Oh, this is true old school, “people from under the hill” fairies.
The sidhe.
In the 2004 Bard’s Tale game you keep running across kids who die thinking they are they chosen one.
And then trows (basically goblins) come out and sing an oompa loompa style song mocking the kids.
“Oh it’s baaaaaaad luck to be you…”
And now i have a new idea for a rogue lite
Oh my God yes
The success of Recettear and Moonlighter show there’s a market for subversions of the genre and I’m here for it.
Just spitballing but what if the faeries’ actions wear down the boss’s defenses over time. Also they can loot the chosen kid’s body for stuff to pass on to the next one.
The kids have psychological profiles. Most of them are dicks who have done something to deserve their fate but you can get a random roll of a kid who is a shining moral beacon, and that run gets to take advantage of his +25 Power of Friendship or whatever. (He probably still dies, but you can make a lot of progress that way.)
Oh! And what if the faeries can affect the quality of kids they’re getting? Something like a PR campaign they can run in “our world” where, if their quest is whispered into the right circles, they can get a kid who’s more studious or works out more, or something. They get better at this over time, which is important because towards the endgame you actually need a pure Chosen One to achieve the win state, and the only way to pull that off is good marketing.
EDIT: to add that after the first run, the game over screen lingers on a shot of the kid’s corpse on the ground. After the second run, the new kid’s corpse is added on top of the first kid. This continues throughout the entire save file until you win; by the end it should be a sizeable pyramid of dead chosen ones.
Thank you for the ideas, i might really start to work on that from time to time.
I was thinking in having the faeries follow the player so as new weapons and armor are found the faeries may give different random options at the start of each run. Also have the player earn something like mana crystals instead of money so the upgrades would be done by the faeries magic.
I really like the idea of having different kinds of kids, it reminds me of rogue legacy, but i like more to have then with a more generic base so as the runs goes the game becomes more and more tailored to the player and his play style.
Having the faeries loot the body of the dead kids would be a great way to have the player recover a portion of the loot from each run, i could totally add a animation for this everytime the player dies.
As for the dead pyramid it could work as a window at the starting area where the corpses would be disposed, so after a couple of runs you would notice the pile getting bigger and bigger until it covers the entiry window.
I definitely had rogue legacy in mind! Great game, but I don’t think it leaned hard enough into just how grim and manipulative the whole enterprise is. Also I think you could have a lot of fun with the “marketing” mechanics, like, can the fairies explore the “real” world at all to find the right place to leave their macguffins? Can they leave better “bait”, like magical books for the chosen kids to find, or even a shiny sword where it doesn’t belong? Maybe they can recruit agents in the real world whose only job is to guide kids into their meat grinder.
Fairies could have a system like dead cells where ate the end of each stage you could equip a skill to a maximum of 3, the more i talk about it the more i want to work on it, but i just started another project for a jam, but i’m going to use the next month to create a prototype
That’s a similar concept to a game called Trillion God of Destruction, in which you need to train
waifusfighters to defeat a monster with 1 trillion HP. Chipping away his HP each attempt, but killing the girl in the process.Would be an awesome game if it wasn’t for the anime bullshit.
Never heard of Moonlighter but I used to love Recettear. It looks a lot like Recettear now that I’ve googled it actually lol.
Catacomb Kids kinda has this vibe
Never heard of it, but it looks cool. Also the coop is a plus.
Thank you, is on my wishlist now
Its a fun game! Be forwarned though, its one of those Early Access games thats been in the oven for a LONG time, its been in Early Access since 2015, and I dont expect it to leave EA for another large amount of years as the dev no longer works on it full time (But I dont think its been abandoned either)
The plot of The Sword of Ditto is like this. It plays like a top down Zelda but has cartoon aesthetic. 2p co-op also
It looks cool and i really liked the art, i will add to my wishlist, i may buy it on steam summer sale
Literally the plot of Dark Souls
Essentially how Konosuba start out.
I mean, he was the choose one, he just blew it at choosing a gift
Add in a few more amoral mythical creatures and you’ve got It’s Always Sunny in Faerie. I’d give that a watch.
It’s Always Sunny in
FaerieFaeladelphiaFTFY
I’m… stealing that as the title of a module to write and run at my next gaming con…
Ah yes, of course, the city of mythical love.
Faeladelfia
Just to give credit where credit is due, I’m actually running this as a Changling campaign, using the old WoD rules from the 90s. The players are a Motely who work at an Irish Pub owned by their Sidhe patron, who dies unexpectedly and leaves them the pub, which is also a Freehold. It turns out it’s in massive debt in the mortal world and faces various supernatural challenges as well.
I’m encouraging my players to make argumentative and annoying characters and to try to resolve problems with sitcom solutions, rather than combat or conflict.
I wanted to come back and tell you, because I never would have thought of it without you.
So fairly odd parents for grownups, anyone?
Wasn’t this more or less the plot of the second episode of The Owl House?
[off topic?]
UnLunDun by Neil Gaiman has a similar idea. There’s a Chosen One, great heroine, and her plucky sidekick. The heroine gets sidelined and it’s up to the sidekick to actually save the day.
Makes me think of my thoughts on seeing the first few episodes of Attack on Titan.
spoiler
Never finished it but it probably would have been a more interesting story if they just let the main character up to that point die. Not sure where the story would have gone but it would have been fun finding out.
You should finish it. Things change pretty drastically.
The first few lines reminded me of the game Nox
Edit: holy shit Nox came out 24 years ago today
Pretty similar to the beginning of the Owl House.
I read “amoral” as “amore” + “al” instead of “a-moral”.
Made me wonder how the horniness of the fairies is related.
That Evil Wizards name?
Siatama.
Oh dang, changeling the lost character plot hook.
