RE: My (quite depressive) dream game
Yo, long time gamer here... have you tried the S.T.A.L.K.E.R series? some of their concepts align with yours. To the exact point you're describing no games comes close, mostly because such a brutal difficulty is a bone-killer. I've seen some DARK games, I've seen some stealth games, but in the end you'll get given power, because without power it would be a castrating and frustrating game. The problem stems with the direction of the story, the bad guys would punish you all the time and you would need to survive... and then what? you escape from the prison? you get your revenge?, there needs to be some incentive to endure such brutal difficulty... maybe escaping from a prison is a good idea, you would have some safe zones and some decisions to influence your escape route... brute force wouldn't get you anywhere and using a stolen gun would be a last resort... holding weapons would be bad too... and by the time you get out of the prison the world has gone to hell and your family is missing... something like that would be really something else, but just like you said, no interactive movies please...
I didn't play S.T.A.L.K.E.R. I'm short time gamer :D
I didn't think that my game would have brutal difficulty. It won't be a shooter. It'll be more about the story than about challenge. An action adventure without killing everything that moves. It may sound boring, but it'll be different at least. And as I said there would be more storylines and main heroes who will be somehow connected. Somebody will want to escape other will try the best option for him to last longer. It should offer different views.
Did you see this upcoming game that was about a coop escape from prison? It's called a way out. I didn't think you were going for an adventure game, since you said "I don't want it to be an interactive movie", but that's what adventures games are like... mostly. I think I focused on the wrong point... you're just like most old time gamers, looking for some epic and engaging mature storyline.
Yeah, I want storyline because I don't enjoy games where you're doing something for nothing. I don't want interactive movie or pure adventures if you want like those from TellTale or Life is Strange I want an action adventure like Uncharted, Tomb Raider or Last of Us. The "action" word has its purpose in the name of this genre. And it won't be coop. It'll be singleplayer, you'll just play for different characters.
So sorry that I'm too mainstream ;)
And as I said in the article I never thought about it in detail. Just this contest was motivation to do so. So yeah, it's not perfect like every brainstorming.