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General Forum [Kreatures] Opinions on game direction    Geat_Masta      8/2/2017 So, one of the things I wanted to make possible in kreatures is to have the creatures learn by watching other creatures. Now, this lead to the idea of a protagonist of a sort of human girl that's in the world, but can take shortcuts that the creatures can't to get around faster, because then they can learn by watching you, and that would open up new ways of interacting with them, and providing me with a narrator, because during the tutorial, after a creatures hatches, and it indicates you should bring up the screen that shows chromosomal crossover and point mutations, I can have the narrator say "well i don't get it" to indicate that it isn't a puzzle or something you're supposed to understand now, I'm just letting you know it exists. Another idea i had was to have two contradictory back stories that are revealed through object descriptions, the background art, and a bit of dialog cues. Now they contradict because i don't want the real story to ever fully come together in the player's mind, this keeps them thinking about it and so makes it more likely that they'll talk about it, meaning more people will find out it exists and try it out. Hence i got the idea of having the first story, one that matches the theme of scientific materialism but has little evidence, be similar to the shee story. And the second story, one that has lots of evidence, but very little significance to the themes of the game: the protagonist is dead, and this world is her personal purgatory. Whats everyones opinion on this? Does it detract in any way to try to get people's interest by getting them to talk about the mystery of the game, rather than focusing soley on the A-life?   Malkin Manager     8/2/2017  1 The trouble with putting in a human is that we'd have more expectations regarding her intelligence. How would you manage that? My TCR Norns   Geat_Masta   8/2/2017 The human is the player character instead of the hand.   Patient Pirate ylukyun Manager   8/3/2017 I think it could work. The original games (particularly the first two) were marketed as virtual pets and it didn't detract from the A-life aspect. The promotional materials still emphasized that Norns were "real life on your PC" somewhere, even if it was just a tagline - maybe try a similar approach?   Intyalle     8/3/2017 You don't have to make Creatures. You can, should, make something wholly your own. No, not only do I not think it detracts, it sounds absolutely captivating. By all means. If you can get the learn-by-watching thing down without limiting things too severely... man, that would be amazing. And would definitely call for a proper protagonist, yes, not just a disembodied hand. Altogether, I think the idea sounds amazing. Also known as bab_5_freak from the old Gameware forums.   Lurhstaap     8/3/2017  1 I think I mentioned this, but my own problem with your two stories idea is that many people will react badly to the lack of resolution. Some people (like me! Lol) adore that kind of thing, but many people will be frustrated. They want to collect the puzzle pieces and finish the puzzle. If you go that route, try to make it clear in associated materials that there isn't a correct answer to be found so the completionists don't have a heart attack. Conclude with killer catchphrase. (Lurhstaap) "This is not knowledge - this is information!" New Model Army, "Courage"   Intyalle     8/4/2017 Eh... I think people are more forgiving of the ambiguity when one of the explanations is that someone is mad or dead. After all... a little uncertainty and ambiguity is rather the point. And if the main character *is* imagining it all, then it follows readily (or can do so) that she herself has thought up the other story (conciously or otherwise), to give the world some internal consistency. So the other could be considered to be "true" in either case, and presented as such. Also known as bab_5_freak from the old Gameware forums.   Wingheart   8/5/2017 Don't do the two stories thing. It'd be like if you were selling things that included a jigsaw puzzle, and people got it out of the box and universally found that the puzzle couldn't be assembled because it was actually two incomplete separate puzzles, and if they rang to complain your only answer would be along the lines of "you thought it was a complete puzzle? why would I sell you a solvable puzzle when I can sell you one you'll talk about?"   Peppery One Papriko   8/5/2017 This whole "contradicting story" and "completionists going crazy" thing reminds me of the headache that MatPat got from FNAF. Or that whole Gast [REDACTED] thing from Undertale. In other words, someone most likely will find a way to make it work somehow, even when it gets convoluted at times. Lets play plants! Photosynthesis... Photosynthesis... Photosynthesis...   Geat_Masta   8/5/2017 @Wingheart Except the game never presents the story as something to be solved, it's just part of the flavor text in item descriptions, etc. If it was a flat out mystery game i would agree with you.   Peppery One Papriko   8/5/2017 Let me bring up the FNAF example again. The story was mostly just flavor texts too, not relevant to the gameplay. The gameplay is "animatronic animals try to murder you in a chuck-e-cheese knockoff". No need for a story here. The primary setup was just you being some random night guard. But people still went crazy over contradicting clues and tried to make something comprehensive out of it. I believe that Scott Cawthon himself eventually admitted that he lost his overview and isn't sure how things fit together anymore. People STILL cobbled together a story that kinda works. Not sure if that is a desirable outcome to you or something to be avoided, but it should be kept in mind anyway. Lets play plants! Photosynthesis... Photosynthesis... Photosynthesis...   Geat_Masta   8/5/2017 It's probably desirable, because if people talk about it, people hear about it, and the biggest challenge in marketing is getting people to know your product exists.   Missmysterics   9/3/2017 I'm curious how this character will control, I'm a bit concerned about how cumbersome walking will be rather than just a simple point-and-click function.

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