Idea Info Name: Perfect game Index: Primary Category: RPG Submitted: 1/9/2003 7:53:46 PM Written By: Nonexistinghero

The story isn't really important, but it has to involve the characters really deep and the player gets to know them while playing. I have a great story that would fit the game perfectly. There may be some others that also would.

On a request, I’m explaining the story better. According to him, it was written a little vague. I have rewritten almost all other stuff too in better detail.

It begins with a 15 year old boy. He loves to fight, and gets them a lot at school. Despite his short length (1,67 m), he is a great fighter. He's a loner who doesn't have any friends. He knows he was adopted at a young age, but he doesn't remember anything of before that. He also is the only person with natural blue hair. His name: Zidane Nomar. Of course you'll think of him as just another young rpg-hero. No, it isn't just young, it's in the beginning. Unlike most rpg's, here the characters grow, emotionally and physically, while time passes by. They get older. But now further with the story. It's just another schoolday. While he’s going to class he hears he gets another fight, after school. He comes into the class (late again, as always) and then a new main character is introduced. The 14 year old Rinell Levian. She's one of the few girls that actually likes Zidane. After the schoolday, and after Zidane's fight she's gonna talk to him. Zidane wins the fight easily. Everyone who watched it is surprised, because he’s a lot stronger then the last time, which was only 2 weeks ago. Zidane goes home, and there something strange happens. His bike suddenly falls apart, before he could even touch it. He turns around and there’s a weird looking man behind him. He gets pushed to the ground, and the weird looking man pushes a sword against his neck. Then he says he’s going to kill him. Rinell, who was about the have a conversation with him, sees that and she pushes the weird guy to the ground. They both don’t notice the changing in the area they’re in. (They are shifting worlds, without knowing. Then Zidane’s sees his chance. He grabs the sword of the man, and then chops his head off.) Rinell falls unconscious to the ground, before Zidane can thank her. He thinks she fainted. He walks up to the dead man, who wasn’t really a man. It appeared to be a very advanced robot. Zidane looks around. Nobody there, besides a another few of those robots. He wonders where everyone else went. He looks at Rinell. Because she saved him, he can’t leave her there. He has pride, which won’t break, whatever happens. He puts her on his back, and sneaks through the robots. After a short while, he gets tired of carrying Rinell on his back. He takes a break at a big tree. Rinell wakes up, shortly after she has been put down. They talk a bit. It isn’t long before a some robots discover them, and attack them. Zidane gets beaten unconscious and they both are taken prisoner.

This is about the beginning of the story. It should take about 15 – 30 minutes to get past this. The story is way too long too put it here. There are many important things that happen. Their journey comes to an end after about 4 years of travelling. There is one main bad guy, named Zack Hell. Well, his last name is Hell. And that also would explain the title: “The 4 V.S. Hell – The legend of the Non-existing Heroes.” Two of the 4 Non-existing Heroes are Zidane, and Rinell. 

The story is divided into 4 huge parts. The first part, is a few months long. Until they meet Hell. In the second part is the longest. Zidane and Rinell are split up. So this part is divided into two parts. Zidane meets the new, heroine in his part. In two years, Hell made 4 new persons. Clones of the Non-existing Heroes. There are 4 in total. He had to go trough a lot of trouble to clone them. All the clones seem to look and act a bit like the originals. But they also have there own personality. They are divided in 2 groups, because they don’t really like each other. For the first year, Rinell’s part is about a bad guy gone good. He lost his memory and takes Rinell with him, because he promised her parents. He also takes her with him in search for answers. Rinell will be unconscious for the first year of the second part. After that they meet up with a few new friends, while they are searching for Zidane & co. At the end of the second part they meet up again, after 3 years, that is. The third part is about obtaining total control of their special abilities. This takes about half year. The last part gives answers to unanswered questions. And the final showdown with their clones, and Hell takes place. This part is about 2 or 3 months. That makes a total of almost 4 years. Surprisingly, the ending would be something not to be expected.

