   If anybodies looking for ideas here are some
  (Sorry if this is the wrong place to post this but I don't know where else to post it).Since I am 1. Not that good a coder 2. Too busy to actually make the entire game 3. Too lazy to make the entire game, here are some ideas I would like to throw out there in case someone is interested.1. This game is a sci-fi game that I think would be easier to make then the other one (maybe). Anyway, I thought about this game a lot more then the other one and I am *positive* that it will/would be a good game. (I have actually tried making this one on my own but I can never get very far (for various reasons). So here are the details:----------------------------------------------------------------------------------AUTOMATIONMain idea:The player plays a crew member on a large freighter class space ship. The rest of the crew has either been killed, or cannot for some reason operate the ship. The ship can not be correctly run by one crew so this creates a challenge for the player to try to get the ship to the ship yard without dieing. Some obstacles the player might face would be: damage to the ship, pirates, aliens, asteroid fields, and simply controlling the ship itself. Should the player decide that he can not get the ship in he might choose to abandon the ship by either going to the hangar and grabbing an interceptor class ship, or grabbing an escape pod. The player would then attempt to pilot this new ship to the yard with of course a reduced score.Control:The player controls one crew member directly, depending on the style. The best style of view and control would be a first person shooter-esc view as this would provide more direct feeling and it would allow certain following game mechanics to work better.Top-view/isometric:In a top view the character would be controlled by use of the WASD keys with the mouse serving to rotate the character. If a gun is given to the player (one option is to make this something that needs to be acquired and equipped at a lost to some other ability such as accessing the consoles) the left mouse button would fire the gun, and the right mouse button would access the consoles situated around the ship.First Person:This would work basically the same as the top-view except that it would be 3d. The character would still be moved by the WASD keys. However, one important thing to note would be that the mouse should control the 'eye sight' of the character, meaning that it should control a cursor/aimer on the screen and move that about the screen not the entire character's view unless a specific button is pressed (the right mouse button for example). This feature would allow for better aiming (if the character is given a gun, or possibly if the character is doing something precise such as repairing some wiring), however it would also allow for an 'interface'. The interface I am referring to here is and interface within the character's mind meaning that it can be interacted with by use of the mind or eyesight (this is easier to make believed), such as there are in many sci-fi books. Through this 'interface' the player could look at a map, or the state of the ship (or any thing else, including interacting with computers from further away by use of a sort of internet system, or information about how to run the ship, it might also be used to open doors and the likes).Controlling the ship:The ship itself would be controlled by use of consoles. These consoles would be placed a respective places around the ship (remembering that the ship is supposed to be controlled by more then 1 crew member). In the bridge the consoles would give information about the state of the ship such as: Where the ship is in space, where other prerecorded things are in space such as planets, space yards, and large asteroid field. It would also report damage to the ship, what systems are active, life signs within the ship, how/what the engines are doing, sensors. (plus any other information that would be useful to the crew). To effect the ship itself the player would have to go (by use of walking and lifts/elevators) to the respective rooms (such as the engine room, or the sensor room, or the life support room etc) to get to the consoles that actually control the ship systems.Objective:The player wants to get as much points by the end of the game. The player starts with a set score and loses points for various negative things happening, such as crew members dieing (if they are in coldsleep or something of the like), unrepairable damage to the ship, lose of cargo, or simply lost of ship as the player escapes. The player ends the game by docking safely at the ship yard. One game should take a few hours tops (so the ship should be placed at respective distance from a yard). Note: If the player dies that play session is ended and lost. This creates a drive for the player to try to stay alive so this would make it more threatening say if aliens have infested the ship because moving around would be dangerous (Over time the player should feel like he is slowly, or not so slowly, losing control over the ship no matter what; so the point is to limp the ship into dock before all control is lost and the player dies).Obstacles:Controlling the ship itself can be complicated in itself, as the ship is not made to be piloted by one crew member and consoles take a while to get to. Other obstacles might be small asteroid fields that the player did not know about (they might cause damage to the ship, though shields might help deflect most of them), pirates (who