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  • I have been working in an NGO. I was playing Temple Run game and an idea clicked to develop a game to raise awareness about status of girl child in villages and at the same time to raise funds for the development activities. The game will be focused on the life of a girl from village; the challenges faced by girl just after birth till she is married, become an entrepreneur and fight & live in an evil society. The game is inspired from “temple run”. The game could be played by anybody from any age group.  The basic idea of story is: The game will start with an image, in half screen, of village women about to give birth to a child but it’s not a hospital it is a small mud house in village. In the other half will have an image of another local nurse (Dai) who is running to visit her house for the delivery of the woman. Level1: The game will start which will show the local nurse running and there will be timer at the top, she has to reach the home for delivery within 60 sec. The countdown will start and the local nurse keeps running, on the way she will be collecting equipment required for the delivery at the same time she has to escape from the unhygienic/dirty equipment. There will be obstacle in the path like stones, mud, cattle, crowd, which will slow the speed of running. If at any time she collects unhygienic/dirty equipment the game will get over and a message will display that “Did you know: -400,000 women die every year during child birth due to infection, injury or disease.” If the player collects all the hygienic equipment but could not reach the venue within 60 sec due to obstacles, then when the countdown will reach 10 sec, there will be a message to use “Motor vehicle” to visit but it will cost the player say Rs. 20 ($.25), out of which 60% will go to the NGO and 40% will be for the game company. Once the local nurse reach the home within 60 sec with all the equipment then an image will show the birth of a new girl- “Lia” with smiling faces of child, mother, father and nurse. Level 2: Now, there will be a health level of Lia displayed on the top which will start from 30% of total health. It will keep on decreasing. Lia’s father will run the game with Lia in his hand and collect the nutrition foods and immunisations. By collecting nutrition and immunisations, health level of the child will increase. It will be necessary to make it atleast 90% of total health within 300 sec. If the player is reached up to 80% of the health, the game will ask to buy nutrition and immunisations say for Rs.50 ($1), otherwise it will restart level 2. If the player is unable to reach even 80%, then the game will be over with a message “165 million children suffer from malnutrition every year due to unable to afford for nutritive food”. The game will continue like this with stage from newborn, then 5 years old, then 13 years old, then 20 years old and then 30 years old. The game will finish once the player reaches 30 years of age. It is not a game which could be played till infinity, the total game playing time would be about 30 mins. The game will also contain power packs to make it interesting. The main objective of the game is to raise social awareness about girl child of poor community in a village, So that, people playing the game could have basic idea of the situation/issues. So, this is my basic idea. I would be grateful if you could give feedback on this and be a part of this project.

  • Answer:

    It's a mediocre idea as game ideas go. The biggest disconnect I see is that the game activities don't connect with the message in any relevant way. Rather than getting the player involved in the context you're bolting a social message onto an unrelated construct. That really doesn't work, and this is coming from someone who's released an awareness oriented game that has yet to meet it's goals. I would suggest going back to the drawing board and generating a lot more ideas for gameplay mechanics; like a dozen at least. From those ideas cull out all but three most promising and refine them. Then from those three choose the one you feel is the strongest and build a paper prototype of it. Being able to create a playable version of your game idea on paper is going to help you going forward. You may actually need to repeat this process multiple times. Most of all it will allow you to find out if your idea is actually fun, and having a playable paper prototype will make potential supporters take you more seriously. Please don't think I'm trying to discourage you. Game designers are always burdened with more ideas than time. Learning when to put down an idea and start looking for a new one is an extremely important lesson. You are at the very beginning of the cycle, when changing course is the cheapest. Don't get too attached to this idea, take what people are saying, learn from it, and start generating more. Put this idea on the shelf, and be ready to do so with the next one and the one after that if necessary. When you finally have one that works you will know so viscerally and everyone you show it too will as well. This one isn't it, trust me.

