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cubytes's avatar
cubytes
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12 years ago

The Three Paths: 'Control VR' Game Idea

Hey Forum,

This idea has been nagging me like crazy. I have to pitch it to vent a bit of creative energy. Honestly the scope of this idea is way over my head and way over my current skill set and to be frank it wouldn't be wise to pursue this idea unless you are comfortable with committing to 'Control VR' all the way like exclusively....absolutely no hand held controllers whatsoever.



The Three Paths;
1) The path of the aether
2) The path of the sage
3) The path of the summoner

The path of the aether: basically an elemental mage
The path of the sage: basically like 'deep forest emergence' a master of plants.
The path of the summoner: summons beasts and creatures

Once you choose a path you enter the world very quickly there will be a narrative but it will mostly be told on the fly and rely on the environment to tell the tale more so then scenes dialog and npcs.

Game Design;
-the world and a lot of the gameplay would be sort of similar to Dark Souls
-which means a huge open world full of procedural generated monsters and bosses which are constantly trying to kill you
-but for the most part you will be extremely over-powered

there is one major exception tho....

the fun is not in how tedious the gameplay is or how hard you have to grind, instead the fun is in the motion controls and how you choose to dispatch enemies and trust me when i say this it will be a lot of fun.

Motion Controls for the win!

This is all about motion controls and applying an interesting set of gestures to combat oriented gameplay the only tech that appears to be up to the challenge of facilitating this is Control VR.

for instance;
-light use of hand signs (kind of like naruto...but nothing too fancy)
-to start a fire spell you simply snap your finger to light the flame in your hand. once it is lit (as long as you keep your palm open) you can do all kinds of fun things with it
-locomotion would be handled entirely by gesture as well
-this is just the tip of the iceberg...

anyways the point is...

a huge tsunami of ideas regarding creative hand gestures that could be utilized with the "Control VR" set up to cast magic in combat oriented gameplay just hit me.

12 Replies

  • cubytes's avatar
    cubytes
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    12 years ago
    i dont have any design specifications or ideas related to art style so if you are an aspiring concept artist feel free to dig in. same goes for narrative. I dont have have any ideas related to a narrative so if you are an aspiring writer feel free to write stories and create characters for this.

    what i care about is the motion controls and locomotion; specifically the gestures that will be used to unleash magic in combat oriented gameplay.

    the path of the aether;
    -fire
    -water/ice
    -wind
    -electric

    the path of the sage;
    -vines
    -trees
    -a lot like wood style from naruto
    -and it would feel a lot like spiderman actually but with plants instead of webbing..

    the path of the summoner;
    -here is where the hand signs come into play
  • cubytes's avatar
    cubytes
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    12 years ago
    the path of the aether;

    fire: to start using fire magic do a finger snap to light flames in you hands (form a fist to put out the flames completely)

    once fire magic is activated:
    -flamethorwer: hold palms out
    -doubleflamethrower: palms out with wrists close together
    -fire ball: put palms close together to form a ball of fire and then push it away like throwing a basketball
    -fireslash; close palms except for pointer finger, use the pointer finger to slash fire like a sword

    water/ice;
    -not sure just yet....

    wind; to activate hold palm up flat like you are balacing a piece of paper on your hand and then use other hand to draw an imaginary circle around the hand three times until you start hearing whooshing noises
    *not sure about this activation method.....

    electricity; to start using electricity rub palms together until you hear a crackling noise or see blue energy radiating on your avatars hands

    when shock magic is activated;
    -shockfield: like flamethrower but with electricity
    -boltshot: form a gun with your fingers to shoot lighting bolts :)

    anyways there is a lot of interesting ways to use gestures to initiate a magic set and then use said magic in combat oriented gameplay

    key insight; use gestures to activate a magic set

    Edit: on second thought perhaps it would be best if gestures were one handed so you can dual wield spells. the other paths wont have this issue but for the path of aether it is important.

