Ideas Dump

[honoreixix]

i think i'll make one with the protagonist being uber overkill...

but of course it would be painful to lose your loved ones...

*awake for about 25 hrs straight*

[gekiganwing]

Time travel romance was brought up a little while ago. Didya know that's considered a genuine sub-genre in romance fiction? If not, then now you know. And knowing is half the battle.

Anyway, here's an idea more or less lifted from the first few pages of Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics, just transposed into a different media:

1. Hero grows up either not knowing that ren'ai games and visual novels exist, or assuming that they're mindless garbage.

2. A friend gives the hero a VN which totally takes the hero by surprise. (Alternately, the main character might stumble upon one.)

3. The hero delves into the scene.

4. The hero decides it's time to make a homebrew VN. It doesn't take long before he/she realizes that only a few other people know that this media form exists.

5. The hero, whether alone or working with others, perseveres.

Yes, this idea is rather "meta." But I think it could work.

[Ellie]

Idea:
Game Name: To Save the World in a Week
Plot:
In the world of fantasy, families have been inbreeding for years to continue to produce the "stereotypical" heroes, so that there will always be that stereotypical heroic protagonist, and that ridiculously sweet, somewhat annoying girl...Well, one person fell in love with someone not in the family, and eventually the blood line became diluted...Now, with no heroic stereotypes left, and time running out (the world apparently must be saved once every year, because it's pretty unsafe like that...>>''), the protagonist (the pretty much polar opposite of the stereotypical protagonist in rpgs), and a bunch of rather unstereotypical girls much go to save the world...The problem? They've only got a week to do it.

Hahaha....>>'' Yeah. *runs*

[monele]

Ellie : I love that one If only because it aims to break clichés, and yet probably work some self-referential humor on top of it ^^

[gekiganwing]

There are, of course, mainstream RPGs with romantic conflicts. Lufia 2 and Phantasy Star 3 come to mind. And if you haven't played Dragon Quest 5, then be aware that a part of that game (referenced in Lucky Star, amusingly enough) is the hero choosing a bride.

In search of genre-melding ideas? Then try mixing ren'ai or visual novel with a graphic adventure. Could be in a SCUMM style, or still images, like Shadowgate or Deja Vu.

Earlier, I talked about my "Professor Layton with puzzles to increase love meters" idea. I wonder if it might work in a mansion setting. Think "Nocturnal Illusion," but instead of just wandering to uncover the plot, there are puzzles. The main character might be able to escape with one love interest, but the ending will vary depending on the love meter.

[azureXtwilight]

Idea:
Game Name: To Save the World in a Week
Plot:
In the world of fantasy, families have been inbreeding for years to continue to produce the "stereotypical" heroes, so that there will always be that stereotypical heroic protagonist, and that ridiculously sweet, somewhat annoying girl...Well, one person fell in love with someone not in the family, and eventually the blood line became diluted...Now, with no heroic stereotypes left, and time running out (the world apparently must be saved once every year, because it's pretty unsafe like that...>>''), the protagonist (the pretty much polar opposite of the stereotypical protagonist in rpgs), and a bunch of rather unstereotypical girls much go to save the world...The problem? They've only got a week to do it.

Hahaha....>>'' Yeah. *runs*

Hey, that's cool.
Wonder what kind of unstereotypical girls are there.
Curios already, hope someone'll make it XD
And me myself is a fan of Fantasy games.

Saving the world.........again

[gekiganwing]

A vague concept: "interactive comic." For an idea on how this might work, look at the sample screens on the Quartett! localization project ( http://charlotte.is.moelicious.be ).

Another rough idea: "Fighting Fantasy." (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fighting_Fantasy ) This book series falls somewhere in between CYOA books and actual pen-and-paper role playing. There's several examples which exist right now: Radical Dreamers, the later versions of Elven Relations, and even a small part of Tales of Lemma.

[monele]

First, although offtopic... eeeee! Quartett translation <3. I had no idea ;3;

Second, Quartett is probably a big part of why I got interested in VNs. I tried to make a similar engine with Flash but it was very hard to script something in it :/. I also tried to bring the bubbles in Magical Boutique and even *cough* MagBou 2, but nothing as detailed as this. The problem with such a game is the need for maaaany pictures, manga-like. I *think* Mikan would be a very good candidate for such a system because she seems to prefer event pictures to character sprites.

Third, I've also dabbled in the CYOA style using Ren'Py. I have a test project that runs dice rolls compared to stats to know if you succeed at actions you chose to do. If anyone is interested in doing a CYOA-like...

[gekiganwing]

To monele:

Some WIP fan translations are a little tough to find, so it's easy to understand why you didn't hear about the Quartett! project. There's a slightly out of date index here: http://www.shii.org/translate And here's a list which mentions everything not being considered by the TLWiki group: http://www.tsukuru.info/tlwiki/index.ph ... l_Projects

Anyway, two ideas today.

1. Time travel: I didn't get into Hourglass of Summer, but I know it's about the main character's quest to undo a personal tragedy which happened during a month or two. (Rather similar to the Anonono demo, and from playing a Shira Oka demo at ACen 08.) If anyone wants to write time travel romance, it could involve trying to resolve small concerns. Or you could go for "major crisis resolution" ala Chrono Trigger. Will the future refuse to change?

