@SerArysOakheart I agree that the story is very intriguing and interesting to read and play through, but I believe it alone is not sufficient to carry something more. A Choicescript game. I believe it is but one of many branches to a tree that will need far more.
@Cataphrak Overall, you do spin quite an entertaining story, however there are a number of functional problems in it. Problems that I believe the game will have to be broader than.
First and foremost: “Even as an anti-democrat…” Nuh-uh. Sorry, but there needs to be a heck of a lot more there. I can’ think of a single Choicescript game where the “Choice” part is so essential to a tasteful treatment. Can and should you be able to play as an anti-democrat? Absolutely. However, shoehorning the player into such a role will just reek to me and several others.
Let’s be frank here: this story cannot be just about Hitler or opposing the Nazis. The German anti-Nazi resistance was never just about throwing Hitler out. What would come *afterwards* was just as important, and it was something that intensely divided the resistance groups even beyond the Third Reich’s death as we saw in Divided Germany. This was one of the defining moments in German history, and I think those divisions need to show in order to make the story as strong as possible.
Obviously, making it too open ended will just make it damn impossible to write or play. However, I think that there needs to be a line drawn somewhere. It isn’t just enough for the player to be against Hitler, they must decide *what* world they wish to create from his ashes. Robbing the player of that choice would be a massive kneecap, and I think would greatly weaken it. Not only because it would deprive the player of numerous endings, but also because it would be an essential role in the narrative itself. Groups like the White Rose, the Edelweiss Pirates, the Black Front, the Anti-Fascist Committee, etc… to say that all of them did not get along with each other was an understatement, and that bled into how the organizations operated, what they did, and in many cases how the conspiracies played out and in many cases played themselves out into destruction. What your character stands for and who knows about it would and should affect the story and game-play *dramatically* and increase replay value. On top of that, I think it is really necessary to make it a honest and good examination rather than a puff piece (like Valkyrie) or a grimdark hackjob (everybody is an @$$hole, why was Germany worth saving in the first place?).
Secondly, let’s be clear: "you would know that certain lines are being crossed and the mounting control of the government over your life is becoming dangerously totalitarian. " Ok, let’s back up a bit and let me play Devil’s Advocate: how would you know? What separates Hitler and his ilk from the DVNP, KPD, or Bismarck or what have you?
Now, obviously this is a rhetorical question. As much as I despise the aforementioned, I’m not daft enough to believe that Bismarck was as bad as Hitler and the game should show that the Nazi organization and regime were well beyond the pale of even the Kaiserreich. However, I think we can’t sell short shrift. If the PC “lives every day knowing they are in a regime powered by unspeakable evil”, how do they know? How do they identify Hitler as being so beyond the pale? How do they measure him up against people like Bismarck, Trotha, Ludendorff, Thalmann, Hugenburg, etc?
You might be 15 in 1933, but that does not mean history started in 1933, or even 1918. You would never just hear rumors about the atrocities in the concentration camps or the occupied territories from those who are living; you’d also hear and read about them in the books and supplemental materials. About the Rape of Belgium, about Shark Island, and others. You’re going to be rubbing elbows against those who fought in the Freikorps, who fought in WWI, and who made their bones in things like 1871. Who are heirs to a tradition that can at least be ideologically traced back to 1848. All of this still held an immensely powerful sway over Germany at the time, both in driving people against Hitler and in driving them into his embrace. It’s something the player character would have to live in and hopefully face, both in-universe and for the sake of education in the Real World. This of course ties back into the first point, about how the player character must be able to choose what they stand for beyond stopping Hitler. It’s something they must have had to grapple with even as we must today if we faced a similar problem.
Are we really supposed to believe that there is going to be a magical light going off in every character’s head at the same time about how “this is wrong” or “Hitler Must Go Nao and For THIS Exact Reason?” I’m sorry, but that strikes me as being too railroady, and even a disservice to the real people upon which this game is based (even the ones I personally despise; Stauffenberg, Canaris, etc. al. did not fight Hitler because a game narrator told them they had to). Heck, maybe you play the Player Character so that he doesn’t have any real moral justifications for standing against Hitler, it’s just a matter of pragmatism?
I think the player needs to have that freedom, and that exposure to the evidence in some form. If we are to safeguard the past at all, we must understand the world the player character and others lived in and what formed it.
Thirdly: I’m kind of dubious about having such a rigid narrative structure overall. Sure, it works fine in and of itself, but if that is all we’re relying on we aren’t going to get that far. Let’s say this: as the player grew up in the ashes of WWI and the 1920’s and Great Depression, we throw them some choices early to set up the main game’s start in 1933 when they are 15. In addition to working, they get to decide what they do. Do they get involved with a party or so? Which party? Do they recieve paramilitary training amongst one of them, like the Freikorps (Far Right/usually Monarchist Absolutist), SA (National Socialist), Militant Communists (KPD), or Reichbanner (Democratic/Republican) that would expose them to a given worldview and grant them some elementary armed training that will serve them later? Do they take to writing and gain the ability of being a pamphleteer? Or do they choose to work overtime to help feed the family and earn some additional wealth that they can use in the game proper? Who did you vote for (in the event you were fraudulent allowed to vote)?
That all can be dealt with in the equivalent of character creation, during your years leading up to 1933 and your year of 15. Which can hopefully be done in the span of a few clicks, each feeding back into each other and not affecting the plot beyond maybe some early starting stats and leanings. Thus allowing you to roleplay freely without getting bogged down for fear of breaking the story, and also without tying you into a single origin without variation.
What’s more, what about if beyond that as your character keeps making their way through the New Germany, you choose what they do, why, and how they react to the Nazi crackdowns and for what reason. So that it does not all arbitrarily lead up to a single “road to Damascus” moment, but so you can choose when it is for that player character and *why* it is without having to write umpteen thousand hand-crafted scenes but also without having one magical “on/off” event trigger that determines when all players turn against the Reich.
Beyond that of course, we can get into the tactics and strategy of your resistance, what you do in the regime and the battlefield, and perhaps most importantly *why* and to what end you seek. Which will naturally inform the player character’s decisions and their relationships with NPCs and different factions. As well as (perhaps?) the future of Germany if not the world?
