So I've been writing my story off and on for almost 2 years now, pondering day and night on how I could write a happy or bittersweet ending for a multiple story route plot, since I want to emphasize the importance of the player's role in the overall story, such as how their absence from the other story routes affect the current story path they're on because they aren't there to trigger certain events or prevent these other things from happening. While I was in the shower the other day, I was suddenly hit with this epiphany.
The idea I came up with is allowing the player to choose between four different people, each with their own point of view on their respective story path. The player will start the game off with the lead protagonist, and after completing the prologue they will be able to play the other three characters. Though the player can finish the game with any character without playing the others, the twist here is that in order for the player to get the best ending, they must switch between each of the four characters throughout the story in order to solve the whole mystery of the game's overall plot.
Here's a rough example of what I had in mind: Character A comes across a situation in which he needs a certain item to save an important NPC. That item can only be gotten from Character B/C or D because he doesn't know where to get it, or he couldn't get it since he had to be at a different place at the time the item became available. If you haven't played Character B/C or D far enough to get that item and pass it along to Character A, Character A will not be able to save the NPC. Because Character A couldn't save that important NPC, he won't be able to get the information he'll need to make a certain decision later. This will cause certain events to happen or not to happen, as well as affecting the available choices during affected plot points for all the characters later. This in turn will also prevent other important items or information from becoming available. In some cases this might even lead to a dead end for one of the characters, resulting in them no longer being able to progress their story unless the player goes back and replay an earlier part of another character in order to change the outcome for the unprogressable character.
Another rough example is who interacts with what during certain story events. Like say, a sick child needs to take a specific medicine in order to improve her condition. Character A has not met with the town's doctor yet, so he needs to go find out who that doctor is in order to get it. Character B knows who the doctor is, but has no knowledge of the sick child since she is busy somewhere else. Character C is currently talking to the doctor, but this is before he knows that the sick child needs the medicine. Character D knows about the sick child's needs, and also the current location of where the doctor is based on the doctor's schedule. If Character A decides to look for the doctor, chances are he'll end up taking too long and the child will end up getting sicker. If Character B is chosen to obtain the medicine, she won't be able to get it till well after the sick child has gone into a critical state. If Character C is chosen to get the medicine, he won't know that he'll need it until after he finds out about the sick child, and by that time he will have to go search for the doctor since the doctor would have gone somewhere else. If Character D goes and get the medicine, he will be able to give it to the sick child right away. Depending on who gets the medicine, certain things will happen later, or certain events become unavailable because of the sick child's absence.
Now I realize this can be pretty frustrating for some players, but I like the idea of showing them the consequences of their actions since the game is a psychological horror, and the whole thing is intended to make the player feel guilty for screwing the characters over. I am currently trying to figure out a system that will give players just enough hints on when they need to change characters, where they messed up, or what they need to fix without making it too obvious. One idea I thought of is highlighting key points as a way to indirectly let the player know that they may want to switch to someone else if they want to change the outcome of the upcoming event. The dead ends are very few (at the moment where I am with writing the story, I currently have 1 for each character and may go as high as 2 if the story dictates it) and won't occur too far away from the decision that caused it of course. Also, the player still has the option to intentionally mess things up even after making the correct choices if they so choose. Like in the case with the second example, they can choose not to give the sick child the medicine after obtaining it.
I'm still debating on whether or not to include multiple difficulty settings. If I do decide to go with multiple difficulty settings, the easiest setting will highlight story branching points and color code decisions that lead to each of the character's bad and normal endings. Normal will only highlight story branching points, and Hard mode won't do any of them. However, the best ending will only be obtainable on Normal and Hard, and completing Hard will net you a reward. Hard mode will have different choices that lead to the same conclusion as the best ending so that players who completed Normal can't just make the same exact decisions on Hard.
Have these ideas been done in another VN before (if so, it'd be great if you guys can give me the names so I can check them out and take notes)? What are your thoughts?
