http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2010- ... ame-tabledWith the news in YerpGonks that the planned Ender's Game... er... game... is all but canned, I felt a mix of emotions; both that thank goodness a game that could never live up to expectations wasn't going to try, but disappointment as I could see it all so perfectly in my mind's eye.
So, because I'm stuck in work and bored, here's what my mind's eye sees.
The opening levels would take the form of tutorials and are based around Ender's life immediately prior to Battle School, as per the book.
The controls are calibrated (sensitivity, look invert, etc) during his visit to the doctor's office. You then get to learn how to move around, converse and fight when Stilson and his buddies attack you after school. Finally, the shuttle flight to Battle School gives you a chance to get used to floating around in a zero-G environment.
Battle School itself would be a beautiful, minimalist open environment with all the locations from the book (the various team quarters, showers, canteen, gym, classrooms) open for you to freely explore in between the battles. I'm picturing lots of bright, primary colours and whites here. Much like Deus Ex or Unreal 2, in between missions you can walk around, talk to other people, look at stuff, play with your desk (more on that later) and maybe do some simplistic roleplaying or mini-quests.
The real meat of the game, though, would be the battles. You'd have a big zero-G environment where you'd point and click (as in games like Brothers In Arms) to issue orders to your soldiers. You, naturally, are vulnerable to being shot too. To cope with the various strategies used like freezing your legs or freezing your own soldiers to do a formation, there'd be a simple ragdoll editor (I can see the programmers among us wincing at the thought) where you could position your limbs and save them as presets to select in battle. Movement around the battles would be a case of looking where you want to go (while on a solid surface) and hitting a button to push off from it.
You'd work your way up through a league table, with scripted battles to drive the story forward appearing at certain intervals. The more 'optional' battles you played in the league, the more experience your soldiers would have, making them more effective. You could go and practice (no XP gained) in the battle room whenever you wanted, as per Ender's famous practice sessions.
Eventually, you'd get to go to Command School. Here you'd have a Homeworld-style space battle section, similar to the Battle School, where you command the human fleets against the buggers in simulated combat scenarios. Command School would have a similar, but much smaller, open environment to explore in between the simulations.
Which only leaves the desk. There'd be email, a simplistic drawing tool (for drawing genitals, of course) and the infamous adventure game. Deliberate rendered to look like a crappy 16-bit platformer, the developers could have a ball coming up with dozens of grotesque deaths for the player when they drink the potion offered by the giant. Everyone knows how to get past the giant, of course, but anyone familiar with the book would drink the potion as many times as possible just to see the gruesome demise that awaited.
Umm... and there we go.
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