ID:1301229
 
I feel inspired to program a game for the first time in years and I don't really care what at this point. I've got a few ideas floating around but nothing meaty enough to build a game out of yet, although I know one thing, I want to make a zombie game. Zombies have always been a vidya fetish of mine.


Rustle me up some ideas, throw me what ya got, everything and anything. I'm determined.

This is happening.
Survival shooter.
Zombie apocalyptic.
Fighting, surviving.
Survival, persistent? Long standing? RPG elements? Stats?
In response to Rushnut
A large, open world.
Persistent with permadeath.
Purely scavenging.
Fog of war? Dungeons? Probably too intensive on the scale I'm thinking

DayZ death? i.e death = other people can come scavenge your stuff

I like that idea.

Concentrate on the human struggle and the emotional damage and loss of trust in other humans. Make zombies just something else you have to worry about.
In response to Albro1
story < gameplay, at least at this stage

zombies are the thing mixing everything up, the real meat of the game si the slow grind and progression, to get the best gun, to build your fort and explore the entire world

or maybe someone will shoot you and take your stuff

the zombies keep you on your toes at all times
In response to Rushnut
That's really just the gameplay version of what I'm talking about lol. That's what I intended with an old zombie project I started but never got off the ground. Players work together or don't, but the key is survival. The zombies are an added obstacle and shouldn't normally be messed with alone. There's also labs and such around the world that contain journals and stuff, so you can piece together the lore of what exactly caused the outbreak.
Scavenging, crafting.. Lots of crafting.
Every item in the game should be able to be crafted if it's post apocalypse.
Charged plot, Coop compatible.
Keep up the positive energy!
Ammo is hard to be found. Also, the humans are against you for food and water make this another The Last of Us and you'll be fine.
I also intended on making a zombie game but I didn't see it working out without permanent death. You die and respawn then what? Just keep doing that over and over again till you get bored?

People would also get super-pissed if you die permanently..

They key being survival. So you survive for days on end, have a lag spike and have your account wiped? So many things to think about.
In response to SilencedWhisper
This. One problem I've found with these types of zombie survival game where the point is to not die is... It's boring.

You get some items together, make a fort, then sit around doing nothing. Even if you die, you just do the same thing over and over again.

If you want to make this kind of game, you're going to need to do something to mix it up and stop people from getting bored.
Permanent death could be added in a form of reincarnation, you'd lose your old character, however you'd retain some bonuses for example or some points for the previous character and then use them to improve the new one?
DayZ works somehow. What does it have?

Scavenging for weapons, ammo, food, water.

Sneaking past zombies, because shooting is a waste of ammo.

Sneaking past other players. Usually you'll be seen and shot at, so you usually end up shooting back if you can.

Perma-death. Lose all your items.

But it works, somehow.
I don't need demos or library thank you, but the thought was nice.

No I just need design ideas.
Copy DayZ's mechanics or at least approach, except improve upon. In DayZ zombies are not dangerous at all where as players will shoot you on sight for the thrills.

I'd rather see a game where shooting was rare, and doing so would be suicidal due to noise. Focusing on looting and such and avoiding zombies.

Way back when I was going to attempt a similar sounding project, I wanted to play around with RTS-like elements where each player would control a group and could find more. Perhaps this idea interests you.