Free game idea(s) for who possibly need some...

anne O'nymous

I'm not grumpy, I'm just coded that way.
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I have many ideas, and way too few times, but sometimes it would be a waste to let an idea die...

So far, I used to write them in the threads that inspired me, but I feel like it's precisely a waste, because only few people would see it, and rarely those who would benefit from it.
So, here's an idea that crossed my mind while trying a game that clearly missed an opportunity. Feel free to use it for your game if it interest you:


This can only apply to Ren'Py, because it's a game mechanism that play with the possibility to rollback. Or, more precisely here, the possibility to sometimes not rollback.
It also need a bit more works, because the MC will have a physical change depending of the player choices ; therefore you'll probably have to render the nudes scenes four times when you'll be near the end of the story.

You are in possession of a device that can travel back in time, but for a really short span of time. Counterpart, each time you tap on it, you loose 1/10th inch (0.25cm) of your dick.
How you get the device is up to you. As for the dick reduction, even 1cm less isn't really visible, so as I said visually you can limit to four variations at the end of the game ; the rest being dialog changes.

The story itself would be the classical Choose Your Own Adventure VN. The player is presented choices that make the story change in a way or another.
But the twist is that (some/most, up to you) choices are blocked through the use of :
Python:
label whatever:
    menu choice01:
        "What movie do you choose ?"
        "An action movie":
            $ renpy.fix_rollback()
            show screen throwBackButton( "choice01" )
            [10 dialog lines]
            hide screen throwBackButton
            [...]
        "A romance movie":
            $ renpy.fix_rollback()
            show screen throwBackButton( "choice01" )
            [10 dialog lines]
            hide screen throwBackButton
            [...]
        "A Thriller movie":
            $ renpy.fix_rollback()
            show screen throwBackButton( "choice01" )
            [10 dialog lines]
            hide screen throwBackButton
            [...]
default alreadyPressed = []

screen throwBackButton( lbl ):
    # You can only press the button once by choice.
    showif not lbl in alreadyPressed:
        textbutton "go back":
            xalign 0.0 yalign 0.0
            # Mark the button as pressed for this choice, and send the player back  to the menu
            action [ AddToSet( alreadyPressed, lbl ), Jump( lbl ) ]
Personally I recommend to do it only for choices where the outcome is the more uncertain.
If you do it for all choices, there's risk that it become annoying and you loose players. But when the choice is uncertain, it add some spice to the game.

A practical example, the movie night I used above in the code example:

You decide to choose the action movie, but then the girl starts to complain. It's clear that they don't like your choice, what will you do ?
Perhaps will she would prefer the romance movie, what would possibly increase her love for you. But there's no guaranty. This said, a romance movie will have some softcore action, what can possibly increase her corruption.
Perhaps that she's a hardcore fan of thriller and would love you way more for this. But who know ? And there's probably no lewd action in such movie.
This said, an action movie can have a torrid sex scene, what would without doubt increase her corruption.

The only thing you know is this initial reaction, and not you've to decide...
Do you assume your choice, and face the possible negative consequences ? Or do you loose 1/10th of your dick to make a possibly better choice ?
What's the worse for you player ? To loose an opportunity, or to loose a bit of your dick ?

Tough choice... But also interesting game mechanism ; at least more interesting that the one presented here.

An advice if you decide to use this, don't be a dick.
The initial reaction shouldn't trick the player, making him believe that he made the wrong possible choice, while he can still have some benefit from this choice.

And when there's more than two choices, have a safe one, that the player can choose without risk. Then hint to it at the starts of the "less safe" choices.
By example, when you choose an action movie, the girl can say: "Why am I not surprised ? An action movie ! It's always an action movie with you. Not even a classical romance movie for once."
This would tell the player that if he want to change his choice, picking "romance movie" will perhaps no give him some points, but at least he will not risk to loose every progress he made so far.


And that's all for me, at least for today. I'll probably come back time to time, when I have an idea that I clearly will never have the time, or opportunity, to exploit.

Feel free to use this thread to put your own ideas, that you'll not have the time to use yourself, if you want.
 

Saki_Sliz

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May 3, 2018
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Personally I recommend to do it only for choices where the outcome is the more uncertain.
Do you assume your choice, and face the possible negative consequences ? Or do you loose 1/10th of your dick to make a possibly better choice ?
Interesting, interesting. I know in a few twine games/ren'py games I've ran into this issue of not being sure what the outcome would be, and taking advantage of past saves (I save a lot), or using the back arrow. But for there to be consequences is an interesting way to go about it.

When you mention uncertain outcomes, it reminds me of how I play/design project. you give the example of the player wants something, ie increase relationship status, and the gameplay is all about doing so, figuring out how/what to do. I always like simple direct results, so I go about this three different ways. Either I mention what the result will be for each choice, thus the player has to decide which outcome they want most (ie doing something they know will piss character A off but worth it to unlock character B), Or I write 1 dimensional characters so the way to interact with them is obvious and follows a theme (I found that Mythic Manor does this really well and I really enjoyed playing the game, enjoying that each character followed a cliché theme and that I didn't make mistakes picking any dialog options), or the third is what I call 'exploration.' where you do things to see the outcome (some small change, not super critical), so that you learn and can know in the future what you can do to get a certain effect (ie this is like less direct version of telling players the outcome of their choice.)

