Have a hot female npc but she's in a hood and cloak run to your character and go "you have to help me, they're trying to flatten my tits and ass and fuck up my face! I need to escape to the patriarchy!" And then get an escort mission where you defend her from goblins and banshees until she reaches the safety of what's listed as the bad guys.
How about you get an arrest warrant for molestation with the tranny's real name so you dont recognize him right away and have to track down this unknown criminal until you end up back at his house where he an-hero'd.
An "unbeatable" DEI inspired rival character that is also a clear allegory for P2Win whales as zir is an unskilled, lazy asshole, but has ridiculous financial backing and still succeeds so most of the other NPCs love them.
Take the inn idea and expand on it by creating a clear, if mostly inaccessible, way for the player to P2win their way out of everything, like a special currency that can be "purchased" and/or earned from miserably grindy tasks, but that arbitrarily expires or depreciates in value.
Sounds like you mostly have it covered. Maybe throw in a bunch of useless collectibles to “justify” the empty open world that gives you some shitty reward. Oh and have a cluttered, intrusive ui full of quest markers, advertisements for the in-game store, reuse assets in an obviously lazy way, etc.
I think you're going about it the wrong way. I know, your creative vision and all that, but your premise and your goal are misaligned. You want a parody, but to play it straight. That doesn't work. Or at least, requires a great deal of careful balance and skill with a very thin success window and very wide fail rate.
I think it would be better if you go a horror game angle. First: Everyone loves indie horror games, and it would also help to add in the trope of yet another damn RPGmaker horror game. Second, it allows you to 100% play straight things going weird or going wrong. The doppelganger forgetting the last time it saw you it was a redhead. A serial kidnapping of people mentioning certain verboten topics, like the words "Taiwan", "Black", or "Female". The uncanny valley of "We were always called the Strawhat Wizards. Black Wizards are wrong. There are no Black Wizards. There never have been Black Wizards. Are you remembering Ẅ̴̷̨̛̤̗̯̗͎̗̳͍́̄̒̃ͩ̒̀͛͘͜͜͞R̨̢̡̧͎̫͕̫̩͓̲ͥͮ̓̾ͪͦͮ̇̕͢͡͠ͅO͌ͩ̌ͧ̓̌̓ͯ̕͜͞͠͝͏̶͎̝͖̖̫̲̩̱͘N̶̨̨̺̙̼̳̟̯̪͖̄̐͐̍͆̆ͬ̌̀͝͝͠͞G̵̶̛̬̫̮̥͇̲̠̲͋̄̊͂͊ͯ̋̒̀̕͘͘͟information?" kind of vibe.
Otherwise, I think you need to play it less straight and more into the parody angle. You should definitely have some on-disc DLC in that case, and like Dragon Age, make it seem really time-sensitive but then just not able to do it. "My village is burning! Right over there! Help!" ->You can't enter this area without the DLC! Expected Release Date 13/13/2024. -> "You monster! Why won't you help me!? Don't just leave us to die like this!" [Your karma has gone down].
Have a little goblin named Greenblott interject into all of your conversations, castigating you for any perceived anti-goblin sentiments. Eventually all characters will openly admit that they only say things he approves of. Have a couple characters who try to push back against him simply vanish without explanation. Have him be a secret major cause of all the terrible things going on.
I'd make it as a parody of the Tycoon games, Factorio, and SimTower, except instead of rollercoasters or machinery, you're filling out an office with cubicles, sound studios, mocap studios, testing workshops, q&a phone banks, etc, and then finding people to fill them.
You have to balance happiness with getting an acceptable rate of workflow. Ranging from an office that's a moneybleeding paradise that accomplishes nothing, a profitable gulag, or an outright reign of terror where dissenters are fired.
The easiest business model to pick would be to focus on mobile games, letting you get away with no testing, no support, but a lottery-like return; low chances of success but massive profits if you get lucky. But the longer you keep making mobile games the less likely you are to get a hit. So you have to transition to other products which means expanding your office and getting more capabilities.
But the more you expand the more testing you potentially need and the more support teams you need to placate customers so testing flaws don't hurt your reputation.
A staffer with many disciplines and successful titles becomes a "rockstar", a special employee type that's a brand unto themselves; you can put in charge of projects based on their strengths and weaknesses to boost results but they also have quixotic demands and a growing risk of leaving (sorta like going rebel in Tropico, or nobles in Dwarf Fortress).
You could even have linked projects. So you have a development project for one game going on, but then you can put another development team on an engine special project. On its own, an engine project is almost guaranteed to fail. An engine project paired with a successful game project becomes a revenue source that requires almost no support as long as you keep pairing it with games (at the cost of limiting the upside of games as the engine gets older).
Rather than expanding your offices as a mobile developer, just reincorporate under a new name, fire all your employees, pay some Indian sweat shops to reskin all your old games, and re-release them with new branding. Sleep with a few journos to get some good press for your shitty reskins, and slip the app store owners a few kickbacks to artificially inflate your game's popularity.
