I am, however, still waffling about actual gameplay mechanics. I picture the game playing much like a survival horror type game -- the player is stuck in a mall, and must venture out of their nice, safe, not-very-well-stocked back room in order to find food, water, and potentially other survivors. All-the-while, they must brave the sex-crazed vixens that occupy the mall and want nothing more than to throw open their legs and fuck until the player is one of them.
What is tripping me up, though, is in conflict and task resolution. I plan to have three basic resources that a player must maintain: Health, Arousal, and Hunger. Hunger will cover eating and drinking, and might end up called 'Fatigue' or some such. Health is lost by the usual way. Getting hit by a rock, falling from the second floor. It is also regained as one might expect: Health kits, and resting. Arousal is gained by witnessing or being subjected to something sexy. Being too close to a bimbo will slowly raise your arousal (they've got them pheremones, after all). Adversaries will have attacks that seek to raise your arousal level, rather than deal physical damage. Adversaries might also engage in sexual activities with each other, rather than the player, and being in proximity to this will raise your arousal. Maximum arousal is bad, as the higher it goes the less control the player has over their baser instincts. I'm leaning towards having arousal maxed out too long will make the player black out and go engage in some sexy times, perhaps waking up at their safe house with some new transformation. Hunger feels kind of contrived to me, but it serves its purpose. As time goes on, the player's hunger meter will rise. It can be lowered by eating or drinking, as one would expect. I'm also leaning towards strenuous activity decreasing the hunger meter at an accelerated rate. The purpose of hunger is to force the player to have a reason to leave their safe house. Otherwise, they could hole up and hide in there forever for no real reason. This is where part of the 'game' aspect of this comes in -- juggling whether or not you are healthy and calm enough to go get more food, or if you have enough to hunker down for a while and get some rest.
As far as conflict and task resolution, really, I'm unsure what level of simulation for which I should strive. I feel like the player should have stats and abilities of some sort that increase as they play -- the character gets stronger, or becomes more dangerous in combat. Or more resistant to the wiles of all the temptations in the mall. If we are increasing these stats, then they must see some use in the game. Strength should affect how much a character can push around or carry, for instance. Perhaps factor in to how far/high they can jump, or how hard they hit in melee.
I am currently in favor of a system derived from the current edition of the Gamma World tabletop RPG which is, itself, based on 4th Edition Dungeons & Dragons. It is actually quite mechanically sound, and simplistic enough that it shouldn't be difficult for a player to learn or for me to implement. A quick run-down:
Characters in Gamma World are mutants in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. They have two origins (rather than a race and a class) that define the nature of their mutation. These origins give them some skill bonuses, and grant them powers. Powers, in 4th Edition D&D and Gamma World, are abilities. Most are different types of attacks, though they don't have to be. Gamma World characters also have one or more 'alpha mutations' which are simpler mutations that change around somewhat frequently throughout the game -- these mutations can be things like an extra arm or the ability to breathe underwater or something. They also gain 'omega tech', which is ancient technological items of great power.
I don't believe alpha mutations or omega tech would really translate to Bimbpocalypse very well -- I am not going for that level of mutation. When I say 'transformation' I don't mean growing extra arms or tentacles or a fourth eye or the like. I mean growing a set of breasts, or a second johnson or something. The origins, though, could work. If we treat origins as means to define basically what the character is, we can whip up a quick list of possible suspects:
- Human
- Breeder
- Bimbo
- Cow
- Demon/Succubus/Incubus
- Robot
- Bunny Girl
Perhaps you run afoul of some cow girls. You get floppy ears, your boobs get to be rather large and milky. You're taller, and a bit more muscular. Mechanically, you are more cow and more bunny than you are pure human. You now have the bunny girl and cow girl origins. So you'd have the benefits of the bunny girl origin, as well as whatever cow girl gives you -- perhaps you can periodically milk yourself (and also need to) and get milk, which could be used to bait a trap for an adversary or to lower your own hunger (at the cost of increasing arousal or furthering your cow girl transformation).
I like how that all sounds, and I like the idea of having the ability to grant arbitrary abilities based on transformations. What's kind of tripping me up, logistically, is what to do about people who are purely one type of transformation or another. A character who has picked up a couple of transformations, and benefits from two origins is more mechanically powerful than a character who has only one type of transformation (Either they are 100% demon or a new character or something). That seems a little unfair, and like it's rewarding what is arguably the 'wrong' way to play. If the nature of the game is to survive against the bimbpocalypse, it seems backwards to reward succumbing to it. At the very least, characters who are purely one type of transformation should have the same basic mechanical benefits as a character with multiple transformations. Perhaps each origin has an additional ability that is granted only to those purely of that transformation.
Also: WTF would regular ol' humans get?
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