But undoing a choice for a consequence I hadn't considered.
 

anne O'nymous

I'm not grumpy, I'm just coded that way.
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But undoing a choice for a consequence I hadn't considered.
For an expected consequence, what make it more interesting.
She complain because you choose the action movie, she frown because you offer to have a date in a coffee, and things like that. But, while she isn't happy at first, what make you wonder if you made the right choice, it doesn't meant that this will not offer you some possibilities.

From my point of view it make your choice more significant.
With Ren'Py is usual to pick a choice, see that it start to not go really well, and rollback to see what happen if you pick another choice. Here, it's still possible, but it have a cost, what make you think a second time: Does it really worth it to pay the price, or is there a way to salve this mess ?
 

Saki_Sliz

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May 3, 2018
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From my point of view it make your choice more significant.
I think I see what you mean
is there a way to salve this mess ?
That seems to be the key, the unique game experience, is making players want to see how things turn out. I hadn't considered that sort of mindset, but that actually sounds really interesting!
And it sounds like the key to get players to think like this is:
For an expected consequence, what make it more interesting.
I might actually play with that idea, of making scenarios of 'pushing through and hope for the best'
I still suck at character writing, but I really like mean characters who have to deal with their self made problems. I've been having trouble writing so I've been trying different things, but this sounds like it could compliment what I'm trying to do.
As for coding it for a game, my instinct is to over engineer it since I use C# and would be making my own engine, not renpy/twine, so I would have to play around with the idea of the consequence (it helps that I can hide and sneak an encrypted save file so the game can keep track of player progress automatically with out them 'save scumming' out of their consequences).
 

anne O'nymous

I'm not grumpy, I'm just coded that way.
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so I would have to play around with the idea of the consequence (it helps that I can hide and sneak an encrypted save file so the game can keep track of player progress automatically with out them 'save scumming' out of their consequences).
For Fallout New Vegas, they used a really basic trick to prevent "load on lost" during the games at the casino.
They have a variable that represent the time in game, and used it to prevent the load of a too recent save file when you were playing poker. It's been a really long time since I haven't played the game, but from memory they saved the value in memory the instant you started to play poker, and prevented you to load any save file that contained a superior value.
Therefore, loading a save meant loading before you started to play, and so the lost of the game you made until this instant you really want to load.


In your case it would be a bit less effective, since loading a previous save would still be significant ; just a bit of the game to replay. But this send back to the "did it worth it" dilemma.
With Ren'Py the answer would be, "I'll skip the part I already played" (what could be prevented with a small hack), but with your engine it can mean 5 effective minutes of play, or even more. And all this because the player suddenly fear to have made the wrong choice...
So, yes, did it worth it to load and have to replay the last X minutes, or is it better to pray for the consequences to be less terrible than what I fear right now ?
 

The Rogue Trader

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Sep 12, 2021
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That was nice, will wait for more ideas.
Well, I'm not a programmer so I can't offer gameplay ideas, just story ones. I hope it won't be outside the scope of this thread.
I'll throw in an idea I had for a story that I love but cannot develop not only because I've my hands full, but mainly because it's a gay story and that's not a sexual orientation that I share.

The year is 1944, the place is a U.S. recruit training camp.
The MC, coming from a rural area, has always kept his homosexuality well hidden, but you know, when you're 18 and you're surrounded by healthy young people of your fav gender, you can end up making stupid hormone-driven decisions.
Very stupid decisions.
The game opens when, after having been caught red-handed in "homoerotic acts" with a comrade, he's locked in a cell waiting for a quick trial, punishment, denouncement and social death.
The cavalry materializes in the unlikely form of a mid-ranking officer from an unspecified unit that comes to visit him.
While not particularly open-minded, the officer, let's call him "the Captain", knows his ancient history. He remembers that ancient Greeks theorized that an army made of homosexual lovers would perform best (as neither lover would dare to show cowardy in face of their significant one), and tested the theory in the form of the Sacred Band of Thebes, which never retreated even when facing a sure defeat.
So, the Captain had this great idea of recruiting a squad (the logic would dictate a platoon, but let's keep the number down to manageable levels for storytelling reasons) of gay boys, encourage them to form couples and then train them as a super special unit for high-risk missions.
Between you and me, it's not the smartest of plans and that he could convince his superiors to greenlight his idea is pure fantasy, but let's not delve too much into the porn logic.
Anyway, the MC has no choice but to agree (his charges will be cancelled), and the game moves to the training part, where he'll have to choose one of his 11 squad members to romance as his Love Interest.
Of course, there will be a rival unit that will antagonize the main heroes and countless "Dirty Dozen" references will be there to be picked.
If the dev will feel like it, he could also move on with additional chapters showing the actual missions of the squad, adding real gameplay and maybe a "Band of Brothers" feel to the whole story.
 

anne O'nymous

I'm not grumpy, I'm just coded that way.
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Well, I'm not a programmer so I can't offer gameplay ideas, just story ones. I hope it won't be outside the scope of this thread.
It isn't. It happen that the idea that made me starts the thread was a game mechanism, but stories are welcome as well.