What's a game you're dying to play that doesn't exist?
Greetings everyone. I'm currently in the process of getting a Computer Science degree for two primary reasons. 1.) Because I want to get a stable development job where I'm currently employed, but most importantly to me 2) Because I want to make video games and have the educational credentials to confidently do so.
I know I know, you don't need a computer science degree to create video games, and my program doesn't even teach game development. So I have a long journey ahead learning game dev alongside my program in my own time. Also I have no intentions of working at an actual game company.
So my question today is,
What is a game that you are dying to play, that nobody has made yet?
I'm trying to get some inspiration. It's hard to think about something that truly doesn't exist, because there's so many amazing games already. I'm genuinely curious.
If you're struggling like I am, feel free to list a game that's been made exactly once but no ones been able to reproduce it's genius.
I'll start,
I am DYING to play a factory builder game, but with ARPG gameplay. So Factorio / Dyson Sphere Program meets Diablo 4 & Path Of Exile. I just think this would create such a dopamine addicting game that would be impossible to pull away from if done right. My idea would be to have the factory be the loot crafting mechanic for progressively better armos, while the ARPG is what you use to get the materials needed to craft truly insane gear. Idk, if done right I think this could have legs.
An actual modern day Freelancer.
I could expound, but it's really that simple.
Ok, I also couldn't type more an hour ago. Now I can.
There is no equivalent to Freelancer. If you have not played it and are into space games at all, do yourself a favour and just play this game. Freelancer is still better than most modern space games, even in its moderately janky incomplete state.
Aside from one thing that ties the whole room together, something I'll come back to later, it's difficult to say what mechanic makes this game great. I'm sure it has something to do with the intuitive gameplay, but it's nothing special by itself. Plenty of space games do something with movement that you can map on a slider somewhere between Arcade and Sim. Freelancer lands firmly on the arcadey side of things. There is no G-Force in space, only the size of your ship defines the rotational speed. Luckily, this arcade like movement gives you the level of control over your ship that makes it feel good to zip around in space and dogfight. Enough to suspend disbelief for me.
Trade then? You can trade in other space games, often with more depth to it too. It's not even dynamic (although there's a mod for that) so you can probably figure out the most profitable route yourself within a couple of hours of playing. Tradelanes, the space equivalent of the Schiphol moving walkways, makes travel seem less distant but they're functionally nothing more than an automated travel system. They can be disrupted by pirates, so it's not smooth sailing all the way through. Yet despite the monotony, it still feels good hauling stuff around.
The factions perhaps play some part. Factions is one of the things that was never fully fleshed out. At the time, Microsoft wanted the game to launch so stopped Chris Roberts (yes, that one) from tacking on more had him ship an incomplete game with an incomplete faction system. Still, the factions are decently well thought out and each have their own design choices and backstory that at least makes them unique and have clear motivations, some of them barely serviceable backstories.. but backstories nonetheless.
Missions are mostly "go here and kill this" and while there is variation, not much. Those are usually not too difficult though and can take you to some interesting places in the system you're in. It forces you to do some sightseeing, perhaps gets you to spot a little secret here and there, plus travel remains pretty neat.
Graphics were ok. Even then. But, style > fidelity. I'm frequently awed (to this day!) by the backdrop of a sun while cruising through a system. Somewhat recently the HD mod was fully released, which is a definite recommend.
However, all of this points to a mediocre at worst and to an enjoyable game at best. Nothing that would have me write this type of post some 23 years after the game first released right?
But that thing, that one thing I mentioned earlier, the thing that ties the room together. It's deceptively difficult to pull off even if the concept is actually very simple. Some games that are on our Earth don't even manage this.
The universe just feels alive. In numerous little ways, this game makes you feel part of a whole. It makes trading feel like you're a trader. It makes the factions feel purposeful. It makes hauling contraband dangerous when there's space cops nearby.
Rivalries between factions occasionally spring to life with shootouts when pirates raid a space station. The soundbytes that play when ships around you are being hailed. Your cargo hold being scanned by the police. That specific faction that specialises in trade lane disruptions disrupting your trade lane. Other trading convoys just trekking through space. Hidden gateways to other systems that the pirates use to move around. Mining factions slowly roaming around in asteroid fields. The scale of any given system is by no means huge by our standards, but it still takes a respectable amount of time to fly across a system. While it isn't dynamic, trade still makes sense when certain factions or planets only produce certain items.
This game manages something unique.
Even in the depths of space, this game feels alive. In a way that's believable, even if unrealistic.
I have not found something like this game since then. I always hope Freelancer gets the love it deserves. And no, Star Citizen ain't it.
This sounds amazing! Where do we get the game and mods?
I'm fairly certain that Freelancer is considered abandonware at this point. You're going to have to download a release somewhere like torrents.
The HD mod can be found on the lovingly oldschool Moddb (if anyone remembers that place): https://www.moddb.com/mods/freelancer-hd-edition
It changes up more things than just fidelity and is all round just a good quality of life fix.
I think you nailed it out of the park with this description.
Freelancer had a soul in a way that Elite Dangerous or No Man's Sky did not.
Elite Dangerous got the trade right, the missions system right-ish, factions right-ish. But going much closer to sim flight and scale meant the universe is so huge it feels dead. Fun in its own right, but not Freelancer.
Things like the gates for fast travel meant that activity was more clustered. Easier to stumblr across.
If EvE Online was brought closer to Freelancer scale (maybe a few hundred systems at most), the actual flight mechanics dialed almost entirely to arcade, and fast travel only able to be done via the gate/lane system, we'd be pretty close to a good upgrade.
The biggest desire you saw out of a lot of mods was the desire for players to get as big as the NPCs did. And for the economics to make sense.
Maaaaan it's so dumb how simple it looks to make a game have soul. But then most of them miss the mark, usually in more ways than one.
Sometimes when you try to dock a station in Freelancer, the game just tells you to wait your turn until the NPCs dock/launch. I don't really know if there's another game that makes you, the all mighty player, wait for an NPC docking sequence at random. Not every time, just like you're not always going to be scanned for contraband or hit a disrupted trade lane, just enough to create that feeling there's more than just you protagonisting all over the place without anything else happening in this game.
