Hello and welcome again to another edition of Great Video Game Ideas Not Used. This is Article number 30 in my series, and it is also My Game Idea #3 . For #1 (“Hospital”) or #2 (“Bloodstorm: The Potential Within”) click the respective number. Thank you for my readers as these are my two most viewed articles in my series. Hopefully, this one will join their ranks. If you enjoy reading my articles, then please consider joining my website for GVGINU by clicking the acronym. You can also check out my youtube videos here, and my soundcloud podcasts here. Other points of contact, Twitter and Facebook. The forums are open, they just need to be filled by gamers and devs. Anyhow, let’s move on to the game idea that you’ve been waiting to read.
Firstly, the back story. If you aren’t curious about it, then you may want to skip this paragraph. This game idea was actually inspired by a picture that I kept seeing on Newgrounds. I’ve seen this face of a monkey that looked so sour it was hilarious to me. Now, I can’t say that you’ll find that sour-faced monkey anywhere on the site now since its revamp, but I know I found it there first. There were a few other sites I’ve seen things similar and you may yet find it looking around. That cartoon monkey though, I had always wondered what it would be like for it to be in a game. This leads to the information below my nonsense rambling. And yes, as you guessed, the game is about monkeys.
Now that I have that out of the way, I can finally move into the details of the game. The name alone might make you laugh, but it’s because the game is supposed to be a bit lighthearted. And the name is………….”Poo Face the Monkey: Defender of the Zoo”. Yep, you read it right, “Poo Face”. I wish I could imagine the questions that come from reading that name, but I’m sure a few people got a chuckle out of it. Heck, some may even have expected a name like that. Nonetheless, that is the title I chose because it best suited the game, and is the name of the lead monkey. Now for me to do a simply break down of this game for you.
Plot
Well, the main point of this game is to save the City Zoo as one of four monkeys (names will be seen later). There is this Corporation (I have yet to name it) which is pretending to want to buy the Zoo in order to provide better habitats for the animals kept inside. In actuality, they want to use the animals as slaves to attack and takeover other zoos to get control of their animals until they have all of them under their control and can take over the planet. Yes, very generic I know, but it’s fun so deal with it. And yes, I know, but I had to do it. I’m sure Adam Orth doesn’t mind.
Anyway, Poo Face and his friends discover this plot, but they can’t seem to get the human owners of the City Zoo to pay attention to anything as the Corporation has already given them a small part of their pay-off to keep them out of their hair while their own minions patrolled the grounds. Wow my sentences are long-winded. Well, instead of waiting to just be overrun and turned into brainwashed weapons, they decide to take down the Corporation on their own. And this is where the game begins.
I hope I haven’t lost you so far, luckily this is one of my game ideas that doesn’t require a lot of major characters. And I will list the stars below.
Characters:
Playable:
Poo Face: A fun loving monkey that has brown fur, wears a red cape and boots. Male monkey.
Shitake a.k.a. Lil Plop: A clumsy monkey that has dark brown fur, wears a diaper, black boots and sunglasses. Male Monkey.
Puffy: A tricky monkey that has black fur, wears a leather jacket and black gloves. Male Monkey.
Swirls: An intelligent monkey that has light brown fur, wears a blue baseball cap. Male Monkey.
Non-Playable:
Tutu: A monkey with light brown fur. Poo Face’s girlfriend. She gathers information that is useful for others in the Zoo.
Claws: A white tiger whom is genuinely kind and gentle unless provoked. He likes the monkeys of his Zoo, often allowing them to rest in his habitat overnight. He is very protective of them and will attack any enemy quickly. He is used as a back up character to clear the screen of minor enemies.
Gramps: An old gray fur gorilla. Wise in his years, he often gives the monkeys snacks that he finds after guests have left the Zoo. Gramps is used as back up character that drops off health replenishment items.
Tinks: As the name implies, this is a highly intelligent animal. She just happens to be a lemur. Tinks loves to mess around with the broken gadgets that zoo visitors lose during their visits. She has many of the other zoo animals bring he things that she uses to make and build other things out of. She love to show off her latest creation. Tinks is used as a back up character to drop off power up items.
Minor Enemies:
Fake Zoo Employees: They take many shapes and sizes, but these people are from the Corporation, only interested in using the animals for their own gain. They normally wear green t-shirts and blue jeans with green and white visors.
Corporation Photographer: These photographers utilize the flash on their cameras to catch unsuspecting animals off guard and blind them for easy capture. Normally seen in generic jeans and t-shirts wearing some sort of baseball cap.
Animal Control Officer: Just the animal animal trapper. These people are called in to capture animals and return them to their cages. They are skilled at hunting the animals of the Zoo and will put them in holding cells until the paperwork has been taken care of for them to be properly placed. They don’t work for the Corporation directly, and are contracted workers. Normally seen wearing a gray or tan uniform.
Corporation Gunners: These Corporation employees keep rifles with tranquilizer darts at the ready to subdue unruly animals. Once an animal is caught, they are taken right to their cage. They wear safari outfits of different colors to blend in with their surroundings.
Corporation Security: These “Officers” of the Corporation wield batons that they use to crush any threat. They use powerful swings and quick, concise movements. They wear black security uniforms.
