The Pitch: Blue Fury and the Temple of Balance (Riskmen Universe)

You all thought I forgot, didn't you!?

Today we give you the first female character of the Riskmen Universe and the first POC character. I give you Blue Fury and the Temple of Balance.

Before I start explaining this game, I want to talk a little about diversifying the Riskmen. I always wanted to make a more diverse team. Yeah, I know the first two characters I introduced were white guys, but that's it for the moment. That said, just about every character I made, I first had envisioned as white dudes. When I started to think more carefully about diversifying the line, I often asked myself "would this change make the character/story better, or am I just changing the race/gender for the sake of it?"


That said, for three out of the five initially conceived Riskmen, the answer to the question was "Yes, changing the characters in that way will actually make things better. I can explore new avenues in the character if I make these changes.


That said, let's get straight into it.

Influences

Storywise, a LOT went into figuring Blue Fury and her game. There's a little bit of Green Arrow, a little bit of Hulk, a little bit of Indiana Jones and a little bit of Hindu legend. There's elements of Star Wars, and a bit of Chinese Philosophy.

In terms of Gameplay, I'm using a LOT of Metroidvania for inspiration. Like all of my games, the SNES Zelda games are a big influence for me. The Secret of Mana and the Wolverine Origins have also given me plenty of ideas.

Story

Years ago, an emerging religious sect known as the Henkashi traveled southwest Asia preaching balance in all things. They had vanished from history for years until an old Henkashi temple was discovered on an island off the coast of India.

Enter Ashna Harolds, Indian Austrlian professor, and the archaeological team from Newchurch University. Keen scholars in Henkashi history, Ashna and her team are studying the ruins when the terrorist group Al Doraq attacks, seeking to exploit the power of the temple. Trying desperately to escape, Ashna finds herself in the centre of the temple, where a mystical bow bestows on Ashna the spirit of the Blue Fury. Now, to restore balance and save her team, Ashna must team up with the Blue Fury to defeat Al Doraq and rescue her colleagues.

Gameplay

Blue Fury's game is essentially what would happen if you took the 2D Zeldas and applied Super Metroid's structure to it. The entire game takes place in one temple. Well, I say one. The whole place is built on the concept of duality and balance. As such, the temple is made up of two structures, each one requiring tasks done in the other to progress. The temple is full of traps, creatures and puzzles designed to test Ashna and the Blue Fury to her limits.

As the Blue Fury, Ashna can fire off enchanted arrows quickly with deadly accuracy. As Ashna, she needs some time to draw the string and her arrows are unenchanted and less effective. She can, however look for clues, solve puzzles and climb up vines.


While playing as Ashna, Blue Fury can recover from damage. However, if the Fury runs out of health, Ashna will be on her own until the fury fully recovers.

The game works mostly on "shooter" mechanics, but is more like what would happen if Link only had the bow in Zelda games.

So that's it for Blue Fury. Let me know what you think. Next pitch will come sooner.

The Pitch: Daybreaker- Refugee (Riskmen Universe)

Last time I wrote here, I introduced you guys to Ghostman. Now, it's time for another character. This one, I call Daybreaker. This is part of the Riskmen Universe.


Influences

If you look at Daybreker's design, there's no denying that I'm heavily influenced by Superman Action Comics and Peter J Tomasi's Superman. I'm also drawing heavily on Geoff  John's Green Lantern. There's not a lot of influence from Marvel, I was somewhat influenced, though, by what I read in Jonathon Hickman's Avengers run.

comics, so there's no point in even pretending that I never thought of them. Particularly, I'm influenced by Grant Morrison's run on


Gameplay-wise, I'm borrowing a lot from older side-scrolling beat-em-ups. River City Ransom, Double Dragon, SNES titles like Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time all influenced the level structure. I learned a lot about how I want to pace each level in the game from the classic Sonic games and even the more recent Sonic Mania. As I'm working with a top-down perspective, I can't deny the influence of The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past.


Does it sound like I'm dipping my finger in enough proverbial pies yet? Yes? Too Many? Also Yes?


Whoo boy...


