I have just finished the game EVO for snes. You control an entity through time and evolve to survive the elements. Although the gameplay was pretty monotonous, I found the concept original. Here is my spin on the issue... In year 20XX on an abandoned space/asteroid colony, you awaken. A small robotic prototype that has lain dormant since creation. You receive a Com Signal that compels you to reach the command center of the colony. But, as a prototype robot, you are incapable of reaching there safely. Other robots have been reactivated, attempting to destroy you, as well as elements of your environment. Upon reaching the command center, you receive a new objective, so on, and so on... The point is, you are one of a unique type of robot, possessing the instinct to survive and the ability to morph parts of your anatomy into new things (i.e. building your own weapons, different legs, wings, sheilds, etc.) You collect the scrap and other supplies to evolve by destrying other robots. New types of advancement are downloaded from computer consoles. What do you think? Would a game like this be fun? Any criticism is welcome, too. I will be ironing out a story in the next few days, but tell me what you think of the concept.

I love EVO too, it was one of the major inspirations behind my gameconcept _Gimmie Those Wings!_. I really regret that school pressure made me leave that project, after which it collapsed... I should revive it someday. But not now while I''m trying to write a novel...

I think it's a great idea. And, I think there is some market sensitivity in why you mention it. I toyed with this concept in a screenplay treatment back in the late 80's, but it never clicked for me artistically enough to fully develop, schedule and resource for. I was interested enough in evolutionary concepts to incorporate them into two games designs, one about human evolution, where the prizes were fortunate chances for survival, instead of an object or honor or whatever payoff the writer and designer designed.

I felt that building in the thrill, challenge and 'fortunate' feeling just the simple act of surviving was to players, more 'cobbler' or 'tinkerer' styles of puzzle partner partially into a gameplay style suitable for the fleet of foot and mind .





[edited by - adventuredesign on October 21, 2003 4:35:01 AM]

thanks for the comments, people. keep them coming.

anyways, here are a couple things I would like some feedback on-

-In EVO, the character progressed through several ages, where his form would change, permanently. Should I follow suite? I personally was a little frustrated when I put all this effort into something and had to start from square one

-What forms of terrain would the robot have to endure? I was thinking there would be differences in outdoors, hallways, water, air, etc. in speed and availability for the player to traverse.

-What forms would the robot become? I thought about making distinctions between wheels/treads, bipedal, quadrapedal, hovering, etc. Any other ideas are welcome. Also, another concept-- hands. Would the robot(assuming humanoid form) possess the ability to hold and fire weapons not installed into the chassis i.e. pick up a handgun? Such a feature would have to be offered the entire game, and that is not the direction I wnated to take this.

Be creative, guys!

Its an interesting idea put i think you should stay away from the humanoid style robot, perhaps that could be hidden final form like it was in evo but other then that it should be more like a little robot.

As far as forms goes I think they should be dependent on the environment and not nessiarly just a 1 way change you could revert to a previous form after returning to a similar environment.

Here''s some ideas for environments:

Outerspace - You little robot changes into a little ship and flies through the cosmos.
Undersea - it become a little submarine
Land - it becomes a land rover of some kind.
Space Station - It is maintance robot used on the station.

your robot could have diffrent parts
-proplsion - how it moves and how fast
-Chassie - The body and how tough it is
-Generator - It power source
-Sensors - How it detects things and how well
-Manipulator - how it interacts with objects
-tool - a tool its currently equiped with
-weapon - used to defend its self
-Software - used to gain new abilites

It would be interesting if there was hacking part to the game, that could used to activate/deactive machines, as well gaining new information.

You could have the robot travel to diffrent planets as part of the game. It would be funny to see the little guy being chased by bone wielding cavemen on primitive earth.

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Writer, Programer, Cook, I''m a Jack of all Trades
Current Design project
Chaos Factor Design Document

Your idea looks cool, even though I have never even heard of EVO. Until TechnoGoth''s post, I saw your idea in one way, and now I don''t know. What I imagined was that what your little robot looked like depended on what you added to it, not on it''s environment. I could see ways that this could affect level design. Like in Zelda OoT, there are certain places that you can''t get to until you have a specific item. An example that you could use in your game: the first time you go into outer space you walk with magnetic shoes, then later you get thrusters that you can use to rocket over to a nearby Space Station. Another example: to go underwater you must first get propellers.

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I am the master of stories.....
If only I could just write them down...

whoa, TechnoGoth. I had a similar list going myself.
I have taken the time to write down some of my ideas for the chassie.

land - depending on type of environment(smooth, rocky) the player might choose between two legs(slow, but can jump high), treads(fast over level ground, slow over rocks, no jump), or four legs(fast, with far jump)

I feel it is important to point out at this point that the one robot may be able to traverse any number of terrains at one time, as in EVO. unlike EVO, however, evolution is not forced. A player can go most of the game without flying- it is just pretty hard. Also, the player will still have legs and such.

air - this depends slightly on the defenition of "air." The whole chassie might have to be changed to suite free floating space, but fore just jumping or hovering - beefier legs with jump jets would do the trick.

sea - once again, the player can choose to design a chassie designed specifically for sea, air, or land. It will just be slower outside of its intended environment. Under water the player could choose the number of fans to place on the legs/back of the suit, changing the speed and agility of the robot.
if the player opts to stick with the land chassie, it must make ballast tanks to float or dive(i have not yet decided which)

also, i wanted to include another kind of environment, but nothing comes to mind yet...

main chassis-
the main chassis will hold most if not all of the vital equipment. this includes engine(outputs power to move), the "core"(this will be the health of the unit), the "chassis"(determines what environment the robot is built for)

also, i have dabbled with the idea of hacking. This would definiely have to be in there. Although cheap, I was enamored with the system from this atari game; i forget what is called, but there is a JAVA version called 'URBANOIDS' to sum it it, you over power circuits, and based on your current form it is easier or harder. this could add some fun elements to the game

weapons would be developed like other parts of the body. Lets say that each "arm" has four slots, multi-purpose holes to add weapons or equipment. Designing a 2-shot rocket launcher would cost 5000 scrap (quite a bit). It would take up 1 slot to put this onto an arm. You could add extra armor, at the cost of 2 more slots, and so on...

Health is an interesting dilemma...
three variables I have considered are HP, armor, and energy. I probably won't use HP, just to do something original.
any suggestions are really neccessary for that part.

If some of your are trying to visualize what kind of robots these would look like, I was thinking of something like mechwarrior.

[edited by - chokki on October 22, 2003 3:30:56 PM]

thanks for the support, but for all of you peoples out there it is spelled C-H-O-K-K-I . Just a personal pet peve of mine, is all.

[edited by - chokki on October 28, 2003 7:19:47 PM]