Daniel Super at Quora Visit the source

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If the game is well-put together and publicized adequately, it might attract a little media attention. But it won't raise any money (it will lose nearly all the money spent on developing it). Temple run is an old game now and this pitch doesn't add any 'fun' to the design (it actually reduces the fun by depressing the player). If you want to make a difference, invest the money you would have spent on making the game into an organization working to make a change (I'm not an expert in the subject, but I know sites like Kiva are connecting donors to needy parties).

Tony Ventrice

So, I think a few things about this game concept. First, as I often say, most people believe they can come up with good game ideas, but it is difficult unless you are pretty familiar with the medium, but don't be discouraged. The next thing I thought was, this would be perfect for someone like Jane McGonigal: Jane and others like her, can, as academics, develop games to improve social awareness, stretch the medium and change the world, while we commercial developers have to turn a profit or else. Next, I thought, Temple Run is an endless runner game and I recently answered a questions about features that make those games so popular. Here is that question and answer: Finally, I thought, if you are going to keep this game engaging, despite the potentially heavy content, you will need to use behavioral game constructs. For instance, make sure that at every point, the main character has at least 2 of these three activities going on: 1. Amassing something of value - food, money, points, anything 2. Skills display - the player is building skills and using them, in front of other human players or AI NPC's that notice and comment. 3. Base politic - the player is negotiating or discussing issues with a real or AI player where equality versus hierarchy are in play - rich versus poor, male versus female, cooperation versus competition. Using these techniques will keep people rewarded as they move through the game. You may also try other genres of games with this core concept. Examples might include, an RPG where you start as a child and work your way up to village council or leader, over time. Or Multi-player co-op op, where 2-6 human players must work together to tend crops, raise children, improve houses, disseminate information, care for the sick and so on. Even a village Sim game where players influence simulated villagers from on high, building wells, roads, fields, schools, clinics and homes. If it is possible to keep the tech suited for an Android phone, you can reach both players where the information revealed is most needed and potential donors.

Al Nelson

Sounds complicated, and not very fun. Nobody plays a video game just for the message. The game also has to be fun and rewarding. Life is mostly work with very little fun or reward. That is why we play games. Not to live out the drudgery of a hard life, but to escape it. I think that in almost every single instance, "games with a message" don't focus enough on making a good game, first and foremost. Those sorts of games just end up on some "worst games ever" list on Youtube, and that is all the exposure they get. And this particular message... Isn't it well known? I mean, I have never met anyone who thinks a poor girl from a small village has it easy, or that world health is perfect or anything. All in all, it seems like the message overshadows the game itself, and it doesn't sound like a whole lot of fun.

Ryan Allen

Thanks for the A2A. FIrst of all, the fundamental mistake you are doing is that you are linking a "casual gameplay mechanic" with a "serious story line". For a game like Temple Run, story line is mostly a hindrance to the gamer. People who don't have enough time to do serious gaming indulges in casual games. They want to access the actual gameplay fast, and they also want to keep the gaming sessions short, mindless and adrenaline pumping. So, if you want to make a game like Temple Run and also want the gamer's to appreciate and immerse on to a deep, social message bearing story line, that's asking a bit too much. Many people have played, enjoyed and burned out Temple Run 1 and 2. They love the gameplay mechanic, so they are embracing clone titles like Agent Dash, Minion Rush, Subway Surfer etc., which shows that this specific gameplay mechanic (encountering obstacles on the road whilst running away from pursuers) is still popular. But in order to make your game fail, one single, long "Loading" screen can be enough. In your game, you want people to pause, read instructions and get acquainted with the social messages. That's too much taxation on a casual gamer. As a social awareness building project, the game has some potential. But from gaming attractiveness and business aspect, it is too ambitious and would most likely fail to garner attention. On the other side, you will never be able to sell a boxed game with temple run mechanics. Hardcore and or mainstream gamers will never buy a game with this kind of casual mechanics. Your idea is more suited for an RPG (Neverwinter Nights) or Adventure game (like Longest Journey/Broken Sword). I think either of these would work quite well, because there aren't too many good games that utilizes the Indian sub-continental life style.

Ishtiaque Khan

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