Derek Metaltron Game Projects

Hosted Games Works In Progress
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So I figured a few people have these threads regarding what they’re working on, so even though I’m still in the process of learning CS and the like I figured I’d do one the same myself! Here’s what I have in mind to write in the coming months/years, including some sketchy stuff I just have thoughts of doing:

Name: The Chronological Caverns
Synopsis: You have been dragged from you era - from Roman times to the forbiding remains of civilization in the distant future - into the mysterious Chronological Caverns where the great Seer watches over all and space and time amid an array of other timewashed peoples! But dark forces seek to destroy the seer and seep into our dimension! Battle aliens, cyborgs, dinosaurs or zombies and decide whether you wish to return home, remain in the cave’s safety or even take its strange powers for yourself!
Inspirations: The Cave of Time (the very fist CYOA book!), Timesplitters Game series, Doctor Who
Status: In planning stages, Mid 2014?

Name: Silver Age Secret Agent Y
Synopsis: The year is 1953, the Cold War is at its hottest. Swept away from your home country - the rainy streets of Britain, the sunny shores of the USA, the cold climes of the USSR or the fertile fields of China - you are the latest recruit to a secret spy organisation who is dedicated to battle the hidden evils of the world, whether needed. And that includes aliens. And giant monsters. And people with super powers, one of which is you! As a super powered spy travel to exotic climes and thwart an evil criminal empire! Use one of a range of possible super powers whose origins are up to you - alien, mutation, gadget-based or magical? The choices you make all affect the options you have and the foe you face! Spanning most of an alternate fifties where those charmish spy Novels, dime super hero books and crazed b-flicks were all true!
Inspirations: DC & Marvel Comic Books, James Bond, various 50’s Films
Status: In planning Stages, Mid to late 2014?

Name: Paris: Resistance? (Needs a better name I think)
Synopsis: Paris fell to the Nazis in June 1940, leading to a long occupation of over four years for the French. Here you play as a secret resistance member, fighting underground to liberate the city from the Germans with an array of possible skills and styles. I liked the premise of this because I knew a female player would be just as easy to play with in this historical setting as a male would. The game would take place (if you survive that long) over the course of the occupation of Paris with a decent cast of characters, including French and later British and other allied forces. Realism will likely be the name of the game here.
Inspirations: WW2 Flicks, Allo Allo, real life stories.
Status: In planning stages, late 2014-early 2015?

The next few releases I have in mind are Ozoic, my long gestating Prehistorical Fantasy concept which will likely be my Zombie Exodus or Sabres of Infinity if I play things right. The idea is that there will be a free or cheap Prologue book where players play the parent of the main character and set things up for their child in the main series, which will be a trilogy of three releases. Players will get to be a surivor in a wolrd where nearly everything wishes to eat them, choosing how they wish to survive, who to love and how to bring up their own children. In addition I will also be creating Ozoic: Sharp Claw, a special spin off release as a cheaper price. Early on in the Ozoic trilogy you will learn to fear the Sharp Claws, hungry dinsaours whose packs are one of your most dangerous threats. In Sharp Claw you get to play as one of them! Hunt in your pack and fight for dominace in a cut-throat world where your life can be just as tough as the humanoids.

These beyond are sketchy ideas I might end up creating in the future, probably as shorter pieces.

  • A WW2 Adventure set in Colditz Castle. Play as a British, American, Canadian, French or Polish soldier sent to the unescapable prison! Can you and your fellows in the Escape Committee figure a way out from one of several options? Plan your escape and keep the German soldiers at bay! Male only since I would want to keep this one realistic. Romance wouldn’t come into things either. Possible that to avoid issues I could make this a made up POW Camp instead.
  • A Rags to Riches Hollywood game in the golden age of the 30’s to 50’s. Play as an aspiring actor or actress as you attempt to wow the directors and compete with your co-stars in an increasing range of hollywood pictures. Which genres will you opt for? Who of your fellow workers will you love or loathe?
  • Something Doctor Who’eqse where you have a time machine and get to choose who to travel with and where to go with a range of options and probably a main enemy to worry about.

