   My idea, tell me how it sounds
  My first post here. In only the recent months many individuals have discovered their ability to create and control basic elements such as fire, water and lightning at their own desire. The majority of people that have learned these talents only have enough strength to set a tree on fire, or flood a small house. These people with the basic ability will be called "adepts". While their talent is small, they are able to overwhelm and easily kill most men who still use primitive weapons.  While the majority of people who learn such abilities only have the skill to control one element, there are some with greater abilities. A small amount of adepts, perhaps 1 out of 100, have strength enough to wreak havoc on areas larger than regular adepts, and overwhelm several people at once. Then there may even be adepts who have the ability to destroy entire towns and kill most anyone against them. These are the magicians, who are only one out of several hundered if not thousands.  Since the ability to control elements has only been discovered in the recent months, many people do not understand this ability, and many are simply  terrified of it. Becuase the only current weapons consist of your clasic swords, shields, bows and clubs, and due to fear of what they know very little about, most people without adept abilities are barley able to combat those with them.  Now several months after the original adept showed his ability to control elements to the world, countless others learned his ways. The adepts themselfs are regular people, but at one point where fascinated by this idea of being able to control elements, and learned how to do so. Most only learn how to start small fires or create little floods, and while some learned to do much more, however strong their talent, it made them stronger than most warriors at that time.  Those that have that power over others often became conceited, arrogant, and currupt. They recently began to lash out and fight anyone without adept abilities, and sometimes with them. This has caused the general public(who doesn't have any adept talent) to detest those with talent.   Within recent weeks adepts have been seen working together in groups to oppose the current authority. They destory entire towns and often kill all residents, perhaps because of their disgust for the public who shunned them away, or mabye became currupt and arrogant from their talent. Because of how little is known about their abilities, hardly anyone is brave enough to oppose them.Now when the game starts:  Your character (male, perhaps around the age of 17) is living in a small town of around 150 people. During the night the entire town is set on fire without any warning. Your character miraculously survices the fire, along with one other man. The other man (perhaps around the age of 21, who I can't imagine a name for), is someone you've lived around for years and talked to a few times, but really don't know him too well. He says a few words to you and starts to make his way to the closest town. Because your town is a pile of ash and rubble with no one alive but you, you follow him. Your character currently has no weapon, so on the way when you are attacked by a single adept your character is overwhelmed and loses conciseness.  You wake up in a house with the guy you knew from your town telling you what happened: you were attacked, badly hurt, but he killed the adept attacking you and brought you here. He doesn't really seem to care about you, but he shows hate for the adepts. A sound outside causes you both to rush outside, to see a group of three adepts with fire talents lighting buildings on fire. No one in the town dares to fight them, but the man from your town pulls out his sword and shield and begins to fight them. Both the adepts and the town people are surprised at his will to fight. He kills the group without getting hurt much himself, and the towns people are shocked that he is able to slay three of them, when most warriors are barley able to handle one. He ignores the praise and cheers of the townspeople to tell you he is leaving the town right away and wishes you would join him when you are healed.  Now your character is given a sword and sheild and you are free to leave the town, perhaps to follow the man from your town who you know little about except that he wants you to follow him?That is the backstory and start.  The story revolves around your journey with the man from your town. Because you or him don't seem to have any adept talent, most adepts you find along the way will try to kill you. You learn that he believes all adepts are currupt and power hungry, and is disgusted by how arrogant they are with their talent, while he hardly shows off his strength. You learn about his motives, but don't know what he is trying to accomplish until the end. With a sword and shield he is a lot stronger than the basic adepts, but all that changes when you meet a stronger adept. You later learn that a large group of adepts will attempt the siege the capitol of the land and create their own reign of power. Since both of you have become skilled at fighting adepts, you two began going to the capitol to see if you can make any difference.Your character is also speechless during the whole story. From ideas that came to me over the last few weeks, that I may attempt to put together with Directx8 application of my own. Haven't quite imagined all the events in the story or thought up a snappy ending, but wait and see.   
