Couple of days ago, I came up with a game idea which was pretty simple:
The game board starts empty (or perhaps with a few initial tiles placed). The tiles are basically road-parts and possibly parts of buildings on them. Each side of the tile can contain either a road to the middle of the tile, or a part of a building. I wrote a tile generator in Python (advertisement ), and here is some tiles it generates to show you what I mean:
---------- Run ----------
X * X * XXXXX * X * X
X * X * XXXXX * X * X
XX X * XX X XX * * X * X
XX X * XX X XX * * X * X
XX XXXXX * XX X XX * XXXXXXXXX * XXXXXXXXX * XXXXXXXXX
XX X * XX X XX * X * * X
XX X * XX X XX * X * * X
X * X * X * XXXXX * X
X * X * X * XXXXX * X
Normal Termination
Output completed (0 sec consumed).
I hope that looks alright. The "*" are just separators and not part of the tiles.
The first part has a road that consists of three parts and a building, the second one just has one straight road and a building, and so on.
When placing a tile, you have to follow these rules:
-Must place side-to-side with an already placed tile.
-Roads and buildings must "match". (You could place the third tile to the left of or above the first one, but not to the right or below)
The object of the game was that you would start in one corner, and you''d have a car there, and you were supposed to get to the opposite corner before anyone else did. Each turn you could move and then do one of these:
-Insert a new tile somewhere
-Exchange position of two tiles (neither can have a car on top of it, and both have to match at their new positions)
-Do nothing
But, I''m not sure that this becomes very interesting (I''m afraid that it will be a very basic strategy that will be the way to play).
Yesterday I thought "maybe the players should start with playing the pieces, and only when a player has a completed path to the goal was he allowed to start driving (at which point the above rules came into play)", which I think is a better idea but I''m not convinced it''s really that complex either.
I''ve been toying with the ideas of special cards (nitros, opponent car breakdown etc) and secondary objectives (if you go to that tile first, you get an additional turn/more time) but I''m not sure that they''d fit in and/or add anything to the game.
I also considered a point system where you''d get more points for driving far (because you are a taxi driver) but I dunno.....
Any ideas would be cool
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"Kaka e gott" - Me
Current project: An RPG with tactical, real-time combat with a realistic damage system, and randomly generated world and dialogue.
Maybe it will become more interesting by having more than one kind of car (taxis, trucks, pizza delivers, trains, boats...), more than one kind of "road" (road, rails, rivers...), adding semaphores, children crossing the street, bridges...
Okay, I think I get what you''re trying to do. It''s like Chinese Checkers, where each team starts on a certain side of the board and has to find his way to the opposite side.
Start with a square board(let''s say 16X16 tiles). Each of four players is on a side. They are allowed certain road types:
Straight Road(unlimited) Left and Right Turns(5 max, or, allow only turning one direction) Ramp(2 max)
Now, each player starts building a road. When his road is blocked off, there is one of two things he can do: he can build over the other player''s road, making a T-Junction. He can then run on his opponent''s road, ram him from behind, and make him start over. At this point, the opponent''s road is destroyed-- up to the point where the T-junction was made. The opponent is NOT allowed extra pieces when this happens. To make this work, you''d have to make it automatic: a player shouldn''t just be able to turn into the opposite player''s road and ride to victory.
Another option is to make a ramp over the player''s road(allowing that the obstruction is only one tile wide). Effectively, the player can continue building on the other side of the road.
Some things to mix up the game:
Account for acceleration. Building one tile at a time and advancing is fine, but creating a longstrip of road and zooming down it should somehow be a benefit and a risk at the same time.
Landmines! No racing game is worth its salt without landmines. Perhaps have these be hidden throughout the landscape. In addition, preexisting obstructions like houses or pits can force a player to move his road around a bit.
Well, I hope I inspired you to make a more challenging puzzle. It''s likely you won''t use any of my ideas, and it''s even more likely that I didn''t have the slightest clue what your intention was, but hey! Talk is cheap!
B. Bradley: The number 2 mind
www.numbermind.com(coming soon)
____________Numbermind StudiosCurrently in hibernation.
Road tiles are selected and laid out by each player according to logical rules (or tiles are laid out in a pre-determined arrangement etc.). There is a jail/police station tile, a "greyhound" bus station tile, a gun shop tile, and a hospital tile (amongst others). Some tiles have payphone icons.
All players start within 2 tiles of the police station (fugitives that broke from prison perhaps, or just released?).
Missions consist of taking this to here, pick that up here and take it there, kill whoever, etc. A mission might raise/lower wanted levels until the mission is completed. Different missions have different monetary rewards.
Each player has one turn per round, on action per turn. See Turn Order below for details.
Certain actions have a chance of making a player "wanted" (shooting at other players, carjacking, etc.). When a player becomes wanted, a police car is placed on the board at the police station. This car may be moved several tiles at a time by any other player that isn't wanted. If all players are wanted, each player moves the car furthest from them.
When a police car is on the same tile as a wanted player:
1. If that player is on foot, the police use their pistols to take a shot.
2. If the player is in a car, the police attempt to run it off the road.
When a player gets $50,000 (either from missions, robbing each other, maybe mugging...?), they have to make it to the bus station and leave on bus (which leaves every 5 turns or so) to win.
Turn Order:
Move one space as allowed to by the streets, or more spaces if you have a vehicle.
Attempt to hijack car (different tiles could affect success rates, or type of car, likelyhood of police response).
Mug a pedestrian (get a random amount of cash). You can mug another player, if you are in the same square as they are; if you succeed, you get all that player's cash/weapons. Guns or other weapons increase your chance of success.
Buy a weapon at the gun shop (pistol, shotgun, etc.).
Draw a mission card; this may only be done on a tile with a payphone.
Pick up object on tile (weapon, mission item, misc other gameplay objects), or buy something from a store.
Attack another player or mission objective (with statistics for random police response, success, etc.). These attacks would be weapon/non-weapon vs. police, other players, or trying to run another car off the road (if a car is run off the road, it may not be moved for one turn; if a player stays in a car immobilized by police, the get "busted").
Manipulate a police asset to move it towards another player (so long as you are not yourself wanted by the police; if all players are wanted by police, EACH player moves the police car furthest from them at end of turn).
In terms of random chances of success etc., use a 1D6 on a table or whatever.
[edited by - SteevR on December 12, 2003 8:49:26 AM]
Hehe. I wrote it down using my standard "quick game design document layout", changed a few rules here and there, but I think it may actually be pretty fun!
), and here is some tiles it generates to show you what I mean:
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"Kaka e gott" - Me
Current project: An RPG with tactical, real-time combat with a realistic damage system, and randomly generated world and dialogue.
