Concepts That You Really Liked

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soren7550

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Dec 18, 2008
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So Escapists, what are some concepts from novels/games/movies/etc. that you really liked?

Note: No, you don't necessarily have to like the final product for this discussion. Liking the final product is also a-ok.

One that I really liked (and which inspired this thread) is the concept for the book The Dust of 100 Dogs, which a pirate is cursed to live the lives of 100 dogs before she can be reincarnated as a human again, all while retaining her memories the whole time, thus has been planing for over 300 years how to get back her buried treasure.

The final product was fine enough, but it could have been better. The concept, I love though.

Now you!
 

tippy2k2

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I don't know if it will count for I have not seen the final project and I don't intend to see the final project...

The Purge [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2184339/?ref_=sr_1]

That is a sweet idea for a movie (the "for 12 hours, crime is legal" thing) that looks like a generic "OMG They're in the house!!!!" slasher flick using The Purge as the most complicated reason why the people don't just call the damn cops. An amazingly cool concept that gets pissed away; what a shame...
 

DoPo

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Jan 30, 2012
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Many, I really like concepts, it's more rare that the product holds up, though. I can still like it on concept alone. For example, Dishonored - the game is meh, too easy and the abilities you get just make it a walk in the park, the story itself is also meh - almost "your princess is in another castle", the characters were meh - most of them didn't really stand out at all. But I like the world, cosmology, and background are actually quite cool. I loved reading all of the books and exploring here and there for some new nuggets of information. The idea of a godless world with (essentially) Nyarlathotep being an adversary for kicks is fascinating.

Then again, sometimes concept is not enough. Here is a different example - Demon: the Fallen the tabletop RPG. Here is the concept - you play as one of the original demons - the angels that pretty much built reality and then rebelled against heaven, headed by Lucifer himself, which caused them to Fall. They, of course, lost the war and were cast into hell as punishment. What I find really cool is why they rebelled in the beginning - apparently (according t their version of the story) they wanted to help humans but God was being a douche and didn't want to mess at all. And the hell he cast them in wasn't brimstone, fire lakes, and the souls of the sinners, but instead just the black empty Abyss where the Fallen were forever cut away from humanity which they cherished. So far so good, then comes the next interesting part - well their "forever" damnation comes to a finish a bit early - the walls of hell get slightly cracked due to...erm, nukes[footnote]long story - some people tried to nuke a vampire, some ghosts nuked a city, and one guy just wanted to nuke chaos for kicks[/footnote], which enabled some of the Fallen to escape into the modern day world. Only to find it a shadow of its former self - apparently it looks way past its expiration date and God plus the rest of the angels are nowhere to be found.

So the concept - fantastic, love it. In practice, though? Well, I found the game to be too whiny and emo. One of the central stats of the Fallen is pretty much have a how much they want to cut themselves (and others). Also, they are supposed to either be wallowing in self loathing and maybe try and regain some of their former angelic heritage by being "oh it sucks to be us, and we really really did bad things, waah" or just go biblical demon on the world with the rationale "eh, I suffered, so should they". So execution - eh, could have been better.
 

Dirty Hipsters

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Too Human.

The concept of the game just sounded so awesome on paper. It was supposed to be a Devil May Cry style hack and slash game, with a story set in a highly technologically advanced future and based entirely on norse mythology.

That concept got me so hyped for the game I was ready to drop a preorder on it. Then the demo came out and the game was complete and utter garbage. It was the most disappointed I have ever been in a game, and that disappointment completely stemmed from how kickass the original concept for it was.
 

BQE

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Jun 17, 2013
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Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City

I was so incredibly excited about this game when I heard about the premise. I thought to myself, "Finally, a chance to be the bad guys in a context like this." I thought the game could of done so much groundbreaking stuff with the IP or at least gameplay. The product did not even come close.

I was sad.
 

AuronFtw

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Mid-battle class swapping from FFX-2. In addition to giving you access to a greater number of abilities to deal with various situations, most of the class grids granted fairly powerful buffs if you swap classes in the right order, stuff from auto-haste to really powerful spells.
 

Realitycrash

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DoPo said:
Many, I really like concepts, it's more rare that the product holds up, though. I can still like it on concept alone. For example, Dishonored - the game is meh, too easy and the abilities you get just make it a walk in the park, the story itself is also meh - almost "your princess is in another castle", the characters were meh - most of them didn't really stand out at all. But I like the world, cosmology, and background are actually quite cool. I loved reading all of the books and exploring here and there for some new nuggets of information. The idea of a godless world with (essentially) Nyarlathotep being an adversary for kicks is fascinating.
This.
The only thing they did good in that game was the setting.

And following up on the World of Darkness: Mage the Sorcerers Crusade. It was one of the worst selling games, but the table-top game of Mage set in a Renaissance steam-punk world is an awesome idea.
 