I’ll end it there for now, I really haven’t fleshed out the ideas for the minor enemies yet. I haven’t even worked out the details of the first boss just yet. But I didn’t think that it was needed at this point anyway, I’m still thinking about stuff for it though, everyday, as I also am for my other two game ideas that I’ve shared with the world. Moving on though, I’ll jump to the game play section. This is probably going to take a while so you may want to grab yourself a snack of some kind before you continue reading.
Gameplay
I want the way this game plays to be something like “Alien Hominid “, but a bit more advanced I guess you could say. It would also be a Metriodvania type of game, not stage by stage. You can only unlock additional areas by completing missions to take down the Corporation. Though the first mission in the game is to save Tutu, who is ultimately your source of information after that. You visit her to find out about happens in the Zoo and to start missions. And did I also say that this would be a 4-player multiplayer game? Yeah, I know, you’re saying to yourself right now, this is a bad mix. Well, I respectfully disagree. Local multiplayer would be split screen, and online well, everyone would be able to move freely. But you can only start one mission at a time, this way it doesn’t get too confusing. This would be drop in/drop out so that if one person needs to leave, everyone else can still play.
The game has to be Metroidvania style for the cages and habitats to have a purpose other than being your starting point. Say one of your buddies gets captured and you can’t get to them on time to save them from being taken away, well you can search for and find them like this and continue playing. And for those who would think, “Well I’ll just drop out and back in, then I’ll be freed.” that won’t work. You drop out and then back in, you’ll be stuck in the habitat until you are rescued, as the game will log which monkey has been captured. Now, you may be able to get out if there is another monkey available to be played with, but the monkey that is captured still won’t be playable until they are rescued. So then someone else would get stuck with being trapped in if they want to play. And there will be monkey-specific (that sounds so odd) missions that cannot be completed without the proper primate being available to be played. Yes, I did think of that, so you can’t just ignore the captured monkeys, you have to save them.
Combating enemies will be close range monkey fists or melee. And there will also be a “fudge” meter for projectiles, but I’ll get to that further down. I’ll cover all of those things individually, starting now.
Controls:
The controls for “Poo Face” would be as written out below.
Directions:
Up
Down
Left
Right
Up-Left
Up-Right
Down-Left
Down-Right
Buttons:
Punch
Kick
Jump
Grab
Projectile
Special Attack
Yep, six very simple buttons. It’s a game with monkeys, I don’t think the controls would really need to be too complicated to get into when characters should really be what you play the game for.
Controls:
Punch: Tap the punch button to use your monkey’s fists to attack enemies.
Kick: Tap the kick button to use your monkey’s lower paws to attack enemies.
Jump: Press the jump button for you monkey to ascend into the air. Press longer for higher jumps.
Grab: Tap the grab button to get ahold of climbable objects, pick up melee weapons, and to grab ahold of nearby enemies.
Projectile: Tap the projectile button to throw monkey chocolate at enemies. There must be energy in the “Fudge” meter in order to use. Projectiles can be thrown 8 different directions.
Special Attack: Tap the the special attack button if the “Fudge” gauge is full in order to dole out supreme monkey justice upon your foes. With multiple players, special attacks can be stacked to create even bigger and more punishing attacks.
Using Weapons: Unfortunately monkeys don’t get guns or anything of the like, but they can pick up things to use against enemies like heavy sticks, pipes, and brass knuckles but not limited to them. Each item has a usage limit shown with an energy gauge that depletes as enemies are attacked. Press the punch button in order to use them. Weapons can also be thrown if you wish by pressing and holding the projectile button. This does not consume anything from the “Fudge” gauge. Weapons can also be dropped by pressing the kick button.
Climbing Objects: As referenced briefly above, the monkeys of this game can climb different objects in-game. At least in how I imagine it. This would mean trees, buildings, billboards, street signs, anything that would be a conceivable object for a monkey to climb. And yes, the monkeys can climb with weapons in their paws. They would be a bit slower though, as they wouldn’t be using all four but three instead. To drop off of any climbable object, simply tap the grab button to fall down. Jump of by pressing the jump button.
These are just the first few basic things I could think of, I’m not really getting any other thoughts to put down just yet. I haven’t even gone into vehicles because I really want to think them out thoroughly, and my articles are all usually very long anyway. When I referenced “Alien Hominid” and Metroidvania style play, I did mean it. I want the game to be fast paced, but also to be explorable. I know in a couple minds out there, this mix up might not make much sense. Even as I try to describe it to you, I know I’m not doing it justice, but I will try one last time.
How this game should feel would be similar to “Alien Hominid”, but more close range attacks than distance, since the monkeys won’t be using guns and have limit usage of the “Fudge” gauge. Each character would move freely of the others, meaning that this game would be split screen for local multiplayer. Plus with additional players, more missions would open up, allowing for some truly diverse undertakings to happen. And in a way that would require for the playing monkeys to split up and do different assignments. All to take down the Corporation. This is also why the game has to be Metriodvania style, it’s just far more friendly to the fun factor of the idea. And without having dedicated stages, but specified missions, this is far easier to pull off. When I first thought this up, it would have been on a stage by stage basis. I just didn’t like that as it seemed far more confined.
I think that sort of gets the idea out, but it won’t be realized until I’m actually able to make the game myself. For now, I’m closing out this GVGINU article, as there are more things for me to write about. Thank you very much for the time you took to read this, hopefully you were entertained. It took me a while to get to number 30, but it is a good feeling to make it here, and sharing this game idea with my readers made it worth it. Please keep your eyes peeled for more GVGINU content. Until then, enjoy your games.