Living on the badlands. Be prepared for a long read. It'll take some talking to get my vision out there in the clear. 'Living' on 'the badlands.' is a project of mine that I've been working on for quite some time, and I'm excited to be previewing it to you all today. For a while, I was actually getting a bit bored with making normal competitive maps, so I moved onto mini-games. And, sure enough, after tireless work in the mini-game department, I was finished there, too. I wanted to create something entirely different. Something no one else had ever seen before. I had a fantastic idea, but, with the current maps, it simply could not be achieved. With the release of Sandbox, the possibility for this idea I had became a reality. I got to work laying out everything- from the map to the gametype, and after a week's worth of hard work, it's nearly ready for it's testing period. But what is it, you ask? Living on the badlands isn't a mini-game. It isn't a competitive map, a racetrack, or anything else you've seen before. It's a world. Yes, an entire world. Players begin with nothing but a Magnum. This is their 'wallet'. Of course, you can use this to defend yourself, but it will mainly be used for monetary purposes, which I will explain. In the world of LotB (Living on the badlands.), players can do what they want, when they want, and, most importantly, play how they want. Think of LotB as an open-ended world, a la an MMO. You can go around head-hunting, buying weapons, vehicles, power-ups, and even houses. But how is purchasing made possible? I created a unique system that allows players to purchase in-game items for their own use. As you can see in the picture below, players shoot at and destroy pallets holding their item of choice. Different items are located in different stores and locations throughout the world. I'm going to ask nicely that you don't go and blatantly steal my idea, thanks. The purchasing system. A weapon store. As I said above, players can purchase houses, using a unique switch system (courtesy of goatnuts420 of www.h3artificer.com) which allows the player to buy a 'key', find their house of preferance, and unlock the door. Sandbox offers an expansive environment, and with the guardians blocked off, this holds true even moreso. Explore the vast badlands area, or travel underground to the caves. (I'll be adding a sky area in a 'patch', later on.) I wanted to give the players a sense of freedom in the world of LotB. You can do what you want. There is no objective. No time limit. No restrictions. Of course, you can make it into a deathmatch, which proves equally as fun, but like I said, it's up to you. It'll play very well with up to 16 players, but can work just fine with around 5. Look for it coming soon. Any and all feedback is appreciated.
I am going to call this LotB an RPG if you will. Now, I myself have thought of this, and I doubt many others haven't, but if you get this to work it will be way cooler than any of the things I've thought of. Mainly because of the points system. If I may be so bold, I have an idea for respawning. How about you set all starting points in the main tier, and in the skybox have a long bridge from one side to the other that players spawn at on death. Upon death the player has to walk the bridge of shame with nothing but his or her magnum. He must use the magnum in several instances to get crates to drop so to makes jumps over wholes in the bridge. At the end of the bridge, there is a teleporter which will drop you at the top of the main tier where you fall back into the world. What purpose does this serve? It punishes the player for dying. You loose valuable money because you died, and start out with even more nothing. It encourages teamwork. If more than one person dies, why should you loose so much to a murderer, or why should you be weak to murder upon leaving? Share ammo and get out with more. It encourages sneakiness. You and your friend just died, but your friend does not know such. Hide behind him at respawn and wait until HE opens up all the doors and get out with a full clip. I think my idea enhances the feeling of life a little. Although the deathmatch thing could have a little problem with this respawn idea. Why don't you make two versions: LotB Life Version, and LotB Weapons Version. They are the same but some items in Life version are replaced with weapons in Weapons version, and weapon doesn't have the walking system. What do you think of my ideas?
Sounds awesome. Only problem I see is that you don't get that many pallets. Maby for some things you might want to use fusion coils that knock stuff off. Also, to make some things cost more, you could have it set ontop of two pallets. This would be a great infection map too, give the humans 3 minuts to gather their equitment, then the zombies come.
I had the idea of making things more expensive, but during testing, I ran into a few problems. To start, you get enough ammunition to buy two items. (Say, a weapon and grenades, or a weapon and a house.) So, adding another pallet would use all of your ammo. I tried it with a Warthog, but it ended up becoming that no one would use the Warthog, because they were left with nothing. I feel that the 'one-pallet-per' idea has worked better so far.