Lonewolfm16

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Leaving aside my love for anything Norse, I really really like the concept behind Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere. A future world where people are attempting to replicate history and each faction has lots of magic and tech related to our mythology? Awesome! The idea of people having sacred weapons that only work on people of different religions? Awesome! Writers having the ability to bend the world to match their writings? Awesome! The idea of contracts with various gods being used as power sources? Awesome! And something I think someone should work into a RPG. I think it would be very cool to join a certain religion/ sect of a religion then obey commands from a deity to gain power. The show never did as much with the concept as I would have liked, but was pretty great nonetheless. I should probably read the light novels sometime.
 

ThreeName

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tippy2k2 said:
I don't know if it will count for I have not seen the final project and I don't intend to see the final project...

The Purge [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2184339/?ref_=sr_1]

That is a sweet idea for a movie (the "for 12 hours, crime is legal" thing) that looks like a generic "OMG They're in the house!!!!" slasher flick using The Purge as the most complicated reason why the people don't just call the damn cops. An amazingly cool concept that gets pissed away; what a shame...
See, for me, it sounded really cool for the first 10 seconds. Then I unfortunately thought about it and realised that a lot of crime is either need-related or retribution-related, and thus would really not be able to be confined to one period.. The idea that it would actually reduce crime is ludicrous. The concept itself is interesting, but the justification is horrible. If we could come up with decent justification, it would be great.
 

Fox12

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Jun 6, 2013
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soren7550 said:
So Escapists, what are some concepts from novels/games/movies/etc. that you really liked?

Note: No, you don't necessarily have to like the final product for this discussion. Liking the final product is also a-ok.

One that I really liked (and which inspired this thread) is the concept for the book The Dust of 100 Dogs, which a pirate is cursed to live the lives of 100 dogs before she can be reincarnated as a human again, all while retaining her memories the whole time, thus has been planing for over 300 years how to get back her buried treasure.

The final product was fine enough, but it could have been better. The concept, I love though.

Now you!
The entirety of the new superman movie was pretty hit and miss. On the one hand Clark came across as borderline emo when he was a child, and the majority of the movie portrayed him as this sort of wandering vagabond. He should have gotten a job at the daily planet, that way we would have been more emotionally attached to metropolis when it was attacked.The religious imagery was way to blatant, i'm surprised they didn't just make him a carpenter. We GET it, he's supposed to be our savior/messiah. More than anything, the movie lost what made superman great: his sincerity, naivety, and heart. He isn't batman (who I like more anyway), and shouldn't have to be. Therefore my main problem with the film was the tone, which was completely wrong for this film.

However, I'm glad that EVERYONE put their all into this movie. Unlike Marvel, The Man of Steel did not feel like a cheap cash grab. It was an absolute masterpiece of cinematography, and the actors were perfect, elevating even mediocre roles to higher levels. The opening with krypton was brilliant, as it tied the whole story together, and gave characterization to everyone, including the villain. I actually liked Zodd in this movie. I expected him to walk in, beat his chest, declare himself god/emperor/dictator/whatever and then get trounced by superman. Instead we get a man who was trying desperately to save his people from an impending doom, and who failed. In the process he had to kill a close friend. I felt bad for him, and even though he clearly needed to be stopped, I never felt like he was evil for evils sake. When superman killed him, it was a very powerful moment, as superman was effectively killing off the last of his race.Some people hated the ending, saying that supes would never kill, but I think that they forget that Christopher Reeves killed Zodd without hesitation, and immediately started making out with lowis. The new superman, on the other hand, was really affected by it. The exploration of superman juggling his immigrant heritage could have been explored more, but I felt it was still better than other movies.

I felt that this film was a step in the right direction, but fell JUST short of masterpiece status. Had the story and tone been improved, it could have been mind blowing.
 

Headsprouter

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Timesplitters...just the idea of a game with a large roster of playable characters not necessarily impending on gameplay, almost purely for aesthetic purposes and individual expression really appeals to me.

The Timesplitters themselves are pretty cool, too. Originally, a creature dwelling somewhere between our dimension and the next, but from the beginning, appearing to be a created being rather than a born one. Also they lack normal eyes, or eyes at all, and that's awesome.
 

Chaosian

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In concept, I love S.T.A.L.K.E.R. - in that The Zone is just a playground for all your most illogical physics-breaking ideas to let loose. The games however, leave me pretty bitter about it all (especially since I recently bought Call of Pripyat to have a game-breaking bug 22 hours in).
I'm not sure how many people here have read Roadside picnic, but I just got into it - and it's imagining of The Zone pretty much puts S.T.A.L.K.E.R.'s piddly little retread to shame. Sure there's a few of Stalker's anomalies that are a little creative , but for the most part they're just area in which painful stock status effect happens - the 'realistic' equivalents of floating-blocks and jumping fire in Mario. Picnic's Zone, is the craziest thing I've read in years, with hair growing from antennas that passes on an infectious acidic corrosion, sentient earthquakes that just kinda move on their own, ill-defined areas that make metal bolts so heavy they fall through dirt, objects that cast illogical shadows for no reason, trucks that don't biodegrade and have completely corroded right next to each-other... it's all very cool to read about, and I can see why someone thought it'd make a good series for books and games.
 