Story


So let's get into what the game's about...

All Marcus ever knew was life on earth. He's only ever known his job as a firefighter and his home life looking after his genius daughter, Erin. One day, however, a strange creature attacks Marcus while he is putting out a fire in an old block of flats. In the middle of that attack, Marcus' body lights up and he rams the creature, killing it. Not long after, Erin reveals who Marcus really is.


Marcus's real name is Marvus Al-Turr, a member of the Daybreakers. The Daybreakers were a corps dedicated to monitoring the activities of universal rulers. When the galactic Prince Zazrael turned his attention to eliminating the Daybreakers, Marvus took Erin, who in reality is a living supercomputer named Enfinity, and retreated to earth. When Marvus attempted to leave Enfinity on earth and go back to fight Zazreal, Enfinity reprogrammed his mind to make him think he was an earth native.


Now, though, Zazrael has learned where Marvus, has been hiding with Enfinity. He's sent his best men to retrieve Enfinity and learn the secrets of what Daybreakers remain. Marcus needs to regain his memories and skills to defeat Zazrael's minions and protect the planet he now calls home.


Yeah, it sounds more complicated than hopefully it is.


Gameplay

Daybreaker- Refugee will follow a linear structure- one level after the other with maybe some branches allowing for "sidequest-style" missions. Gameplay will be mostly similar to a common beat-'em-up. You'll have a button to do a basic, physical attack, a button to use one of your combat powers and a button to switch between flight and ground-based combat.

Daybreaker uses solar energy to perform some of his more devastating moves. Right off the bat,

you'll get the ability to light your body up with energy and ram an enemy, but you'll also get the ability to create a light construct clone, plant a "solar bomb" and, yes, launch energy blasts Goku-style. The ability to do this will depend on whether or not your character is in full daylight (they won't always be), as sunlight will fill Daybreaker's "Special meter", which allows him to perform these attacks. As Daybreaker unlocks more of his past memories, he will gain the ability to use these abilities.

Emphasis will be on trying to move and fight quickly, getting through a level quickly and with less damage will award you will be awarded with more EXP to spend on upgrades for your abilities. These will come in handy most during boss fights, which will be mostly against Zazrael's different generals. These bosses will be multi-stage affairs and will take a fair bit of time to really take down.

I'm considering a new-game plus mode. Perhaps where each level takes place at night, so you need to be careful about how you use your solar power, or where your health is slowly chipping away, forcing you to get through levels quickly.

That's currently all for now, next up is Blue Fury and the Temple of Ishdun.

The Pitch: The Great Ghostman (Riskmen Universe)

Okay, so last week I introduced the Riskmen universe. I gave an overview of the entire city of Newchurch and a basic rundown of the characters. You can check on that here. Today, I give you the pitch for the first game in the universe; the one that's currently in production: The Great Ghostman. As with every game pitch, the plan is to make this using the RPG Maker 2003 engine (though I'm considering other things).

Inspirations

So first, time to talk about the main influences in this game.

Let's start with story: I was heavily influenced by Christopher Yost's Scarlet Spider, featuring KaineNightwing trade ever written and Scott Snyder's Batman, which encouraged me to add a slight horror element to the plot. For gameplay, my main influences are Double Dragon and The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. I'd be lying if I said that the Arkham games had NO influence on me (I'm making a superhero game- it's going to have an influence), but the only one I've played is Arkham Origins- Blackgate, so take that as it is. There are a range of RPG Maker 2003 games that have taught me a lot about using the system.

Parker. In fact, I came up with the character not long after reading the first trade in that run. Other books that have influenced me are pretty much every


Story

When Luke Scarce was young, his mother died of cancer. His father, after years of trying to cure her, took his life. Without the guidance of mother or father, Luke lived only for himself. Training himself as a magician, his fame eventually earned him enough money to buy the old Grey's End Theatre in Newchurch City, Australia.

That's when things fell apart.

On Luke's first show, a gunman working for the crimelord Graeme Green opened fire on Luke and twenty other guests. Where his guests died, however, Luke lived, walking the line between life and death. Now, he takes the fight to Green's gang on behalf of the departed as Ghostman.