So that’s what I have so far! Hoping to commence work on both Silver Age and Caverns at the end of the year or start of 2014. Let me know what you think and if any of the sketch ideas appeal too!

1 Like
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Hmm i like the cave and Ozoic . But my interest is in the Old hollywood could you start little before too appear Rodolfo Valentino in lately 20´s it was the first film start idol the brad pitt, james dean of the crazy twenty. I love that golden era the scandalous parties, the commies inside the cine the murders the beautiful dresses and decorates … so you got me there.

Im not so fan WW II style games but could be interesting if there are well done

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@MaraJade Thanks! The Chronological Caverns has indeed got some inspiration from The Cave, now I think of it. Ozoic will probably be my grandus maximus if I can learn enough via CC and SASSY (did I only just realise those intials spelled that out? Huh.).

Well the Hollywood game is just an idea at the moment, the precise era is as yet undefined, though the point where silent films switched to talkies in the late 20’s could be interesting. I could also form an anthology of shorter pieces with multiple eras under one banner if I can figure out to making that work.

WW2 has enough scope in it to be able to do a range of stories, I’m actually surprised that Allen’s Marine Raider is the only one we’ve see so far. But I’ve been reading up on Coloditz lately so I think a POW Camp adventure would be interesting. I may even elect to do that instead of my French Resistance idea.

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Looking forward to it

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@derekmetaltron My vote, FWIW, would be for the French Resistance one. It’s a fascinating topic and had some great real-life characters and wonderful stories from which you might draw inspiration. It certainly has the potential to tick all the boxes for many different readers.

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@Vendetta It is a great topic, though I would be needing to be careful about what to show and get across, but I agree that I would have a range of historical figures to use for inspiration. I suspect that the central focus would be a bar or nightclub which acts as the hideaway for the members, and I would be making a range of supporting characters for relationships and possible romance. I’m also considering at the moment what sort of types of character skill the player can have - demolitions, charisma/seduction and stealth all seem logical. The intention is that I would have each vignette be a different mission to cause trouble which the player can tackle in a number of way, all leading up to the Liberation of Paris in '44. As I said, the situation makes it very ideal for a female character to be as interesting (if not more so) than a male one, and I suspect I might allow elements to play out differently depend on gender.

It is possible that I might hold off on Silver Age and tackle Caverns and this first, since I get the impression Silver Age is going to be fairly expansive and so some testing via those two would help.

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@derekmetaltron I think there’s a very real danger in having too many different projects on the go at the same time although, granted, some people do seem happier having at least a couple and switching between them as the whim (or writer’s block!) takes them… Still, considering the gritty realism / atmosphere / ‘mood’ for which this project cries out (assuming you weren’t seriously considering going entirely ‘Allo, Allo’ on this!) I should think that focusing on it 100% would probably be the best way to go. If you have other ideas you wanted to explore it may be best to get those out of the way first, or perhaps leave them until later… Just something to think about.

The potential for different gender roles to play and actually feel quite different (rather than just be the usual variable-swapping business) is one of the things I find most attractive about this idea, tbh, but you do have to be very careful about how this is done and, more importantly, how it comes across to the reader. For instance, you will have to avoid the man always punching his way out of trouble and the woman always resorting to, erm, ‘charm’, as the best way to achieve anything. You’re probably perfectly aware of this but I’d really hate to see the project scuppered by “gender bias” accusations, so I figured I’d mention it anyway.

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@Vendetta Well I doubt I will be working on any more than 2 projects at any one time, though it does appeal to having something more out there for Chronological Caverns and then a more grounded piece with the Resistance concept. Happy to see someone who has seen Allo Allo, but I can promise that any inspiration from that is purely on a background and character template basis - there woll be no truns containing serages to be bummed by the RAF hare. This month I suspecting will be mapping out my plans for CC and this now I expect, then I’ll be getting to actual writing in Jan.