Dirty Hipsters

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Lonewolfm16 said:
Leaving aside my love for anything Norse, I really really like the concept behind Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere. A future world where people are attempting to replicate history and each faction has lots of magic and tech related to our mythology? Awesome! The idea of people having sacred weapons that only work on people of different religions? Awesome! Writers having the ability to bend the world to match their writings? Awesome! The idea of contracts with various gods being used as power sources? Awesome! And something I think someone should work into a RPG. I think it would be very cool to join a certain religion/ sect of a religion then obey commands from a deity to gain power. The show never did as much with the concept as I would have liked, but was pretty great nonetheless. I should probably read the light novels sometime.
I had to look this thing up based on that description alone.

The Japanese name is "Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon" right?


If it's actually anywhere as interesting as the concept is I'll definitely remember to watch it.
 

Something Amyss

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Dec 3, 2008
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Dirty Hipsters said:
Too Human.

The concept of the game just sounded so awesome on paper. It was supposed to be a Devil May Cry style hack and slash game, with a story set in a highly technologically advanced future and based entirely on norse mythology.

That concept got me so hyped for the game I was ready to drop a preorder on it. Then the demo came out and the game was complete and utter garbage. It was the most disappointed I have ever been in a game, and that disappointment completely stemmed from how kickass the original concept for it was.
Yeah, Techno-Nordic DMC would have been awesome. What we got was...Oi.
 

Zhukov

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Dec 29, 2009
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Battlestar Galactica.

Last 50,000 humans left alive, crossing the galaxy on a ragtag migrant fleet, pursued by a relentless enemy.

The show was actually pretty good. Started to wobble toward the end though.
 

Lonewolfm16

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Feb 27, 2012
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Dirty Hipsters said:
Lonewolfm16 said:
Leaving aside my love for anything Norse, I really really like the concept behind Horizon in the Middle of Nowhere. A future world where people are attempting to replicate history and each faction has lots of magic and tech related to our mythology? Awesome! The idea of people having sacred weapons that only work on people of different religions? Awesome! Writers having the ability to bend the world to match their writings? Awesome! The idea of contracts with various gods being used as power sources? Awesome! And something I think someone should work into a RPG. I think it would be very cool to join a certain religion/ sect of a religion then obey commands from a deity to gain power. The show never did as much with the concept as I would have liked, but was pretty great nonetheless. I should probably read the light novels sometime.
I had to look this thing up based on that description alone.

The Japanese name is "Kyoukai Senjou no Horizon" right?


If it's actually anywhere as interesting as the concept is I'll definitely remember to watch it.
Yep. And its a pretty good show, though it spends more time being a somewhat generic, but genuinely good action/comedy/romance anime (in that order) then on its premise. Considering how long the "light" novels apparently are (according to Tv tropes, the second volume is on par with Lord of the Rings in length) I am guessing they flesh stuff out a bit more there.
 

The Wykydtron

"Emotions are very important!"
Sep 23, 2010
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I liked the concept behind Remember Me, even though the morally questionable memory stuff was so integrated into everything that it couldn't focus on the interesting bits and instead it's just the amnesiac hero looking for her *sigh* memories...

I still don't know if the memory remix parts were the best or the worst parts in the game. Twisting certain character defining scenes in a character's life just to make him/her want to help you is morally bankrupt to say the least.

The first one is someone comes to assassinate you and you make her your person who drops you off at every mission in a helicopter. Surely she's going to find out how you fucked her over right? I haven't seen the last hour or so of the game so forgive me if they explain everything at the end.


Oh and Higurashi no Naku Kuro Ni. Your generic highschool rom/com slice of life anime gets turned into a slasher flick halfway through with one of those school characters going insane and killing the rest for no apparent reason. Then the universe gets reset and a different character goes loopy. It's damn cool and has a great mystery story.

Persona 4 because heavy handed truth/mystery themes are best. Just as an example, the main battle theme is called "Reach Out to the Truth"

Notice the "to" is not "for" which would still make sense grammatically but would actually be inaccurate story-wise. "to" indicates reaching in the general direction of something whereas "for" indicates focused direction towards something you know is there.

Yes I overthink everything.

Don't even get me started on how great the Shadow/Persona stuff is. Absolute genius. The fact that they not only have a great concept they pull off the execution of it flawlessly.

I adore any good mystery story really.
 

shootthebandit

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Haze set its self up to be really cool with the whole soldiers and drugs thing although the drugs make combat more efficient they repress the truth of what is actually happening so you are essentially used as a robot. I also like how the militia could use these drugs against them. Just a shame that the game was delayed for so long and it turned out to be a generic shooter with terrible mechanics and the main plot twist was on the back of the box. So much potential there that has gone to waste
 

afroebob

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I'm surprised I'm the first one to say Day Z. Its an amazing idea, the only thing holding it back where the glitches and what not and that should hopefully be fixed in the actual release.