    electric: instead of rubbing palms together you rub your thumb across your fingers to activate it.
    wind: hold two fingers up towards the sky and draw a circle to activate wind magic
    water: not sure yet....
    *to cancel or deactivate magic form a fist and that will clear the spell
  • cubytes's avatar
    cubytes
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    12 years ago
    hmmm i do not want to cop out and build this on top of an "on rails" experience. so this would also require "Stompz" for player controlled locomotion. further isolating the game from the possibility of mainstream pickup....

    so to pursue this idea you would be committing to;
    -Control VR
    -Stompz

    All the way! no second guessing. no going back. it is all or nothing with this one.

    it is very important that this experience be;
    -a seated experience
    -require no controllers to occupy the hands

    do you have the balls to say fugg it and commit to this endeavor even though the target audience will be extremely limited? are you crazy enough to build a game that has little to no chance of making any profit in the short term and probably not even in the long term as a result of committing to hobbyist, DIY and extremely expensive input devices? do you have what it takes to laugh in the face of a tsunami of haters bitching and complaining about this game because they lack the input devices required to play it (there will be a lot of haters)

    i would go for it just for the learning experience.... but i be crazy like that!

    speaking of crazy... you would have to be a crazy mofo to collaborate with someone like me anyways. if you have been following my posts you have to realize by now that inviting me to the team will be like embracing someone who will constantly nag you with questions and concerns. and 90% of those questions and concerns will be naive ignorance and a lot of "what ifs"

    hey at least i am being honest :P
  • cubytes's avatar
    cubytes
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    12 years ago
    ahh ha i think i got it!

    to activate water magic;
    -hold out your hand palm towards the ground
    -if you have no magic activated all you have to do is wiggle your fingers in some fashion

    to activate ice;
    -ice is a shock augmentation addition to water
    -when water is activated slide your thumb across your fingers as if to activate shock magic

    and now you can shoot ice shards!
  • cubytes's avatar
    cubytes
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    12 years ago
    the path of the sage;

    short description: kind of like spiderman but with vines!

    here is a list of moves;
    -vine-web: shoot a vine web thingy just like spider man but without having to do the sign of the horns
    -vine-whip: create a vine then use it as a whip/lash
    -tree emergence; make a tree emerge under an enemy almost looking like a hand that comes out of the ground
    -seed bombs; throw different kinds of seed bombs

    this one will be fun to play :)

    i will update this post with specific details about the gestures if anyone cares...
  • cubytes's avatar
    cubytes
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    12 years ago
    path of the summoner; time for some hand signs but there is also some puppeteering involved once you have a summon out!

    details about the summoner gameplay;
    -this one will be like hard difficulty
    -when you start the game you start out with a couple default weak creatures that you can summon
    -from there the goal is to capture and ensnare monsters that you can then turn around and use as summons

    skipping the hand-signs and the system involved with summoning creatures for now....

    to puppeteer a summon;
    -when you have a summon out you can puppeteer them with gestures but first you have to possess them
    -you hold one hand up and place a couple of fingers on your temple this activates select mode
    -when in select mode a reticle will appear, you move reticle with positional tracking :)
    -thumbs up with the other hand to confirm remote possession when the reticle falls on one of your summoned creatures
    -or you can just nod to confirm...
    -when you have possessed one of your summons you will now be able remotely control them with gestures
    -to cancel possession touch the temple on both sides of your head like you are psychic that is thinking really hard

    puppeteer controls;
    -to make your creature punch just start punching and your creature will do what you do
    -some of your creatures might have weapons they will still punch (assuming they have hands) so in order to use/control them and their weapons you would use pointer finger to swing blade, stab et all
    -some of your creatures might be dragons or huge dinosaur like creatures that can bite use you thumb and fingers as if it is the creatures mouth to bite :)

    air stick mode:
    -to make your creature move form a fist
    -use thumb like you would be tilting an imaginary thumb stick
    -face buttons would be mapped to the other hand
    -if you want to use a button/input/command just tap thumb on one of the fingers


    pandoras box;
    -the summoner will summon a pandoras box
    -you will use the box to trap creatures in order to be able to summon them
    -when they get trapped a series of hand signs will be assigned to them (think naruto)
    -initiate these signs properly to summon the associated creature
  • Tgaud's avatar
    Tgaud
    Honored Guest
    12 years ago
    I just read the first topic, but your idea make me think of something interesting :

    A VR new combat style or RPG game
    a naruto like game, where you have to learn and reproduce "signs" with hands.