Or this trade lane disruption not even having anything to do with the player. That lane is disrupted by Xenos but they're not hostile to the player, they're attacking the trade convoys of Ageira and fighting the Liberty Police because yeah that's what pirates would do: A starving pirate crew would attack a loaded convoy of cargo ships from the agriculture/food industry to nick some much needed rations.
Some developers think that a player has to immerse themselves into a game by creating and playing a role beforehand, but then it completely falls flat when the player decides not to do that.. and the world around them is not accommodating to not being shaped by the player. Then you have this game that creates an environment that does sensible things without the player and all you have to do as the player to start playing.
Edit to add: The two videos I linked in my posts have been uploaded on YouTube within the last 10 months. This game refuses to die.
I've gotta get in on this game immediately
Yesss!
If the singleplayer no longer manages to keep your attention there are a couple of private servers still live and active.
Discovery is the all time top dog, for good or for bad, and is still accessible.
For a list of active private servers people can lookie here.
One thing of note for Discovery and the other servers marked as RP: Roleplay is heavily enforced. If that's not your cup of tea, find a non RP server instead.
I haven't looked at that server list in a while but it does seem like player count is drying up. Not at all strange for a game from 2003. A couple of them are still going strong though.
I’m seeing a lot of discussion about this game, particularly with people comparing it to Star Citizen or NMS or other popular space sims, which yeah don’t really seem similar.
But is there anything that sets it apart from X4 by Egosoft? Everything I’m seeing about this game sounds exactly like X4, to such an extent that if you just blanked out Freelancer and told me to fill in the blank, I’d guess X4 or one of the earlier entries in it’s franchise.
It ain’t a perfect game, but it seems like it checks all the boxes? Anyone have experience playing both that can tell me what I’m missing?
Freelancer can be played multiplayer. Playing in a small fighter squad takes it to a whole new level.
Ah got it, I knew there had to be something I was missing. Would you say X4 scratches a comparable itch? I’m tempted to give Freelancer a try myself, though at this point I’m not sure I know enough people willing to play it with me to get the full experience.
I've eyed X4 many times, but never pulled the trigger due to the lack of multiplayer.
I enjoy it, though I’m also a long time player of the franchise. They’ve been consistently improving the game year after year and the universe feels pretty alive at this point. It’s not the same as multiplayer, granted, but there’s plenty of universe to explore and interact with, plus a few quest lines that keep things fresh for a while.
I do know someone is working on a multiplayer mod, but it’s pretty early development so it’ll be a while before anything comes of that.
The Star Citizen comparison is easy, Chris Roberts was responsible for Freelancer and is now at the helm of Star Citizen. At the beginning of the kickstarter plenty of people figured that he was now finally able to make the game he wanted Freelancer to have been all along. Without Microsoft forcing an early release this time.
But hey we see how that turned out. Maybe Microsoft was onto something with Chris..
X4 is probably a decent comparison by itself but X4 tries to do much more than Freelancer. Quite frankly, I don't need Freelancer to do or be more than it is. I just need it do the same thing but better.
Personally, I always appreciate if the gameplay loop is tight. Freelancer is very simple and does those simple things well.
Then you have the thing that space games try to shoot for realism as a sort of holy grail. Which can be fucking awesome, but sometimes you just want a game that's fun and throws out the notion that pilots can't turn 180 in 2 seconds while burning at 300m/s.
Even though I can feel totally immersed in the game, Freelancer is anything but a sim.
You mentioned this in another post. The game is still properly cool as a Singleplayer game too and not too long to beat. Could always do that to see if it clicks.
THIS! Freelancer is one of my all-time favorite games. I played it so much back in the day. So sad we never got a sequel.
I used to play online on a server running a Battlestar Galactica mod, it was so much fun.
I liked the original Freelancer, but I played the Frontierspace mod until I had every section memorized.
The Frontierspace mod was different from others in that it had a built-in quest. Of course, the mod expanded the number of systems and added other groups as well. The biggest problem with the mod was that it was developed by one guy, and he never got around to fixing all the bugs. But it was still very fun to play.
Freelancer let me host my own server, something that very few games allow today.
Freelancer multiplayer is fantastic. There are plenty (for a 2003 game) of private servers still active too.
I fear this is just a waxing nostalgic post but I'm putting it up anyways.
Back in 2002ish I got my hands on Freelancer. This was when we still had dial-up so I didn't do much with multiplayer. I did come to love the game - as someone who was heavily invested in the Star Wars universe at the time, it was a really neat way to scratch that itch.
A few years later, we got DSL internet and I discovered multiplayer, and mods. Some of my favorite memories are about space trucking in a huge freighter through system after system, chatting and having a good time listening to prog rock. The game truly has iconic visuals.
I discovered the Freeworlds mod (Star Wars conversion) and got really really good at the space combat, becoming the reigning Pirate King by way of a duel system in place for that faction. I have some of immensely fond memories of that mod and that community.
It's one of my favorite games that I don't think I can ever "go home" to.
I will just put out there for those trying to scratch the Freelancer/Escape Velocity itch, Star Sector is fantastic BUT different.
It's 2d like EV, and it's about commanding a fleet, not a single ship. It's not a replacement for either, but if you liked them at all you really owe it to yourself to check it out. It's very close to 1.0 but has been one of the best games in the genre for years now.
Star Sector is pretty fucking cool in its own right. Good suggestion for sure. Space game fans should go into that game blind and just find out what that game has on offer, because it's a lot.
You could even try it for free with Youtuber SsethTzeentachs key. With full endorsement from the devs.
C-Beams is coming soon and looks like a modern, spiritual successor to the Escape Velocity franchise. I'm pretty excited for it.
Seconded, reminds me most of mount and blade in space! Great free form game to do what you want, I imagine there are tons of mods to extend you past the vanilla experience too.