World

The Great Ghostman takes place in Grey's End; a derelict suburb in western part of Newchurch city.

The Green Gang practically own the area. Wherever you go, you find their graffiti. Schools set up there are abandoned and in disrepair. Building projects started, but never finished. There's more rubbish on the street than there is concrete. The people there, though, are a strong bunch. They look out for each other as much as they can, balancing their business and family demands with the fights for their own lives under the Green Gang. All they need is for someone like Luke to show them what is possible.


Gameplay

The Great Ghostman is an action-adventure game in a similar vein to the early Zelda titles. You wander Grey's End undertaking missions on behalf of the ghosts that populate the area. Some of those missions operate very much the same way as "dungeons" that Zelda players know quite well.

Combat will operate mostly in a similar way to the Double Dragon games. When in a combat situation, waves of enemies will approach, which you'll defeat with a range of attacks. Some of these enemies will be armed, however, and when you defeat them, you may be able to pick up their weapons and use them yourself.

Ghostman's abilities are based around two powers: his ability to walk through walls and his command of telekinesis. his phase shifting ability acts as a sort of dodge button when in combat, allowing him to walk through enemies before they can land an attack. Telekinesis can be used to pull enemies and certain object towards Ghostman or push them away.

For traversal, your most important ability is ghostsight. This allows Ghostman to see and speak to ghosts all over Grey's End. It also allows Ghostman to find phasing points, which allow him to walk through walls.


In a game where you have ghost powers, its natural that some stealth becomes an important part. Ghostman has some pretty low defence stats, so stealth will usually be your first port of call. You can use telekinesis to bring down enemies and take them out before they see you.


Structure-wise, the game will feature 5 main levels and about 15 side quests. These side quests give you the opportunity to increase your stats.


So far, that's all I have to say about the game. Next I'll be talking about Daybreaker: Rebel, where the universe goes into space.

The Pitch: The Riskmen Universe

If you've been looking long enough at my blog, you will see that I'm a bit of a superhero fan. I was a 90s kid and grew up in the golden age of superhero Saturday cartoons. Batman: The Animated Series, X-Men, Power Rangers, Ninja Turtles and a range of also-rans made up a large part of my mourning routine.

Something I did that a lot more of, though, was make up my own superhero characters. My reasons were pretty personal. I was born with sight and hearing problems- some of which weren't fixed until I was twelve. What this meant was that I couldn't entirely trust the world around me. My imagination was a world I could trust. As such, considering the shows I was watching and the stories I was consuming, it was only natural that I invent my own super-teams with their own abilities and aesthetics.

I'm 31 now, but seeing what I can pull out of my imagination is still my main pastime. It's the reason I work with game-creation tools as a hobby. With that in mind, let's introduce my concept for a superhero game universe.

Rules for the universe:

Firstly, I'm not making this universe too big. Five heroes get their own games, one is reserved for the teamup. Six games in all, with the possibility for sequels later on.

Secondly, each game will be structured differently. Not every game will be an open-world, Zelda-like adventure, nor do I think it needs to be. Some will be linear, some won't.

Third, and this is a personal gripe. I'm not make my female characters "adorkable". Leave that rubbish to the CW. If my male characters are allowed to have personalities not lifted from Frozen, so are the women.

Fourth, each game will be set in or around one city. Let's set the scene in the next sub-heading.

Location:

For location I'm taking what I think are the best parts of Marvel and DC.

From Marvel, I'm taking the notion that all heroes live in the same city. It makes the teamup that much more believable, and allows for some more street-level action throughout each game. Each game will take part in a different section of the city. From DC, I'm using the idea of the fictional city. This should allow for enough freedom for me to design the whole city to accommodate gameplay, rather than trying to warp the gameplay to suit whatever city I base this in. Aside from that, this city is going to be based in Australia. This is for no other reason than I'm Australian and I prefer to write what I know. 

