Crazy Idea: Let's start up a group project!

Interviews with Grand Battlers.

ON EAGLE TIME NEWS.

So I was thinking about making a group project again, and then I thought "oh hey, we have this thread I made a while back, don't we".

I notice we have a few ideas, like the murder mystery one, but nothing concrete's come out of it.

So I'm going to toss out some more concrete ideas.

1) Group adventure or comic-like thing.

Basically, this would be "a bunch of people come up with a story together" (something we already do quite a bit of) and "a bunch of people illustrate the story". People could do music if they were so inclined too, as well as anything else.

I think we'd all need to agree on a basic story, and on the overall organization of things. (for example, do we have one main writer who consults with other people to make sure the story's polished? Multiple writers with some organized way of settling disputes if they arise?) Could be fun if people are up for it, though; I'd certainly be interested in writing for such a thing myself.

2) Group-designed game

Basically the same as the above, only a video game. This does have some key differences, notably that we'd need programmers and pixel art (though non-pixel concept art wouldn't hurt.)

As an alternative, we could maybe plan out a game in some level of detail, something just a tiny bit more structured than #mspafaQuest was. What I mean by that is, we'd actually accept and reject ideas, but not worry about making an actual game out of it. Just do some writing and some concept art, maybe plan out puzzles and dungeons or whatever we're doing with it. We wouldn't have a lot to show for it in the end, but it might be fun to just come up with stuff and not worry too much about the details collecting it all into a playable product.

I guess those are the main things I can think of. Any interest in those? Or other general ideas along those lines?

Okay I'm going to toss this idea out there and you guys can judge it's worth.

Now I'd say that the real "group project" here is the eagle time forum itself but blahblahblah that's not what we're talking about.

However I was looking back at that Alternia bound thing that Andrew Hussie did but that's homestuck so who-gives-a-shit, but then I saw what kazergad (his name?) did for Prequel adventure (which you can check out HERE) and I was thinking

What if we did that, but made it an introduction to Eagle-Time?

We want to expand this forum to a larger audience eventually, and probably starting with an MSPA familiar crowd (since that's where all this jazz met up from), so why not give them a little game to play to get familiar with the forum rules and culture?

GENERIC PLAYER could enter the town/forum and start walking around talking to people (US) to figure out what there is here and what we're all about. Since it's a flash file we could build to it every now and then to add extra areas and subforums that crop up.

I mean there could even be a whole GRAND BATTLE BUILDING filled with cameos of all your favorite characters and writers to introduce newcommers.

These type of flash story things can lend themselves to organized collaborations (so and so get background music, make the tiles, need a sprite?, can someone write some dialouge? What sort of design will this have? etc.) And it shouldn't be to difficult to bounce around a shared .fla file between flash endowed authors.

As far as programming it goes, I have a little bit of experience with actionscript, not much, but just enough to say that it is not that difficult to pick up for computer savvy individuals.

I like this idea in particular because I think it's something we could easily complete and still have a fun satisfactory and purposeful product. Or something like that.

Thoughts?

Btp I think that sounds really fucking cool.

But I'm not really an authority on these things :v

i hope other people think its really fucking cool too because it sounds really fucking cool.

Re: band idea

Project leader/organizer picks a piece of music that has a lot of parts, all of which they can obtain

Each part is distributed to a different participant

Each participant records themself playing their part with whatever instrument they want (e.g. piano, guitar, synth, tracking program, keytar, voice, etc.)

All the parts are submitted to the project leader/organizer, who puts them together and posts them in the thread

Wacky hijinks ensue

I can play the slide whistle.

I dibs female vocals.

Also Thanks Yoshi! I think it is a cool idea too! I also hope other people think it is cool!

Here is a less-cool idea but maybe an easier one?

A composite image. Say like an "eagle-time" themed image but broken up into a grid. We then each draw a square and put it together. I then print the finished product out and use it to decorate my room.

Maybe like this except the eagle is crying and wearing a bandanna-mask. and it says WOOP ZOOP instead. I mean, duh.

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Wheat is THIS the team you were thinking of?

D: but bob I wanted vocals ;-;

Cool stuff.

I like the idea of an Eagle Time flash game type thing. Perhaps it could incorporate the band idea in some fashion? i.e. either as background music, or have like a music hall area where people can go and listen to some sweet Eagle Time beats?

