The Room Types Ideas Thread

[Pepisolo]

Hey guys

I thought it'd be a good idea to start a thread where we can all pitch in ideas for different room types.  The current rooms don't really have a wide variation of interesting mechanics, so if we can brainstorm a bit and come up with some cool ideas that prove implementable, that'd be great. I'm going to start with a simple one -- so simple that something similar is probably already in the works further down the line, but here it is:

Arena. Specifically, a SMASH TV-esque wave based arena. Your ship enters a room, a siren goes off. There are four locked doors, in through which periodically come a few waves, each with multiple batches of enemies. Each wave should be high pressure with the sense that you need to keep each batch of enemies under control. To this end, each batch will be timed. If you're slow with the first batch then things are going to get scary by the last batch. Next waves would up the difficulty. Other optional extras are random power up or credit drops and extra wall turrets as enemies. Yes...basically just copy SMASH TV!

https://youtu.be/PRHSi4hBHSM?t=4m14s

Seems like a good solid idea with the programming and art resources used not seeming outlandish (although I'm no dev). I'll save other ideas (ok, "borrowing" from old-school classics) for another post. If anyone's got any other ideas to share, that'd be great!

[TheVampire100]

Reminds me of the Monster rooms in common rogue-likes. Did I mention that I HATE Monster rooms. They can ruin your run just because the room didn't look suspicious at first but turns out to be rogue-hell.

I liked the mini game rooms in Rogue Legacy but I guess it's asked too much to add minigames into the game. Also I have no idea how a mini game would work here (maybe missile shooting gallery? Don't know...).

Puzzle rooms with switches would be cool (I don't think interactive objects would be that much of a problem). I like some pauses beteen all the fighting and Puzzle rooms seem for me like a nice variation.

[Pepisolo]

Reminds me of the Monster rooms in common rogue-likes. Did I mention that I HATE Monster rooms. They can ruin your run just because the room didn't look suspicious at first but turns out to be rogue-hell.

I haven't played a ton of roguelikes, although a few, but as I recall Dungeons of Dredmor has Monster rooms which can be crazy because it's basically just a single room piled high with random enemies that can all attack you at once. This SMASH TV arena style room idea is at least a little bit more refined in that it is a series of probably hand seeded waves of a more controlled number of enemies. I think it would be much more manageable than a lot of roguelike monster rooms. I like the narrative of the idea, too, it's like the floor's security have detected you as an intruder, put the room into lockdown, and are sending drones to exterminate the threat.

Puzzle rooms with switches would be cool (I don't think interactive objects would be that much of a problem). I like some pauses beteen all the fighting and Puzzle rooms seem for me like a nice variation.

Puzzle rooms would be cool as a bit of a respite from all the fighting, and games like Bangai-o show that it can be done in a twin-stick shooter. I'd like to see it, but puzzle games are not really my strength, so I'm not sure at the moment what would be possible.

[mrhanman]

I like the idea.  It would add variety to what is an otherwise straight-forward level design.

Personally, I would like to see the more claustrophobic rooms removed and replaced with this type of "challenge" room.

[Pumpkin]

Nethack has a Sokoban branch. While it's not the kind of minigame we can put in there, I love the idea of some puzzles that would change the flow of play.

[tombik]

Sidescroller rooms?

The idea came through my mind not from a roguelike, but from VVVVVV. Anyone can remember the Tower part of it, and how thrilling was the level.

[Misery]

The problem with puzzle rooms:  They could get very repetitive very fast.  Once you've done one just once, it poses no challenge anymore.  It'd quickly hit a point of becoming tedious rather than interesting.

[Pepisolo]

Another room type idea: The Spider's Nest

This one might take a bit of explaining, although looking at this video of Gradius V, which is the inspiration for the idea, should make things a lot clearer.

https://youtu.be/B7ZpU9EJnbc?t=27m36s

The idea revolves around the concept of a regenerating block type. There would be large sections made up of this regenerating block, with the goal of the player being to bust through it to reach the other side. Because the block regenerates you can't simply shoot through the wall and fly through. Instead, you have to break a hole in the section for your ship to fit into and then you must move in, continuing to work your way through to the other side before the block regenerates onto you. This is the raw concept, but now I'll add some more narrative and extra elements.

Let's say that this regenerating block takes the form of a spiders web. The player would enter a room and be greeted by a large expanse of webbing, with occasional pockets of empty space to provide some breathing room. Inside this webbing would be the Spider enemy (already present in the game and which fits perfectly narratively and mechanically). The spider would be able to move around freely within the webbing, shooting its tendril-like (non-projectile is important) attack. Any contact with the webbing would do a small amount of damage over time as well as slowing you down significantly. The primary goal of the player would be to make it through the webbing to the other side, which would involve trying to avoid the spider as much as possible. A secondary goal could also be to eliminate the spider, this would be harder, but if successful the webbing would stop regenerating and the room would become safe.

This is just one version of the core concept of the regenerating block expanse shown in the Gradius video. It doesn't have to be webbing, that's just what seemed to fit based on the existing Spider enemy. The main difference between this and the Gradius version is that there is no forced scrolling. I think the concept will work without it, though.

Programming and resource-wise this doesn't sound too crazy. Creation of the regenerating destructible block and some tailoring of the necessary enemy behaviours would be needed.

[nas1m]

I got two, albeit similar ideas that could give the game some rooms/sections that feel more like a vanilla shmup (as I described here the game feels a bit lacking to me in the shmup department - at least from what I expected).

The Gauntlet and the Hallway.

The first one I envision much like a (section of a) regular stage in say, Jamestown.
A very long room potentially with auto-scrolling (if that is an option to introduce for individual rooms) and waves of incoming enemies moving in formations from one side as well as, potentially, some free-roaming enemies (like we have now). These could represent the passages from one section of the mother ship to another and/or the "elevator shafts" between floors.

The second one is similar, only more narrow and crowded and mainly populated but turrets and traps, forcing the player to make his way, dodgeing stuff,  though the hallway. Think of it as the approach to the death star, only in the hallways of a mystery scifi castle . Come to think of it, this type could be used to model the approach to the mothership in the first place!

Both room types would really enrich the game's variety in my book as well as introduce some classic shmup love, which can never hurt right ?

[Pepisolo]

I got two, albeit similar ideas that could give the game some rooms/sections that feel more like a vanilla shmup (as I described here the game feels a bit lacking to me in the shmup department - at least from what I expected).

The Gauntlet and the Hallway....

Both seem pretty good to me, although Gauntlet would be a bit more involved coding-wise because of the addition of formations of enemies with more traditional shmupy behaviours. Hallway seems like a nice idea as probably a transition from one floor to the next. Technically, it doesn't seem too far from the auto-scrolling falling levels from AVWW although I think it'd work a lot better here, especially if you were to allow use of the afterburner to make the scroll go faster and give more of a sense of speed. I'm definitely up for something like this. Should help the floors feel a little less claustrophobic, too.