What Types of Games Would People Like To See?

[ZombieGenesis]

We have a blast with SW: Rifts in my TT group. We mix in the superpowers companion and I played a Superman clone in a group with a dragon, combat cyborg, and ley line walker and it was a blast.

[Lotherio]

@Kay said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

I'd kill for an all original concepts superhero game. All OCs, no DC universe or Marvel or anything.

I had one up, all originals, a couple months back. It got all of two people that showed up, one completed CG even.

It was an Andromeda strain meets Wild Cards meets WoD feed the beast mentality.

A bio terrorist attack hit Detroit, over 50% casualty rate. 75% of the remaining in a certain vicinity were just mutants (blue skin, or three arms, or grotesque, just some visible mutation). Two years after (present) some others showed signs they had powers. (PC's mostly, and villains). They had powers but if they didn't use their abilities, they grew melancholy (gained apathy), too much of that and they gained a rage (uncontrollable desire to use it), and too much rage they became primal/raw power (I was watching gun sword a lot, it was fitting).

Lots of meta to deal with, but basically 10 years back there was an incident in a town called Ten Ravine (Wyoming, actual town is like Ten Sleep). Andromeda strain, it pretty much killed everyone. So there's bits of this stuff out there, 2 years ago some Nutter fired it on Detroit (Wild Card when the alien agent was first released). Players begin as basically victims that have to feed the beast and use their abilities as they are awakening.

I don't like mega power can't be hurt (my ability is phasing, no one can touch me, or force field, no one can tough me, or zero energy super power no one can touch me), everyone was good in some aspects and vulnerable in others. It used FS3, I coded in a switch that checked the five choices and gave bonuses as appropriate in opposed resolution.

OC super game sounds fun, but I think it need not be made in silo, the silo ones aren't making it. OC supers needs a team of developers, theme and otherwise.

[ZombieGenesis]

I've tried a few times to get an OC game going and they never go anywhere. I've done a trait-based game and I've brought Empire Bay up multiple times and we get maybe one or two regulars. Even running regular scenes didn't help. Though that's another thing that bites my butt about people who say "we need more scenes run!" and then never show up but that's for another thred.

[Ghost]

@TNP said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

I'd love a Valdemar game. But Mercedes Lackey has forbidden them. Not sure if that's changed at all.

It hasn't.

[Runescryer]

@Ghost said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

@TNP said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

I'd love a Valdemar game. But Mercedes Lackey has forbidden them. Not sure if that's changed at all.

It hasn't.

Which is why we have Blue Rose as an option. It has all the elements and style of Valdemar, with a greater assortment of animal companions and the option of playing one of the intelligent animals, including spellcasting.

[Ganymede]

Mass Effect.

With Ares.

But, fuck I just can't get off my ass to do it.

[Arkandel]

A good D&D game. That's all.

[HorrorHound]

Demon: The Fallen. End Times. Focus on stopping the Dread King Alliance from forming, or working after they DO align to protect the last humans on Earth.

[Ghost]

@ZombieGenesis Constructive, here...

So I see you often spinning up new games and then "few people came" gets mentioned later. This very well could be that the right IP/setting hasn't been picked yet, but I'm getting the overall question here is: "Will picking the right setting/genre result in 10-15 unique IPs sticking around?" I think the answer to that may require you to privately poll some of the players on your games to find out why previous efforts didn't result in that.

You can make new games or poll for what people want to play all day long, but if those 10-15 unique IP logins aren't staying, it likely isn't because of the choice in game itself.

[Cupcake]

Period games, basically. Victorian era. World War II. Regency. Swords and sandals. Dark ages. Etc. Etc. Etc.

[Arkandel]

@Ghost said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

You can make new games or poll for what people want to play all day long, but if those 10-15 unique IP logins aren't staying, it likely isn't because of the choice in game itself.

I'm not one of those 10-15 players but the thing is creating a new game compared to using more generic codebases is hard. Very hard. Almost anything that requires custom code alone takes a long time to do it justice - and if you don't do it right but cut corners (not saying @ZombieGenesis did!) then once the game fails was that really because the theme didn't work out or because there were important features and customizations missing?

And on the flipside of that... with so many games failing to attract players past the launching date is it a wonder more game runners don't invest too much work upfront? We could be looking at a chicken-and-egg situation.

[Herja]

My kingdom for a Sunrunner game.

[Lotherio]

@Arkandel said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

@Ghost said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

You can make new games or poll for what people want to play all day long, but if those 10-15 unique IP logins aren't staying, it likely isn't because of the choice in game itself.

I'm not one of those 10-15 players but the thing is creating a new game compared to using more generic codebases is hard. Very hard. Almost anything that requires custom code alone takes a long time to do it justice - and if you don't do it right but cut corners (not saying @ZombieGenesis did!) then once the game fails was that really because the theme didn't work out or because there were important features and customizations missing?

And on the flipside of that... with so many games failing to attract players past the launching date is it a wonder more game runners don't invest too much work upfront? We could be looking at a chicken-and-egg situation.

I think both of these concepts contribute (not meshing with staff/game/meta and not having the right features even); and yes, the number of games failing to attract does contribute to less wanting to launch something new I think but that's another issue maybe.

I think with the two ideas mentioned and the idea of silo building which is more popular (one or two people doing most of it, and probably not by choice to do it staff thin) all obstacles sort of mingle together. I think its a matter of fewer new players coming, more older players thinning out and they all know what they want.

