Frost Sparks

This was SO FUN to make please please give it a read! I've still got more to write, but this was by far the most important history I've been needing to iron out.

hii sorry for late reply ^^' but this is a perfect opportunity to bring back up that "social crafting" thing I mentioned a while ago!

So, DNA Swap will have two primary sides to the game: a social aspect and a platformer aspect. The platformer aspect is more or less what you'd expect until you get to specific levels and alt form interactions and stuff so I'll talk about that later.

SOCIAL: There are four villages in the game. These are the main places to engage in social interaction (oo big surprise x) different forms will have different social quirks but the core idea is that you'll be able to shape the world by manipulating the knowledge you gain from speaking with others.

If an NPC tells you "In my opinion, cats are trash." and another tells you "aaaa my cat is lost in that cave!" you Could go in that cave, locate the cat, and then you'd have choices. You could carry the cat back into town, gain the respect of the cat lover, but maintain the stance of the cat hater. Or, you could lie and say that the cat was fending for itself perfectly fine, and maybe even found something cool. Or you could even do something within the platformer level to allow that to actually happen naturally. Regardless, if you have proof that cats are cool, you could convince the cat hater to become a cat lover as well, and use this to your advantage somehow in the future.

I haven't worked out all the details yet, but this is the general idea. I've been thinking, in this scenario, maybe when you gain the first pieces of information from these NPCs, it enters a little journal that you can check any time to see the current opinions of everyone you've met. Similarly, once you locate the cat, a journal entry would appear for the current state of the cat, and update as relevant events happen in the level.

This could even apply to regular enemies. Maybe you meet a hunter who thinks a certain creature is just not worth fighting, but you discover a weakness, relay the information to them, and next time you visit they're feasting. This would boost your reputation and maybe even affect your reputation with the other villages as word gets around?

The core idea is, I want you to be able to influence the world, practically like a sandbox game, but purely through social interactions and manipulation of information. You can't change anyone's core values or skills, but you might be able to hire a builder to make a direct path between villages for fast travel. Literally altering the map itself!