I think if I do try to make two separate and each engaging roles for male and female characters, and by no means do I want brawn or seduction to be the only means to tackle issues for men and women. I won’t be particularly making the likely character classes male or female exclusive. I think the core thing I want to do here is make either gender interesting and different without implying one way is better than the other. I’d want players to replay a second time with the other gender and felt they got a different and rewarding experience, ideally. After all, what I like about your Vendetta game is it totally makes sense for the player to be male, and it’s not because you’re not interested in female characters, indeed the ones I’ve seen thus far in your game are all interesting. I do like the idea of letting guys and girls alike tailor their own resistance fighter.

Also considering romance options for a Resistance game, whilst few characters are set in stone I know I want a British RAF parachutist in the game who players can romance regardless of gender. Romance in games is something I know everyone thinks differently about, and I’m always uncertain of this ‘everyone is bisexual’ philosophy so players can date either sex at times, but I would like to give all players enough scope if possible.

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Paris: Resistance seems nice to me, the espionage, trying to teach us Britons French while we blubber with stubby tounges, and running around being uber sneaky.

Sounds good to me.

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“Inspirations: Allo Allo”

Good moaning, I have brought you a policeman’s out-fart.

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@Drazen

I think I can beat that, My friend’s French speaking: I have really long horses and I like hair.

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@trollhunterthethird I tried speaking French in a cafe, once, when on holiday across the pond; In an attempt to order a chicken sandwich, I said: “Je requeste le pomme sandwicho, por favour.” - The strange look I recieved meant I abandoned the effort, and returned to the time-honoured English wisdom that any foreigner can understand you perfectly, if you talk loudly, and clearly enough. If they pretend not to understand, they are being insubordinate, and must be struck with one’s cane.

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@Drazen then never came to north spain, only go Mallorca or Canary Islands . But england people normaly are very rude when people try to help them in english i heard sometime two young brats insulting a poor old woman in a little shop trying help them . i tell them if they dont know education they could call shit his mothers. My accent is pretty bad but they understand enough to be more polite.

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@Drazen Using my limited French I can roughly translate it to " I request an Apple Sandwich, for favourite"

And I say I applaud you for your response, you truely did do us proud Sir. But I think I can beat that.

Being six at the time I had went to Belgium to visit those relatives I had utterly despised, one was especially cunning and deceiving, we shall call him ‘Claus’. I had just begun learning French and Claus had offered to teach me, the first word he had taught me was ‘Mamelon’ (For those who cannot be bothered to look it up, it refers to a part of the female cleavage). The clever bastard had told me it was a greeting that was used in that little water hole of a town. In short, most think of me as a feral child who would sexually prey on their children in that tiny back-end town in Belgium.

@MaraJade It could be worse, I remember my first day at secondary school. I look very Polish and normally most will ask whether I am from the grueling cold of Poland, but that teacher was especially rude. He had said “DO YOU KNOW ANY ENGLISH?”. Well I’m in top set English so I would imagine so.

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Well there seems to be quite a few votes for the Resistance game, so I think I’ll up that in the timeslot alongside Chronological Caverns.

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@Drazen “por favour” isn’t french and chicken sandwich is if i’m right this “sandwich au poulet” and “le pomme” means apple but the “le” must be “la”
It might seem im good at french now but i suck at it, i’m not very good at languages except for english because i seem to be the best in my class and that might also be because no one in my class will understand what is in this comment. (Yay i’m very good in english)

I like the idea for Paris resistance :relaxed:

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@Drazen they all speak fluent English, they just pretend not to when we’re around…

@trollhunterthethird I’m not sure how bad you consider this, but once (when I was in France) I was told that ‘merde’ was a word for a sandwich. Being as naïve as seven-year-old me was, I proceeded to ask for a “merde d’jambon” at a café. Needless to say, I quickly found out that ‘merde’ wasn’t the word for ‘sandwich’…
The only positive thing that came out of that was a humorous reference to the phrase ‘Please excuse my French’.

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I hope you were joking because if not that’s INCREDIBLY racist.

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@Beezlebub That’s very much a standard joke among the English (mostly to cover the extremely embarrassing fact that the vast majority of us can’t speak any other language) so yes, he’s joking.

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@Beezlebub yes, I was joking! @Vendetta is completely correct, the English have loads of jokes about the French :slight_smile: