucker right.
Crisis->Godly actions->Debate->survive
Already that looks wrong to me.
Looking at the example (Mario) we have Jump-Move forward-Overcome obstacles.
So let’s try this. We need to evoke those pillars in our design loop.
Godly acts->Debate->Plan
Now that feels like a solid loop. Remember, we can always modify the actions and game play, but the loop is a foundation we are working with. We can still change things and add to this but a good spine helps us frame this.
So how am I doing so far? Did I screw up somewhere? Let me know so I can improve.
Motherfucker count: 2