My wife destroyed that game. I was just happy with the campaign, but she maxed out the Spanish (or Italian?) drug lord factions that you had to go out of your way to reach.
Spanish. The Corsairs and Outcasts were from the sleeper ship Hispania.
But yeah, getting those factions in good standing gave you access to other types of ships. Some impossible to get otherwise.
Oh god yes, I totally agree. Everspace 2 was a somewhat decent attempt at scratching that itch, but there were just things that didn't match up. It felt it was missing something, and whatever that "it" factor was, is likely one of the keys to making a good Freelancer again.
Word for word how I would describe Everspace 2. It almost got the feeling right but then some things just felt off. I was giddy when you first jump systems like tradelanes but then never booted the game again when I realised they're just glorified loading screens. Instantly turned me off the game. It was all veneer, no substance.
Even though it was pretty well done and it's more about preference, the combat in Everspace being closer to Privateer than Freelancer didn't quite match how I like things either.
Nail in the coffin was the gamified ARPG-type loot Everspace has. I like how Freelancer has set progression pieces, with some soft sequence breaking when you find a wreckage tucked away in an asteroid belt with good loot, but otherwise following a clear line through growing stronger.
Everspace also never gave me the feeling that the universe was alive like Freelancer does.
Everspace 2 is an ARPG set in space. It's not a "space game", if that makes sense.
Oh yeah I'm fully aware, it's just that I expected it to be something more than that and it unfortunately isn't.
I highly recommend first creating a game that has been done a million times already. Even a simple game like Tetris can teach you so much before having to also tackle new design issues.
That said I'd like to see a business building/management game that lets you hire employees that have Dwarf Fortress level of personalities and interactions. Maybe some of them hate each other and don't work efficiently. Maybe they form a union and go on strike. Maybe they have a bad day and go postal. Lots of fun potential!
Yes for sure, I have no intentions of making a massive, or even an "original" game right out the gate. I only just downloaded Godot and have been messing with tutorials, but I do program and code things for my job. So I'm not unfamiliar with code.
Genuinely I'm just curious as to what ideas others have that hasn't been done yet... There's just so many amazing games that I stop and wonder what hasn't been created yet? Somehow it's hard for me to think of that myself xD
Admittedly I read this on reddit, so it's not my original idea, but it's something I want to play.
You know how every game seems to use yellow paint to guide the player nowadays? How about a game where you are the painter? So the player would be dropped into a level designed with basically no affordances except a clearly marked entrance and exit. The player has a can of yellow spray paint that they can apply to arbitrary surfaces until it runs out. Once you run out of paint, an NPC (or other human? How could you make it fun and avoid trolls?) navigates the level based on the paint. Then the player is scored based on how easily the NPC navigated the area and how many secrets they found.
It sounds almost but not quite like Lemmings, which, come to think of it, could use a modern rework.
Sounds like that one part of The Stanley Parable.
The Stanley Parable Adventure Line! (Spoilers)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQ_kuOR0BM0&t=32
Where is it in The Stanley Parable? I only played it when it was given out on Play Station Plus, but that was the bonus version. I'm pretty sure I accidentally turned into the "bonus content" door accidentally and never properly finished the game.
The last things I remember are:
The bottomless pit that isn't quite bottomless and The Stanley Parable 2 tradeshow-like area.
A game popped up in my feed that had a similar premise. You're basically a director filing your typical action scene (presented as a 2d Flash era platformer), but your role is to basically "edit the level" around the stunt double, with a UI feeling like a videos editing program. Adjusting the level until you get a good take where the stunt double doesn't die.
It's a wrap
As for what I would love to play... A modern day Morrowind. To be fair, one is in the works and is almost done!
But what I mean by that is a game that gives me the same sense of wonder and whimsy and freedom that Morrowind did back in the day
That would be great! Have you taken a peek at: https://tesrskywind.com/
Yeah, skywind is what I meant, I'm really excited for it
More games like Katamari Damacy, not in the sense of quirky physics based action puzzlers (although those are welcome) but in the sense of more experimental alien / outsider designs.
I like simpler rpg and visual novels but kind of wish the would experiment with the formulas a bit more:
Totally agree. The most memorable games are usually ones that come with a totally unique take that then inspires an entire genre and copy cats. Stardew, Dwarf Fortress > Terraria > Minecraft, Pokemon, Vampire Survivors, Tetris, even the humble farm sim, match three, Flappy Bird or Angry Birds were innovations for their time.
There is one I haven't seen a lot of clones for, probably because of the creativity involved: Monument Valley and its use of optical illusion puzzles.
What I would really like to play is a modern 3D citysim with interesting & deep-ish simulations of society, politics, infrastructure, commerce, industry, transport, traffic, etc.. Ideally very optimized and self-published by an independent studio.
But that's very hard to make and basically impossible for a single developer.
Would your title be a top-down high level approach to city simulation and governance or would it be more at the ground level?
At the time I played Shenmue, the ground-level approach to city living had me totally enchanted. Opening drawers, taking the bus, shopping at the convenience store -- it all felt intensely personal and for me, that's the kind of city sim I'd love to see.
A life sim that takes place in a city with the option to shape the city through everyday tasks. And for godsakes put it in VR.
A citysim to explore in first person sounds cool too, but I'm basically looking for something along the lines of a classical sim like the SimCity-series, only in modern and complex.
The Cities:Skylines games go in that direction, but are quite simple and game-y; they're more like 'city painters' where it's basically impossible to fail, and their simulation is quite shallow. I would love something with much more depth and variety (and less DLCs 🙂).
I haven't given it a go myself yet, but have had it on my wishlist for a while Microlandia claims to at least check some of these boxes.
Looks good! It's not quite what I had in mind, but it's very cool that they've set a focus on the simulation aspects. I put it on my wishlist, maybe I'll check it out some time. Thanks for sharing!
Ughhh, I feel this so much! I love games like Cities Skylines & Manor Lords, or some of the Paradox games, but somehow it feels like no one has combined the concepts together to make a giant city simulator.
I myself have been looking for a game like this where you can be involved with society, while actively building it up.
