Marketing Study: Testing the waters

M

Mylon

Guest
I'm in the beginning stages of building a map, but I want to know what people want out of a custom map. And of course, I also have to make sure what I want out of it, too.

The map idea is of Disgaea: Hour of Darkness. The main idea is that each player controls a party ( about 6 heros ) of characters. These characters are all heros, though most of their abilities are passive (so the player only has to really control one hero at a time). Throughout the game, players can spend resources to transmigrate their characters. This restarts the transmigrated character back at level 1, though they may choose a different class. However, this character gets bonus stats per level based on stats at transmigration and total number of levels earned. Additionally, characters may "enter" an item and complete a dungeon to level up the item. These dungeons may also award other items, like at the completion of the last level of an item, they may obtain an item of the next tier. (I'll probably only have 2 tiers)

There are no tomes to purchase, but there is infinite potential for growth by means of transmigration.

So, how to make this map into something that people will play? I was thinking of trying an AoS / Foots vs Grunts or Enfos Team Survival map. The base idea is that there are control points placed about the map and these control points generate resources. Two (or three, undecided yet) overlords compete for total domination of the map. Meanwhile, there's plenty of neutrals that threaten both teams and can be used as sharpening stones for the heros and as a balancing force to prevent one team from steamrolling the other (if one side hold more control points, they'll have to deal with more of the neutrals).

I really enjoy the Foots vs Grunts game, though it's often a short game and the emphasis on heros is fairly small. I'm not terribly fond of AoS style maps, since they all seem boringly simple _and_ similar. EotA has a lot of different options, but you're still only controlling one hero and there aren't many heros to choose from. I also enjoy Enfo's Team Survival, though I often find the execution poor: Monsters quickly become incredibly uber, not all heros are balanced, and when one team looses the other team's game ends, as opposed to seeing just how much they can take.

I noticed the competitive games seem to draw a bigger crowd (EotA, Footies vs Grunts, Footmen Frenzy, ect) so I'd prefer to make a competitive game, as opposed to an RPG/hero siege. I also don't like the idea of people coming in with uber heros and owning everything, so I'm not in favor of being able to save progress (despite the tons and tons of gameplay that the original Disgaea offers). So what do people what? What do you think about the features I propose?
 
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