The Turning of Thumbs

The gladiator-n-ancient rome thing has me thinking about interesting stuff you can do with Multiplayer.

Well, 'cause first off, Gladiators worked together in pairs, usually, and I like that, a pair is pretty much the default for a multiplayer game, and I dunno why people don't design more shit around that.

And I've always thought it would be cool to try a MMO where you just got thrown together with some stranger, with the two of you against the world, I mean, there's a lot of cool shit I could see to that, including the idea that you might win the lotto and get thrown together with somebody who was really cool, insteada just some guy you got chained to that you were gonna have to hack the arm off of 'cause he was gonna die in like three seconds in the ring and be a lot of dead weight after you used him as a Human Shield with your Special Formation Attack Power heh.

And then theres the Gameshow stuff, like having the audience vote on whether or not the guys who lose (and win!) in gladiator fight should live or die.

With the Emperor getting the final vote.

Y'know, should they all be NPCs?

Or mebbe just the Emperor?

Is there some system that allows you to impress them and make 'em cheer louder for you, then?

Will they hate you because you are representing Carthage in a Battle Reinactment, and you won, even though you were supposed to die, or will they like you more, because they hate the Emperor, who is putting the show on, and they like it when you made him look like a fool?

Some kinda complex political thing going on in the background between all the senators that lowly grunts in the gladiator ring ain't aware of.

Or mebbe only players in the audience get to vote.

Or mebbe the players in the audience try to get the crowds to vote in a certain way, like some kinda instigation mini-game.

And that would set things up for where you might be treated unjustly as a player, in the ring.

And then, in your next life, mebbe the gods would try to even things up, by sticking you in a position of authority, where you could get revenge on the people who did you wrong heh.

That's classic mythology there man ahaha.

Or maybe you'd have multiple characters, in all sorts of different positions throughout the game, y'know, like one gladiator, and one Senator, and one legionary, or something, who were all replaced a lot, 'cause they all died so much, Syndicate Wars style, but even then, the time and effort you put into the game could be Observed and Remembered By the Gods, y'know?

Yah, like, your advancement in the game was stored in the cruel and not-so-easy-to-please memories of Mars and Jupitor and shit.

And would those be AI, or players?

Either way its interesting.

And when somebody says, the gods must love you because you make 'em laugh, there might be something more to it than they think heh.

Well, whatever, it makes for some interesting twists on the same ole wonder bread and butter sammiches we keep eating ahaha.

Another thing I was thinking that's sorta unrelated is how cool it would be to actually have all the voice-over shit be in whatever language they really spoke in the Ancient World.

Y'know, so the shit you heard the audience yelling, as a gladiator in the ring, would be our best approximation of whatever those dudes actually had to have their ears filled with.

Then just have it translated in the text box or whatever, if yer dude knew the language.

Or how about two gladiator slaves that get thrown together that can't even speak the same langauge becoming buddies purely because of their actions, y'know, taking care of each other and keeping each other alive?

There's just so much cool stuff to think about there, besides the obvious bits about how it'd be the fucking ultimate in PvP or a good place for Historical Detectives and tourists and social pvp'ers (with the Sentators and all that) or boobs-n-gore guys or wargames folks or folks that wanted to just build pretty dollhouses in the countryside and farm barley or whatever.