I'd say that a city builder and city simulator could exist in their own genres, but yeah, it sounds like a massive undertaking. Whoever gets to it first though could be making something truly unique. Truly expensive too
Workers & Resources: Soviet Republic goes also in the right direction, it's probably the most complex city builder right now. But I'm not really a fan of its theme (russian vassal state), so it hasn't really clicked for me.
Yeah, I agree! Although the gaming market is so crowded, this particular niche has not been served yet. I hope we'll see more citysims in the future.
With a couple of friends at the moment:
Dyson Sphere Program optimization, scale, and graphics with Dwarf Fortress-level detail.
Spore but good.
I played a game in my youth called Mail Order Monsters for Commodore 64 that would be fantastic as either a mobile game or a full-fledged remake with modern graphics and gameplay.
Oooh! This reminded of "Gogo the Ghost" I think it was called...yes!... That I played a ton over at a friends house.
Seems like a good fit for mobile remake too!
My all time absolute favorite psuedo genre of game is something I'd maybe call... "Co-op journey games". Games where the objective is to get from one place to another over a long journey with your friends. Usually centered around some vehicle or vehicles.
Barotrauma is the one I've been playing lately, but RV There Yet, The Raft and so on fit into the genre nicely also.
I've always wanted one of those games, centered on an air ship. The key is that you must make a reason for the players to stop frequently. Interesting caves to explore, resources to upgrade the airship, fuel to power it, materials to craft ammunition for it. The airship becomes a base, but also close air support if you get into a sticky situation.
Upgrades and customization are the main source of the feeling of progression, and there are ideally lots of procedurally generated missions, but also hand crafted story missions that tell some sort of overall interesting story. Something like the fallout universe would be a great setting; huge overarching meta story, but also lots of interesting little pockets of societies and cultures within it.
I've dreamed of a game like that for years, but haven't seen anything that scratches the itch.
Have you played Subnautica? Without getting into spoilers, I think it is exactly what you are looking for. Though it's singleplayer only. That's what scratched this itch for me and I haven't been able to find a similar game since :(
I've tried Raft and a few more, but it's not the same. I'll definitely try Barotrauma. (I have RV There Yet wishlisted since a while).
I've also tried Pacific Drive. It's good, but it's not the same.
Would Forever Skies be of interest?
Disclaimer: I have not played the game, but I do have it wishlisted to try some day. It's just the first thing that popped to mind while reading your criteria.
I've looked at it. It seems really it interesting, but I haven't given it a try because I've heard there's not much in the way of content. If I'm going to rope a bunch of my friends into buying a game, I'd want something that'll keep them engaged for at least 20 or 30 hours.
I believe there was another similar game that was supposed to be released soon, but I forgot the name.
I haven't purchased the game for similar reasons. It seems really interesting though. The other game that's been on my radar is Everwind. I played the demo of that one, and it was still really unpolished. I'm keeping an eye on it for later though.
Riftbreaker is a combination of factory game and arpg combat! Though the combat isn't relevant to the building or upgrading, I believe
I actually have this in my library now, I gotta boot it up because I bought it for the exact reason... an ARPG factory builder experience. It looks fairly close to what I'm imagining. My backlog needs some... revisiting
A massive strategy / civ / nation management game that progresses very slowly through time. Maybe with the mechanics changing between eras to keep it fresh.
The closest to an all-in-one game like that I've seen is Spore with its different eras (cell, animal, tribe, civilization, space), but they're all just way too short. You can plow straight to space in a single sitting if you want to.
And I've heard that you can kind of do this with Paradox strategy games. Like start with CK3, convert your save file for Europa Universalis, convert that for Victoria, convert that for Hearts of Iron, etc. I've never actually tried that though, so idk how valid that is.
And then Civilization set with slow tech progression comes pretty close to it as well, but there's still something missing.
What I basically need is all three of those examples mashed into one game that nobody but me would enjoy!
I, too, would greatly enjoy this game.
Slow. Like, I want to celebrate building the first temple with my civ, the first aqueduct after 100 turns of work, or rushing the first granary and fighting off pests and protecting the grain from mold and wheat, just in time before the lean years come.
I always feel like Civ becomes less fun as things progress, and I wish we could stay in the antiquity age nearly forever, and then transition with my civ into the next age. Don't time skip me. Let's not pretend my immortal leader died overnight and suddenly chose all new building esthetics. Don't just give me microcontrollers and rockets to space with the same amount of effort as it took to make my first fishing boat.
Edit: Civilizations VII had a May 2026 "Test of Time" update in which you could stay as the same civ each age, apparently. (PC Gamer)
Yes, exactly! I like that mundane small stuff like a temple or fending off pests. But also I want to see those problems evolved into bigger problems as my village turns into a town, a city, multiple cities, regions, nations, empires, etc. I want to start off REAL micromanagey and then progress into broader stuff.
Exactly, I want to see some left over stones from that first temple incorporated into the archway for my civ's Stargate. I want my empire to carry the emblem of our first tamed horse, Bucky, from 10,000 BC.
But I also want the ability to zoom waaaaay back in, like, yes it's space age but I want to help one of my guys with installing their Bug Zapper 3000 today, and tomorrow I want to help that one little weird circle of worshippers get a virtual temple for their harvest festival.
I guess I want to roleplay as immortal guardian angel: intergalactic politics today, installing a toddler play area tomorrow.
Same kinda. Some combined game of Civ + simcity + aoe depending on the view level.
A brand new 2D-HD Pokémon mainline entry that is entirely designed with sprite art.
Call me a nostalgia whore, but I just think that 3D Pokémon hasn’t yet caught up to 2D... with the possible exception of Legends: Arceus, which I have not played yet because despite its fun gameplay, it looks horribly outdated, and is in dire need of a remake on the Switch 2.
Maybe like Octopath Traveler style?