Constantly imply the game is early access. Make the build number 0.80something on the title screen. Include a build select somewhere in the options, with a parody '0.91.01a beta branch', which if selected changes the style of combat to something totally different and shitty, with only the "Female Presenting Non-Binary" player character as selectable, sweet-babified tumblr char portraits etc. Doesn't have to be more than a joke, have it fake crash early on with a dev note about bug reports and V1.0 releasing soon (dev note dated 2018).
*you have a stat in the game called karma, it does nothing but it goes down every time you pick the "incorrect" choice, the NPCs in-game will talk to you in worse and worse ways the least karma you have, eventually they only tell you a script line saying karma too low comment hidden,
*Alternatively, if you get too low karma you effectively get a game over screen, karma too low this player character is now Hidden.
*skill: paradox, character yells in a balloon something like: Islam is right about women, it deals 9999 damage to NPCs
*during dialogue options your character will have some choices available every time you do you will lose karma, all the choices that make you lose karma perfectly foreshadow events in late-game
*there is a character called Mary Jane in the game, the first time you talk to her her name is just Mary Jane, the second time Is Mary Jaw, the third time is Manly Jane and the last time is Manly Jaw. her jaw became comically larger each time.
*there are shops in the game that sell the coolest names, coolest looking equipment and even recruitable party NPC that look like waifu, when you try to buy them the transaction gets stopped by OyVeyPal.
*you will be unable to pick the choice that would lead to fighting the last boss early because when you do so the NPC will say
*The sixth time you try to save the game the game tells you that you will have to pay 20 dollars to save the game further, and asks if "you consent"
*Anyway any time the game forces the player to make a decision that is clearly a scam it asks the player if "you consent".
Whatever triple-a trends palworld copied from triple-a. On rails open world prefab survival craft unlive-service ephemeral arbitrary RPG. Cater to normies that think Samwise Tarly can be obese post wall expedition because dragons exist and "it's fantasy".
Sounds fun, I'd play that. Just be sure that there are constant reminders that everything in the game is destroying the industry. Regular corporate update emails with announcements of winning an award from some shitty magazine, and right below it is the tanking stock prices or layoff announcement.
Have a hot female npc but she's in a hood and cloak run to your character and go "you have to help me, they're trying to flatten my tits and ass and fuck up my face! I need to escape to the patriarchy!" And then get an escort mission where you defend her from goblins and banshees until she reaches the safety of what's listed as the bad guys.
You should find the "trans rights" NPC dangling from a ceiling fan later. That or an arrest warrant for child molestation.
Why not both?
Sounds like a quest chain to me.
How about you get an arrest warrant for molestation with the tranny's real name so you dont recognize him right away and have to track down this unknown criminal until you end up back at his house where he an-hero'd.
Maybe build upon or get some ideas from this game?
https://store.steampowered.com/app/416760/Pay2Win_The_Tricks_Exposed/
An "unbeatable" DEI inspired rival character that is also a clear allegory for P2Win whales as zir is an unskilled, lazy asshole, but has ridiculous financial backing and still succeeds so most of the other NPCs love them.
Take the inn idea and expand on it by creating a clear, if mostly inaccessible, way for the player to P2win their way out of everything, like a special currency that can be "purchased" and/or earned from miserably grindy tasks, but that arbitrarily expires or depreciates in value.
Sounds like you mostly have it covered. Maybe throw in a bunch of useless collectibles to “justify” the empty open world that gives you some shitty reward. Oh and have a cluttered, intrusive ui full of quest markers, advertisements for the in-game store, reuse assets in an obviously lazy way, etc.
I think you're going about it the wrong way. I know, your creative vision and all that, but your premise and your goal are misaligned. You want a parody, but to play it straight. That doesn't work. Or at least, requires a great deal of careful balance and skill with a very thin success window and very wide fail rate.
I think it would be better if you go a horror game angle. First: Everyone loves indie horror games, and it would also help to add in the trope of yet another damn RPGmaker horror game. Second, it allows you to 100% play straight things going weird or going wrong. The doppelganger forgetting the last time it saw you it was a redhead. A serial kidnapping of people mentioning certain verboten topics, like the words "Taiwan", "Black", or "Female". The uncanny valley of "We were always called the Strawhat Wizards. Black Wizards are wrong. There are no Black Wizards. There never have been Black Wizards. Are you remembering Ẅ̴̷̨̛̤̗̯̗͎̗̳͍́̄̒̃ͩ̒̀͛͘͜͜͞R̨̢̡̧͎̫͕̫̩͓̲ͥͮ̓̾ͪͦͮ̇̕͢͡͠ͅO͌ͩ̌ͧ̓̌̓ͯ̕͜͞͠͝͏̶͎̝͖̖̫̲̩̱͘N̶̨̨̺̙̼̳̟̯̪͖̄̐͐̍͆̆ͬ̌̀͝͝͠͞G̵̶̛̬̫̮̥͇̲̠̲͋̄̊͂͊ͯ̋̒̀̕͘͘͟information?" kind of vibe.
