Blastfrog

Please note that the following has nothing to do with the proposed "Freestrife" project, and I may or may not even join the Freestrife project.

I want to make a game (or at least a branching story) based on this idea. Thing is, I'm not entirely sure where to go with this. I'd like you, the reader, to come up with some possible outcomes of the branches of this story. The basic concept of this is based around "good, bad, and ugly", and tons of branches around this concept, based on this 3 act story. There would be 27 possible endings. It's heavily based on the idea that the player can't "go back", so to speak, their decisions and actions are permanent.

The main theme is that this planet is left to it's own devices, gets involved in it's own civil war taking place over hundreds of years after it's abandonment from the major mining corporation, so much so to the point where it's completely and totally isolated in it's involvement and attention payed to the rest of intergalactic human society and civilizations.


Basically, the A path is the "good" path, the B path is the "bad" path, and the C path is the "ugly" path.

Backstory: (not important or relevant to the gameplay or main story at all, but explains how this situation came to be):


The planet this story takes place on is a very mineral rich, desert wasteland planet.

Humanity in the 22nd century expanded to mine and colonize other planets, due to advancements in society and technology. A powerful mining corporation colonized one of the newly discovered planets for the sake of mining the resources out of it (similar to the British empire's colonies in North America) with indentured servitude. The poorer people of the intergalactic human civilization would join this corporately owned colony on one of these planets, and become one of the members of civilization of one of these planets.

The corporation, like it does with all of it's owned planets, establishes a local planetary government with a set, specific agenda, using locally elected officials from the populace of the colony to govern the overall colony in terms of laws an resource management, following the agenda of the corporation. The corporation doesn't necessarily want to trample on anyone's rights, but considers resource mining it's number 1 priority above all else.

After a while, this planet that the story takes place on starts to run out of resources, and the corporation decides to grant independence of the colony from the mining corporate government simply because they've mined so much that the planet has few resources left.

The major mining corporation decides to leave the remaining population of the colony to their own devices, and simply doesn't give a shit anymore what happens on this planet.

The remaining elected government officials decide to continue the "legacy" of the colonist corporate government, as an "unofficial continuation" of the original corporately owned government, as the corporate-colonist government continues to rule over the planet, but this time guided by ideology and ideals, rather than simple corporate goals while trying not to fuck too much with people's democratic and inherent rights.

The remaining elected government officials on this planet decide to continue the "legacy" of the corporately owned government by setting up some totalitarian Military-Industrial-Complex government vaguely resembling the corporate government, dedicated to the "goal and ideology" of absolute forced order and resource gathering.

The remaining population is split into three factions:

The ones that remain loyal (either by decision or being forced into it) to this colonist, collective "be part of something bigger than yourself" society dedicated to resource collecting and collectivity become part of this Military-Industrial-Complex, dubbed as "Faction B".

A resistance, sensing the corruption and misguidement of Faction B, tries to redirect the ideology into something more sensible than Faction B's Military-Industrial-Complex "might makes right, maximum collective power" ideology, but there is a disagreement among the rebel faction, thus splitting into two rebel factions, Faction A, which focuses on democracy and equality, and Faction C, which focuses on anarchy and maximum freedom, no matter what the cost on others' is.

The different factions can be summed up as follows:

Faction A: Believes in maximum collective freedom, direct democracy, equal rights for all, defending the weak unable to defend their own rights, making sure to regulate the powerful not to trample on those rights, and that those without "power" have equal say in things.

This faction's views can be summed up as that every individual's view is equally as important, and that democracy and fairness are the best values that a society can hold. They believe that collective freedom is best. They want very advanced technology, and are about medium in their level of technological achievement, but regardless value personal and collective freedom over technology.

Faction B: The traditionalists, hanging on to the idea of centralized power, corrupted from the ideal of the original corporate government (which neither cared about nor wanted to trample individual rights). Very powerful, tends to regulate what goes on on the planet.

