I'm partway through my first OGL/Animated/lots of other tech-stuff project and am getting a little concerned about my game concept, i.e. that it won't be fun at all. Most of the code I've created so far is technical stuff not related to the rules of the game so I'm relatively free to change it to whatever. The concept is that you are a guy with some sort of magnetic power that can be controlled at will with either a north or south polarity. Each level consists mostly of enemies of various sorts who generally will be faster than you, magnetic pillars that you can push or pull yourself to (using the opposite or same polarity as the pillar) and a similarly charged spiked ball that you can push away or pull towards you. The pillars will be used to escape from enemies and the spiked ball can be pushed or pulled into your attackers to destroy them. Extras such as destroyable blocks, power-ups, static things to be switched on and off by magnetism, etc. could be included. The game so far - yes, that is Butz of FF5 fame. :) As I said there's not much work done rule/art-wise. Is the idea terrible and not worthy of pursuing? If yea, then what top-down arcade-style idea do you think should replace it? If the idea doesn't suck, in what ways can it be improved or refined?

Quick opinion: I think the idea is actually kind of cool, and I think it would be a fun game. As for the the view, I would either do a completley top-down or an angled top-down (as shown in your provided screenshot). </opinion>

[Edited by - Omega147 on March 25, 2006 11:12:26 AM]

Agreed. Changing the polarity of a magnet seems like a great play mechanic to start with - but I would suggest trying to get a bit further before thinking too hard about it. You've got a good idea, and some working base code, so take it to the next step and make a gameplay demo. Hopefully then you'll be able to tell whether or not you can make your idea work. The more games you make, the more you realize that just about anything can make a fun play mechanic -- most of the time its in the execution and details.

I love the idea too, im the kind of person who loves to take simple things (magnets) and make a full fledged game out of them. I do agree that it will take some work to make it entertaining and chalenging tho, but thats the fun part to figure out in my opinion.

The first step you might take is looking at the core mechanics of the game, "magnitism" and do a little research. If you look you will find all sorts of things your character could use magnets for. Your concept of somthings being North Poles and others South is cool, you might have it so that some things you dont want to pull so you need to watch your polarity. Maybe as the chracter you can levitate over gaps if you are the same polarity, or rise up a shaft if your oposites. You could even add another mechanic and have a range of charges making the force stronger or weaker. Point is, see what else you can do with magnets before you proceed, i bet there are som realy cool things.

Most of all, what kind of game is it? Adventure, RPG, Puzzle etc? I would say Puzzle. Figure that out and then you will know how better to build it.

If you are interested in some more help please PM me, i would love to make this uniqure idea come to life.

Great feedback guys, just what I was looking for. I guess all there is to do is keep working on it until I can see for myself whether it's fun or not. :) Nice suggestions uber. Do expect this thread to sink and be resurrected at a later date by myself after some more work is done...

Rather than just having the one spiked ball, I might suggest that you can fight with various sharp junk that you find scattered about the level.

Just hopping in to say I love the idea too :D