I Heard You Like Prompts (Brainstorming thread for story input)

(This brainstorming thread will not lead to a Call for Submissions: the dev team will draw ideas directly from this thread.)

We're going meta: Come up with a prompt for a game idea for an episode! (Don't come up with an actual game idea, come up with the prompt text that people will see and create their game idea submissions based on.)

The dev team will draw some prompt ideas for future Calls for Submissions directly from this brainstorming thread, so share your ideas here!

There's no deadline on adding ideas to this brainstorming thread -- we can keep it alive and keep drawing from it now and many episodes into the future. If you're interested in possibly getting your game prompt idea into a Call for Submissions for Episode 3, however, you'll want to add it here no later than Thursday, Sept 27th at 12 noon (Pittsburgh time).

Laura

For example, the Call for Submissions prompt for Episode 2 was "Using 300 characters or less, describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must re-contain escaped ghosts. Be as creative as you can!"

deathbow

(For an episode way further than 3...) The gnomes have not only returned, but, they have infiltrated Puzzle Clubhouse and stolen Uncle Cornelius' pants. Why? Because they love to parachute from the roof of Puzzle Clubhouse! Follow along as Uncle Cornelius (in his outrageous underpants) and Jasper try to contain the situation, find and re-claim the missing gnome parachutes...er...pants.

Clearly, I've misunderstood the assignment, so...

"Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must try to catch the gnomes who are parachuting from the top of Puzzle Clubhouse using Uncle Cornelius' pants, in order to restore said trousers to Uncle Cornelius."

Werehare

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must place whoopie cushions on every seat in the mansion without being caught (and without setting off any of uncle Cornelius' wacky contraptions.)

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must several new rooms to the mansion without crushing/blocking off or tipping over any existing rooms.

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must canvas the community in order to get new game ideas!

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must use disguises in order to get through various rooms and eventually get to the kitchen and have a cookie.

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must turn off a time machine which has gotten into a loop. Change the past in order to stop the machine from being turned on.

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must stop Werehare from spamming the forums the an endless parade of questionable game suggestions!

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in whic... Oh wait... I think that's the front door. I'll be right back.

...

*sounds of distant scream followed by a promise to stop typing*

postArgus

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which Uncle Cornelius must clean up after raucous party he threw on a distant dwarf planet using his favorite cleaning apparatus, the Vacuum of Space.

JuryDuty

Describe a game where festively lit hamster balls end up on Cornelius' giant Christmas tree in the Puzzle Clubhouse foyer.

(Yes, this is Christmas edition.)

We will also need contributors to submit an original Christmas carol for Jasper, Cornelius, Rollins, and other past characters to sing. I hope whoever does the voiceovers at Schell can sing!

JuryDuty

Describe a game where the sphinx that wanted to be butler traps Mr. Rollins in a puzzly maze.


Describe a game where Cornelius and Jasper must lead a class that is on a field trip to Puzzle Clubhouse out of the giant Cornicopia of Un-thanksgiving.


When a tree fell on Jasper's old high school, Cornelius offered to move Jasper's reunion to the Clubhouse. Describe a game where Jasper must avoid his former bullies and the embarassing Uncle Cornelius as he dances across the floor to declare his love to his old crush.


Describe a game where Jasper has to tie marionette strings to the feet of the giant raptor birds nesting on the parapets of Puzzle Clubhouse.

Nozcumber

All the games demonstrated so far (frogz/sardines) and all 4 prototypes seem to be twitchers, requiring faster and faster reactions to complete.  How about trying a more puzzly call to action in a future episode?

"Using 300 characters or less, describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse PUZZLE in which the player must" <x> "but not under pressure of a timer/requiring fast reactions. Be as creative as you can."

Stuff with an elegant solution, with rounds that escalate in cerebral difficulty.  Like a number of moves, or number of guesses, or even placing stuff at your leisure and then pressing play to see if your arrangement holds up.  Maybe.

Nozcumber

Where x = "help Jasper to fix the machinery of the Puzzle Clubhouse Lighthouse"

<and not before an airship smashes into it :)>

deathbow

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must navigate around a bunch of angry carrier pigeons as they try to eliminate on your head, dodging them and opening your trusty umbrella at exactly the right times.

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must help out in the kitchen during a dinner party, as RoboChef 5000 has malfunctioned. 

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which the player must enter the tunnels beneath Puzzle Clubhouse, trap those meddling gophers, and fill up the holes and tunnels to protect the integrity of the building above.

Describe an election day idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which Uncle Cornelius is running for Mayor, and trying to put up campaign signs for himself faster than the thieving weasels can remove them, deface them, or put up signs for a nefarious candidate (TBD). (Never mind that in the end, Uncle Cornelius reveals that he is only running for Mayor of Puzzle Clubhouse...which he technically already is...)

Describe a Thanksgiving idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game in which murderous turkeys want to eat Uncle Cornelius' cat for their holiday dinner. Escape the evil turkeys and trick them into flying into a wood chipper (which...turns THEM into the Thanksgiving dinner).

Describe an idea for a Valentine's Day Puzzle Clubhouse game in which meddling Uncle Cornelius sets up Jasper with some hilariously uncomfortable speed dating.

Describe an idea for a Puzzle Clubhouse game, in the Aquarium Room, where you have to zap the tentacles of the kleptomaniac squids with a cattle prod before they steal [insert community idea for objects].