Otherwise, I think you need to play it less straight and more into the parody angle. You should definitely have some on-disc DLC in that case, and like Dragon Age, make it seem really time-sensitive but then just not able to do it. "My village is burning! Right over there! Help!" ->You can't enter this area without the DLC! Expected Release Date 13/13/2024. -> "You monster! Why won't you help me!? Don't just leave us to die like this!" [Your karma has gone down].
Kek
Have a little goblin named Greenblott interject into all of your conversations, castigating you for any perceived anti-goblin sentiments. Eventually all characters will openly admit that they only say things he approves of. Have a couple characters who try to push back against him simply vanish without explanation. Have him be a secret major cause of all the terrible things going on.
No thanks. I have experience with RPG Maker and this entire project is going to be about as low-effort as possible.
I like your approach. Appearing low budget adds to the parody.
Nah, that's not how I'd do it at all.
I'd make it as a parody of the Tycoon games, Factorio, and SimTower, except instead of rollercoasters or machinery, you're filling out an office with cubicles, sound studios, mocap studios, testing workshops, q&a phone banks, etc, and then finding people to fill them.
You have to balance happiness with getting an acceptable rate of workflow. Ranging from an office that's a moneybleeding paradise that accomplishes nothing, a profitable gulag, or an outright reign of terror where dissenters are fired.
The easiest business model to pick would be to focus on mobile games, letting you get away with no testing, no support, but a lottery-like return; low chances of success but massive profits if you get lucky. But the longer you keep making mobile games the less likely you are to get a hit. So you have to transition to other products which means expanding your office and getting more capabilities.
But the more you expand the more testing you potentially need and the more support teams you need to placate customers so testing flaws don't hurt your reputation.
A staffer with many disciplines and successful titles becomes a "rockstar", a special employee type that's a brand unto themselves; you can put in charge of projects based on their strengths and weaknesses to boost results but they also have quixotic demands and a growing risk of leaving (sorta like going rebel in Tropico, or nobles in Dwarf Fortress).
You could even have linked projects. So you have a development project for one game going on, but then you can put another development team on an engine special project. On its own, an engine project is almost guaranteed to fail. An engine project paired with a successful game project becomes a revenue source that requires almost no support as long as you keep pairing it with games (at the cost of limiting the upside of games as the engine gets older).
Rather than expanding your offices as a mobile developer, just reincorporate under a new name, fire all your employees, pay some Indian sweat shops to reskin all your old games, and re-release them with new branding. Sleep with a few journos to get some good press for your shitty reskins, and slip the app store owners a few kickbacks to artificially inflate your game's popularity.
Have the big amazing land turn out to be a front for the mobs money laundering.
Dicks.
make it a survivalcraft game with only 4 puzzles, but copypasted 100 times across the map.
Constantly imply the game is early access. Make the build number 0.80something on the title screen. Include a build select somewhere in the options, with a parody '0.91.01a beta branch', which if selected changes the style of combat to something totally different and shitty, with only the "Female Presenting Non-Binary" player character as selectable, sweet-babified tumblr char portraits etc. Doesn't have to be more than a joke, have it fake crash early on with a dev note about bug reports and V1.0 releasing soon (dev note dated 2018).
*you have a stat in the game called karma, it does nothing but it goes down every time you pick the "incorrect" choice, the NPCs in-game will talk to you in worse and worse ways the least karma you have, eventually they only tell you a script line saying karma too low comment hidden,
*Alternatively, if you get too low karma you effectively get a game over screen, karma too low this player character is now Hidden.
*skill: paradox, character yells in a balloon something like: Islam is right about women, it deals 9999 damage to NPCs
*during dialogue options your character will have some choices available every time you do you will lose karma, all the choices that make you lose karma perfectly foreshadow events in late-game
*there is a character called Mary Jane in the game, the first time you talk to her her name is just Mary Jane, the second time Is Mary Jaw, the third time is Manly Jane and the last time is Manly Jaw. her jaw became comically larger each time.
*there are shops in the game that sell the coolest names, coolest looking equipment and even recruitable party NPC that look like waifu, when you try to buy them the transaction gets stopped by OyVeyPal.
*you will be unable to pick the choice that would lead to fighting the last boss early because when you do so the NPC will say
*The sixth time you try to save the game the game tells you that you will have to pay 20 dollars to save the game further, and asks if "you consent"
*Anyway any time the game forces the player to make a decision that is clearly a scam it asks the player if "you consent".
Whatever triple-a trends palworld copied from triple-a. On rails open world prefab survival craft unlive-service ephemeral arbitrary RPG. Cater to normies that think Samwise Tarly can be obese post wall expedition because dragons exist and "it's fantasy".
Sounds fun, I'd play that. Just be sure that there are constant reminders that everything in the game is destroying the industry. Regular corporate update emails with announcements of winning an award from some shitty magazine, and right below it is the tanking stock prices or layoff announcement.