I have multiple:
A smaller scale Homeworld, where I can manage a small persistent fleet of ships revolving around a capital ship where I can micromanage its systems. Also procedurally generated missions and sectors that I can endlessly play. The games in this genre are either block-based type ship builders (Cosmoteer/The Last Starship/Avorion), single ship pirate/trade/mineathons (Star Valor/Endless Sky), or make you eventually run a big fleet of capitals to tackle the biggest threats in the game. Closest one to what I'm thinking are Star Wolves, Nexus: The Jupiter Incident and if you intentionally keep your fleet size small in Starsector.
The original vision for House of the Dying Sun (Enemy Starfighter). It was supposed to be dynamic missions where you warp in with a fleet, do the job, and warp out. The final release is a fixed campaign and a wave-based defense mode.
A modern day Jason Bourne simulator social stealth game. Lose Treadstone agents in a crowd, keep your mark alive in the most intense escort missions ever made, and using what you can when you have to fight. I want the crowd as an actual gameplay mechanic instead of just donning disguises or dark/light stealth. References: Radical Entertainment's cancelled Treadstone game, and the bluffing and melee mechanics in 007: First Light. Basically encourage the player to be scrappy by using whatever's at hand instead of having a magic inventory and turning the game into another open world third-person cover shooter.
For #1, have you had a look at NEBULOUS: Fleet Command? They recently added a campaign mode and campaign editor.
I dipped out around the time the original conquest mode was shown and the pace of updates that seemed like it was leaning to cater to the PvP multiplayer crowd.
I get what it's going for, but if there was one thing I wanted out of a singleplayer part was a system like in UBOAT where you can fine-tune how much automation you want to engage particular systems. Never sat right with me where games tell you that you're a commander or a captain of something with a full trained crew, yet you're also the one who has to manually curve your custom-built missiles around a rock to hit a target behind it. Even Soulslikes have a more gradual introduction of game systems leading to the skill check with the first boss. I'll have to see if the campaign here hits that.
So, since ideas are free and I haven't made any progress in over a decade I'll give you a couple of mine (and they have probably been done, just without me seeing them or in the wrong art style or tempo, etc)
First I have an idea for a party 2D platformer where you play as rats taking over a house. You can play up to 4 rats, but each rat also has a playable tail, so up to 8 players can play. You use the tails to swing yourself and each other, pull handles, bridge gaps, etc. Most levels are for 4 players (2 rats), but some require 8. To compensate for when you don't have 8 players you can pause the game and change what you are playing as. This also allows for game mechanics or even modes where you are given a new entity to play by the game rather than yourself. The game can then also be played by 1 player but then it becomes more of a puzzle game. I envision it in the style of Spelunky and the tempo from classic Sokoban all the way to Geometry Dash with fairy×DnB music.
My second game is a Tower defense × MOBA × Lemmings like game for 1-4 players. Imagine DOTA2 or LOL without the players so only the buildings and creeps/minions remain. You gain gold passively and from different buildings. You use the gold to power up your creeps and buildings and even to lay new tracks to take control over new buildings/resources or to create a backdoor into the enemy base. The core is PvE with a good scenario-editor backed by a custom language (Lua?) to create and share single map scenarios and campaigns. The feel I want to go for is single player Warcraft 2, but with tracks/lanes and more RPS than micro managed fights by how you power up your creeps & buildings. It must be possible to create PvP scenarios and campaigns too, but the core game should not ship them but allow players to create them. At most the core game could ship a scenario where players play against each other as a race but not actual fighting. (This is to set the tone of the game and to encourage cooperative over adversial gaming.) I think of this as an isometric pixel game with a Megaman feel, no idea about the soundtrack though!
Take the strategic layer of a previous or current generation paradox interactive GSG with the tactical layer of the total war games.
Into desperately want something like a Slay the Spire game set in the Netrunner universe.
I’m not super interested in Netrunner as a PvP game, though I do find it and the universe it inhabits fascinating. It feels like old school cyberpunk as a genre is fairly under represented in roguelike spaces. As much as I love Slay the Spire’s vibe and art, applying those mechanics to a cyberpunk world really isn’t represented out there.
I don't think it's netrunner, but this kinda seems like what you're looking for: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2576200/Into_The_Grid/
I've not tried it yet since my backlog is so huge, but it's a game I've been keeping an eye on and early reviews seem fairly positive.
I would love to see a modern Syndicate game. The isometric one, not that fps garbage.
I'm sorry, but I'm twisting this the other way - I would love to read Benoît Sokal's book that Syberia was based on (there is no such book to my knowledge).
As for games I'm dying to play that don't exist, it also isn't an answer you are longing for - many games "don't exist" because they are behind launchers or need to make an account. They do exit now, but will they ten years from now? 20? Will developers make them playable even without additional software needed when the studio goes bankrupt? Will they make them independent on server connection once they decide to shutdown the servers? Games like these "don't exist" for me.
And actual one game I would love to play - singleplayer racing simulator. I'm talking career. You start with say go karts, go up to say hobby kit cars, cup cars... all this while actually playing simulator, not arcade or simulator-dressed-arcade. Maybe something like that is out there, but I don't think so. Game that got this close on the career side might be Toca Race Driver (2), but it lacked on simulation, although it wasn't that much of an arcade game.
I know Assetto Corsa, Automobilista and some other games that are great sims, but I think none of them has carrer mode from "nobody" to "champion in multitude of racing styles". I'm not counting mods, I would love to have a game developed as this from the start.
In my process of playing Forza Horizon 6, I also got a similar itch to play a racing game where you have a rags to riches story.
I found online that Grand Turismo should scratch the itch, but I don't have a PS5! Are you familiar with the game at all? It seems to be the closest I've found to this concept. I would love to see a game where you start off with some go karts unseriously with NPC friend, but then get more serious up to racing in Grand Prix's when the character realizes they actually like racing.
Just something like that. Like the Tony Hawks Underground of racing games.
I ha e played Gran Turismo 3, 4, 5, and 6. All of them have "career" where you start with sone budget or some slow car from like 100-150HP range. You choose what races you want to try, you have to do licences to unlock higher tier races, you have to win money and prize cars to be able to win higher races etc.