Now, about the world system. There are 4 worlds. One of them, is our world. It’s called the 2^nd World. There is almost no magic possible in this world, so they rely on technology. There also is a magic world. Technology isn’t as far as in this world, but they combine it with magic to get some really impressive results. That’s the 3^rd World. Then there’s the 1^st World. It’s sort of a prototype of the 2^nd and 3^rd world combined. It has several parts of those worlds, and the civilization is minimal. Magic and technology, however, seem to be a bit farther than that of the 2^nd and 3^rd world. And last, but not least, there’s the 4^th world. A small and mysterious world. Later up, another world shows up. No secret world though, it wasn’t there before. And there is a difference between dimensions and worlds. A dimension is another possibility of how one of those worlds could be. Let’s say that they are clones of the originals. They have the same restrictions as those other worlds have. There won’t be any dimension travelling so it’s pretty pointless to go deeper into the subject.

The battle system would be kinda complicated. The battles are ATB (active time battle, those who played FF7 should know what this is). The standard attack command, will be replaced by a combo command, to make the battles look more realistic, and harder. (Nobody would walk up to an opponent, slash, and then go back, would they?) And you can then choose from different combos. The more times you use the combo’s, the stronger they get. And they will also improve by giving more hits. But just choosing the combo isn’t all of your worries. You’ll have to press the right buttons that fly on screen (like Gitarooman, for instance) to perform the chosen combo. The more precise you press, the more damage the enemy will take. If you press wrong it would just be a weak hit. The battles would have up to 4 characters in you party. There’s also a standard magic command. Just like combo’s, magic evolves more powerful, the more you use it. Two new command would be combo + magic, and combo magic. Combo + magic can be used to combine your standard combo’s, and spells. And combo magic can be used to perform multiple spells in a row. The standard mp system will be replaced by just a waiting time. How long you have to wait before the spell is performed, depends on you status and level. There’s also the usual item command. And last but not least. There are the Team attacks. They can be performed when multiple characters can be commanded. Something like Chrono Trigger. But there also are techniques for 4 characters at once. Combo’s, Magic and all that other stuff can be gained during events, during battle, and after battle. You can get most abilities by using certain ones a set amount of times. But some can only be acquired during events, or when you reach a certain level. Besides the 4 characters that can be used in battle, there will also be some support characters. They are characters that cannot fight. Some will heal your health sometimes, but others will do nothing. For example, Rinell can't do anything in battle, apart from taking hits, for the first part of the story. It's in the 2nd part that she learns how to fight. Most of the time there will be 1 or 2 of these support characters that travel with you.

You will be able to equip a few things. Not too much. It follows the story. You can equip only weapons on most characters. And robe/cape wearing characters can also equip those. Now, about the healing items and spells. Those can only heal your characters for about ¾ of their maximum health. To completely heal your characters, you must rest at a savepoint, inn, or hotel. This keeps the challenge a bit in the game. The rest of the items would be rpg standard.

This was about the basics of the game. Now about gameplay, where your character status doesn’t matter. I’ve seen a lot of those new rpg’s, without any challenging puzzles. I understand it can be harder too make hard 3D puzzles, but it is possible. Especially when combined with platform game elements. Movement of the character should be smooth, and play just like a great action or platformgame. There should be at least a jump button. And a slash button, to break objects. And you can also use (key)items to solve puzzles. There are no random encounters in dungeons. When you see an enemy, walk up to it (or let it walk to you) and then you get a fight. Enemies can also be used to solve puzzles. There are tools that stun, or do something else to an enemy. There should be different effects between enemies. This is only so with monster encounters, or animals. Humans are smarter, and when your seen by them, there will be a fight. That’s where a new element comes in. Sneaking. Yes, you can hide ala Metal Gear Solid. Still, it requires a lot of skill in some situations to avoid battles. Because after you sneaked behind them, you’ll have to slash them. If they see you, you can always runaway and try to hide behind a corner or something, but they will most likely find you.

Well, since it’s has to be a really, really, really good game the graphics have to be top notch. If the characters look too realistic, it won’t fit with the style of the game. So, just a bit deformed. A bit anime-alike, but also enough differences to make it a unique style. If seen, the first thing that comes up in your head shouldn’t be: “You know, this looks like anime.” What is should be is this: “WOW, this IS COOL!” And that’s how the whole game should look like. Every environment should be incredibly detailed, and like it can be destroyed any minute. Because sometime in the story, the people who live in the different worlds, discover about the others. And it totally devastates our world with chaos. And another is falling because of war. So there is a LOT to be destroyed. You could figure out by yourself now, how should look.

