Animorph Game?

[Duff]

yea GTA sandbox style is def the way to go

it would be cool if you gain points for accomplishments and stuff, and then those points can be used to buy new morphs, like you go to the zoo and theres a menu of different morphs for different prices

So certain missions involve getting staple morphs like bird of prey, dolphin, bug etc. So the gameplay will give you the morphs you absolutely need, but then if you want better morphs they'll cost you. Like you go through a mission to get a red-tailed hawk as your basic bird morph, and then you can buy a peregrin falcon for speed or an eagle for power and you get a dolphin but then you can buy a shark. And maybe for battle morphs you start with a wolf and buy more powerful or different morphs.

It would also be cool if you could level up your morphs, so if you use the same battle morph throughout it will get progressively stronger and you'll learn new moves and stuff

yea this game could be absurdly cool lol

what kind of like mini quests or stuff do you think it could have? like gta has gang wars and stuff like that thats extra gameplay outside the main story. Maybe you could have like busting up sharing meetings, free hork bajir and bringing them to the valley, and maybe you'll just come across a random stereotypical yeerk plot to stop right then and there, like logging in the forest or something. Cause the key to a good sandbox is replayability and being able to just run around the world doing stuff without having to play the story

[ThinkAgain]

I say that GTA style sandbox RPG would be great, but in first person. It would be hard, but would really get out into the game.

Think about it... morph bird, and see the world with the ultra detailed vision and see far away, morph a dog and have vision weird, but see like faintly colored scent trails to follow, morph an insect and see the compound eyes vision, morph a roach and see the screen shake when you're near human footsteps, have controls harder to work/become unresponsive when the animal's instincts are fighting you... It would be amazing.

Third person is okay for most games, but to really get a feel of what it's like to be an Animorph, you need to go first person.

I disagree that you'd have to "buy" morphs, I say that they be more like hidden packages or something, like you can get a golden eagle, so long as you find and catch one. The better the morph, the harder they are to get to.

I think there should also be a karma system with multiple endings. For instance, based on what choices you make, it can affect the ending. Do you kill human controllers or save them? Help the Hork Bajir Colony or not? Save a bunch of humans and miss your ONLY opportunity to get a grizzly morph, or ditch the humans and obtain the morph? Also, split decisions, moral conflicts in game... really get a feel for it, how it was like for the Animorphs in the book.

This could have the potential for a very long, very good game... but it will simply never happen. A big budget sandbox RPG like that is reserved games with a wide fanbase; it just wouldn't happen for a "child's" book series that's 10 years old. In order to really match the books, and to play first person, there would be some hardcore stuff. For example, if you were a wolf fighting a Hork-Bajir, you'd see your muzzle rip through flesh, and you'd see blood, missing limbs and bodies everywhere. For the intended age group of the books, the game would need an E or at the most T rating. It would be hard to pull unless you made the game really, really cheesy.

Also, to really make it work, you'd need a brand new engine that is very different from what current games run on. For it to be practical, if you get hurt, you would have to lose strength and mobility and vision, etc. based on the injury. This isn't just a red splash on the screen, find a medkit and reload, you would need to limp away bleeding your life away, and remorph. It isn't "as soon as you're not getting attacked, your safe." In the books, a big issue was demorphing before you lost too much blood. In order to really make it... limp differently based on how injured a limb is, loose partial vision when hit in the head, changes in controls for all animals that get damaged in any possible way, ALL the different motions and attacks and controls for dozens and dozens of animals... (It wouldn't be fun if you only could pick between a handful...) It's just too big of a job. It would be extremely expensive to do, and just isn't practical for who would buy it. Also, being a nothlit isn't game over, you'd just be trapped; if you find the cube, there would be countless of npc's to pick from with their routes; if you find a controller, you could trap them for three days to save them and affect the story, but how many controllers are there? If you become a controller, how could you be saved? There would need to be storylines for every possible thing you would do, every choice you make. This isn't standard RPG choice morals that lead to a max of five or six possible endings, you're talking about dozens. This isn't some "OKAY, you're a criminal. Kill people and get money and cars." This game would be more massive than anything previously made. It just can't be done today.

Assume I was a multibillionaire, and change everything above I said was impossible to "pay people to do it", and you would have the most amazing game to ever grace the surface of Earth.

If it was made half-ass, I would still play it, but be incredibly disappointed when I get five morphs and they have limited controls, and follow a linear path with no real choices, and no ability to attack what I want, defend what I want, or really do things with innocence and controllers.

[Galladerotom]

Personally I thought there should be a free play region or something where you can unlock morphs for multiplayer and replay missions. Sort of like the story and free modes in lego starwars. Although they should probably have a limit on morphs you can equip during a mission around eight or nine.

[Shock]

I say that GTA style sandbox RPG would be great, but in first person. It would be hard, but would really get out into the game.

just Mod GTA so you don't have to work with the source code.

[Liz]

I want a tabletop RPG for Animorphs.

Um, all this other stuff sounds good though?

[Hunter]

I say that GTA style sandbox RPG would be great, but in first person. It would be hard, but would really get out into the game.

just Mod GTA so you don't have to work with the source code.

good idea, but who here is that good with computers to do that?

[AniDragon]

.....

Well, I can make the graphics, and I can do audio-video. And can help with design docs.

And I think... Well, we all want the most epic game to ever exist. Nearly every game designer does. Fact of the matter, though, things get sacrificed for things like time and money. If they're not, you end up with games like Duke Nukem Forever, that end up not getting released because it's never quite "good enough", and things get done and re-done.