might want to take cargo/the ship they will be armed but the player might hope to escape with the ship or in an escape pod, and once again the shields might protect from fire). Another problem asteroids could cause is that they might be carrying parasite spores. These parasites are aliens that are not necessarily hostile but might cause damage by chewing or scratching the ship's systems meaning a loss of the system or forcing the player to go and repair the problem as well as to try and get rid of the infestation (probably by taking out the nest before other nests form, robots might be of help). All these obstacles should be random occurrences as the ship travels through space they should also probably remain once the player leaves the area in case the player is forced to turn the ship around to run away from something else they would then run into this previously encountered problem (Though actually an asteroid field could be useful maybe to escape from pirates if you are willing to chance the damage).Skills Required:This of course depends on how much you chose to do but for the most ideal version you would want:3d graphic experience (both making and implementing)A good to very good understanding of whatever programming language is chosen.Some very basic AI (mainly in 3d)Maybe some 2d graphic experience as wellThats probably not it but that is all I can think of off the top of my head.----------------------------------------------------------------------------------2. Now the second game I thought up is very different. This one is a god-like which would require considerably more AI experience then the other one. Details:----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Possible name: SPREADMain Idea:This game is a god-like. You control the behavior, mutations and other things of a species of an alien race. This idea is that a spore of this species just arrived on a planet populated by humans (doesn't necessarily have to be Earth, or humans). For the very first one of these creatures (probably have the role of some sort of queen) you set the initial behavior (and maybe the initial abilities). Each type (queen, warrior, worker etc) would have a different 'genetic code'. The player could create as many or as few genetic codes as they want depending on how they want there species to act. So once the spore lands (maybe after a nifty cinematic) a screen is brought up to let the player create the initial creature. This might take a similar look and function to spore if the game is 3d (the game could also use a ASCII type graphic like the game Dwarf Fortress). However, if the game is not 3d you would have parts on a menu on the left with tabs for different type of parts. In the center you would have the states of the creature and its abilities (such as climbing trees, digging, flying etc) on the right you would have the behavioral settings. This settings would probably be a number of sliders (if there are too many they could also be set in tabs) that define various actions the creatures would do (such as how much they stick together, where they prefer to be (in trees, underground, etc) how aggressive they are, how much they reproduce etc). Once this is done the game would begin for real. They player would have no direct control of the creature at this stage. As soon as the player unpauses (there should be the ability to pause, play, and accelerate time) the creature would start moving and acting according to the behavior and abilities (so lets say the player gave the creature the ability to borrow and the behavior that it prefers to nest underground the creature would find a place where it can dig down (and possibly some place that is out of sight) and start digging down till it reaches a place it is comfortable and start laying eggs there). At any time the player can pause and change the attributes of the species: adding new genetic codes (making a new type of the creature which would have slightly (or very) different abilities and behaviors (for an example this game would say that male and female in the human species are two genetic codes, and queen, workers and warriors ants are each a different genetic code). This would continue in a sandbox way possibly with the eventual goal of exterminating all other life on the planet.3D:This would probably be the most interesting and intriguing type of graphic for the player but it might complicate the making of the game (and Dwarf Fortress proves that a game can be extremely good without very extensive graphics).Game World View:Rotatable and movable camera freely, using standard left click drag to rotate maybe right click  to pan as well as arrow keys. Mouse wheel to zoom with the option to use both mouse buttons if the player does not have a mouse wheel. There should be the ability to select you creature (maybe from some search menu) and zoom to the creature as well as follow it around. One interesting feature would be to rotate the camera with the creature rotation so that if the player is following a creature hanging from a roof or branch the camera would be flipped to give a more appropriate view of the creatures view point. There should also be buttons for pausing and speeding up the time, as well as a button for accessing the attributes screen. It is up to the creator of the game to decide if they want to make it possible to look at the entire play area (be it an entire world or only a section).Attributes Screen:The creature in the center with maybe a couple set 'hard points'. On the left there would be a menu with a number of different tabs to select the various categories of parts (limbs, eyes, misc etc). The player would drag these parts onto the 'hard points' of the creature to add the parts (also idealy to have them act differently depending on where there placed, like in Spore by Will Wright, but that would be very difficult to replicate).  