    You play side by side on the living room, but each one see his ennemy in front of him in the rift/morpheus.

    Instead of combat game with complicated buttons combo, or dangerous gesture, you would have to master
    Hands movment very fast.

    So the battle would look like the Jutsu with hand movment in naruto, more or less.
    something with good cinematics, giving you time to make a counter jutsu.

    The interest would be to learn jutsu from each class, try some way to learn them (secrets jutsu too)
    And master them to do it quickly. The power would come in part from the précision of it.
    Best jutsu would be complicated to make, and have only a few counter. Or would have a very fast cinematic giving very little time to the opponent to counter.

    The skill and interest would be to know the most jutsu you can, think fast and react fast with dexterity.
    And fin creative way to make the jutsu interefere with each others.


    There would be a lot of interesting gamepaly involved.
    And jutsu countering and interfering with each others.

    We could also think about game, with team of multiple players doing jutsu teamplay ;)
  • cubytes's avatar
    cubytes
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    12 years ago
    "Tgaud" wrote:
    I just read the first topic, but your idea make me think of something interesting :

    A VR new combat style or RPG game
    a naruto like game, where you have to learn and reproduce "signs" with hands.

    You play side by side on the living room, but each one see his enemy in front of him in the rift/morpheus.

    Instead of combat game with complicated buttons combo, or dangerous gesture, you would have to master
    Hands moment very fast.

    So the battle would look like the Jutsu with hand movement in naruto, more or less.
    something with good cinematic, giving you time to make a counter jutsu.

    The interest would be to learn jutsu from each class, try some way to learn them (secrets jutsu too)
    And master them to do it quickly. The power would come in part from the precision of it.
    Best jutsu would be complicated to make, and have only a few counter. Or would have a very fast cinematic giving very little time to the opponent to counter.

    The skill and interest would be to know the most jutsu you can, think fast and react fast with dexterity.
    And fin creative way to make the jutsu interfere with each others.


    There would be a lot of interesting gameplay involved.
    And jutsu countering and interfering with each others.

    We could also think about game, with team of multiple players doing jutsu teamplay ;)


    Awesome :) Neat ideas Tgaud.

    I'm not sure a full blown Naruto IP association would be ideal for "The Three Paths" considering....

    The path of the Aether: would look/feel like Skyrim magic but with hand gestures
    The path of the Sage: would look/feel like Spiderman but with vines and plants instead of webbing (sans the swinging)
    The path of Summoner: would be like Naruto jutsu utilizing hand signs for summoning creatures

    these three different play styles;
    -would share the same open world design
    -share the same lore/story (with slight variations)
    -share the same monsters and bosses (with slight variations)

    just like in Dark Souls;
    -there will be a ton of monsters/enemies tied to a specific location
    -there will be tons of bosses tied to specific locations

    in addition if time permits I would like to experiment with;
    -free-roam enemies (like the Weapons from FF7)
    -procedural generated enemies that can appear anywhere at anytime
    *Keep in mind that these two experiments are not a huge priority.
  • cubytes's avatar
    cubytes
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    12 years ago
    well it doesn't have to be seated. I suppose a user could stand up if they wanted to.

    path of the sage;
    -pinch pointer finger and thumb to initiate vine aim mode
    -when vine aim mode is initiated a reticle will appear
    -aim reticle with arm/hand
    -release thumb and finger to shoot vine at enemy

    *the vines that you shoot emerge from the ground slightly in front of you, they do not emerge from the avatars hand

    lots of ideas :)
  • cubytes's avatar
    cubytes
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    12 years ago
    on second thought if the finger tracking is really that good....

    path of the summoner: for remote controlling summoned creatures: air stick

    air-stick;
    -when summoned creature is selected when you want to move it just form a fist
    -use thumb like you would be tilting an imaginary thumb stick

    also when air-stick mode is activated on the other hand the 4 face buttons will be mapped to the finger tips

    to press a button you essentially just pinch/tap finger and thumb together to initiate the associated input