2. "School utopia." I thought about this just this morning. I'm sure you've seen some ren'ai games which take place in a school setting too *nice* to be plausible. The sort of place where no one insults okama like Jun Watarase. Well, take that to its logical extreme. Have a story in a surrealistically (sp?) nice school. But make it a negative utopia. Something is seriously wrong behind the scenes. There are false fronts. Think _Those Who Walk Away from Omelas_.

[gekiganwing]

While wasting time browsing TVtropes, I found a page titled 'Pitch Testing Zone' here: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... estingZone Lots of amusing/potentially good ideas which could be well suited to a ren'ai game, from 'Harem Mutation' to 'Harem Deconstruction.'

...I wonder if this will show up on the Weirdest Inbound Link page...

[papillon]

A little near-future sci-fi setting for you...

There's a current obsession with trying to be Young and Thin forever. What if in the future the upper classes who can afford it have had themselves genetically modified so that they really are endless lolis, with the bodies of fragile, waifish 12yos (slightly older for boys) until they reach old age and wither away? And at the same time, you have the burly, rugged underclass who must perform all the physical labor?

(Sort of eloi/morlock, yes, but not having diverged quite that far yet. Still interacting with each other. We can also call them Elves and Dwarves)

Now, take an Elf woman whose husband has been murdered by some sort of conspiracy and fled for her life, seeking shelter in a Dwarf enclave and needing their help to hide her and solve the mystery. She and her new partner both find each other amazingly unattractive (she thinks he looks like a fat hairy brute, he thinks she looks like a child) but slowly learn to see past outward appearances and find romance while thwarting the bad guys...

[rocket]

Earlier, I talked about my "Professor Layton with puzzles to increase love meters" idea. I wonder if it might work in a mansion setting. Think "Nocturnal Illusion," but instead of just wandering to uncover the plot, there are puzzles. The main character might be able to escape with one love interest, but the ending will vary depending on the love meter.

I like this structure, seems perfect for low key slice of life stuff with low drama...

The sun rises, you wander the mansion.

In the conservatory you meet Emma again, but this time she's strangely reticent. A brief chat (with you making the right choices) reveals that her kitten is stuck in the tree. Solve a puzzle to recover her pet - better/faster = more receptiveness in her. Wrap it up with a chat (to revel in her Moétry and through choices multiply receptiveness with the relationship of your choosing (friendship, love, etc).

In the afternoon you wander the mansion again, this time you explore the library and meet Sasha... Rinse and repeat.

[rocket]

A little near-future sci-fi setting for you...

<snip>

Now, take an Elf woman whose husband has been murdered by some sort of conspiracy and fled for her life, seeking shelter in a Dwarf enclave and needing their help to hide her and solve the mystery. She and her new partner both find each other amazingly unattractive (she thinks he looks like a fat hairy brute, he thinks she looks like a child) but slowly learn to see past outward appearances and find romance while thwarting the bad guys...

She's a spoiled tsundre loli looking for the man who killed her lover. He's a down on his luck factory worker with a grudge against the aristocracy. They fight crime!

Love it!

[Tsundere Lightning]

Who here has heard of the tabletop RPG Bliss Stage by Ben Lehman?

In short, all but the adult population of the world has fallen prey to a mysterious sleeping sickness, the Bliss, leaving the children and teenagers of the world in the crumbling ruins of the abandoned cities, desperately trying to survive the attacks of the aliens responsible for the Bliss.

7 years later, the child survivors, led by an insomniac adult Authority Figure, managed to take out an alien mecha and reverse engineer it into a weapon capable of defeating the aliens.

Called an Alien Numina Inversion Machine or ANIMa, it sends it's teenaged 'pilot' into a controlled dreamscape, where they can attack the aliens using thier relationships as weapons - an intimate relationship manifests as a component of a suit of powered armor, with the pilots' love for thier navigator or 'Anchor' forming the chassis.

Oh, and just imagine the implications of a suit of armor made out of your love for your first girlfriend sustaining battle damage.

It's a real tabletop RPG (obtainable at http://swingpad.com/dustyboots/wordpress/?p=214) - albeit a WEIRD one, with stats like Intimacy, Trust and Trauma.

...this needs to be made into a ren-ai game. BADLY.

[risingbamboobanana]

you know all those cross-dressing romantic comedies, with female protagonists transferring to an all-boys' boarding school?

now reverse the situation - but not in the way you're thinking.

what if the protagonist is an actual male transfer student? and it's his roommate that's doing all the crossdessing? it'd be an interesting twist, i think.

and to make things even funkier, the whole level of the res building he's in could be filled with other girls with similar situations! most, if not all of them would be unaware of the other's identities.

it'd be fun to read about how the main character juggles homework, covering for his roommate, and making friends while sloshing through a tangly web of secrets, messed up crushes and, uh, sexual tension?

it might be a blast to make, but it's way too crazy a project for me to pull off or even lead. if anyone wants to do something like this though, i'd love to help