The gore level is extreme, and it would most likely be an (M) rated game. The gore is part of the story. Somewhere in the story our world doesn’t believe Zidane and his friends are doing things that are better for the world. So they get an army after them. Somewhere, Zidane kills more that a thousand men. He doesn’t want to kill them. But if he doesn’t, they kill him. It wouldn’t feel right if there is no blood while he slays them. So if he chops a head of, the head goes off. It should be pretty detailed, even better then Soldier of Fortune 2. Besides a lot of gore, there also are a lot of graphical jokes in the game, that make it look a bit cartoony. For instance, at some point in the beginning. There’s a beautiful young princess is introduced. Her name is Lucia Alexis and she has, apart from the four heroes, the biggest role in the game. Zidane is going to be trained to be a magical knight, because he needs to have some money. There are a lot of other people standing there, because they want to see the princess. When she’s in sight, Rinell looks at Zidane. He has… a drooling dog face. She shakes her head and his face is normal again. She looks for a few seconds at the princess again, and then to the crowd. All the guys in the crowd seem to have drooling dog faces, then she looks at Zidane again. And again, he has a drooling dog face. Then she shakes here head again and everything is normal again. That’s one, of many of the graphical jokes.

Voices are to be spoken. There may be a possibility to name the character the way you want, with a certain, complicated program. It is possible, but it takes a lot of work. So there’s a big chance you can’t rename your characters. The voices, should be done by great people with the right voice for it. And it should be of high quality. I didn’t like those of Final Fantasy X because it sounded like they just read it from a peace of paper. No feeling at all. I also should mention that most of the voice-actors, must be good at singing. They don’t have to have a really good voice. Just a fitting voice. But the princess is an exception. The one who does her voice, must be good at singing, and have a great voice. Since she will be singing most of the songs, which are sung, by the main characters.

And what is a rpg, without mini-games in it? You won’t miss them here, in fact, there are a lot of mini-games. Sneaking areas could be considered as a mini-game. There also is a fighting mode, for up to two players. Not too complicated. Xenogears had done a good job with that. It has a battle arena to fight against eachother, and it’s just as fun to play as a normal fighting game. There’s also some first person view things in it. Some moves and spells have to be practiced. There also is a sort of racing mini-game. It’s more like running from something (You know, huge animals, lava, avalanche, water and a lot more). And you can drive a car at certain points in the game. And also do some mini-games at a fair or something. In short, a lot.  

The difficulty also is an important factor. With most rpg’s I had a feeling that it was way too easy. So, an easy mode for the beginners. A normal mode for the more experienced rpg players. A hard mode for those who finished the game, and know everything about the spells, enemies, and the different effects of them. Bosses have more hp, more attacks, and stronger attacks. And lastly an insane difficulty. Bosses are a lot stronger than on hard, have even more hp, and a few other attacks. The biggest problem is that you cannot go higher than a certain level per boss. This requires a lot of thinking before a battle, and a lot of luck to go trough. Boss battles should be kind of long, or else it will be still too easy. Let’s say 10 to 30 minutes for most boss battles. Last one will be 45 till 60, on the harder difficulties, even if you’re high on level. This will give the game a higher replay value, then it already has. Since this is a 80+ hours game for those who finish it for the first time. And every time after that, it’s always more than 50 hours. And speaking about the length… Since the bad guys do a lot more, than you learn about in the normal game, there also is some sort of darkside adventure. That should take about 50+ hours for the first time to finish. And 30+ for the times after. And maybe even a second extra adventure, since there is an unanswered question in the ending.

Also, a new thing would be a characters development status. It shows how cool, or dumb, or bad you’ve been acting. It always changes. The best thing of cool is: Non-existing Hero/Heroin. The best thing of dumb: Master idiot. And the best thing of bad: Bad boy/girl. The player decides which character will be what. I think there are a lot of players who would like to see their hero be called an idiot.

And lastly, about some little gameplay details. In most games, I’ve noticed that one cannot bump into someone. Well you can, but they won’t fall down. Here they will, or they will hit you back. If you bump into people a lot by accident, you’ll become an idiot. If you run straight into them, you’ll become bad. And if you neatly dodge them. You’ll become a hero/heroïn. That’s just a little part of the ranking. It won’t help anymore if you do something to often. And in many games I’ve seen that the characters can walk half naked through the snow. Or thick-clothed through warm areas. That isn’t right, so they need some different outfits for the different events and areas in the game. And always at least one person in your team should carry a bag on his/her back. Then you won’t have to wonder where they carry all those items.

Well, this seems it. Questions would be welcome. I've thought about it in every detail. Ask and I'll try to answer.