So let me introduce you to Newchurch City:

Newchurch is located in between the cities of Townsville (yes, it's a real place) and Cairns the north-eastern part of the Australian state of Queensland. In this part of the country, it's hot, humid and crocodiles are a constant reality. Demographics-wise, the region is home to a significant immigrant population from various parts of Asia as well as a large indigenous population of Australian Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders.

The Characters:

Alright, let's get to the important part. Who are our heroes, what are their origins what can they do and which ones get their own games?

Daybreaker

Years ago, the Daybreaker's were peacekeepers throughout the universe, keeping an eye on corrupt rules. When prince Davarous declared war on the Daybreakers, all but three were destroyed. One, Marvus Randor, escaped to earth, took on the name Marcus Ray, and now uses his powers to protect his newfound family on earth. As a Daybreaker, Marvus utilises solar energy into blunt-force attacks. His attack of choice tends to be to cover himself in solar energy and ram opponents. He also possesses enhanced strength and the power of flight. Look out for him in Daybreaker: Refugee.

Ghostman

A world-renowned magician, Luke Scarce dies when his Newchurch show ends with a gunman shooting him and fifteen others. Where the others died, however, Luke found himself stuck walking the line between life and death. Half-man, half ghost, Ghostman now works on behalf of the dead to protect the living. Being part ghost, Ghostman is able to walk through walls. He fights mainly with the power of telekinesis and has the ability to see and speak to departed spirits. His game, The Great Ghostman is currently being developed.

Blue Fury

Indian-Australian Ashna Harolds has worked for Newchurch University for years. When she gets the opportunity to visit a small island off the coast of India to visit the temple of a long-dead cult, she discovers the Bow of Balance. Upon picking up the bow, the spirit of the Fury takes over and Ashna finds herself fighting to restore the balance between order and chaos. In her Blue Fury form, Ashna can enchant the arrows of a limitless quiver. She also has a healing factor, which makes her the perfect divine weapon. You'll learn more about her in Blue Fury and the Temple of Balance.

The Outrider

A modern day Bushranger, Elsie Hammer's father fought police corruption and bike gangs as the Outrider. When he died in the line of duty, however, it became Elsie's turn to take her father's arsenal and motorcycle to become the new Outrider. She's an accomplished stunt rider, and carries an array of weaponry to finish her father's work and beat the corrupt rural police west of Newchurch. She rides into battle in Legacy of the Outrider.

Silver Shark

Aaron Miller's life is hard- an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander boy straight out of high school, he jumps to take the job of a courier. While transporting a strange device between Matthews Island and Newchurch Docklands, a storm knocks him into the water causing the device to explode. When Aaron washes up on the shore, he finds his DNA combined with that of a shark, Aaron now has a shark's agility, speed and magnetic sense (it's a thing; check it out). He'll stuggle between his indigenous and superhero identities in Silver Shark. 

Dr. Patchwork

All Dr. Patchwork has ever known is life in the sewers. A creature created by man Patchwork only knows as the Witchdoctor, Patchwork escaped the villain's torment and reach the city above. A man made of parts of other men, Patchwork is regarded as a monster by the people of Newchurch. The fact that he is super strong and endurable doesn't help matters. He'll bring the team together in Riskmen Vol. 1: Riskmen Rising.

And for the moment, that's all there is to it. Look out for next week, when I introduce the first game in the universe, The Great Ghostman.

Game Pitch: Here Comes Daredevil

So, I use RPG Maker a lot. I've been using it since I was 16 (For the record, I'm 30 now). And for the moment, I'm going to play pretend. I'm going to pretend that I was going to make a game based on Daredevil.

Before we go further, I should point something out: I'm going to pitch games based on my ability to make them. This means, unfortunately, no three-dimensional environments or characters. These games are going to be mostly 2D, and something that I may make later on- we'll see.

History of Daredevil in Gaming

Outside of games that feature the wider Marvel universe with Daredevil as an option for playable character, there has only been one game made for Daredevil (well, only one that actually got published). It was this one for the Game Boy Advance in the early 2000s:

If the game looks like a stock-standard beat-em-up, that's because it is. Every now and again, the screen will flash, indicating that Daredevil's radar sense detected something, but that's about it. There were  main console games planned for the PlayStation 2/Xbox and the PlayStation 3/Xbox 360, but they were both cancelled.

