Story basics. 1. The protaganist lives on a dying world. He works for the government and is drafted in a top secret program to help restore the world to it''s prime. The way they do this is travel through a "portal" that transports people between alternate universes. 2. A bit later in the game he finds out that the orginization wants to use the portal to conquer worlds in which they would be the ultimate rulers. 3. He defeats the government and big happy ending. That''s the VERY BASIC SKELETON of the plot. I''m too lazy to type the rest.

Well, I think you have the makings of what could be a very awful story or a very good story, depending on all the details. It sounds a little bit cliched, but then again, most two and three sentence summaries are likely going to sound cliched.

Maybe an alternative summary of the same story would help us. Perhaps you could summarize the story from an entirely different perspective, focusing on something different other than a script of events of the story?

It seems like you''re missing something. The primary motivation of the character is to save the world, but in the end he only overthrows the government. The character''s primary reason for action remains unresolved.

How does overthrowing the government (which may save the inhabitants of the other universes) allow the character to save his own world?

thanks for the feedback.

Here are some things I have added or fleshed out.

1. Well he doesn''t really overthrow the government. Just a section of it.
2. His motivation is doing the right thing.
3. Instead of offering some slap-on ending. I''m thinking he ends up taking over another world even though that was what he originally wanted to prevent. It''s like one of those bittersweet endings. There''ll be this cool fully animated ending showing the emotions going through him as he watches the military come through the portal and subjugate an entire albiet medieval civilization.

There are some other ideas jumping around in my head but these are some of the things.

One thing about governments: anyone who''s played RPGs probably knows not to trust em. In fact, i can''t think of any RPG i''ve ever played where the government actually was the good guy. The government always turns out to be bad in the end. But at the same time, you probably don''t want to make the government a bunch of good guys, as gamers in general like to see the government evil. I think one way to make it better would be to have several groups, not just "the government" and "everyone else". Have some renegade scientists working against the government, some alternate-universe anarchists, some plane-shifting-eco-terrorists, etc. And the player has to decide which group to help. But in the end, none of them are really "good guys", each group is just working for its own agenda. That way, even though a lot of players will expect the government to be evil, they probably don''t expect the anti-government pacifist group to also be evil.
One other thing: for people who in general will already guess the government is evil, don''t make the player have to do too much government stuff. I got mad at deus ex when for the first few chapters i had to work for the government and shoot the anarchists in the head, because in real life i was clearly on the anarchist''s side from the beginning, and i knew that eventually my character in the game would also join the anarchist''s side. And i hated having mission objectives like "shoot all the people who don''t agree with the government".

I was planning on having the first couple "missions" be scouting out various worlds thus meeting various factions of the paralell worlds. He''ll also meet the inhabitants and such.

Hey, this is very similar to our story, regarding time portals anyway :-(, but there was no government or overthrowing involved much so I guess its ok. Our objective is completely different.

2 questions by the way.

1) How does overthrowing the governemnt restore the world to its prime. Overthrowing the governemnt means - a) All for themselves, meaning chaos and confusion b) The hero becomes the leader so he was no better than the governemnt. c) What is the objective of the player - overthrowing the government or restoring the world to what it was ?

2) The governemnt is not the right organisation that would on the whole want to conquer the world. Maybe some people of the governemnt would want it and generally they form their own organisation so you could tweak your sotry a little bit to make it more realistic. So these people should have a lot of powers in the real world(by powers I don''t mean skills and stuff like magical powers), I assume now you get what I mean.

Re-read your story atleast twice or thrice, you will get what I mean.

One of the key points of a good story is to have lots of very strong characters in a very rich world. I consider myself something of a coinneseur of games with good story, and yours simply doesnt seem complex or involved enough. Here are a few pointers:

1. Not one government. Lots of rival factions instead.

2. several very emotionaly rich characters, who are involved with the story at a high level, that the player must befriend, outsmart, deal with or neutralise in order to change the story radically, and hence the outcome of the entire game.

3. Multiple endings, each with its'' own degree of success, some comprimised, eg defeat the government but get killed in the process, destroy the portal and hence save the medieval world but end up stuck on the dying one, etc.

Thanx guys!
Y''all been a great help. With all your points in mind my partner and I are building up an extremely involved and deep story. I''m to lazy to write it but when our D.D. is completed I''ll show it to anybody who''s interested.

post it here when you''re done!!

Or e-mail me att kabooomm@hotmail.com

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