Had a game concept, no actual work done. Looking for thoughts.
So players spawn into a facility (think any classic facility that contains entities) map. One team is “Scientists” and the other team is “Zombies”. At the start of the game Zombies spawn in an enclosed area or room. Scientists spawn throughout the rest of the map.
The goal of Zombies is to escape their containment and infect all Scientists. The goal of Scientists is to prevent the escape of Zombies, survive until the round ends, or recapture all Zombies. Zombies will have multiple lives, Scientists only have one.
Zombies can break doors, gates, windows, vents, etc (anything that can obstruct them) to escape and infect Scientists. Scientists can repair said things and build more obstructions (like boarding up a door or window). Additionally Scientists can interact with the facility; they can close emergency gates which have much more durability than regular gates, turn on turrets which will delay zombies, communicate with radios, and pickup items.
At the beginning of the round when Zombies are breaking down their first obstacle Scientists can prepare for their escape.
When Zombies eventually end up running freely around the map Scientists should hide in rooms and work together. To defend themselves Scientists can find tasers. I really don’t want the classic zombie game with survivors constantly gunning down mobs of zombies (tasers stun and do damage, but just not enough to justify having a firefight). The aim is to be more like Hide and Seek. To balance out the fact that Scientists are mostly at the mercy of Zombies (when caught in the open), Zombies have reduced vision and speed.
The process of hiding and seeking repeats until all Scientists are infected or the round timer ends.
The way infection works is Scientists have a stat for now called “Infection”. When Zombies attack a Scientist Infection will accumulate, instead of decreasing the Scientist’s health. Even after escaping an attack Infection will slowly increase and the Scientist will become a Zombie when it reaches maximum. Infection can be reduced (not cured) using items.
Additional Ideas
These ideas basically expand on the game and I don’t believe are required for the base game.
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Rescue Teams: When a certain amount of time passes or a certain number of Scientists are infected a new team will be added to the round–Rescue Teams. Rescue Teams will consist of players not currently in the round (anyone joining while a round is in progress or players who have lost all lives). Rescue Teams have to fulfill one of two goals: Save all Scientists or Defeat all Zombies.
To save Scientists Rescue Teams must bring all Scientists to the same location the team spawned in at. To defeat the Zombies Rescue Teams must reduce all Zombies’ lives to zero.
Members of Rescue Teams have increased resistance to Infection (it should be possible for Zombies to infect them, but not necessarily worth the effort) and use special tasers which stun for longer and deal more damage.
Again I don’t want non-Zombie teams to be gunning down mobs of Zombies; tasers are meant to discourage attacks but are entirely capable of literally killing zombies. -
Mutated Zombies: Mutated Zombies are simply Zombies with abilities (can see and move normally, can deal more damage to obstructions, can climb, crawl through vents, etc). Mutated Zombies are AI-only and are kept in separate contained areas, they must be freed by regular Zombies.
I don’t want players to become Mutated Zombies because firstly Scientists don’t really have a similar way of powering up and I don’t want to have to increase the power of Scientists to combat Mutated Zombies.
Mutated Zombies will wander randomly or pursue specific targets. -
Gamemodes: Gamemodes in general. A gamemode in which there’s a team of “Bad Scientists” who try to secretly infect other Scientists and then an outbreak occurs outside of expected containment. A gamemode in which Scientists can capture Zombies (similar to Freeze Tag) so Zombies have to hide (but can still infect Scientists).
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Power Outages: Like any facility game the power can go out and the map will be dark. This makes it harder for Scientists to evade Zombies.
My Thoughts
I do think a game like this is interesting. It’s Hide and Seek (a good game itself) with zombies (and for once the all-terrifying incurable virus is actually a mechanic).
But I don’t think it’d succeed.
Firstly it’s a team game. It requires lots of players who know how to play and want to play the correct way (no “Good Scientists” helping zombies infect everyone else and actually trying to help other players). Also it requires a lot of hype and interest before it’s release to get the number of players required to even start a round.
Secondly it’s a zombie game that doesn’t revolve around shooting zombies. I’ve never seen a game like that on ROBLOX (please send me any games like that). I’m thinking that fact would be unliked by players, especially younger players who I assume like fast-paced experiences.
Third it’s a round-based game. Meaning if you join and there’s a round ongoing you have to wait, and if the round lasts too long you might just leave (though I could probably just throw joining players in as Zombies).
Fourth is that I imagine a large indoor map. I usually get lost in indoor maps and I assume new players getting lost and then swarmed by zombies isn’t fun. I don’t want to make a map UI because I don’t want players to focus on messing around in UI (like inventory or stats). Could put a map on the map walls, but there’s the pressure of memorizing everything and then scramming cause zombies are running around.
Fifth is that players need at least a proof of concept to decide if the game is fun or not, which obviously I have none currently. And some of their decision is affected by how polished and well developed the game is.
Sixth is that I worry people will play as if it were a classic SCP or prison game. In those games you escape the facility or prison and come back with a gun. In my idea escaping is the win goal (for Scientists) and there is no coming back to fight with what you once feared.