So I just had a quick idea for a game. I don’t think I’ll get around to making this, considering I’m a busy person who still hasn’t finished my first WIP. However, I thought it would be good to get a feel for what people think of this idea. Feel free to suggest any better title. This whole idea was a literal showerthought that I expanded on over the course of the hour it took me to write this post.
The Exorcist (working title)
The game is set in a fantasy realm. Magic is real in this world, but most people can only perform magical rites and rituals to channel magic, not use actual ‘raw magic’. Raw magic belongs to creatures of magic - demons. Demons exist in a plane beyond ours, and are invisible to most people. Very few people know much about demons save the fact that they exist - and that demons often take interests in the affairs of mortals, meddling maliciously with people’s lives.
Your character is the titular exorcist, a nomad with a mysterious past who travels the lands, protecting people and saving lives by banishing malevolent demons. There are two extremely rare special traits your character has. Firstly, a talent for using raw magic. Secondly, empathy, a skill that allows your character to access certain parts of the demonic plane. Why do they have these traits? It’s a secret shrouded in your character’s past that you will discover for yourself.
You can pick your exorcist’s background from three choices that will affect their reasons for pursuing this dangerous and uncommon occupation, the people they know, the connections they have, and the resources available to them:
- The Thief: a street-smart criminal with a few underworld contacts, the thief’s favourite part of the job is the money. Personality: sarcastic with a sharp tongue and biting wit.
- The Sorceror: a student of the arcane arts, the sorceror places great stock in furthering their own knowledge. Personality: serious with a mild dash of social awkwardness.
- The Noble: the black sheep of an aristocratic family, the noble abandoned their comfortable life for adventure. Personality: fiery and headstrong.
You have seven stats that govern your approach to exorcism. The first four stats are skill stats, which means you need to train them to increase them. The other three stats are practical stats, which means your actions in the game will influence the way they go.
- Charisma: being aware of who you’re speaking to can allow you to influence people and demons.
- Knowledge: gaining knowledge of the way magic and demons work will aid you.
- Engineering: building special devices can aid your exorcisms as well as help you in the mortal world.
- Intuition: how observant you are, and how strong your instinctual senses are, can help a lot.
- Raw Magic: your innate talent for raw magic must be practised to be used effectively.
- Empathy: the talent of using skills from the demonic plane will come in useful - but must be balanced, for over-utilisation will lead you to the dark side.
- Purity: the more pure the magic, the more effective it is - but beware, for pure magic is not only dangerous to demons, but to humans as well.
That’s not all. Successfully completing quests, objectives, and tasks gives you experience points. As you gather experience, your Skill Level increases, and you can train your skill stats as well. You can also find charms in the world. Charms are magical objects that have no value on their own. However, once your Skill Level advances to a certain point, you can strip the magic from a charm to advance a certain stat.
On your travels, you will encounter all sorts of beings, both demonic and human. You will be out of your element many times. Sometimes you will find demons so overwhelmingly powerful that the direct approach will not work. Sometimes you will find that your supernatural talents may not even be required, but rather, your human ingenuity. At the beginning, you are but an aimless traveller, moving between towns and villages in search of coin, or experience, or adventure, aiding helpless commoners with their supernatural woes. As you continue on your travels, you will notice that greater minds seem to be at work. An invisible hand is moving pieces, and there is a conspiracy coming into play. Do you have what it takes to unravel it?
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Seems cool though.