Look at the Deadlands discussion in this thread, it was popular but two different takes on the theme/setting. If a couple folks want central California deadlands (Zorro the zombie slayer) but others want Dodge Kansas (The Boothill Nightwatch), attrition will factor in and it'll go the way of ghost town. Even the want of SW but in another sector not featured in the books so the players become the heroes of the rebellion or whaterver was brought up here, but @Skew has that one going on Ares, using FFG(?).

Its not just want of IP or OC, but game system/location/theme of the game itself within all that is a factor. I think we're just picky people and though few games are sprawling these days (literally a few outside of MUD'dom), and I think most potential players are sitting in shell games working on their own idea of a good game? I really don't know just food for thought.

[faraday]

@Ghost said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

You can make new games or poll for what people want to play all day long, but if those 10-15 unique IP logins aren't staying, it likely isn't because of the choice in game itself.

There are all sorts of reasons why games fail, but the biggest one in my experience is critical mass.

MUSHers basically expect RP to be available on-demand. If they can't find it, they'll leave.

There are some things staff can do to combat this, like making sure you remove obstacles to RP (like don't spread people out among factions/planets, give them reasons to interact, run plots and scenes for people to jump into), but all of that basically requires butts in seats. A recognized IP is invariably going to get more butts in seats from Day One than an original one, and thus have more chance of achieving that critical mass.

Certainly there have been original-theme settings throughout MUSH history that succeeded in spite of this. It's not impossible, but it is a challenge.

[Arkandel]

@Lotherio said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

Look at the Deadlands discussion in this thread, it was popular but two different takes on the theme/setting. If a couple folks want central California deadlands (Zorro the zombie slayer) but others want Dodge Kansas (The Boothill Nightwatch), attrition will factor in and it'll go the way of ghost town.

That's a different vector for game failure in general - some players being unwilling to compromise at all. I remember a while ago in a DCU superhero MU* discussion thread a player expressed interest based solely on if Flash was Barry Allen or not. So unless a game is 100% what someone wants or doesn't manage to dodge what appear to be arbitrary criteria on some very specific choices made then it loses some of those potential logins, and of course when you're dealing with a very niche setting to begin with, it can spell trouble before even considering the end result.

So the same thing could happen with, say, a D&D game. "I'd love it but I'll only play if it's set in Ravenloft" could be the exact same deal.

[Sparks]

@Herja said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

My kingdom for a Sunrunner game.

+1

(Though there's probably like two or three other people in all of MU'ing who would join us there.)

[Herja]

@Sparks See, I think if you set out info and lore files that were pretty comprehensive, a lot of people into Lords and Ladies games would love the Sunrunners universe, even if they never read the books.

Now, if we were talking Lenfell, I feel like that would just be me. I love that story world so much. Melanie Rawn is an incredible world-builder even if her unreliability as a writer has made it so that I don't read her work anymore.

[Saturna]

Changeling. CHANGELING. Changeling. Changeling.

I would LOVE a game with changeling. A solo changeling game, or just CtL offered in any of the current WoD games, I don't really care. Changeling is my jam, though.

I would also love a fresh D&D game.

[ZombieGenesis]

So I guess to touch on a few things...

First, I didn't make this thread to give me ideas of what to open. I was just curious about what the community had an interest in due to the kind of unexpected excitement surrounding the Stargate post. I also may make posts like "Hey, what do people think of X, Y, or Z" out of sheer boredom or something. Not necessarily because I'm trolling for new game concepts myself.

Second, I won't lie..I spin up a ton of games. I'm lucky in that I have 3 or 5 people who love to RP many and varied things, most of which don't currently exist in the MU sphere. I'm also fortunate enough to be able to code the support systems necessary to play such games in a reasonable manner that isn't just play-by-post format. I may post about those games here, invite people over, and then when people ask why said game got shuttered it likely does result in "well, interest was lost in it so I closed the doors". I may not say it but a large part of that is those core 5 people or so have moved on and if there isn't enough spaghetti to stick to the wall then, yeah, I just close up the game. I'll probably always be that guy who has a few pokers in the fire.

Third, sometimes I fail. Heroes and VIllains MUX died largely because my life fell apart at the beginning of the year. It didn't get the attention it deserved from me even if people like Auspice and several others put in a fuck ton of effort on their parts to keep it afloat. The game closing largely comes down on my shoulders. Again, sometimes I fail.

In this instance, however, this isn't a thread about me looking for new ideas(I'm still rebuilding H&V and I'm working with some folk on an 80s horror MUX) but more a thread to explore ideas and sate my own curiosity.

I think you are right though, the theme/setting/IP isn't everything. It is something though and can be a huge part of that initial draw. Once you get past that initial draw, however, you do need to have a secure infrastructure in place and a clear idea of what the game is and how to sustain it.

[Ganymede]

@ZombieGenesis said in What Types of Games Would People Like To See?:

I think you are right though, the theme/setting/IP isn't everything. It is something though and can be a huge part of that initial draw. Once you get past that initial draw, however, you do need to have a secure infrastructure in place and a clear idea of what the game is and how to sustain it.

You should probably have a clear idea of what your game is and how to sustain it before you determine the infrastructure, and even begin on putting it together.

I'd love to collaborate with you because I have ideas, but not the time to pull it together. You probably need to find others that you can work with who can pull in some ideas, invest some time, and assist you. It sounds to me that you put your projects together with a small cadre of folks, so maybe you ought to consider reaching out to others.