The trick to making a good game is compromise.  Like, okay, having the different morphs "see" things differently in 1st person is doable. There are only so many "types" of vision, that it's not unreasonable.

But, having every NPC have a different story that you could potentially unlock? That's not feasible. I don't think even SquareEnix would consider that.

Karma system would be good. Definitely doable.

Here's the trick to game design. We decide on the ESSENTIALS, on things that absolutely must be in the game. We estimate how long those essentials will take. Then we make design docs based off of that. We give ourselves time limits so that we don't spend ages on some little insignificant detail. We make milestones for different iterations of the project. Deadlines exist for a reason, and that reason is for things to actually get done.

Now, if we get the essentials done in due time, we start working on the "extras". Little things that we have planned for "if we have time".

Yes, that formula will inevitably sacrifice a bit of quality. But that's how things work.

*cough* Of course, this is all a moot point without having a programmer on board or some sort of budget.

[Xan]

The other thing that would be cool in an Ani-Universe game would be the ability to use firearms or alien tech. The best game IMO for an Ani game to based off of right now is Fallout 3.

[Duff]

well the thing with games like fallout and oblivion are that they sacrafice gameplay for massive storylines and huge worlds. The have one guy, who walks and runs one way, and then he shoots.

Animorphs would be the exact opposite, the gameplay would be the biggest and most expansive thing. There would have to be dozens of completely different character models and controls based on all the different morphs.

IMO thats the most important thing hands down. So like anidragon said its all about compromise, we cant have ridiculously in depth and adaptable characters AND have a huge world and adapting storyline.

We could still put a cool looking, decent sized world out there, but the story would definitely have to be linear. Think about Spider-man 2. How fun was spideys moves in that game? He could do everything spidey could and it was just damn fun to play. Did it matter that alot of the buildings and streets looked alike? hell no cause it wasnt about the world it was about the gameplay

[senter.pat]

hmm... an intriguing idea... i reacon the best way to make an ani game like that, would have to be something like Oblivion or Fallout 3 (free-roam, sand-box gameplay) with GTA style physics... like you can't morph in public, you have to be where there is no people (like an alleyway) and of course, there has to be the 2 hour limit

Thats exactly how I would have thought it would be. An in depth game like that. The only problem is that I cant figure how they would work a team into it. And also the battle system would have to be way more in depth then either oblivion or fallout, different attacks for different morphs. Maybe as a sidequest or something you could go to another planet to pick up some alien morphs. But man...Bethesda could do this game justice i think.

[senter.pat]

I have played the PSX one and the GBC one and the PC one had the board game.

the GBC one was alot like pokemon didn't like that you could only keep certain morphs at a time.

I always dreamed of a Super smash brothers style game With Animorphs XD why IDNO I just thought it would be fun to play

I had always thought that a pokemon game would be the best to use the super smash bros battly system. I played the GBC one and i didnt care for it. I never played the other ones, but I'm pretty sure that they couldnt live up to my expectations.

[senter.pat]

Did anyone ever play Shenmu? The time system from that would be great. You have to go to school do your stuff then get home by a certain time to keep your cover. Though you would have to find a way to make going to school worthwhile. thinking about it, the time would have to pass alot slower then either fallout or oblivion since if you were playing day by day, the days would have to be alot longer. In order for the game to be good for anyone, not just us ani-freaks, it would have to start from the beginning. You make your character, then you and your buddies run into elfangor. (this whole part could be the training part) then you go on with the story line. only question is is how much it would follow the storyline of the books. The game could be long as **** if it did. but could always make a shorter game then make expansions or end it with a cliffhanger to leave room for a sequel.

[SuperBlue]

hmmmmm here's my idea. i like the idea of having the GTA style game, that's perfect, but after hearing Duff's description, I think a it should be a game where you create your own team of Animorphs in a free play mode and then in story mode you play as the original six.

the story mode would be you playing as the Animorphs and each level would be about a certain book(exapmle level 1= basically going through the entire first book) since there are 54 books that would mean this would be a pretty long game, but cutting out some irrelevant books wouldn't be a problem.

The Free play mode would be you creating your own team of Animorphs and just doing whatever you want with them around the city. You could be morphing and attacking random animals or civilians, flying over the city, swimming in the ocean, completing Yeerk pool missions, explore the city, forrest, beach ect, and acquire what ever morphs you want/find(exapmle: you're in the forrest and come across a bear, you have to find a way to acquire it without getting killed) pretty much a GTA styled mode.

Team work would also be an important dynamic to the game, especially when acquiring dangerous morphs, you could get a member of your party to distract the animal either by going into their battle morph and fighting it, or just getting it's attention long enough for you to acquire it. and obviously a game with 6 main character needs to have a co-op mode. I also think this game would be more fun if you're able to switch between first and third person, a game like this wouldnt be as good if your only limited to one view

I plan on getting into a career for animation and video game design and this would defiantly be my first project if i'm ever hired by a big video game company

[senter.pat]

I've been rereading the series and imagining how it would be in a game, and It would be way too much to try to follow the storyline of the books, not without several expansions, but I like the idea of a free roam world, but I'm not sure that any of the current platforms could make the game as good as i want it. It would only have to be one city, since most of the story is in their hometown. The gardens would prolly be the most common place to get exotic morphs, and you could possibly do side quests to influence them to get certain animals that you wanted to aquire. Cassies barn could be used to get the more common animals and it could be at random. Man...Just thinking bout this game makes me wish someone would the resources and skills cared enough to do it.

[Gaz]

A computer game with updated graphics would be really cool!

I tried the demos of a couple, but never got the full versions. I have the board game sitting in my closet at home.