There are just two "problems": 1) There is no actual campaign/career, you choose what and where you go, kinda open world but limited by the cars you have - this is kinda fine, not really problem; 2) neither of the games is actually a simulator, they come as close as they can while still being playable by almost anyone, but they are not hard simulators.
From those, I like GT4 most. Part of it is definitely nostalgia, but also some hard facts - unbelievably lonb list of licences and driving missions, which are all challenges for the player (while racing alone can be steered your way if you pick and tune up your car in your favor). Another thing is there are endurance championships and endurance races. Have you heard of 24h Le Mans? You can race it on your PS2. Yes, the whole 24h without any chance of saving your progress anytime throughout the race. GT4 was real hardcore sometimes.
GT5 lacked some (tracks, cars, finesse), GT6 gave you starting car which means you can't choose your path from the start, which is kinda let down for me. Previous games let you buy one by yourself and made it fun from the start. In GT4 (and I believe 5 too), you could buy used older car with higher power but possibly worse handling (being older technology). But the higher power hnlocked some higher races from the start, which meant saving more money and different progression for you.
Gran Turismo games are great and I thought about them when writing my comment. It's just I'd like some of the GT aspects mixed with Toca Race Driver mixed with Assetto Corsa.
I would like a game that is a MMO, but instead of being an RPG it is more like a squad based tactics game. It should be turn based (everyone sets up their turn in parallel), but each turn is limited to e.g. 30 seconds. Out of combat there's no need for turns.
I've imagined this heavily inspired by Necromunda. You essentially control a gang in the underhive. You send out gangers to collect resources from your safe house. If they encounter combat you can opt to control it (or potentially auto resolve).
I played a lot on https://www.konkr.io/ a while back and loved it. The reason was because 2D turn based combat is in a lot of games, but I was never good at them. They become too complex too quickly and as a total scrub I was never able to understand why I suck, and there were never any game commentary that go over the most basics of assumptions that seem clear to everyone commenting "get good, scrub".
I love konkr.io for it's simplistic rules played out over and over again in many slightly different scenarios and on two different difficulties. I love the indicator and speech bubbles that give clues to how the opponents feel, and how their feelings change every turn. I love how you can easily rewind and fix a mistake I didn't see instantly.
I wish chess was like that: take back as many turns as you want, are you sure you want to do that did you see the rook there, hey you left a piece unprotected. I wish shooters were like that: Superhot but for utter scrubs. I wish Crypt of the Necromancer had all the middle steps in between turn based mode and even the easiest of their character modes.
Surely many of us are utter scrubs who would love games if given patient guidance. You might even make a best seller for a super wide market.
Honestly, I feel this too. There are games I have in my backlog that I've been meaning to play, but then thinking about the mechanics puts me off. Like for example, Stellaris is a game I've been meaning to play and enjoy, but I just know I'm going to have to play like 15-20 hours before I even have a grasp of what's going on... And I'd rather put that time towards something I already understand... Like Guild Wars 2 xD
Overall, I think a game that takes a complex idea but breaks it down in easily digestible ways would have a lot of potential.
Maybe even just presenting behind the code information might help: eg, you crossed the enemy's line of sight, or enemy range detection range circle, or 2 turns till have have enough units to win etc, or if you spend points buy nice to have X it comes out of your budget for necessity Y. It can't be text box either that's super boring and naggy, so it has to be layered into the gameplay very gently. I know that still sounds super boring for old players or intuitively good gamers, but surely there's a bunch of us out there....
I'd never played konkr, but after playing the first map this game looks to have been heavily inspired by Slay which was originally released in 1995. There is another game that is also a clone/inspired by Slay called Antiyoy.
I bought Slay after seeing a YouTube video on it and seeing it wasn't too expensive on Android, so I used my Google Survey rewards money to get it. I haven't played too much Antiyoy, but I've slowly been playing through Slay to beat all the maps included in the base game on Master difficulty.
I wanted to bring this up in case you/anyone else in the thread are looking for similar games.
Edit: I looked up the game as I was curious if there was an app for it to add to my phone, and found the dev mention that he was inspired by Slay here: https://www.reddit.com/r/playmygame/comments/wdog32/konkrio_a_deceptively_simple_turnbased_strategy/
I would love a sniper elite type game, but focused around bows and and crossbows.
Shooting people with arrows is so satisfying, but it always has to share development time with other mechanics. You could add difficulty by giving enemies armor, so the player has shoot through the eye holes in their helmets and other weak points
World of Warcraft 2
It's called Final Fantasy XIV. ;)
"Study WoW and do what people like about it, and do other things better," was basically the directive for it during development. And the past several years have had some very transparent borrowing in reverse by WoW.
I'd be curious to hear what you want from it that isn't given by current retail WoW? I'm inclined to think the Blizzard I'd want to make WoW2 doesn't exist anymore and kind of WoW2 I'd want to play isn't viable in 2026 (outside of niche servers like Classic, Seasons of Discovery, etc.)
Yes I have no trust in Blizzard to make it. I'm sure they will try at some point in the future, possibly after the next expansion which will wrap up this World Soul Saga unless they just keep making endless amounts of WoW expansions, successful or not. Either way there's a reason it doesn't exist.
WoW2 would push boundaries, be a refresher to a stale genre, break new ground, etc. I really enjoyed something like New World in the first few days or weeks of playing it. It was a modern take on the MMORPG but as we all know it failed miserably once its lack of content became obvious. So WoW2 would have modern combat, it would have modern graphics, thoroughly designed environments, je ne sais quoi! I don't really have any concrete answers as to what it should be I guess. Just a sort of vague wish for a continuously fulfilling gaming experience in a world I've loved and liked and at times disliked across 20 years of gaming.
can we get a world of starcraft first please
I've got a couple projects I've been sitting on but haven't done anything with yet:
An incremental game satirizing gacha. There's some overlap there like in silly resource mangement. You increment dollars when your guy goes to work (perhaps played out by a minute of mashing a button at the start) then blow it on currency for pulls. Once you gather the current "released" characters or "max" power cap, the devs release a new update making more characters available and new power caps. And having routes to alter the "day" portion like change jobs, improve income, take out a credit card you can/not afford, go totally destitute, rise to corpo, etc.
