I like your idea, especially the idea of being able to decide the degree of democracy.
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I had this game idea while falling asleep last night: an IF about bodybuilding.
It would lean more on the gamey side than the narrative, designed with high replayability in mind. You start as a freshman in college and have three years to become a pro bodybuilder and compete on stage. You get to choose whether you start out fat or skinny and your gender.
The core game loop for working out will consist of picking your workout routine (what body parts you want to work out, how many times a week, the intensity of workouts, what kind of cardio you want to do, etc). Over time you will make progress by becoming bigger and or/leaner, but you will also develop imbalances that you will have to iron out (legs out of proportion with your arms, one arm bigger than the other, etc). At the end of the game, you will be judged on how big, symmetrical, proportional, and lean you are.
While working out is the main focus of the game, there are also other elements you must juggle in order to be successful, such as your grades, relationships with friends and family, your love life, nutrition, job, and sleep schedule. Neglecting your social life, for example, would lead you to isolate yourself and lurk in sketchy online communities. This, in turn, will make you post incel/nazi stuff online which has a chance of getting you banned from the competition (I’ll have to think of something equivalent for women because they don’t become incel Nazis when they get lonely, lol).
There will also be benefits to focusing on other aspects of your journey. For example, if you have a good relationship with your mother, she will bake you her famous anabolic apple cobbler which will get you jacked faster. Doing your job well will get you more money which will obviously let you buy better food and supplements.
There will be a way to adjust the difficulty of the game, which is your roommate. On the easiest difficulty, he will be a well-adjusted member of society, doing his part of the chores, paying half rent and even helping you when you struggle. On the hardest difficulty, he will be a crypto bro who eats Doritos and plays video games all day. You will not be able to get rid of him because of your history together and will have to constantly do his part of the work and even lend him money without the possibility of ever seeing it back.
You will meet all kinds of people at the gym who will give you all kinds of advice, good or bad, solicited and unsolicited. You will be able to ask them to hang out outside the gym and even date. The people you will interact with will have different backgrounds in the gym culture spectrum: bodybuilders, powerlifters, climbers, calisthenics, athletes, and old people doing weird stuff.
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I beg to differ.
N-not that I had a phase like that or anything…
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Less code to write then, haha.
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Could be interesting narrative-wise potentially, but that core gameplay loop sounds hella boring. I think it’s one of the weakest parts about how many people write HG titles; they try and focus on replicating interactive gameplay elements in a text-based game, effectively turning it either into a number-crunching game or a excruciatingly boring list of things to click through.
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What I had planned ,was like there are 4 kingdoms on which you are the 4th.
K1.Would be like focused on making all other kingdoms kneel no matter the cost.
K2.Are like good guys only fight when they have to , a friend in deed really if you would consider it.
K3.They are like anti-heroes who don’t have a side,only looks after their own,would compromise any deal to do that
K4.Well you can decide what you would be like.
So mostly K1 is the threat hear,since they are focused on conquering everything.
But all this miss some of the the things you mentioned in your reply,I will have to make a few tweaks.
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Id totally play this I am sucker for parent of the chosen esque games but tbh I just like having the chance to raise a kid
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It really depends on execution. Taking inspiration from existing works is common and reasonable in my opinion. The 19th century setting is very different to Wayhaven, which is a broadly contemporary setting in a nebulous location. Urban fantasy and paranormal romance are not unique to Wayhaven and detective protagonists are very common in urban fantasy too.
That said not everyone thinks the same way. It’s very likely that there are sections of your potential audience who will compare your work to TWC for better or worse. I’ve observed games being compared to TWC (by TWC fans or detractors) which bear so little resemblance to TWC that the comparison is meaningless; this concept has more similarities than them. It’s worth going into it with clear eyes.
Where I would suggest further consideration as you develop your concept is the characters. I’m not totally sure what “the classic ROs in IFs” means really because characters vary so widely. It’s fine to think of them in very broad-strokes/tropey terms at the beginning but one brooding/hostile character can be developed and refined to be wildly different to another. My advice would be to consider how you can make your characters their own individual people that feel real to you and the audience. That - and also the nature of their immortality - is a major way in which you will distinguish your game from existing ones
I guess I’d also suggest considering: will you feel like your story is derivative? would it be more satisfying to feel it was more its own identity and fully “yours”? Will it be fun to write if you’re thinking of TWC and how it’s similar or different? For me personally, I’m not sure I’d find that very fun - on the contrary it could feel pretty stressful. You may feel differently and again, it’s all about execution - having Inspirations isn’t the same as copying. But that’s worth bearing in mind too.
