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Game Plot Inventory

29/11/2012

So mcc made a big list of the plots of her games over here and invited others to join in. Here's mine, organised roughly into shared categories:

Kill Things

• Die, You Stupid Hurdlers! Trip up hurdlers and crush them with a wall.
• Plort Descend a dungeon and kill something(? - I can't actually remember what happens on the last level).
• Tile Massacre SHMUP Build levels; kill all monsters.
• Neon Lights Kill everything.
• Step Sequencer Kart Various; mostly kill everything.
• Pastarena Kill everything.

Search for Things

• The Lost Hebrides Search for a lost archipelago.
• The Lair of Fungal Wonder Investigate a fungal cavern.
• The Divine is Hidden Behind the Noise of the World Gain understanding.
• No Longer Subject to Judicial Review Determine the killer by reading newspaper reports.

Make a Better World

• Stop Killing Each Other! Try to prevent 2 armies killing each other by building a wall and encouraging others to help you.
• Caverns of Light Bring light back to the world.
• The Future Will Only be Dystopian if Capitalism Remains Undefeated Foment a revolution.
• Luciente's War Kill nurses to protect the future.

Only Play

• Explosive Transcendental Circulatory System Just play.
• A Song in the Void Give birth to a song.
• Pointillist Flow Play.

Escape

• Safari Park Escape Escape from safari park; evade re-capture.
• Rainbow Space Donkey Escape Return to your donkey herd.
• This is the Way Get to the exit.
• Labyrinth Find the exit.

Misc

• For Queen and Country Stake claim to an island.
• Wall Jump Time Sphincter Box Set Wall jump through time w/really awkward meta commentary.
• Screaming Snakeball Beat the other player.
• Dwindling Worlds Save a series of worlds which are dwindling away to nothing.

Looking back on my games like this, I'm a bit disappointed so many of them are about killing things, and that I've done so few that belong in the Only Play category. I really want to make more elaborate and satisfying games that are purely about play.

The category that's interesting to me is the Make a Better World one, because I think those are the games where I wear my heart on my sleeve the most (excepting Caverns of Light). And because I think I tend to approach that plot differently to the typical 'save the world' plot so many games have. Where most games task you alone with saving the world in a fairly standard hero's journey setup, that kind of individualism ("Only you can save the world!") has always left me uncomfortable. In the real world change is the result of people coming together and supporting each other. These games try and reflect that; you play a small part in the overall struggle, and if you want to succeed you need others to help you. I want to make more games like this.

As an aside, I re-played Wall Jump Time Sphincter while I was writing this, and it turns out that is one embarrassingly bad game. Expect it to disappear from this site as soon as I figure out how to delete things from the app engine database.