Development Interest

Hey everybody!

I've been learning how to use Unity 3D recently. And I've reached a point in the development where I would feel more comfortable prototyping some ideas for games that I've had in the past. It's always been a dream of mine to produce my own adventure game. The genre has always been one of my favorites.

I'm posting a poll here to see what manner of adventure game the casual iOS user would be most interested in. For this initial poll, I would like to know what visual/control style most interests you.

3rd Person point-and-click adventure games are like the classic Sierra and LucasArts adventure games, where you control a little character who walks around the screen

1st Person point-and-click adventure games are like the original Myst, where the room structure and controls are very similar to other point-and-click games, but you never see the character you are playing as

A 1st Person adventure game would be controlled similar to how FPS titles are controlled, with a 3D world that you walk around and interact with

A Visual Novel would be more of a choose-your-own adventure with more graphics. It might have some point-and-click elements (similar to the Phoenix Wright series) but would predominantly involve reading and branching conversation trees.

Why not bring it to Android as well if you're using Unity? Note: I don't have an iOS device, so I voted from the standpoint of an Android user.

My vote goes to the Visual Novel genre. I'm not a huge fan of any of the genres mentioned, but visual novels are one genre that I've been trying to get into recently. I downloaded a couple of them on Android and wasn't very impressed by the ones I tried... (too many grammatical mistakes, not interesting enough, ...) But after playing Radical Dreamers on SNES, and having seen some interesting Japanese-only games on other consoles, I'm optimistic that the genre can be executed well. I would like to see what you come up with if you take on such a project.

Hope my input is useful to you in some way, and good luck on your project.

[quote name='Josh1billion']Why not bring it to Android as well if you're using Unity? Note: I don't have an iOS device, so I voted from the standpoint of an Android user.

Hope my input is useful to you in some way, and good luck on your project.[/QUOTE]

Any input is useful for me, and I appreciate your response.

Android is a possibility. I mainly mention iOS because I got a free license for iOS development using Unity earlier this year. That and the fact that iOS has seen far more commercial success in terms of downloadable titles.

I actually have several other ideas for games, and a card game prototype that I'm already well into work on. But adventure games have always been a passion of mine, and I wanted to poll on interest from mobile users. The genre has seen a resurgence on these platforms in recent years, and I feel it is a good fit.

So, each option would still end up with 3D graphics? Because I strongly prefer my 3rd person adventure games to be 2D like Monkey Island, Broken Sword, Simon the Sorceror, etc.

If it had to be 3D, I would choose Myst style. If 2D, Monkey Island style without a doubt.

[quote name='ID2006']So, each option would still end up with 3D graphics? Because I strongly prefer my 3rd person adventure games to be 2D like Monkey Island, Broken Sword, Simon the Sorceror, etc.[/QUOTE]

That is actually a really good question. While I am using Unity, strict 3D is not necessarily the direction I will use. I already know how to create 2D characters in Unity, even to the point of implementing 2D animations. There will probably be some variation on 2D-3D. I'm thinking possibly 2D characters in a 3D environment, or a 3D environment populated by 2D sprite objects. (kind of like Paper Mario) I'm flexible on the art style, but it will likely be influenced by time and expense restraints. (so some manner of 2D will probably be incorporated)

I'm going to try to avoid purely pre-rendered graphics, such as what showed up in Myst.

Whatever you do don't use any virtual buttons or virtual d-pads. If you need to move a character in the environment just touch the screen where you want to position him. If you want to interact with an item just touch the item.

Personally your going to want either a 1st person point and click like myst or a visual novel.

Simply because people who own iPods and iPads are going to find it easiest to control. I do not want to have to around with controls and the simple tap to find/use item makes it universally easy for people who are not technology savvy and people who hate the iPad for anything other than myst like games.