This faction's view can be summed up as "might makes right", is very collectivist, favors the views of those in power who "know better", and for the blind collectivist power, purely going for ruling everything. They have the most advanced technology, but represent the most oppressive theology of the USSR and possible future United States if this pro-military stance becomes part of our national identity.

Faction C: Chaotic tribal anarchists. They believe in maximum individual freedom. They prefer simplistic, tribal system of governing. They have the least advanced technology and civilization, but they believe this is best for humanity. They tend to be chaotic and primitive, but don't necessarily want to trample on others.


Faction A is the "good" faction, Faction B is the "bad" faction, and Faction C is the "ugly" faction.

Since the planet has been mostly (but not completely) depleted of resources, the major mining corporation has abandoned the planet and left the existing colony to their own devices.


This is where the game begins:

The game is divided into 3 acts (Macro-branches), each one being decided based on the sum of Micro-branches in the story.

The whole story is based on the personal development of the player character (in terms of what they politically and ideologically believe in), and the overall world that he lives in.

Act 1 begins with a poor colonist as the player character that decides that being a poor colonist kinda sucks and decides to become an independent mercenary/soldier. Being totally independent and free of any particular affiliation, he is free to work for any of the three factions he wants to. Faction B pays the most (but has the least actual change on the world), Faction A pays about middle (has about morally-middle effect on the world), and Faction C pays the least due to their primitive lifestyle (but effects things most drastically (either negatively or positively, however the player sees it)).

The major branch between Act 1 branching into either Act 2A, Act 2B, or Act 2C is entirely based on which path (Faction A's, Faction B's, or Faction C's path) the most.

Throughout the course of Act 1, the player eventually starts to decide which faction he likes morally and ideologically. Which faction he does the most work for determines which faction he ultimately joins in Act 2.

There are 3 totally separate sub-campaigns taking the place of Act 2 based on which faction the player joins. Joining faction A at the end of Act 1 sets the player on the Act 2A path. Joining faction B at the end of Act 1 sets the player on the Act 2B path. Joining faction C at the end of Act 1 sets the player on the Act 2C path.

Act 2A chronicles the journey of the player fighting for the ideals of collective, fair, direct democracy and equal rights. Act 2B chronicles the journey of the player fighting for the ideals of authoritarian collectivism, power, and resources. Act 2C chronicles the journey of the player fighting for the ideals of anarchy, absolute individual freedom, no matter the cost of other individuals.

Each version of Act 2 has 3 branches, the "good" branch, the "bad" branch, and the "ugly" branch. This is based on the player's attitude in each ideology/faction. The "good" branch of each ideology/faction is where the player truly and deeply believes in the ideology of their chosen faction, honestly believing that it's for the greater good of mankind on their planet, whether or not it truly is. The "bad" path of each version of Act 2 is where the player believes that their chosen faction's interests, regardless of how beneficial to the general populace is, is superior and should trump all. The "ugly" path to each version of Act 2 is not caring about either their chosen faction or the people governed by it, simply only caring about their own benefit.

Each version of Act 2 splits into it's own 3 different versions of Act 3. The possible versions of Act 3 that can come about from Act 2A are Act 3AA, Act 3 AB, and Act 3AC. The possible versions of Act 3 that can come about from Act 2B are Act 3BA, Act 3 BB, and Act 3BC. The possible versions of Act 3 that can come about from Act 2C are Act 3CA, Act 3 CB, and Act 3CC.

In Act 3, the player has the freedom to either "repent" their earlier philosophy of being either "good", "bad", or "ugly", and can slightly influence the outcome of each version of each version of Act 3, or continue their current philosophy of either "good", "bad", or "ugly".

By this point, the player can select from 1 of 3 possible endings from their current version of Act 3 (there are 9 versions of Act 3, and 27 possible endings).






What do you guys think of this basic concept? What can you guys think of to add details to the Acts?