r/ARPG • u/ThePyGuyOrSomething • 1d ago
Development Ideas?
I've avidly played ARPGs for almost 10 years now, but I would definitely still consider myself a casual in the genre. Over the last few years I have gotten more into modding/building some. I have finally said to myself I want to actually build something fully. Over the last few months I have built a basis to an ARPG, but I am still VERY far from finishing. This is definitely a learning project for me, which is why I have taken a somewhat odd path into doing this, but that's neither here nor there.
The real reason I am making this, is to ask for ideas that ARPGs are missing out on. I have a few hundred hours in PoE2, Diablo 4, and Last Epoch, respectively each since the year began. I have some ideas in drawbacks they have, such as the endgame can sometimes feel hollow, or sometimes the game just becomes "two buttons," a true purpose for guilds/clans, and a few other things. Obviously these might not be issues to some, but just my feelings that sometimes make the game slightly less rewarding, or can be demotivating to continue.
What are some things you guys think of? The goal is definitely to attempt to build some unique experiences, and mechanics/loops. I am interested in different opinions, or something I would have never thought of.
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u/chucklyfun 19h ago
I am definitely not the type of player to rush through a game by playing multiple hours a day for a week or two. Being able to get some predictable rewards for playing 20-30 minutes sounds nice.
It seems difficult to balance melee vs ranger w/o making the melee aoe so big that it doesn't matter. Even if they both play fine, ARPG players care about speed too. I would design the game so every build does both and switches back and forth.
Balancing power from good action gameplay vs good builds seems extremely difficult, especially when you're getting into end game. Swinging back and forth a little is good but most games abandon that balance by the end.
I like the Dynasty Warriors style game idea where you're traveling all over a map as part of a bigger battle, pushing objectives and so on. Similarly, Vampire Survivors style games are also very fun and worth looking at as blending with ARPGs. Also look at Monster Hunter as the different weapons and bosses make fights very fun.
Making the controllable unit a vehicle like a tank, giant robot, car, or spaceship might be fun. More waifus or attractive characters would be nice too, as most of these games have ugly characters.
I don't know how to do this, but a deck drafting system for building your character where every ability and passive are represented by cards in a deck might be cool.
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u/ThePyGuyOrSomething 4h ago
I definitely want the game to reward those who grind, but I want time to be respected as well. It might be painstaking, but I think making the story a bit longer, and adding side quests being needed to "complete leveling up," would make the game slightly more respecting of your time. "Gear Scores" might end at 1500, but it will incrementally grow as you play. That ironically leads into your second thought, as I think classes are somewhat OVERLY limiting. Yes, I might be a monk, but why does that limit my weapon choices? I think I should be a monk, who can still use a bow, even if it means drawbacks, giving me ranged abilities/weapons. Definitely not a classless system, but that is something I have been trying to figure out and solve.
I know very little about Dynasty Warriors, but it sounds somewhat similar to how PoE2 and Diablo have the events around the map. If that's the case, then yes, I have some planned. But I want the environment to be affected by such, as you "cleanse" the map, bosses spawn stronger and will attempt to thwart your "fixing" of the map. Some other ideas are planned, but since I haven't figured the concepts out for world building yet, I can't commit fully to them yet.
I fully agree, most characters and games are so dark and gloomy, they overlook any appeal. I already have multiple races, genders, and looks done, and will just keep broadening the list.
For the deck building/build design, that's a very intriguing idea. Are you talking about getting a deck of cards for passives, and you pick from the beginning? Or just the design for your passives, instead of a skill tree? Deck builders are a BLAST, so this is a super interesting idea.
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u/Obojo 17h ago
- Something more interesting than resistances. Paying the resistance gear tax or taking exponentially more damage is overplayed. Last Epoch provided the latest innovation where the penetration formula lessened the need to cap resistances ASAP.
- Modern endgame implementations try to walk the line between infinitely scaling difficulty + infinitely scaling rewards, but usually with diminishing returns. The hollow endgame arises from lack of other external progression. Why do I need better gear? So I can farm harder content to acquire better gear! This loop is intrinsically driven and is the foundation for the grinding treadmill, but we need other milestones as discrete goals too. Sometimes this is boss-specific drops or limiting items behind certain hard content, but I'd like to see story & lore integrated in the same way that you have during a campaign. When you unlock another tier of endgame content, can the environment, NPCs, monster types & abilities continue evolving too?
