So This first post will respond to everyone and I'll double-post(if that's okay) with a more detailed explanation of he idea after.
Why not tie the CoH IP to a social medium of some sort?
I think the social aspect of CoH is so extremely important to it that I think we should design this and any other potential App/Mobile/Casual gaming projects with either a built-in chat client or some manner of Twitter-style function to facilitate player communication. yes, even something like a server status check up or a stand-alone costume creator.
Wave of the future and all that--maybe mention it in a letter to a potential future publisher, like, oh, I don't know, Valve.
This is actually why I think this idea is relevant at this early stage of our efforts, despite seeming like more of a "Plan Z"-stage idea. If we can craft a proper proposal/pitch concept for this idea to latch on to any efforts we or Paragon studios make to keep the IP and game alive, it would "Sweeten the pot" so to speak, for any potential investors, backers, or companies looking to buy us out, Including NCsoft/Nexxon itself. It would give interested parties the security of investing in a known profit-generating product, and the growth potential of a low-cost, high profit future product.
One of the things I'd want help with is converting this idea into a format that sells well to these types of people.
Someone who's good at selling ideas or advertising could definitely help out in crafting a pitch for this idea once it's cemented.
It also might give the CoH IP Family of Games (the CoHIPFoG?) some presence outside the gamersphere. I was telling a nongamer friend the other day about the demise of CoH. First, I should mention that he, like every other nongamer I've mentioned it to, was astonished that a publisher would shut down a game, period, let alone a game that's earning a profit. More importantly for this thread's discussion, when I described the shift from subscription to F2P with the release of Freedom, he pointed out that this sort of resembles the way most games for the iPad and the like are sold: the basic game is free, and then you pay for extras. (I wouldn't know; I'm a Luddite and can't really afford a smartphone or tablet.) But if we (whoever "we" is) could create a cheap/free, extremely casual-friendly game, there may be an untapped market out there of people we could get interested in the CoH IP as a whole.
I think one of the biggest problems CoH faced was a complete lack of advertisement. It might be hard to convince anyone else to support the game
and an ad campaign with the intention strengthening it. But if we can use this project to advertise City of Heroes(and vice versa) it seems like a win win, create a game that can yield direct profits on it's own whilst increasing the visibility of another game, and thus increasing
it's profitability. Similar to the numerous children's cartoons which, bring in profit from ad revenue, but are
also primarily vehicles to advertise toylines. It's a thing to sell that sells something else.
I would gladly get behind such a project to help design the gameplay......................... and can actually lend some programming to the project if my understanding of android games is correct - that is, if they are indeed coded primarily in java. Even if they aren't, I can certainly help with debugging (and realistically that's probably all the coding work I should do, we have much better people around for that).
I hope you can put your skills to use very soon!
==========(which I think would need to be drastically simplified, perhaps based on the CoH TCG that barely printed before being cancelled)==========
I also happen to have a decent sized box of CoH cards collecting dust that might be able to lend some ideas to the game. Mind you, I'm not suggesting we create the android version of the TCG. I'm merely suggesting the card game had a necessarily simple (ish) structure that might be worth examining for creating a mobile/casual game.
One thing I want to do is recreate the
feel of City of Heroes in a different format as a way to ease "crossover" from the purely-casual market and the Hardcore market. City of Heroes is often called "casual friendly" but that's for a certain definition of casual that doesn't necessarily represent the vast majority of "Casual Gamers". It can be a daunting thing for even most hardcore gamers to just jump into. We've all been a noob who needed enhancements explained to us at some point. If we can create a game with all or most of the gameplay and character creation elements of City of Heroes intact in some format, someone can come from one game to the other and pick up things fairly quickly.
This is one of the reasons I wanted to copy over and modify the powers-system and information, a player of the mobile game could create their favorite character in City of Heroes and find it functioning in much the same way they do in the game they are used to, creating a stronger connection(for the player) to the game.
The TCG idea is interesting as it presents an elegant solution to an idea I had to encourage purchase of costume parts.
If we integrated Collectible digital cards as "powers" or enhancements to use in the game, they could be packaged with costume pieces(Like baseball cards and gum) as an incentive to buy the functionally useless costume parts for people who might not otherwise buy them(some people, myself included, will buy the costume parts anyway, but if we can get
everyone to buy them we create something much better.)Both the costume parts and the cards could also be bought individually, of course. This would also set the stage for a new City of Heroes digital TCG down the line.
I really like this idea. In fact if CoH survives in anyways outside of NCSoft. This should be something we implement. In the event 'we' own the IP, and have access to the Databases, I think we could even take this Mobile game app a step further and actually have the characters connected to your MMO characters as well.
For instance if you have an account already, login, select server, and character OR create a new character.
New account, create account, select a server and Create a Character.
All XP and INF earned transfer to character in MMORPG version of game as well.
Costume Designing opportunities. Create your costume on the go, buy new costume pieces etc.
Work on Character back story.
How great would that be to level up your character while waiting for the bus? In between classes? On your lunch break at work, or in the Doctors office waiting room? Or spend that time working on the perfect new costume? Or figuring out your next alt?