Nozcumber

I just tried explaining the latest "Episode 3 Game Idea Prompt" voting series to my girlfriend, but halfway though my head exploded.  "It's vote to determine the call for submissions we'll then be voting on..." This is very cool, and pushing new boundaries - great stuff PCHQ :)

Nozcumber

I don't think there's much inspiring about fixing an elevator. Maybe a lighthouse would be more fun?  You'd still get the vertical progression (fix floor one puzzle, to get the bulb's power/drive rotation up to floor two, etc) but with a more satisfying end target (e.g. when Jasper fixes the main beam to stop the impending night time calamity, it instead blinds the airship pilot, who crashes into and knocks down the lighthouse).  

Laura

In case you haven't seen it yet -- we've opened up voting on the game idea prompt for Episode 3, using five ideas pulled from this thread. Check it out & vote here!

Laura

Nozcumber said:

I don't think there's much inspiring about fixing an elevator. Maybe a lighthouse would be more fun?  You'd still get the vertical progression (fix floor one puzzle, to get the bulb's power/drive rotation up to floor two, etc) but with a more satisfying end target (e.g. when Jasper fixes the main beam to stop the impending night time calamity, it instead blinds the airship pilot, who crashes into and knocks down the lighthouse).  

Depends on where the elevator is going to take you, I think, and in what ways it's malfunctioning. =P With a lighthouse it's very tempting for time-sensitive elements to work their way back in... after all, the kinds of problems lighthouses solve tend to be time-sensitive!

Nozcumber

Laura said:

Nozcumber said:

I don't think there's much inspiring about fixing an elevator. Maybe a lighthouse would be more fun?  You'd still get the vertical progression (fix floor one puzzle, to get the bulb's power/drive rotation up to floor two, etc) but with a more satisfying end target (e.g. when Jasper fixes the main beam to stop the impending night time calamity, it instead blinds the airship pilot, who crashes into and knocks down the lighthouse).  

Depends on where the elevator is going to take you, I think, and in what ways it's malfunctioning. =P With a lighthouse it's very tempting for time-sensitive elements to work their way back in... after all, the kinds of problems lighthouses solve tend to be time-sensitive!

True.  I think there's difference though between the games being time-sensitive and the situation being time-sensitive.  For example, the way our episodes are structured, you could go and have a cup of tea during Fr0gz level 8, even though during the episode itself you've left Cornelius/Jasper in peril.  Our episode timeline kind-of stops while the game plays out in another alternative temporal reality (where if I'm playing, Jasper dies hideously many times), which works just fine.  So I could fix lighthouse levels at my leisure, even though we're actually trying to avert imminent timed disaster in the episode.

palenoue

Elevators aren't inspiring?  Haven't you ever seen Police Squad?  Every time they got into an elevator it was hilarious!  How about this: you enter the broken elevator and are presented with a box of empty shapes into which you've got to arrange some clutter on the floor to fill the spaces in a jigsaw-puzzle type of arrangement.  Once fixed, the doors close, elevator goes up, doors open and a bunch of cavemen and dinosaurs get on. Elevator goes up, breaks down, doors open to a busy department store and the cavemen/dinos get off to hunt bargains leaving behind stone-age clutter when you use to fill in a new set of empty shapes.  Once that's done the elevator fills with shopper, goes up, breaks down, and the doors open to reveal a sunny beach for the shoppers to enjoy as they leave various shopping items for you to use to fill new blank spaces.

And so on and so forth, with each floor becoming sillier.

Now doesn't that sound like more fun than a lighthouse?

deathbow

I'm siding with @palenoue on this one. Some of the most memorable movie scenes ever, involve elevators! Mel Brooks' "High Anxiety?" That failed elevator rescue on "The Towering Inferno?" The final scene of the original "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?" "Die Hard!?!" 

Then, there are some reeeeally popular games that depend on elevators ("Donkey Kong," "Tiny Tower" to name a couple...).

I think it's a great topic.

Laura

Nozcumber said:

I think there's difference though between the games being time-sensitive and the situation being time-sensitive.  For example, the way our episodes are structured, you could go and have a cup of tea during Fr0gz level 8, even though during the episode itself you've left Cornelius/Jasper in peril.  Our episode timeline kind-of stops while the game plays out in another alternative temporal reality (where if I'm playing, Jasper dies hideously many times), which works just fine.  So I could fix lighthouse levels at my leisure, even though we're actually trying to avert imminent timed disaster in the episode.

For sure. Because the prompt was initially defined in terms of an unspecified "Problem X," we went with the idea of an elevator because it seemed likely to get submissions that followed the spirit of the prompt, and because an elevator would work well with our needs for Episode 3.

One of the really interesting and distinctive things about the game prompt is its push in a more puzzley, less speed-based game mechanic direction. We wanted to reinforce this focus on puzzle over speed to help ensure that people creating submisions wouldn't lose sight of that aspect of the prompt. Another factor is that we were tailoring the prompt to Episode 3, and one of our goals for that episode is to reduce the number of new locations that Brittany and Chez will need to art up. We're really putting them through their paces with Episode 2 and all its new locations, so we wanted to give them a breather before we set them to creating more impressive vistas.

As it is, though, it looks like we've got a time machine in our future... the Call for Submissions for Episode 3 game ideas is coming up soon!

Laura

Heads-up -- the brainstorming thread for the game prompt for Episode 3 is up, and the Call for Submissions for game ideas begins tomorrow!

Laura

Happened on this fake Twitter feed for game designer Peter Molyneux... these game idea tweets would fit right in here! =P