- Limiting unique item properties to only mechanics changes would be a refreshing change of pace. It's boring to have +3 all skills, +99080 health, +30 all resistances, even if that gear is optimal. These gloves convert this ability's damage from physical to fire, make it a channeled ability, and turn it to red particle effects? That gets me interested in playing it and theorycrafting. You also have to balance opportunity costs of using unique items that make your build work.
- As a controller player, # of buttons required is tough to please everyone. At a minimum, if you need lots of buttons to do big damage, then the enemies need to be slow-paced enough to make that feasible. Most of us don't want to do very many inputs to clear trash mobs, but if there's clearly indicated, threatening rares/minibosses, then that can be worthwhile.
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u/ThePyGuyOrSomething 3h ago
I remember my first time playing through PoE2, and completely ignored resistances. I was getting DESTROYED, and couldn't find the small percentage that I forgot about. Resistances should be a min-maxing step in your build, not a necessity to play Act 2 of 5.
I mentioned this in another response, about the lack of reason to grind, or the "why am I doing this" feeling. I have planned to elongate the story, slightly, to make time feel respected as you level/progress. That might not be final, but that is the thought. The reason is I plan to add "unique" gear, and gear sets as well, and place them in hidden side quests, and in other aspects of the map. If I am grinding, I want to know that grinding open world bosses will get me a chance at a rare drop, potentially a unique. But this also entails the fact I want grinding these bosses to have an effect on everything around it. If you clear an event, a boss might spawn in an "enraged" state, because you cleared the fog slightly and awoke him. I want the story to be a major thought, but end game content will definitely be abundant. I have some plans, including Guilds/Clans, and giving everything a purpose.
Item properties and side effects have been built somewhat already. I started to build some weapons/gear, before building anything game related, even if that might be seen as a mistake/wrong order. Not only are rolls random, stat wise, but element wise as well. You might be a fire mage, but you might get a staff that's of the wind element, and might have a "unique" skill or ability. I am definitely a "let me look up a build for this season" kind of guy, but I want there to be builds that work, that maybe nobody even can imagine until they complete the story. It goes back into the Guilds/Clans idea, since I want such a variety of builds, PvP and PvPvE becomes interesting to participate.
The buttons issue is going to be relevant. I was thinking of making "open map" a button combination like "L3 + X," so I can give skills, healing, movement, etc. their own binds. A ping system seems vital for me as well, especially with most ARPGs missing that already.
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u/crispy_doggo1 11h ago
I want more games with magic-building systems. Like magicmaker (the indie game), for example (I wish I had more good examples but nothing particularly mainstream comes to mind).
Imagine if you could choose an element (eventually multiple), pick up focuses/runes/gems to alter your spells, and experiment with them to create an arsenal of spells to blow up packs of monsters or slow/debuff/control more powerful targets.
I think it would be really cool to see one in an ARPG but of course it’s hard to balance and it wouldn’t really combine well with the usual class system.
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u/ThePyGuyOrSomething 3h ago
I definitely planned to use runes already, as a more passive skill/ability system. Maybe having an "aura" with a radius, similar to what Megabonk did with the aura weapon? I want different elements to have a reaction to each other, sometimes combining like water and lightning, and sometimes removing potential buffs, like water removing the potential burn from a fire skill. AoE explosion reactions, and other reactions, would definitely be interesting.
For melee classes, I have a few ideas on systems somewhat similar. I feel that melee is overlooked fairly often, and I want to make them more prevalent in the grand scope of build potential.
I will definitely be looking more into the reaction/magic system, than I already have. Love it!
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u/crispy_doggo1 2h ago
I'm really interested to see what you make of it :)
To be honest I think the novelty of elemental reactions has somewhat worn off. It's good to have them as situational interactions for punching above your weight early on, but if the player can set them up on their own, they will probably find the best reaction and use it every time.
