Entry Nine – Rough Stages of gameplay.

A rough outline of how the game-play mechanics work in relation to the players overall goals.

Transcript from above

Stage one

Stage one of each section will start with the dark lord on his throne. With an animation in will walk his advisers and the dark lord will come down to address them.

The player will be able to walk freely in the throne room but must interact with the advisers to continue.

(Or could he just throw them out and wait for the hero? Hmmm, don’t think that would work.)

A simple speech bubble with an exclamation mark will direct the player to the adviser with a situation to be resolved.

The good choice might increase the Dark Lord’s support within his realm but not provide a reward, or territory, but will mean a stronger hero is less likely to turn up to fight him.

Transcript from above

The logical choice is simply the action that would be reasonable for any leader to make and so still unlikely to draw the strongest hero with some exception perhaps.

An example from the first section of the game, of which there are five, is that you and your army are in need of new weapons and armour. The logical choice is to set a tax to collect sufficient finance to do so.

The result of this would be a fair tax on the people that doesn’t turn them against you, save for “Grrr Taxes!” or send them to the “True Hero” for help while giving you what you need to expand your control over the land as your ultimate goal is to take over, you are after all the villain and genuinely believe you should take over as you’d be better at running the place than it is currently being done.

The totalitarian choice is over what is reasonable for the people to bare while it would offer more resources to expand the dark lords control it drives the people to aiding the hero however they can.

The evil choice is past any kind of reason. In actuality, while it might seem helpful it will actively destabilize the Dark lord’s control and summon a stronger hero with a more just cause and as such a stronger hero.

Once the player has made their choices they move onto the next stage.

Transcript From above image.

Stage two – the Hero 

No Matter what, some sort of hero will turn up at the start of stage two.

However the caliber of that “Hero” is determined by the player. The goal of the game is to gain enough resources whilst causing enough chaos/unrest to take over the surrounding regions without being so evil the True Hero arrives to put an end to your schemes.

So while the player must act in villainous ways to acquire more power and control it is imperative that they not go to far and end up facing a threat they cannot defeat, Gaining the true hero’s attention is a defeat as the last villain always losses (forgive my existentialist  rule, probably will keep, might not).

However the trade of is that in order to meet the villains goal of conquest being a “Nice Guy” will mean that while the player doesn’t attract a strong hero he expends resources but does not gain any more, setting him back and meaning that to expand his territory the Dark lord might actually only have evil choices to make with the more subtle pragmatic choices just no longer available on the limited capabilities.

Too many “Good Choices and the player can bankrupt himself and his domain, failing the game as he can no longer defend himself let alone take over others.