1) Group adventure or comic-like thing

I have been meaning to kick off something like this since a few weeks. I hope I will get around to it soon. ; -;

It would be either something silly like #mspafaquest was, only with an actual continuous story interwoven with worldbuilding. Perhaps some sort of thing like the old Hexasandbox was. Other ideas was the daily life and stuff of the Eagle Dungeon. Or something. Still thinking about if it should be silly self inserts or just a story with original character, preferring the latter, I guess.

As my first contributive post, I will say that this collaborative band is a thing I can help in and the radio play also sounds need, and I'd like to check out this Dungeon Architecturing.
But what is/was #mspafaquest?

(I call violin, it is the best instrument)

Other idea I had was to make a pen and paper wargame together.

Maybe like Eaglehammer40000? Or Eaglerfworld? I don't really know, since I have not actually played wargames yet, but I always enjoyed turn based combat of games like Heroes Of Might and Magic, and I know some basic things from a Mass Combat GURPS Supplement.

I had two version of this idea:

#1: Conquer the world

Balanced game with unit buying,factions and cities and such. Factions would start out from a singe tiny town, and take over the world until there is only one faction left, or the Time Limit is reached.
Pros: More interesting and larger world, possibility to RP out certain negotiations.
Cons: Too much bookkeeping. Takes a very long time to finish. Battles have to be very abstract.

#2: Skirmish
Small scale battles, with more emphasis on tactics then strategy. More in depth combat. The gameplay would be based on "what if" scenarios like "Can an army composed from these units take over the Haast Mines defended by these units?" or "Can two dire walruses defend a castle full of traps from 100 Shovel Imps?" .
Pros: Less bookkeeping, short. Can use lot of interesting battle setups with less consequences.
Cons: Maybe too short. Severely limits participant numbers. Not balanced, just experimental play.

So, what do you think?

I would love to work on a strategy or tactics game; heck, I've nearly started or restarted a dozen TBS games on the forums recently and just not done it because I'm worried it won't spark interest or I'll get tired of updating it. Doing it in a group would really remove a lot of that burden as well as giving us a chance to do something fun and large-scale.

I'd love to do something erfworld-based too, since I love me some Erfworlds.

I recall that there have been some attempts so far, but most of them failed. But hey, making a game and ruleset sometimes could be more fun then actually playing/GMing the game! As I have found out with Experimental ; -;

Also the "Severely limits participant numbers" downside for Tactics version might not be that problematic, since people could control subsquads. Hum, that gives us four options, actually:

1, Conquer the world strategy version A: N players, each has their own capitals.
2, Conquer the world strategy version B: N teams, each have their own leaders. Some people might be warlords or heirs or democratic parliaments.
3, Tactical Battles A: Two sides going against each other.
4, Quick Tactics B: Each side is actually a team.

Also, the setting would have huge impact on the system. Perhaps it is magitek with early 1900s technology? Since having both fantastical and technologic elements would give way for many shenanigans.

I am reviving the shit out of this thread

I have been fidgeting with Gamemaker and now that I finally proved to myself that I can in fact finish a game, I would like to venture forth and make something MARGINALLY WORTHWHILE, and with the inclusion of the fine minds of the Eagle-time Magicians.

And by fine minds I mean PIXEL ARTS. I am horror-bad at art in its entirety.

And also fine minds for real sure whatever

I will be the code jockey, Mehga gonna be the star, put that pack on my back lets ride like the wind.

I am specifically interested in making action-adventure. Zeldalike if you will.

Just throwing all this out there.

oh nooooooooooooooo i offered myself to help but i forgot/procrastinated? i'm sorry :<

i actually made some progress, did i even showed you these?

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Onion head



Onion head sprite



Alternate onion head sprite?



Onion head marching

I'm still super willing to help dude! There's nothing i'd love more than arting for vidjas, i mean, if you still want me to help.

I forgot all about that

In fact even though I remember that we talked about that I don't actually know what it is

Something about a magician apprentice? i have a folder called 'transmutation' so i'm guessing that was the name.

Maybe i should... get on IRC at reasonable hours.

Oh yeahizzle

Forgot all about that idea, but now its flooding back to me

Actually it would be perfect, if you are still up to it Ed. It had a nice simple premise, perfect for a small scope game, which are the only scopes that ever actually work out here on the internet

Sure! I bet more people will be willing to help once they see a nice little finished product. I'll try to get on IRC during the day.

Be sure to prod me as much as you can or else i'll forget about it (that's how Fogel gets me to update our collab thing)