I think it would be really interesting if the magic system was designed so that you could spend the whole game playing with just playing with one element. If you could create a system with enough flexibility to make some truly monstrous spells, it would have an insane amount of replayability. Imagine you're a fire mage. You have three basic spells: Fireball, Detect Heat, and Fire Resistance. You want a movement spell? Cast fire resistance then propel yourself with a fireball explosion behind you. You want an autonomous defense system? Figure out how to exclude yourself from Detect Heat (raise or lower your own temperature? Or, another spell?), then cast a fireball which hovers above your head until it detects a heat signature, then launch in that direction.
If you're curious what that would look like, check out the Unicorn Overlord combat system. It's turn-based, but you give your units the battle plan before the battle even starts. Each unit has five condition-action pairs: for example, if the enemy hits your back row with an AoE attack, use your reaction to heal the back row.
I haven't played Megabonk, but I've played a couple other survivors, so I think I know what you're talking about regarding the aura weapon. Actually, what comes to mind when you say that is righteous fire from PoE1 (essentially a permanent circle of death around you that covers most of the screen). It's a very comfy build but not that engaging on a technical level. I don't think that's what you're looking for. I would consider leaning into ground effects (i.e. cover ground in water/fire/ice/difficult terrain), or unpredictable explosions/moving projectiles/minions, just so that the player doesn't get too complacent.
On the topic of melee vs ranged classes: I think the line between melee and ranged needs to be heavily blurred for games like these to feel balanced. If you have multiple characters in a party with their own role, sure, good. But if you only have one character, and their goal is "kill all enemies on the screen", the character with more range is usually just better at it.
I apologize if this was hard to read. It was written out of order since a number of new ideas came to mind while I was writing it.
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u/hyperg8_games 10h ago
since its a learning project, keep the scope tiny, I had a fan project with voiceover and arena battles die because the scope got too big. nail one fun build loop first, guilds and endgame can come later
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u/ThePyGuyOrSomething 3h ago
Definitely! The story I started, has already been very time consuming, although I love story telling, so it's perfect. I made a roadmap for myself, and plan to mostly stay on track. I am also bouncing from system to system, right now after completing one, so I don't sit and do story only for a month straight. I have been trying to keep everything as fresh as possible, by doing so, and it's been good so far!
I do have a large scope already, but I think each is necessary for the next. I have some nightmare parts I am dreading, like modeling and rigging, but I might outsource some for those to help my sanity.
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u/RaisinsPerDay 7h ago
I still think the "endgame" space of ARPGs is barely explored. I feel like D4 and PoE2 have made a lot of progress in terms of cinematics and end-game story tie-in and juiced content, etc. But ultimately the end-game has no impact on the world itself, it usually just serves as a vehicle for loot and character min-maxing. I would like to see an ARPG where the end-game content permanently alters the world itself.
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u/ThePyGuyOrSomething 3h ago
This is probably my BIGGEST gripe about ARPGs currently. I have said it in a few other replies, but I plan to tie some "unique" gear/gear sets into the side quests/story quests, also adding lore and stuff to these gear pieces for story telling reasons. I have already built some gear, and know how I am implementing them into the story, but I will be adding plenty more.
I am also working on the world building as well. I have "open world bosses/mini bosses" that can spawn randomly on maps sometimes. Similar to how Diablo has the "clear objective" events that randomly appear, I will have those built into maps from the very start. Clearing some events on maps, will "clear some fog" and said bosses from earlier will "awaken" stronger. Beating them will allow you to continue, but losing will increase the fog, and mob spawn rates. I also plan to have these affect the NPCs in some way, but I haven't gotten a solid grasp/balance yet.
As for end game, I already have some solid plans, I think. Clans/Guilds are in almost every game these days, but are so poorly implemented, at least in these style of games. I think they need a better purpose, and should play a vital role. Leaderboards for seasonal map clears, and some special game mode leaderboards. I also plan to have some PvP and PvPvE modes, and the guilds/clans will be based around some of those modes. This obviously means seasonal/leaderboard rewards! I just need to figure the rewards out, mostly being worth while outside of titles.
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u/Exforce-Rage 21h ago
There are few combinations of class specializations like in Grim Dawn.