Assignment 4: Final Project Erin Beach
This is NORPMOG's newest game. We've created this World of Asgard to show players that this really is a huge game. They can go where ever they want, unless things are intentionally blocked off for story-progression reason. The game is an action role playing game with a few bits of team orientation as well. The player will be allowed a group of up to three characters, controlling one, and the computer controlling the other two where as if one is a magic user, the player can switch to them and cast a spell and then switch back to the "tanking" character and deal out some pain and so on and so on.
Cut-Scenes will progress the story, but my team and I have decided to make some of these cut-scene interactive so that it keeps the player glued to the screen and not sitting through boring 30 minute cut-scenes, which I can assure you we will not have!
We want the players to feel like they're actually inside this game and can really connect to all or even just one of the characters. So for this, we've divided three basic storylines and characters to use. The player will have the chance to play a character from the Humans, Ferals (werewolves), and Vampires, simply because these are the most equal in power so to speak. They all have their strengths and weaknesses. This is only at the beginning of the game, as it progresses, the player will be able to control a group of Hunters which will be one of the hardest parts in the game. We felt that starting with the three and then moving on to the sickningly hard difficultly after they've learned the controls would be the wisest decision.
So this brings us to our storyboard here of the opening to the game. After looking at it, I'm sure you're all a little confused on what this trying to portray but our team believes that we want to keep the players guessing to whom all these characters are and what they will have to do with later within the storyline. The scene with Jitu and Lupa is a tad long, but that's something that happens BEFORE this game's storyline, and at a few points in time will flash back to this scene. Everything else is basically foreshadowing to key-points that happen in the game that the player can be like, "Hey, I remember that guy in the opening I wonder how he does such and such." kind of a thing.
Some questions I have heard from my collegues ask me and a few I hope to clarify with you.
1. Questions about the Nordic Mythology, it seems to be heavily influenced by these myths, but what are elves, werewolves and vampires doing in this setting?
Basically, we're not using Nordic myths for our basis. We used some of them to get ideas and built our own story from that. There's the basic bad guys like Fafnir and Loki, and then there's Odin himself. There's Fenrir as well, as well as the name Asgard and so on and so on, but that's about it. Odin's family is about the only thing really based off the Nordic myths. His wolves Freki and Geri have the ability to turn into humans that have wolf ears and tails, and then there's his son Lukas who has been cursed by Loki with the demon wolf Fenrir. While Lukas loves his father, Fenrir still has a tendancy of rearing it's ugly head to try and kill Odin. Since Odin and his family are key players in the story, they are heard from alot of places, but that is basically it as far as the Nordic mythology goes. Everything else is in place from our artistic license.
2. This opening seems a bit short, are you sure you have enough here?
No, we don't have enough. There's a whole lot more that we wanted to add but time simply didn't allow it, so we shortened to down to the point where, to us, it basically made sense. It shows a lot of the key characters, but then it does. The only set of Hunters you get to see is the three riding in the last few scenes. We didn't get a chance to put the Vampires or Humans for that matter into the beginning as well. If time allowed, they would be in there, but since it did not, we ran short.
3. Your characters are awfully pretty...
Eh, the only the ones here in the opening. Trust me, there are ragged out characters later in the game. Even some of the pretty ones are a liiiittle creepy.
4. You mentioned creepy, what kind of rating would you give this game?
This game, in our eyes, is definately mature, 17+ rating. While it looks like a simple harmless RPG, it is far from that. We want the characters to be expressed along with the gameplay. Since this is war, it's violent and bloody, there's strange characters, creepy characters, there's even a few who are basically playboys (yes boys) who sleep around just for whatever reason, cannibals, human cattle for vampires. These our are characters and closing them behind a teen or E rating wall is something we don't want to do.
That's about it. If you have any more questions or concerns, please don't hesitate to ask. We're more than happy to answer them for you!