The Challenge

Thankfully, I don't have to try and make Daredevil popular at the moment. Before 2013, I doubt  I could say that, but thanks to Charlie Cox and his appearances on Netflix, Daredevil's gotten enough of a mainstream appeal that I don't have to sell the character's appeal to people who aren't comic fans anymore.

The problem instead, will be to deliver an experience that makes the player feel like Daredevil. The first-person Daredevil game is a meme that will never die as long as people are talking about superhero games. The thing is: just making a regular fighting game and putting a Daredevil sprite in it doesn't feel like you are playing as Daredevil. It makes you feel like you are telling Daredevil what to do from a distance.  Therefore, the first major challenge will be to put the player in a position where he feels he sees the world as Daredevil instead of someone who is looking at him.

The second problem, and this is one that is going to loom over superhero games forever, is that there's already been a game that does punchy-stealthy gameplay for a character with pointy bits on his mask that covers everything but his mouth. Which begs the question; how do you make a game that makes you feel as though you're playing as Daredevil without people thinking you just reskinned Arkham? The game needs to feel like it's distinctly its own thing, or what's the point of it existing, honestly?

 Story

Before we go too far into any of these questions, I want to get the story out of the way. Not because it's insignificant, but because it will set what kind of world Daredevil inhabits. It will also allow us to figure out what kind of bosses the man without fear will face.

It's a pretty simple one, really. While on a mission to find out why one of Matt Murdock's clients has been kicked out of his home, Daredevil finds the dead body of the Kingpin. Naturally, news of this gets out, and now everyone wants a piece of Hell's Kitchen- the Hand, the Serpent Society, Owlsley's gang- they all want to be in charge of the Kingpin's vast resources for different reasons. Daredevil's in for a long fight as he rushes frantically around trying to stop a slew of villains who have now taken a sudden interest in his stomping grounds.

World and Traversal

This sets Daredevil very firmly in his home turf of Hell's Kitchen. Visually, the world is going to look fairly minimalist. See an example of the environments below:



The look I'm going for here is Daredevil's vision from Mark Waid's run in 2011:

 The environment will fade in and out according to how much sound is in the area. As noise increases, secrets around the level will appear which will encourage the player to undertake various puzzles. Enemies and things with a more biological element can be smelt and they appear as a different colour to the background (Grey for unfriendlies, brown for trash cans and, yellow for friendlies).

Traversal will include certain things I've seen in cancelled Daredevil games, you will be able to travel on rooftops and "rail grind" over electrical cables between buildings. I'm going to avoid grappling hooks to stop the game from being "too Arkham-y".

Throughout the game, the player will be able to perform tasks for his clients- mostly evidence-gathering for clients who need help. As he gains them, he will earn points that can be used to upgrade Daredevil's stats.

I know the big question- will the game be open world? In short; basically. It will be open in the same way that The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is open. You will still have to take on various levels, but the map will be more a matter of asking "what can I find here?"

Combat:

Okay, here's the difficult part. I had to form a system that was different to Arkham. So here's the way
things go. The three pillars of Daredevil's combat style are his own martial arts, his billy club and his acrobatics. Therefore, we have one key for a regular strike, one for a special application of the billy club (which can be changed with the number keys) and one to jump. It's a simple enough system that will progress as your repair the billy club that gets broken early on in the game.

Level Design

This is an action game, first and foremost. To separate the game from Arkham, I'm not going to include stealth sections. In it's place, I'm going to include tracking sections where you take advantage of Daredevil's sense of smell. Basically, you find something with a character's scent and follow it to rescue or attack them. Tracking will occasionally allow you to follow certain significant enemies at a far enough distance that they can't attack you.

Otherwise, the game will sell itself on combat against large numbers of foes. I'm thinking 10-15 at a time. The levels will also be puzzle-based in a way that requires clever use of movement to solve.

And that's about it. If I see enough positive feedback on this, I may even try for a tech-demo on this one.