MMO - GTA type game?

[Lilwolf]

With GrandTheftAuto Vice City coming out with an online version (where I hear its just a bunch of people running around killing each other.)

I started thinking... A Massive Online gansta type game would do GREAT!  

Here is my premis..

Everyone starts off a thug... Lonely low in the gutter thug of some nature.

You start doing little jobs...  Gaining 'rep' points.  Each time you rob an old lady, you get some points.  Take on an armored car... get more...   Gain money and points.

what are the rep points for?

Well get enough... and you will start getting a territory.  This will be your little area.  You will get people who will pay you to protect their shop (from you and others).  This will be a monthly type.  Then you will have to both protect them, plus get continue on your rep points.

If someone robs a protected shop, you will loose rep points.. but if you can avenge them.. you rep points will go up (the more brutal the better).

But wheres the online aspect.  Well you can join up with others... and your rep points will combine.  Giving you bigger and better areas..  Giving you more money.. and more power.

Also, make sure to rob / pillage the stores who are in your territory, but aren't paying.  This will increase your rep points and get them to join your protected 'customers'

Next..

What happens when two gangs areas start touching?  Well.. it pushes back and forth based on rep points...

The neighbors start muscling in on your territory... Well, start robbing their protected stores (and getting away from it).  This will add to your rep, lower theirs... PLUS add to a 'hate' point system with their group... if this gets high enought, you can start attacking them directly... Attacking their main base... Attacking their members who are running around...

Also, how about alliences?  Well, someone is annoying you...  But they will mop the floor with you?  Well join up with others and the combine 'hate' points (hate points only...) will allow the group to attack the other (while all hate points gained will reduce hate with the new alliences).  Make it so you can suprise attack someone by joining forces and attacking when the didn't think you could.

Next... what about the cops?

Well, don't get caught doing anything with then around.  Or you will loose cash to laywers and rep points.

Then what will money do?

1) buy weapons / ammo.  Good start...

2) buy off the cops in your area specifically.  You don't want them pulling you over all the time.  But it would be nice if they tried to stop others coming in.

3) buy your lawyer golf club dues.  The better you treat your lawyer on a monthly... the cheaper they are (if not free) when you get caught.  The less rep points you loose... and the quicker you get out.

4) buy mercenaries (pcs or npcs) to do jobs for you.  Hit other groups...  attack stores in your area to get more protection money

5) Hookers? buy them with extra cash....  Or hire some for money making...  

Anyway, seems like the politics and backstabbing would be GREAT!  Add ways to take over someones territory.. Add ways to bring down the big mob boss of an area... steal his territory... become the Don!

[SirPoonga]

Interesting, I had a simular idea.

I;d like to see the next GTa have all the classic multiplayer modes from GTA1 and GTA2.

[Lilwolf]

I just want to put beat on some little old women for their purse... so I can afford de ho-s  

[hyiu]

interesting idea....

however... I can't imagine what will happen when young teenagers all think this is IT !!!....
if they think its all cool....... and so on....

believe it or not...... I do think this game will be quite good if implemented right....

it'll be real time.... a number of people will belong to the same gang.... and when you logoff... other gangs can hit you.... so, you better take shifts to login..... (just like real life...) this will be SOOOOO addicting....

you join gangs... and when you're strong enough... you split off....

but seriously.... I think it'll be too violent for any young teenagers.... yes, they know its a game...... but it'll creep in their mind slowly.... I don't think this kind of exposure is healthy at all....

*** didn't mean to pour cold water on your idea... ***  

[HeadRusch]

Sadly, this game would suck.

Why, you ask? Glad you did...i shall tell you

1) Within 1 day of opening, you'd already have the "Elite Beta Testers" ganging up and killing off all the people who actually paid for the game in a store.  Then, they'd be telling you how elite they were cuz, they are Beta Testers.

2) Within 2 weeks, groups of high school kids with nothing else to do with their shallow, excitement-free middle America lives will have drawn the line between the casual players and the kids with nothing better to do so they play all day long.  The defenseless n00b has no chance.  "Join my Gang!", "Tryouts for My Gang at 5pm", are all you hear.....inter-gang killing runs rampant.

3) Within 3 weeks, someone will have figured out a way to set their video card to a certain color/driver combination that would allow them to shoot through walls and always get headshots.

4) Within a month, the servers would be so overloaded nobody would be able to log on.  The company making the game will blame Al Qaeda.

5) Within two months the only people doing well are the power-mad guys who want to play the game professionally and compete in tournaments.  Naturally these groups would all be guys from Sweden or Russia, who have reverse-engineered the code and have learned how to exploit every flaw within it.

etc, etc

[jakejake28]

dont forget the ever-popular "I went on a murder spree becuase i wanted to play <insert game name> in real life"

[SirPoonga]

That's why you'd have to support local servers too.  That solves alot of those issues above

But you get those issues with any massive multiplayer games.  

[TalkingOctopus]

Sadly, this game would suck.

Why, you ask? Glad you did...i shall tell you

1) Within 1 day of opening, you'd already have the "Elite Beta Testers" ganging up and killing off all the people who actually paid for the game in a store.  Then, they'd be telling you how elite they were cuz, they are Beta Testers.

2) Within 2 weeks, groups of high school kids with nothing else to do with their shallow, excitement-free middle America lives will have drawn the line between the casual players and the kids with nothing better to do so they play all day long.  The defenseless n00b has no chance.  "Join my Gang!", "Tryouts for My Gang at 5pm", are all you hear.....inter-gang killing runs rampant.

