Overview
The project formerly known as 'Prelude' has been scoped down to become 'Labyrinthers,' while retaining the same core aspects. Labyrinthers is now a turn-based board game where you must guide a team of three characters through a maze. Reach the end before the opponent's team does, but watch out for the maze's monsters and shifting walls.
The main design goal of Labyrinthers is to apply VR to types of games that have not been explored enough in VR. Specifically, VR games typically have not experimented with these qualities: grid-based position and movement, turn-based game mechanics, or issuing commands to multiple characters. These qualities are shared by the RPG and strategy genres, both of which VR currently lacks. I believe making even a simple game with these qualities will have implications for how to do these other genres for VR and give VR some much needed variety in genres.
VR & The Tabletop View
As a board game made for VR, Labyrinthers uses a 3rd-person overhead perspective, as if the player were hovering over a tabletop. This perspective works for VR in several ways. First, it is very likely to be a comfortable experience due to having no avatar locomotion (e.g. walking). At the same time, players can survey the whole level by simply turning their head towards the place they want to see. In this manner, they can get a sense of where things are in a way that is more natural and satisfying than scrolling on a traditional screen. The use of head-look can potentially give a feeling of grandieur from being surrounded by a sprawling miniature landscape, much like a model train set or tabletop wargame in real life.
Further Innovation
In Labyrinthers, you can shift your viewpoint of the level by teleporting from place to place. The new viewpoint location is determined by where the player is looking at when the teleport function is pressed or tapped. This teleporting replaces scrolling in 2D overhead games with large maps, like in some RPGs, strategy games, and some other genres. In VR, teleporting to move is less prone to sickness than locomotion. It is particularly fitting for the 3rd-person tabletop view, yet most other 3rd-person VR games so far do not take advantage of it.
Labyrinthers has the potential for longevity. Many games and experiences for VR are short or repetitive -- they don't keep your interest for hours upon hours like traditional-screen games do. I hope to avoid that with some features to be implemented in the future, beyond the jam. Firstly, Labyrinthers is compatible with multiplayer. Secondly, the grid-based nature of its levels means it's also feasible to support randomized map generation or even a map editor. Taken together, these things could offer a variety to keep players coming back for more.
How To Play (Mechanics)
In progress. Stay tuned!
Updates and More Info
Please see my thread on the official Oculus forums: https://forums.oculus.com/viewtopic.php?f=77&t=22407
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