If you had $100 Million to make a game...

[Crazed Rabbit]

What would it be?

The premise is that you would want to create the exact game you want, without worrying about how other people would respond.

One thing that rattles around in my head is creating a FPS that's not based on war and soldiers, but rather some government agent type battling bad guys, set in the civilian world. And instead of the silly red spots appearing on your eyes when you get hurt, the damage is realistic. In fact, compared to the modern (COD:BO, BFBC2, etc.) FPS games there'd be a lot more realism in terms of shooting, damage, wounds, etc. Like a Red Orchestra set in modern times.

And the multiplayer wouldn't be the standard deathmatch, or be like modern game where you sprint around constantly. It'd be slower paced, have more realistic aiming. Also, some levels the objective might be to rob a bank or target, while everyone else is trying to do the same in a GTA like city environment, with civilians, and players trying to blend in and not constantly shooting at each other, to avoid alerting others. So, carrying rifles gives you more firepower but reveals you to other players, as you would stand out among the NPCs. Like assassins creed, you could choose to blend in or go in guns-a-blazin'.

But what I really, really want is a realistic space combat game. A 'admirals view' sort of game, like Homeworld, with a three dimensional combat zone.

It seems many recent 'space combat' games don't have a third dimension in tactical battles (Sins of a solar empire, Sword of the stars, etc.) To me, having the ability to maneuver in the third dimension is an absolutely essential part of any space combat game.

But my desire for realism goes behind that basic requirement. Even homeworld had combat and ships based on what was basically the whims of designers. I want a game simulating what real space combat may be like; conflict across hundreds or tens of thousands of kilometers or more, with ship and projectile speeds measured in kilometers per second. I want realistic lasers shooting so far that the speed of light is no longer assumed to be instantaneous. I want railgun and missile salvos launched from thousands or millions of kilometers away. I want realistic ship acceleration. I want ships to have to radiate heat in order to not have the crew boil alive. I want to be able to see ships on the other side of the solar system and know their acceleration. I want effective range determined by the accuracy of my guns and targeting, and not some silly arbitrary limit that assumes bullets stop moving at some set range. I want stealth to be impossible because nothing can hide a rocket flare through space. I want realistic damage, with lasers burning through armor and kinetic weapons impacting ship hulls and vaporizing interior ship chambers or being mitigated by whiffle shields. A game where you get your ships in the beginning and not an RTS.

In other words, the information on this site made into a game: http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/

Or, this game made for the computer: http://www.adastragames.com/products/adastra/av.html in real time.

Sure, since we have a 100 million USD budget, add a great story and lots of polish. But the core - realistic space combat - must be perfected.

And make multiplayer accessible and easy to fight someone of equal skill. Allow for a huge variety of options in setting up battles, from the areas (around planets, asteroid belts, etc.) and team and fleet set ups. Importantly, the game wouldn't be a clickfest or a test of reaction time. Like MTW, while the ability to react to a developing situation with timeliness would be important, so would your overall strategy.

I also want the game to showcase the beauty of the stars - the staggering immensity of space, the millions of stars and galaxies that hang in the night sky.

So, fellow Orgahs, what game would you make, if you could make any game in the world? What is the perfect gameplay experience for you? Part of my answer is the fact that no one has created a game remotely like the space combat game detailed above. So, in your replies, look beyond the usual and remember that you can can choose a game far outside what is popular.

CR

[gaelic cowboy]

Some kind of Cold War spy sim you pick a side and try to cause the others breakup using propaganda, economics or proxy war etc. You can tinker with various funding and tax programmes to build weapons which cause blah blah you get the idea. Plus you could do the odd mission FPS style to get out defectors or plant fake documents etc and your score effects how much of a ripple effect it has on the superpowers.

Failure ends either in MAD or your country losing the cold war and breaking up.

Lastly something like Assassin's Creed but set in the Sengoku period Ninja's Creed has a ring to it.

[Hooahguy]

I would basically re-vamp Combat Mission: Shock Force so it looks really good.

[Crazed Rabbit]

Some kind of Cold War spy sim you pick a side and try to cause the others breakup using propaganda, economics or proxy war etc. You can tinker with various funding and tax programmes to build weapons which cause blah blah you get the idea.

Expand! That's the point of this thread; to delve into the detail of the game you really want. I don't want just an idea, I want to understand your vision.

I would basically re-vamp Combat Mission: Shock Force so it looks really good.

$100 million and you'd just improve the graphics of a game that's already out?

There's nothing you'd want to change, to expand? Think of the game that perfectly appeals to you and share it with us.

CR

[pevergreen]

Imagine, if you would, a game where you load to the main screen and say:

I feel like having a massive fight, with hundreds of thousands of sword wielding troops, against hundreds of thousand of whatever my enemy picks.

You then go to the multiplayer screen, and sort the games by whichever 'pack' you want.

It would basically be the total war battles, but done well.

But thats boring you say!

The packs. You and your friend can decide to not play with roman units, but futuristic space walkers and such. Then you can change the pack to medieval.

And its all easily modifiable. The units, the skins, the stats, the battlefields.

In essence, the perfect TW multiplayer game.

[Hooahguy]

$100 million and you'd just improve the graphics of a game that's already out?

There's nothing you'd want to change, to expand? Think of the game that perfectly appeals to you and share it with us.

CR

Fine.
I would ask them to actually show helicopters and fighter-bombers that assist you. I would add in a replay button so I can go back later and see the troops Im commanding since I have to keep a birds-eye view at all time so I can direct in the best way possible.
That would probably cost about $50 million. Id put the rest of it to fund ME3 to make it even better. Can you say "unique dialogue for every side mission"?

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

Make M&B Warband so easy to mod I could do it with a "create mod" wizard and zero effort.

Failing that, maybe implement Old Man's War or the Takeshi Kovacs novels into a space marine shooter that reflects some of the imagined challenges to being a space marine in those novels.

[miotas]

I'd make Mount and Blade, but on a much larger scale. Thousands of troops being led and strategies needing to be planned out prior to battle starting. You could plan general movement orders, flanking manouvers, ambushes, fallback positions and just about anything else you can think of. You could layout a large number of plans to be executed during battle, but they would take some time to filter to all the troops and appart from the group you are personally leading you would be very limited in what you could improvise in battle. You would be able to have general plans laid out that would be possible to execute across any battle, but they wouldn't be tailored to the terrain in the battle and so would possibly be useless for the current situation, essentially just last ditch plans if the battle turns to **** or plans to use if facing a very weak force and can't be bothered setting up in depth battle plans.

I'd also make a propper story mode for it, starting out as a lowly footsoldier in the kings army and, as you prove yourself, slowly working your way up though the ranks, commanding more and more men until you become a general, leading a whole army and planning out battles. Once you become a renowned enough general you become one of the kings advisors and take part in royal intrigue, either working purely for king and country's best intrests or building up your own power by making a network of friendships and alliances for an attempt at a coup. Then you could become a ruler yourself and gain your own court to try and maintain the happiness and loyalty of your nobles and try to keep down any upstarts like yourself, all the while directing or even personally leading your armies against external enemies. As king you could take an active role in planning out invasive or defensive campaigns, telling individual nobles where they should amass and attack or just giving general orders for your armies to attack and defend certain locations. If there were an individual who you particualy disliked or were threatened by you could order him to a very dangerous location, angering his allies and running the risk of him succeding and returning with more support than ever. You could leave the running of the realm up to a trusted friend and go out into the field for honour and glory, but run the risk of him becoming strong in your absence.

Basically just things were I go "I wish" as I'm playing Mount and Blade.



That space game of yours also sounds amazing CR.