On the left there would be another menu with a number of tabs, these tabs would allow the player to both see the attributes and abilities of the creature but also to change the behavior.2D:This would be the simplest view and easiest to make. And with some luck not many features of the game would be lost. Mostly the game view would not be quite as interesting to look at.Game View:Every entity (actor,character,creature whatever you want to call them) would be represented by various symbols or sprites. The arrow keys and left mouse drag would move the screen around. There would once again be buttons for pausing, playing, and speeding up the game as well as to access the attributes screen (there should also be shortcuts for these keys). Once again there should be the possibility to track a single creature. And as in 3d the entire play area might be view able or might not.Attributes Screen:I already talked about the general lay out in the 'Main Idea' section but ill go over it again to just have it all in one place. On the left there would be a menu/list for the parts and descriptions of what they do. There would, of course, be tabs to select the various types of parts. In the center the ability of the creature would be shown (or if the creator wants a simple representation of how the creature might look). On the right there would be a menu allowing the player to alter the behavior of the creatures, as well as making the various genetic codes.Genetic Codes:You can look at genetic codes a bit like the various ship designs one can make in most 4x games (those space strategy games). When there are different genetic groups there is a chance for each new offspring to be one of these (picked randomly). This might also be set to have a different likeness by the player to help control how the species acts. Parts:Here is a list of the possible parts that might be included and what they might do:Legs(maybe a couple types): To allow the creature to move and run (the creature would naturally crawl around).Grabber Arms: These arms would allow the creature to grab things possibly to build stuff or just to bring food back to the den.Claw Arms: These would allow the creature to attack efficiently and possibly also climb as well as dig.Modified Respiratory System: Might allow the creature to survive efficiently when underground.Sensing glands(or something equally unspecific): Allows the creature to sense other creatures from further away allowing it to react accordingly.Eyes: Allows the creature to see around it self. Same as above but needs a line of sight.Various Reproductive Organs(depending on how specific you want to get): Would allow different forms of breeding (eggs, no eggs, queen only or all creatures).And probably a lot more that I can not think of right nowBehaviors:Here are some of the possible sliders that the player would be able to set in the behaviors screen:Spread: How far the creatures will move away from each other.Reproduction Rate: How many children will likely be made by what ever genetic code is capable.Aggressiveness: How likely the creatures are to attack other creatures they detect(the more 'armed' the creature is the more likely it is to attack.Altitude Preference: At what level does the creature prefer to be, especially to make the nest/den.Possibly a number of others (maybe about how secretive the creature prefers to be etc. Note: that a creatures behavior should also be modified by what parts it has).Changing Attributes:When the player pauses and changes the attributes the changes will not take effect immediately. With each successive off spring the new attributes become pre dominant and left long enough alone the creatures will come to acting completely like the set attributes. This does not apply to the first creature who automatically matches the first attributes set. Note that there might be need to make creatures die of old age to make this effective.Skills Required:If done in 3d there will definitely be a need for 3d graphic experienceThere would also be a need for procedural generation as there is in Spore (as I said this might be overly complicated).There will also be a big need of extensive AI programming (more for 3d but still for both).A 2d artist would be needed for the 2d and maybe for the 3d version if somethings are simplified.As usual there would be the need of a good experience of programming in general.That's probably not it but that is all I can think of off the top of my head.----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Now let me point out that obviously none of this is definitive or even necessarily a good idea, its just what I think it should be like, but I might be mistaken. Also I would appreciate if someone sent me a pm if they are planning to use one of these ideas. If they do I might be able to provide more detailed info on these games as the info up there is a little vague; of course you don't need to listen to me, its just that id like to know. Also if these ideas are not interesting to you, but you would still be looking for an idea pm and tell me what type of game you want to create and I can probably get something back to you in relatively good time that might be good (no guarantee).-Munchkin   