Kings of the Sea

[Sascha]

Hello everyone,

I am new here and have this Idea in mind, I do not have much experience in game making so I hope someone will pick this idea up and make something useful out of it.

I've played WoW for quite a long time and really liked it, I am also a fan of One Piece and Dragonball (specifically the ABS of Buu's Fury and a fan project which I've found on youtube under the search term 'dbz rpg east').

Since I don't have neither the skills nor the time to make this Game, I really hope someone will, so that I can atleast play it.

About the Game:
Starting with an offline version first, to introduce the World and build up the Story (should be a 'little MMORPG').
Name would be 'Kings of the Sea' ('Online' for the other version), 2D (3D if money is not an issue ).
Topic: Pirates + gemstones (Devil fruits, most important part, will be explained later)
Battle system: A fun and engaging ABS (very important part)
The factions (Marine and Pirates) will build up during the offline version of the Game (no united Pirate faction yet), similar to Warcraft (probably no strategy game), that means you will play through 6 campaigns to introduce the 6 basic classes:

- Priest = Healer [Cloth, Mana]; Holy dmg range with cast time [Cloth, Mana] (those are the specs)

- Monk = Healer [Cloth, Energy and Chi]; Melee fighter with Chi attacks (think shaolin monk or Martial artist, comparable to Dragon ball fighters) and fist weapons, could be a supporter class [Cloth, Energy and Chi].

- Buccaneer = Rogue with two daggers and stealth [Leather, Energy]; Bandit/Robber Range DD with two Pistols [Leather, Energy].

- Range Specialist (for lack of a better name) = Marksman with Crossbow/Longbow [Leather, Focus]; Lance thrower with shield and lances, tank [heavy armour, Focus/Rage].

- Engineer/Tinker = Supporter with Gadgets [Leather, Mana]; Mortar/Bomb thrower/Mines thrower heavy caster [heavy armour, focus/stock/oil/mana].

- Warrior/Weapons expert/ Melee specialist/ Gladiator = dual wielder [heavy armour, Rage]; Tank with shield and weapon [heavy armour, Rage].

and the 5 races (Humans are both Pirates and Marine):

- Humans (Marine) = The Humans live in old Roman (or Greek) style cities, the capital has a huge Colosseum in it. The Humans have the biggest Marine force and the best warriors of all the races, however, they are not united and make up by far the biggest parts of pirates (not organized yet) from all the races.
According to the great field commander Pompeius Magnus (placeholder name) are a 'plague to the world' (funny fact, which i just found out: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pompey#Campaign_against_the_pirates).

- Animal/Cat people (Marine) = This race inhabits the deserts (especially the oases) and has phenomenal buildings such as the great pyramids and obelisks.
They have an extensive priesthood and there is no other race which understands to wield the light as good as them.

- Gnomes (Marine) = Since the gnomes are physically weaker than all the other races, they had to rely more on their brainpower instead of muscle power (not able to be warrior) to build up their kingdom in the mountains, so they created some wonderful engineering inventions. The Gnomes are the best tinkers and teach the other races how to be engineers on their universities.

- Turtles or frog people = hidden continent, will be revealed during the offline game, they will join the Pirates at the end. They are the Race who will bring the Monk class to all the other races.

- Undeads/Skeletons = they don't exist at the beginning, their creation has something to do with those Gemstones everyone is talking about. Will not be able to wield the holy light.

Story for the offline version follows tomorrow, tell me what you think about that concept so far.

Regards, Sascha.

 

[Siolfor the Jackal]

To be honest, I don't think you're going to have much luck with some stranger seeing this post and making this game. Generally, anybody with the potential to build a game like this probably already has their own ideas and projects they would rather work on.
If you really are passionate about this idea/setting, then I believe you have two main options:
1. Knuckle down and start making small games until you have the skills to build something of this scale.
2. Pay people to properly flesh out this idea and make this game for you.

 

[Sascha]

this post can be deleted.

 

[Sascha]

@Siolfor the Jackal
Thanks for your reply,
I am thinking of paying people if nobody realised this idea, in the meantime, I am writing out my idea and hope for some feedback on how to improve it.

One important part which I forgot in my post:
Gemstones (like the Devil fruit's in One Piece, the central part of the game) = I had in mind of making the level experience small (as if you level to 30 or max. 40 in vanilla WoW), to be able to play it on console AND to integrate the 'Gemstone' Idea properly, I would not give a class 50 spells or so, I would limit the amount of techniques (up for discussion, maybe just release it on PC?).
Here comes the IMPORTANT part:
Those Gemstones are unique and get absorbed by your body as soon as you touch them.
Let's take for example the Fire stone and Ice stone, one gives your attack spells a passive DoT effect, the other gives you a passive chance to slow your opponent with your attacks, on top of that, you get unique spells for your class (sometimes you only get a passive or active effect/spell), some Gemstones are more powerful than others.
Now, some questions occur on how that would work out in an online environment, here are some conclusions:
- How do you prevent a player from obtaining the Gemstone and just stay logged out?
If he does not play a certain amount of time during, let's say one week or one month, the skills will be removed.

- How do you make it possible so that everyone has a chance to obtain those Gemstones?
First of all, I would limit the amount of players on one realm (let's say 500 players) and when a player who has obtained the Gemstone skills gets killed by another player, he loses his abilities.

- How to prevent dead realms?
If a player is inactive for longer (let's say 6 months), he gets detached from the server (is that technically possible?) and the spot on the realm is free again for other players (he can choose another realm with his chars of course).

Those are the three most important questions to grasp the concept I have in mind, tell me what you think about it and if this would work out.
Ask further questions if something is unclear.

 

[Danei]

This seems like the sort of thing that would require dedicated programming, design, and art teams, and long-term balancing efforts. It's not inherently bad to dream up big ideas, but make sure you follow it up with specifics about the systems. You say that the battle system is "a fun and engaging ABS". Well that sounds great, but it's also a big design challenge, and it could take many shapes depending on your decisions. And those decisions will impact other areas of the game. Many of these things are easier said than done.

As for the subject matter, well, to me it seems a bit... derivative. That's not too unusual in video games, but it is a negative in my opinion. Just make sure you have the engaging mechanics and hopefully engaging lore to back it up.

That said, the overall idea of a competitive piracy MMO is a pretty cool one and hasn't yet been fully explored to my knowledge.

 

[Sascha]

@Danei
Thanks for your reply,
I am well aware that it is a bit derivative, but that is even the case with the most successful games like WoW (it's not unusual, probably not completely avoidable after all).
I've found a way to make the offline game mostly myself, and depending how successful it is, I will find a team to make an online version.
One question arises, is a budget of 50k to 100k Euro enough for a 2D online project?

 

[dannyjenn]

That said, the overall idea of a competitive piracy MMO is a pretty cool one and hasn't yet been fully explored to my knowledge.

If we count non-indie games, Disney made a pirate-themed 3D WoW clone called Pirates of the Caribbean Online a while back. It was a lot of fun. But it didn't have any sort of single-player mode, and then they took it offline, so it's no longer around.