I'm not necessarily
against this idea but considering how stripped down the mobile game would be the conversion to the proper game might not be as clean and easy as the one from the MMOG to the mobile game, more on this in my second post. Nt a bad idea, just harder to implement. There's also this:
Maybe even create different mobile apps, one just for costume design, and another for actual game play in a 2d side scrolling way............................. Each app is free or .99 cents, and is chock full of purchasable content.
Love it.
I think this is a very important direction to go in. Multiple Apps means multiple sources of possible revenue. If we, say, Create a mobile version of Mids, a Mobile Costume Creator, and find some way to allow connection to the MMO proper, we have multiple products out accomplishing multiple goals. People who might not want to play the mobile game might still want to create a costume/character/build while out of the game proper, and we gain this consumer base by giving them what they want without forcing them to take something they don't want. People who want the whole package will, of course, take the whole thing.
, or even more retro cool would be to make it a 2d top down view like Super Nintendo RPG games. Recreate our character as 8bit characters.
I think a 2d side-scrolling, beat-em up style(but not necessarily a beat-em up) would Suit the project best for a few reasons.
- Cost: It's cheaper and easier to make different animations for one sprite than it is to make them for a Forwards, backwards, left and right sprite.
- Functionality: This particular style has already been shown to be highly conducive to multi-player cooperative play and PvP. These are defining aspects of this type of set-up and, with Dungeon fighter online, we have a proven example of it in the MMO market.
- Visual Quality: With the lighter sprite costs, more attention can be paid to detail, allowing for cleaner animations in, say, a 16-bit style
- Visual Fidelity: As part of the above, this style would lend itself better to transferring things from the game proper to our hypothetical mobile game. Just enough detail to communicate everything, but still easier and cheap to make.
[21:44:28] Codewalker: And I'm surprised you haven't posted something in the "just a stupid idea" thread, DeP
[21:44:39] Codewalker: Haven't you been wanting to make a 2D game using the coh power mechanics for a while now?
[21:45:55] DeProgrammer: A very long time!
So it goes without saying that I like the idea, though mine was in more of a top-down RTS direction. I like yours more for the community's and the original game's sake.
Glad to have you aboard!
Let me make the idea even stupider. I've got a *3d* FPS on my Android... can't remember what it's called, and the phone is at the other end of the house right now. But the do exist. Would it not be possible to have some sort of scaled down client which talked to regular game servers? Probably have to have some reduced functionality just because of the lack of screen real estate. But if you could make an MMO client that ran on smartphones, could open up a whole new market.
I don't necessarily think it would open a new market so much as give a wonderful service to an existing one. The people most likely to play smartphone games don't necessarily want to play MMOs and the People who want to play MMOs most likely have smart phones already. This would be super-convenient for the existing demographic, but not really profitable.
Even if you can't do a full client, how about clients that only access certain parts of the game? For instance, a client which logs your character on, but only allows you to access the market and your inventory. Or one which allows you to craft only with what's in your inventory or bank. There's a whole "minigame" possible for those who enjoy such things, or for those times when you can't access even a laptop.
Or, for the socially inclined, how about a mobile app that simply accesses the global chat system? That could be kinda fun in its own right. There are a LOT of possibilities out there for tying MMOs in with mobile apps, I don't really think social games need detract from the MMO market at all. MMOs just need to figure out ways to draw in those gamers... the first one's free, man...
These are all great avenues to pursue.
Something I've noticed about mobile games: most of them use preset characters. That could be a great way for us to have different tiers of the app:
1.) A free version. This version would have ads on loading screens and would allow only the use of certain signature characters with predefined powers. Additional signature characters could be purchased in some sort of market.
2.) A paid version. No ads, access to custom characters, and the ability to load costume files from your CoX characters.
The app could also have two modes. The first would be a side scrolling PvE adventure that could possibly earn rewards for your CoX account. The second would be a PvP battle against friends or random opponents.
I think a game of this sort is an incredibly good idea. It might even have the side benefit of widening the audience of the MMO itself to people that are casual gamers. CoX is a fairly casual environment, and might appeal to them even though MMOs in general do
I had been considering a more complex Hybrid F2P model for MMOs in general as just a mental exercise, so this is definitely worth exploring. I don't want to
completely remove character creation from the capabilities of free players simply because it's such an intrinsic and definitive part of the City of Heroes experience.
Limiting it, though, isn't out of the question. We do that already.
just saying, as a lvl 50+ with 7 full trays. i'm hoping the app wouldn't be a direct port. lol
I don't really have any plans to include incarnate content or powers in this idea at the moment. That's a can of worms I don't think is very constructive to open just yet.
Direct port, no. But if you think about it, how many of those powers do you actually USE on a regular basis? There are a lot of situational powers, then toggles which you if everything goes right hit once and leave running. You'd have to vastly simplify the UI, but there's a LOT of room to simplify. Probably make it so you have one visible power tray, maybe. Yes, it would be a major limitation, might encourage people to try the PC version, yes?
My original idea was to allow six slots for powers per encounter, I just went up to one normal power tray to make people more comfortable with the idea.