A v-pet/creature collector where you can do stuff with them besides fighting. Like imagine pokemon gen3 beauty contest, but with some more depth, and plus a couple other modes like racing, platformer, puzzle, base building, etc. Yeah, it means essentially making multiple games in one and even if none is taken to the full depth a dedicated game would go, folks wanna play with their lil guys.
The prior would probably be the one I try at sooner while the latter would probably be a long term project worked on in chunks.
You may know Hardspace: Shipbreaker, a space aim where you're a roughneck taking apart junked spaceships and have to be mindful of electrical systems, air, and safely dismantling nuclear reactors among others. I want a game that's the opposite.
A game set on a variety of hazardous situations - sinking ships, oil rigs on fire, natural disasters on the ground. Your job is to buy time by patching up the structure and mitigating the damage, evacuate the passengers / workers, and figure out what the hell happened to cause this before the whole thing goes up and evidence gets wiped out. There's no real antagonist besides the environment around you - fire, water, rubble, explosions - all doing its best to kill you and claim the lives of everyone inside. Idk I feel like this is where humanity and heroism shines.
When I read you wanted the opposite, for a brief moment I was thinking about Viscera Cleanup Detail but that’s very much after the disaster, not patching up during.
I really like your idea, and there’s a lot that could be borrowed from real life emergencies! Maybe you’re one of the first responders for the Haiti earthquake (2010, too soon?) or in NYC for 9/11 (2001, too soon?) or at the Chernobyl disaster (1986, too soon?) or on the lower decks of the Titanic (1912, too soon?) or the Great Fire of London (1666, too soon?)
I want an open-world Police Officer sim. Like LSPDFR does for GTA. The police games that are out there that act as if they are that are so poorly done.
Oh, and a modern SimCopter!
I want first person 3D PCVR platformers with good graphics.
I would love that, but if we had The Matrix level of technology, otherwise it’s just a motion sickness nightmare for most of us, I’m afraid.
No, you are a minority!
I have some stupid ideas for multi-player games that have weird play styles that I don't think anyone would actually play haha.
These are all stupid ideas I had over the years and never actually bothered to finish lol
Devil May Cry LAEWM (Literally Any Entry With Multiplayer.) The cameo feature in DMC5 proved it was possible, Mission 13 confirmed it could be fun. Mods sort of make this possible, but I'd -kill- for that kind of gameplay and co-op modes.
Though I would settle for another genre: No Man's Sky but with a mix of human and alien NPCs and a less fantastical art-style. Starfield has the visuals I crave (and I think it's shaping up to be decent at this point) but No Man's Sky has the gameplay loop of roaming space to scavenge just enough to keep on truckin' that I once only dreamt about.
I'm in almost the same boat as you: one of the ideas that motivate me to do game dev so that I can execute them one day is a fighting game based on 3D beat 'em up gameplay (DMC).
Street Fighter started out as basically a translation of classic beat 'em ups in a player versus player context, and nearly everything that came after SFII followed the same mold. There's nothing that makes more sense as a concept than doing the same thing with the games that succeeded those beat 'em ups. But somehow, no one's considered it! Instead, everything 3D is either a spin on Tekken and Virtua Fighter's super grounded, close quarters formula, a janky arena fighter with no sauce, or some esoteric thing like Power Stone.
We've had something around 30 years of stylish beat 'em ups in 3D that operate with a similar mechanical basis, that all take from fighting games, that all allow for high amounts of expression, and not a single one's considered having one such game where you fight other people instead. Why?!
I'd love it if more developers opened their games up to alternate control schemes. I'd love the option to play Monkey Ball and Katamari with a trackball, or for arcade racers to accommodate steering wheels and shifters.
Most of all, I'm suuuuper looking forward to the Steam Frame's ability to play 2D games on the unit, and hopefully, the mod community's commitment to introducing full motion controls to already immersive worlds.
Seeing what the community managed to accomplish with Skyrim was nothing short of mind blowing, and I don't even really like the game.
I have a list, but keeping this short:
2D Block button fighter ala MK. MK has been dropping the ball for years but there's some really neat design space there that no one wants to pick up the slack on.
About 100,000 custom games from the WC3 era. Of note Island Defense (asymmetric team vs 1 multiplayer), Tech Wars/Boreal Conflict (RTS Macro without the micro), Parasite (asymmetric team vs 1 but think The Thing or Among us), and TD's THAT GIVE A SHIT ABOUT MAZING (basically anything made by Zoatar such as Zoatar TD which is also a 5 v 5 team game or Sprout).
Anything riffing off what Offworld Trading Company but with a 4x take. Basically take the market ideas from Endless Space 2 but make them actually matter as resource scarcity is really really good for driving player interactions.
Something akin to Diplomacy/Solum Infernum in that it's a FFA setup but requires co-operation and deceit to really succeed.
A successor to Snkrx. Brilliant time killer with a lot of room for growth. Dev planned on it then moved on, which fair enough, but I think there's some very clever space there.
Think those are the highest up there. Given your goal, i HIGHLY, rec looking over custom game scenes like WC3, SC, CS, whatever. These are often games built with in game game engines and thus have had a lot of time to focus on "what's actually fun and can be done in this limited framework" rather than just "well first build an open world simulation..."
I have a few, which is why I did the same thing as you, OP! I described one in another comment, but another one I want to make is a 3D beat 'em up game that takes after Kingdom Hearts II's game feel. I do mean Kingdom Hearts II. It's unique compared to any Kingdom Hearts game or to anything that takes after DMC, by how fast individual attacks are and how fluid and effortlessly aerial it all is. Air combo attacks move your character on hit, and air finishers move you back down quickly to continue fighting. Your moves change based on distance and position of the target to make it simple to start combos while giving an importance to intentional spacing if you want to fully control your kit. Long combos are possible and look awesome and short combos are valued too. It just feels so cool in hand ; yet, negative feedback at release had them decide to move away from that style of combat in later entries, and no game's ever reproduced that feel somehow !