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This reminds me if a choice game that i found on itch.io that does so.ething like this. For the life if me i cant remever the nane but i think it was brought up on a forum here a while ago.
I’ve started work on a new WIP, and I thought I’d share it here now that most of the pre planning is out of the way.
My WIP is a retelling of the Greek myth “Eros and Psyche!” I’m changing it to fit in a second RO (Apollo), and to get rid of the chunk of time that Psych is alone (I may get rid of Persephone and give her part to Hades. I want to do her next, but I haven’t decided if it will be in the same continuity). Besides those things, the story will be a pretty good adaptation of the original myth. Here is a fun video retelling the myth if anyone is unfamiliar
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I’ve been thinking about making sort of a superhero universe. All the books would be through hosted. I would try to make it similar to marvel in the way that multiple individual books that eventually intertwine. I would try to avoid some of the more stereotypical norms of superheroes and branch out a little bit. Ideally I can find six other people that each come up with their own superhero and are in control of their story and those six will be apart of the team while I have my own that I’ll make.
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That sounds like a cool idea! will there be any potential for a female ro or gender selectable ones in general?
It’s likely that at least one of them will eventually be gender selectable. But for now at least, I’m going to write them as male. I love IF, but I’d be lying if I said coding wasn’t a nightmare 
. So I’m going to do a first draft that’s simple, coding wise. Then as I do edits and rewrites I’m going to look at the coding and stuff
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Is there anything where you can play an Empress or Concubine? I am just asking
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If you are asking for a game, you should probably ask in this thread:
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seems interesting and I will definitely check it out when you know,it’s out .also,I have no problem with just male Ros that’s what I always romance anyway.good luck !
Had an idea for an IF that I would like to flesh out (and maybe try my hand at making it), so I thought I should at least get some opinions here.
I feel like there’s a distinct lack of historical (non Fantasy) and Dystopian fiction, so this is both of those.
It takes place in an alternate history (not so subtly inspired by TNO) where Germany won The Second World war. It takes place in the mid late 50s, in Paris, currently controlled by the French State, a de jure independent country lead by Joseph Darnand. However, it’s no secret that the French government is just a puppet to the German Reich, and (somehow) more worryingly, the Order-State of Burgundy lead by the SS. This government is (unsurprisingly) extremely oppressive and racist, treating non-Germanic people like dirt, and fear keeps resistance at bay… Until now.
You play as a young laborer. Fresh off high school you slave a way in a factory day in and day out. Your father was a member of a resistance group, but he “disappeared” a few years ago. All you have left of him is some books and a small necklace and some illegal books.
Eventually you meet the resistance group your father was a part of, and you start working with them. This group is small, only about 6 members, but managed to assassinate a minister. You have to decide your strategy to beat back the government and whether or not you are ok with murder and terrorism in the name of your cause.
There will probably be a small form of ideology system, where the books your father left you will change which ideology you have. This will mainly affect your relations with the other members as well as maybe strategy.
I will probably have some romance, thinking 4 of the 6 members.
If there are any questions, shoot. I want this idea to be fully fleshed out.
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That’s an interesting idea! I enjoy historical fiction (all those what-ifs to explore) and I’m curious to see how your project takes shape. I guess my biggest question is how grim/dystopian do you see the story getting overall? From your description, it could be anywhere from a very angsty introspective piece about morality vs necessity to a more action oriented spy-thriller about banding together to win the day.
Both options could lead to a very good take on your premise, but where you put your focus seems likely to have a ripple effect on how the game gets structured/what stats and challenges become more important. And of course there are other directions to go in as well. I do hope you continue with it!
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While it definitely will be quite grim, especially at the start, I don’t want it to be 1984 level “all revolt is doomed” grim. I want to show the terrible system that Naziism is while also showing it’s inefficiencies that could ultimately lead to it’s downfall. So it would be grimer in tone but with elements of that sort of spy thriller as well as you combat the regime. The moral dilema of how far you should go to accomplish your goals will certainly be a key player, especially between the different members of you rebel group.
Also thanks for the interest!
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Maybe you can even set it in the TNO verse? Given how cool the devs are with the various submods wouldn’t surprise me if they let fans do a choice game as well.
Want to give mc’s a real dilemma, have the “kinder, gentler” more “liberal” dengist version of Nazism of Speer prevail while having Kirkpatrick in the US which makes the main two blocks competing for France be a lighter shade of black and dark grey.