3) Within 3 weeks, someone will have figured out a way to set their video card to a certain color/driver combination that would allow them to shoot through walls and always get headshots.

4) Within a month, the servers would be so overloaded nobody would be able to log on.  The company making the game will blame Al Qaeda.

5) Within two months the only people doing well are the power-mad guys who want to play the game professionally and compete in tournaments.  Naturally these groups would all be guys from Sweden or Russia, who have reverse-engineered the code and have learned how to exploit every flaw within it.

etc, etc

Wow this sounds like a description of almost every online game.  

[Lilwolf]

hehe, yeah... they would have all those troubles...

btw, this was just and idea of mine of adding a few game ganras together.  MMORpg, Gang and throw in some life cycle algorithms for territories.

1) Not being logged on for a gang war.  Since its a trigger (they can't attack until the get enought points) you can probably come up with some rules about it..  but mainly they would be able to gang up on the few members who are online at the time.  They don't get any new features / abilities other then being able to attack a PC.

2) I'm sure if you don't have PK (or make it hard to start a gang war) it will keep some kids on.  Since the only PKing will be gangs against gangs... it will probably get some people to join and follow some rules.

3) I'm sure there isn't a chance in...well... down there... That you could get this thing published... for pretty good reason.  I'm not sure if I want my daughter playing online, joining a gang... but her character has to hoe a while before she's 'in the gang' where she can kill people like the rest....

4) The elites who where in beta would be the people tryign to be the new mob bosses.... and they should...give some direction... show people how to get the game going... And they are ALWAYS the first to be assassinated!  hehe...

I would like to try to figure some fun ways (in game ways) for the people in the gang to take it over.  Get enought faction points... Then being able to make side deals with other gangs maybe or being able to be part of more then one gang... Your in Gang A (as a subboss) but you create your own gang that you are the leader too... You try to get as many members of GangA to form loyalty to you... Then in one jump, you can break all your ties (and the others in your subgang) and start attacking maybe?  Hard to assassinate the ring leader when don't have a perminent death...  But you start all this subgang stuff and the head boss finds out... Before you get the strength... he could put the wipass on you... and each memeber below gets a choice of who they will follow (where they really all that loyal... when your getting your ass reamed?)

but it was kinda fun trying to see what it would take to design a game...  

[said7]

Sadly, this game would suck.

Why, you ask? Glad you did...i shall tell you

1) Within 1 day of opening, you'd already have the "Elite Beta Testers" ganging up and killing off all the people who actually paid for the game in a store.  Then, they'd be telling you how elite they were cuz, they are Beta Testers.

2) Within 2 weeks, groups of high school kids with nothing else to do with their shallow, excitement-free middle America lives will have drawn the line between the casual players and the kids with nothing better to do so they play all day long.  The defenseless n00b has no chance.  "Join my Gang!", "Tryouts for My Gang at 5pm", are all you hear.....inter-gang killing runs rampant.

3) Within 3 weeks, someone will have figured out a way to set their video card to a certain color/driver combination that would allow them to shoot through walls and always get headshots.

4) Within a month, the servers would be so overloaded nobody would be able to log on.  The company making the game will blame Al Qaeda.

5) Within two months the only people doing well are the power-mad guys who want to play the game professionally and compete in tournaments.  Naturally these groups would all be guys from Sweden or Russia, who have reverse-engineered the code and have learned how to exploit every flaw within it.

etc, etc

lol, ah the way of the counterstrike eh? actually it does sound like every online game.

How about having people the option to become a police officer as well so that way there could be 3 way conflict. And all the goodie goodies can be happy too

I actually had a similar idea to this game but it was a streetracing game. You would start with a crappy car have to race people buy mods, get hos, compete in car shows, get in fights, etc....

Sounds like good fun  

[Lilwolf]

hehehe

I love the idea of being able to be a cop....

BUT... only if you can take bribes as part of it.

Take too much (or spend to much of it somehow) and you might get busted yourself..

Work your way up to city commisioner... where the big money is!

But someone you get 'protection' money from and you will start getting gangs against you... and you will start loosing revenue...  Or maybe they will start going after your family??  And maybe your protected customers..


Trouble with cop players will be that they will be the harrassors for all the newbee players... Unless they can only go after the NPC robbers (that the gangs have to protect their protected customers from)

But cops could be treated like a giant gang itself.  That you start off in.

[DaveMMR]

I never got into Massive Multiplayer online thing.  I don't know why.   Although I played PSO online for the X-Box for a while.  

Perhaps I got totally soured on it when I beta tested the Sims Online.  I signed on ONCE, watched everyone spending their time doing menial tasks, playing a stupid pizza game or ramdomly performing actions with others before I realized the game had as much appeal as typing in an AOL chatroom while playing Connect Four with yourself.  Good thing I didn't actually pay for that -- I would have been slightly upset.

[Lilwolf]

Many are like that.  You have to have some time syncs or things to do while playing.

I LOVED EQ when it first came out.  And it grew old after a while.  But initially it what I was doing felt like a total experience more then a game.  Then it turned into a job.

The idea is if it is fun to be a theif?  or to run a mob gang?  because that is what you would have to expect to do... but you want people to do it over and over.  That is where you have to change what you can do... or find more things for them to do.

But MMOG's are interesting because they want people to play for 10 months... not a few weeks.  

btw, I was in SWGalaxies beta... and that one kinda stunk.  The graphics where GREAT... but they never made anythign actually fun to do.  You never went exploring (which was fun in EQ... until they opened up the entire world for people to move around too easily).