You may be interested in Duskfade and Genokids. Both have playable demos. One released in early access a few months ago and the other is releasing 13th August.
I have a few
Spiritual successor to Wario Land 3
Antonblast and Pizza Tower are based on Wario Land 4, which is my most disliked entry in the series. What I really want is a game more like Wario Land 3, an open-world Metroidvania puzzle platformer where the player character is immortal and traverses the world hunting for treasures with a mix of platforming challenges, transformations and item unlocks.
RTS/MOBA hybrid
Picture this. A MOBA where you fight on a three lane map separated by a river and jungles, similar to Dota 2 and League of Legends. But rather than control one singular hero, you control small to medium sized armies of troops you produce from a central building near your fountain.
The closest I've seen a game get to nailing this idea was Guardians of Atlas, a short-lived 3v3 RTS that lasted about three weeks in open alpha before the developers pulled the plug.
Modern-day take on GunZ: The Duel
GunZ was a Korean third-person arena shooter released by MAIET in the mid-2000s, and gained a cult following over the years because it was basically the Super Smash Bros Melee of arena shooters. Both games had competitive scenes, both games revolved heavily around movement exploits and glitches, and both games had their developers patch out said tech in future updates and newer instalments.
K-style is the umbrella term for all the movement exploits and glitches in GunZ that let you do things like climb walls indefinitely, short hop/attack/block in quick succession similar to wavedashing, slash-shot, dash break, animation cancelling weapon switches with reloads, and lots of other things. This makes GunZ one of the most mechanically intensive arena shooters to exist, and it's such a shame that MAIET mismanaged it to an early grave
We've already seen loads of attempts at creating spiritual successors to Smash Bros and Quake 3 Arena, but I haven't seen any attempt at creating an arena shooter that plays just like OG GunZ.
Wow, it's been a long time since I thought about GunZ: The Duel. Apparently it's getting a Steam release too, though getting a big enough mass of players to make it viable is another story.
I don't know how easy it would be to do, but I always thought it would be cool to be able to plug in two mice, one for each hand, and control two crosshairs at once while your character is on rails and moves around automatically.
I feel like this would be the perfect game for the Switch 2 architecture
I’d love to be able to play a game for litrpgs I’ve enjoyed like arcane ascension (sufficiently advanced magic) or dungeon crawler Carl. Maybe they will be made one day!
This is the first time I’ve heard of litrpg. I think I’m going to check that out!
They scratch that itch of playing a game but with mostly story, and no decision fatigue.
I had tons of game ideas for games I wanted to make, just so that I could play them. It was what originally got me to learn programming as a kid. Well, that and the fact that all old home computers came with BASIC and I ran out of games to play :)
One that comes to mind that I actually got pretty far along in developing was essentially a multiplayer side scrolling "beat em up" game in a large persistent world with some RPG aspects. This was well before tacking on RPG-ish features became common in games. I based my game on the NES game River City Ransom because it was the closest thing I had played that was a beat em up that let you explore a world (well city) and get money and improve your character with new moves and stats. I called my game River City Ripoff because I was using sprites I made from RCR, but ideally I'd eventually get someone with actual art skill to make sprites in the vein of the Capcom CPS games (e.g. Final Fight). The game had a server you connected to and you chose your character and off you went. I worked on it in the early 2000s and it was based on Java 1.1, I even made an applet version of the client (you can see how old we're talking here). Life just never let me get too much further in making it, but it was playable even if my netcode was fragile and iffy. That was probably the most complete that any of my homebrewed games got.
I guess Star Citizen but it's not a scam and it actually delivers.
Black & White 3 with an unlimited budget with direct input from the original artists, designers and programmers. Just give them all a giant office with all the freedom to bring on new talent and let them cook. Peter Molyneux is completely optional.
I want 1vs100 back.
Sonic Adventure 3, but mostly just because I really want a modern chao garden game. It seems like a concept that would be ripe for releasing as a mobile game with predatory micro-transactions and I'm semi-shocked that Sega hasn't done anything with it. That being said, I think there is something to the gameplay loop of play a sonic level, then hangout in the chao garden. If the sonic levels are removed, I suspect that it would be beneficial to add something else back in to replace them.
You’re thinking about Star Garden.
It’s not exactly what I personally want, because I’d like it to also look more modern, and the gameplay outside of the garden to not be based on Kirby Air Rider (which, by the way, this game has been in development long before Kirby Air Riders on the Switch).
So yeah, I’m 1,000,000,000% with you. I want a Sonic Adventure 3 with a Chao Garden. By itself, it wouldn’t be as fun.
Or someone come along and create a 3D platformer with something like a Chao Garden that works in tandem with it.
So there are two games I have thought about making but have never been made..
Football ref - you are not the player, but you play as the actual ref. Run around the pitch, follow the action. Left stick moves, right stick is your 'field of view'. You are responsible for paying attention, blowing the whistle, calling fowls etc. Make your way through the ranks - start with local sunday league games and grow your career and be responsible for reffing ever bigger games. You would be graded on your knowledge of the rules, how accurate you are - and you can earn reputation over time for being amazing, or not very amazing. OR you could 'go rogue' - call some things wrong.. Be the cause of controversial decisions. You could be called in to reff for a two player match - they could pick how close to the rules they want you to follow. Do you show unbiased rules-adherence, or do you blatantly favor one team over another, along with the consequences for your career and your stats? Could be a fun twist on soccer..
The other game was 'Geriatric Racer' - inspired by the car tuning of Gran Turismo. Pick an old person and 'upgrade' them to go faster. Start with better shoes. Perhaps upgraded glasses, a walking stick with a special rubber stopper on the end for more grip. Perhaps allow some sabotage towards the other racers. Eventually you can upgrade to the mobility scooter division and really go crazy with upgraded batteries, new aero parts, spikes on the wheels etc. Your quest is to become the champion before your time runs out. Or something.
So far these games have never been made - an injustice!