Make a game with underused game mechanics combinations. GO!!!

[Kosoy]

Well then.
1) an action game with advanced mechanics from fighting games (think Devil May Cry and Ninja Gaiden)
2) rhytm-game, where you moveset corresponds with the soundtrack. Actually rewarding chains of moves are designed to sound like decent music.

With DMC-style combat mechanics, where canceling can be used to generate immediate responses to player's actions (necessary for a decent rhythm game), such thing can become possible.

1) Complex fencing/brawling/martial arts system.
2) Slo-mo

Real-life fencing and martial arts have one big problem with being spectacular - they are way too fast. Yes, it's actually faster than in a movie. An average fight can last from 2 to 10 seconds if both opponents are serious. Using slo-mo not to show-off your moves that were done in normal time, but as a way to simulate lightning-fast decision-making, can be used to make a great game.
By the way, same goes for all kinds of fighting - expand the wild west quickdraw duel idea.

1) Online game where players fill different roles and complete goals together.
2) Wait... it's just that! What the heck, that's a basic idea of MMORPG's and tactical action games! Just do it in the end of all, stop making games where there's no real difference between those roles!

Not that I expect a lot of game designers to be reading this =). But it's still a fresh idea. Progress is really slow in this field. There are diamonds like Team Fortress and World of Warcraft, where roles appear to be really different, but there are way more dissapointments like Quake Wars, where similar functions are divided between classes just to create an illusion of difference.
And way more possibilities. Imagine a fantasy MMORPG - the same as all the fantasy MMORPGs around. Now imagine that playing a tank feels like TP hack'n'slash, ranged classes are more like FPS, rogue-types get lots of quick-time events, bards get rhythm games and mages do some very fast puzzles (from runes of Arx Fatalis/Black & White for simple spells, to something like Rubik's Cube, which they will be solving anxiously during a raid for some massive damage spell while their whole parties try to keep the Boss away)...
Well, I can dream like that for hours. Sure, that's a great deal of tricky coding in it, but I believe that such a game can be superb fun.

 

[Hungry Xenomorph]

1) 2D shooter (ex. Contra)
2) physics engine (ex. Little Big Planet)

Yes. Begin production now.

 

[Red Rum]

1: everything is based on quick time events.
2: it's a "type the right word" game
litterally everything is quick time events, even moving around (but that should be really easy like typing "bo, be, ba, lo, le, la" or something), and boss battles should be typing antidisestablishmentarianism in 4 secs.

Kind of like "Typing of the Dead", like "House" but heroes use magic keyboards instead.

 

[Anarchemitis]

A 3D Real-time Strategy Game in which you must adventure. Imagine; Jak & Daxter with a heaping helpful of Homeworld 2.
Hmmmm....

 

[Man_In_Gauze]

1: everything is based on quick time events.
2: it's a "type the right word" game
litterally everything is quick time events, even moving around (but that should be really easy like typing "bo, be, ba, lo, le, la" or something), and boss battles should be typing antidisestablishmentarianism in 4 secs.

Kind of like "Typing of the Dead", like "House" but heroes use magic keyboards instead.

Guitar Hero with words instead of notes?

 

[josh797]

this post had already been said

 

[Red Rum]

1: everything is based on quick time events.
2: it's a "type the right word" game
litterally everything is quick time events, even moving around (but that should be really easy like typing "bo, be, ba, lo, le, la" or something), and boss battles should be typing antidisestablishmentarianism in 4 secs.

Kind of like "Typing of the Dead", like "House" but heroes use magic keyboards instead.

Guitar Hero with words instead of notes?

Actually, there is a game Called "Typing of the Dead". Look it up.

 

[Man_In_Gauze]

Actually, I'd like a game that requires actual skill in melee combat. I'm tired of games where you just swing your sword horizontally until someone dies. The three games I can think of that do this well are:

1. PvKII. It's a medieval Half-Life 2 mod where you can attack vertically, horizontally in either direction, and stab by pressing the appropriate arrow key before attacking. This makes melee combat reasonably similar to actual combat, as you have to dodge or parry accordingly. However, it really, really interferes with attacking while moving, as movement is also mapped to the arrow keys, and it's not reasonably possible to move, attack, and choose an attack pattern at the same time.
2. The LOTR movie games. I've never played the first, but The Two Towers and Return of the King had a reasonably deep combat system, that let you feel like you could choose to approach any encounter several ways. There's a button for quick attack and another for fierce attack, which you can string together to pull off combos, which are more powerful than the moves individually. Also, there's a kick button, to shove unshielded enemies away from you. Speaking of shields, the fierce attack can break shields, but is slow and leaves you vulnerable while attacking. The quick attack is blocked by shields, but results in a parry if your weapon and that of your opponent collides. There is also a one-hit-kill move for enemies on the ground, a seperate parry button that doesn't have as much cooldown as the speed attack, ranged attacks, and a special move where you parry an enemy's attack, then strike them once and finish them off. The only problem with this system is that Aragorn and Gimli get powerful enough to take out foes with basic comboes, and only Legolas's melee game has any real skill to it, but is really diffcult at the same time (his specialty is his arrows, which are extremely overpowered).
3. Ronin: Spirit of the Sword, a Flash game (http://www.2flashgames.com/f/f-38.htm some NSFW parts that should be turned off, as they really only detract from the game) where you can click and drag the cursor to attack with your sword in a given direction, which allows you to choose how and from what angle you launch your attacks. For example, you could go for a short diagonal slash across someone's hand to interrupt their attack, and decapitate them.

In short, I want a situation where each enemy or group of enemies is a different puzzle, relying on the environment and different tactics to dispose of them. Running and gunning should work fine early on, but will make the later stages harder because you'll be low on health and ammo. The soldiers, particularly the Surface Tension level as a whole, in Half-Life did a good job of this, as did Legolas vs. Uruk-hai in LOTR: The Two Towers (a game that I strongly encourage you to get if you happen to find it on sale somewhere)

 

[Dectilon]

I once made an SC map where the only units you control are a few engineers (civilians) that can activate doors and defense turrets by controling certain points. The idea was to lure an enemy engineer to a room, lock it and activate the guns. So, indirect combat.

I think a game like multiplayer Portal could be awesome if you substracted the ability to survive long falls and include a bunch of other ways to hurt people. Maybe operate cranes to knock people off ledges, drop those cubes on people, put one portal high up on a wall and another on the floor in front of the enemy and make them fall in etc : )

"How about a fantasy game where you have to draw "runes" on the screen to cast spells?"

Okami, Black and White

 

[topscore1632]

How about a fantasy game where you have to draw "runes" on the screen to cast spells?

Also Arkane Studios did a dungeon based RPG like this a long time ago...can't remember what it was called. As a mechanic it worked pretty well.

 

[Blayze]

Kind of like "Typing of the Dead", like "House" but heroes use magic keyboards instead.

Actually, they use Dreamcast keyboards, don't they?

How about a fantasy game where you have to draw "runes" on the screen to cast spells?

There's probably at least fifty games for the DS that use this mechanic.

 

[Geoffrey42]

1. Rochambeau
2. Checkers

 

[Malic The Great]

A Hitman type game.

1: Only you don't have any weapons.
2: But you can stop time and set up events to eventually kill your target.

 

[Geoffrey42]

A Hitman type game.

1: Only you don't have any weapons.
2: But you can stop time and set up events to eventually kill your target.

When I read that, the first thing I thought of was Final Destination.

How much fun would it be to play Death (in a Final Destination scenario) where your goal each level is to set up the Rube Goldberg-ian machine'o'death?

 

[mshcherbatskaya]

I was watching the typographic animation of a scene from "Pulp Fiction" [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syf8olcM0z4] and thinking of the synesthesia scenes in The Stars My Destination and I thought that would be an interesting game mechanic to try in a FPS or RPG. The player character sustains some sort of implant damage/neurological effect/magical attack that crosses up the main senses available in a video game, namely sight and hearing.

Actually, I think The Stars My Destination [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Stars_My_Destination#The_Burning_Man] would make a great game.

 

[Red Rum]

1: everything is based on quick time events.
2: it's a "type the right word" game
litterally everything is quick time events, even moving around (but that should be really easy like typing "bo, be, ba, lo, le, la" or something), and boss battles should be typing antidisestablishmentarianism in 4 secs.

Kind of like "Typing of the Dead", like "House" but heroes use magic keyboards instead.

Guitar Hero with words instead of notes?

Actually, there is a game Called "Typing of the Dead". Look it up.

Oh crap, I quoted myself... sorry.