  Can anyone become an adept with proper training, or do you need to be born with those powers before you can begin the training?   ;The good:Sounds like an interesting backdrop of the story, it might provide an interesting world to do stuff in.The Bad:I think you have your most significant detail right here:Quote:Original post by AltiverFrom ideas that came to me over the last few weeks, that I may attempt to put together with Directx8 application of my own. Haven't quite imagined all the events in the story or thought up a snappy ending, but wait and see.First, all you have is an environment.  You don't have a story of the actual game.  You don't have anything to play, just an abstract "Since both of you have become skilled at fighting adepts, you two began going to the capitol to see if you can make any difference."Second, you don't currently have the skills needed to make that game, especially if you are just now working with DX8.The Ugly:You are biting of a huge amount of work.  The environment you described would take 10+ work years to impelement as a fun game.  If your goal is to work on it full-time until 2016, then go for it!If you have the (realistic goal) of writing stories for games, great!  You'll need to develop skills at interactive storytelling, enticing player emotions, and manging branching plots.  Don't bother with learning DX8.  Once you master the storytelling aspect, you can work in designing and building great games.If you have the (realistic goal) of programming games, great!  You'll need to stop bothering with developing a story line and implement and write your first few dozen games.  (See the site section "Resources | For Beginners" to see the testris clone, side scroller, and other starter games.)  Once you master the skills of programming for games, you can work in designing and building great games.Just try not to do both.  It's a well-trodden path to failure.frob.   ;Quote:Original post by someboddyCan anyone become an adept with proper training, or do you need to be born with those powers before you can begin the training? Most anyone can learn it if they are willing to put time and effort into it. Most people are satisfied by the basic talents, while some have a desire to become stronger.Quote:Original post by frobThe good:Sounds like an interesting backdrop of the story, it might provide an interesting world to do stuff in.The Bad:I think you have your most significant detail right here:Quote:Original post by AltiverFrom ideas that came to me over the last few weeks, that I may attempt to put together with Directx8 application of my own. Haven't quite imagined all the events in the story or thought up a snappy ending, but wait and see.First, all you have is an environment.  You don't have a story of the actual game.  You don't have anything to play, just an abstract "Since both of you have become skilled at fighting adepts, you two began going to the capitol to see if you can make any difference."Second, you don't currently have the skills needed to make that game, especially if you are just now working with DX8.The Ugly:You are biting of a huge amount of work.  The environment you described would take 10+ work years to impelement as a fun game.  If your goal is to work on it full-time until 2016, then go for it!If you have the (realistic goal) of writing stories for games, great!  You'll need to develop skills at interactive storytelling, enticing player emotions, and manging branching plots.  Don't bother with learning DX8.  Once you master the storytelling aspect, you can work in designing and building great games.If you have the (realistic goal) of programming games, great!  You'll need to stop bothering with developing a story line and implement and write your first few dozen games.  (See the site section "Resources | For Beginners" to see the testris clone, side scroller, and other starter games.)  Once you master the skills of programming for games, you can work in designing and building great games.Just try not to do both.  It's a well-trodden path to failure.frob.I may have misphrased that part about Directx, I've used various Directx's for a few months and have been working with certian languages(vb6, vb.net, c++) for 2 or 3 years. The game itself would just be my attempt at a simple 2D super nintendo looking game, the story being most important. I've thought out how the fighting works and how moving around the areas works, but I won't go into it much because of the forums topic.  The world is mostly underdeveloped land, consisting mostly of forest, open fields, or something inbetween. Non-human creatures are similar to real life animals, mostly because I don't want to the game to be focused on fighting simple animals. Smalls town are developed all over the land, connected by rough paths and loosely protected. The capitol of of all these towns lies near their center, and is quite a large city thoroughly protected.   For the start of the story, you are following the other survivor of your towns destruction to where ever his destination is, since anyone else you knew in your home town was killed. As you travel you learn about him and what his motives are, such as he hates adepts because the majority of them abuse there talent without thought and most people are afraid of them, while he himself has great fighting skills but no one reconizes it. You learn the hostile adepts motives, that most of them are outcast from society because of their talent and join together while becoming more bitter towards the society that outcast them. Their feelings of bitterness may be taken advantage of by a party unknown towards the start, and most are being used to gain something big for that party. You also learn about other events, such as who destroyed your home town, about the original adept, things that have happened to start the conflicts, and more I haven't decided yet.  Sometime before the middle of the story you meet one of the magicians(the one out of a few thousand with great talent) and while fighting him you learn he has similar motives to your friends: that he hates to see the power abusing adepts destroying the current way of life, but since he is similar to them he has a hard time going against them. You stop fighting in an uneasy truce, and go seperate ways. Perhaps around the middle of the story you learn about that soon to be attempted siege to overthrow the crown, and decide to make your way there to protect your current way of life. When you arrive you see the city is in all out war, and has a good chance being destroyed. During the fight you find both friendly and enemy faces, ones with the same goals as you and ones that original started the conflict.I will post more later if anyone still has interest, and I would appreciate more opinions.   ;  (Note: Post deleted because I linked to this thread via the "Recent Threads" window and did not realize that it was in the "Writing" section.  Which means while I was giving suggestions on game design, it was not in the context of the thread.)[Edited by - JBourrie on December 2, 2005 7:42:06 PM];  I find the story pretty interesting (though it has yet to receive an ending), and I would probably follow the story in a written or illustrated form, but not as a game. A game revolves around the gameplay, not the story as many people believe, citing the expansion and prevalence of recent games revolving around spiffy graphics rather than a good game. Sure, graphics shouldn't be dominant, but that doesn't mean that a game is Graphics vs. Story; the way the player advances and interacts in the game is essential. If gameplay can be attached in a solid and sensible way, go for it and make this a game. If not, you shouldn't completely abandon the project but perhaps take it in a new direction, perhaps not in the medium of video games.   ;  For JBourrie's reply, If you believe all I have done so far is make a story with no game, you underestimate me. In the past I've made all sorts of 2D Mario/run around on platforms jump on things get item reach the next level repeat games, along with several 2d map editors and done the basic things such as collision detecting, but those become redundant. In making this I wish to do more with "combat" and AI, while making it interesting with a story. I have already done quite a bit with the combat and a smidgeon with the AI, which is why I come here for the story. But mabye I will forget writing code and try to become a professional author [smile]   ;  (Note: Post deleted because I linked to this thread via the "Recent Threads" window and did not realize that it was in the "Writing" section.  Which means while I was giving advice on game design, it was not in the context of the thread.)[Edited by - JBourrie on December 2, 2005 7:40:33 PM];  (Note: Post deleted because I linked to this thread via the "Recent Threads" window and did not realize that it was in the "Writing" section.  Which means while I was giving advice on game design, it was not in the context of the thread.)[Edited by - JBourrie on December 2, 2005 7:54:21 PM]