Creepy/horror Themed Planet And Missions

[Boomstick720]

Dead Space isn't scary.  Well, at least not the good kind of scary anyway.  Dead Space is well liked (for some reason) because it consistently throws unexpected (for the first half of the game) jump scares at you at unexpected times.  You are constantly in danger of getting pretty much insta killed by every enemy, so you need to rely on quick reflexes and button mashing, cause your character is so slow and clunky and the enemies so fast and violent that your only option really is to back away and shoot.  

 

Is it scary?  Well, sort of, at least the first time you play it.  But after you've been through an area, you kind of know what to expect, which significantly diminishes the "scary" factor.  You pretty quickly learn "alright this corpse if going to come to life" and "something is going to pop out of this vent" after the first 6 times it happens.  And that is why many consider Dead Space to be "not scary", because you know what to expect in these areas.  

 

So lets relate this to Warframe.  If we were to incorporate this idea to the game, the player rage would reach the heavens.  A horror game needs to rely on 1. Being helpless against something and 2. Not knowing what to expect ahead.  Being a badass space ninja kind of removes the "helplessness" aspect, and forcing the player to be helpless for the sake of "horror" is a terrible idea (Remember Nervos?  Everyone totally loved those).  The not knowing what to expect ahead is kind of why many horror games are pretty linear.  It takes a REALLY good horror game to randomly design an area that is consistently scary.  Since Warframe kind of relies on Randomly Generated dungeons, and obviously isn't created to be "horror" it just wouldn't work. 

[Phonxi]

-snip-

 

Corrupted Tennos sound like a good idea, but, having them come at you with gears similar to you seem like just custom Stalkers

 

However, it give me an idea for a rare encounter. What if you were walking down a strangely empty corridor, suddenly, you hear some panicked whisper you turn the corner and there a random Tenno just standing there shaking and mumbling to him/herself like they are struggling to control their own body.

 

  -You avoid them: you move on to your next target, they keep standing there trying to take back control, days later their tenno training give out and they die exhausted while also taking the infestation with them.

 

  -You shoot them: the shock from you shot make them lose focus allowing the virus to take over, then a rage fill infested tenno come at you with all of the strength that they have (like a twitcher from Dead space) without weapon but only powers (not well controlled of course) while screaming WHYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!

 

  -You kill them stealthily: stabbing them in a area only Tennos knows that will kill them instantly. They fall.

 

  -They see you: they screams NOOOOOOOO! then explode into pieces, their body splatter on the wall creating an area that disrupt all your powers and damage you with their respective powers while also attract a large amount of Infested to the your area.

 

also having no working machinery or light on an infested ship might be a huge boon to the horror factor 

 

 

(yes!!! after acidently deleted my post twice)

 

TL:DR

Lotus turn Tenno into Bananas

Edited February 10, 2014 by PH0X-1

[CosmoKnight]

-Adding another suggestion to these enemies: They could have some sort of feel of desperation when you're trying to kill them. For example, if you've shot them enough times with your Soma (and somehow they're still not dead), this enemy could start falling apart but also increasing its resistance to slash damage. As they fall apart, they call for help to combine themselves with another and become bigger in stature, and will have much higher health along with the resistance to slash damage. So you're really going to need some variety in your team's arsenal if you want to take these things down.

-Something else I thought of is let's say they can latch onto you and start gnawing away at your Warframe. You're constantly trying to get them off as best you can, but after a certain time of struggling, this enemy will start screaming alerting others that they've caught onto someone and they will agro you. This will make you feel desperate as you try to get the thing off you before the others arrive to finish you off. 

-To go back to the thing latched on your back: As it slowly destroys your Warframe, it could damage your shields and health that in the end will decrease the limit of shields/hp (for ex. Before the thing attacked you: 650 shields. After: 462 shields. This obviously depends on how long it takes you to remove the thing from your back).

 

That's all I've got for now. As I typed this I forgot a few things I was going to say so I'll add them later if I remember.

Edited February 10, 2014 by CosmoKnight

[Vargras]

Alright, since you're hellbent on this, I figured I'd do a mockup. Combination of Mass Effect 2's Collector Base, and the secret mission in Starcraft 2: Wings of Liberty.

 

The Lotus hears rumblings of an ancient Orokin vault that contains more undiscovered Prime frames. She sends you the location (which not surprisingly point to a derelict), and you head in. There's just a few Infested here and there, nothing major, and you and your team press deeper into the derelict. As you finally reach the vault and begin to open it, the Lotus messages you, bewildered and asking why you're even there. Turns out the original message (with the directions) wasn't even from her. Whoops.

 

Unable to stop the opening sequence, the vault finally opens and reveals absolutely nothing inside, except for the Stalker. The entire thing was a trap, set up by him, and he's very &!$$ed. The Stalker throws down a unique smokebomb, scrambling your UI for the remainder of the mission, and gives you a headstart. Why? Because it's more fun to see you run. For the remainder of the mission, the UI would essentially be non-functional. Rather than being garbled like when hit by a Disruptor, the UI would instead display false information. Health, shields, and ammo counts would fluctuate wildly, with numbers changing rapidly from one to another. The minimap would display false enemy and ally markers.

 

Players would have to run throughout the derelict, buying as much time as possible for the Lotus to cut through the interference and direct you to the actual extraction point, with a timer ticking down until extraction is available. If the Stalker catches up to a player, they are grabbed, and are killed unless their allies deal enough damage to the Stalker to break them loose. Powers and weapons would only be capable of slowing him down, not stopping him. To help players keep the advantage, several hacking terminals would be scattered about during the run, giving players a choice -- they can spend precious seconds to hack the terminal and lock down a blast door, temporarily buying them more time to escape, or they could take their chances and continue to run.

 

Mission completion would have the chance to give coordinates to the actual vault, which could lead into the introduction of the next Prime frame.

Edited February 10, 2014 by Vargras

[Instinction]

Corrupted Tennos sound like a good idea, but, having them come at you with gears similar to you seem like just custom Stalkers

 

However, it give me an idea for a rare encounter. What if you were walking down a strangely empty corridor, suddenly, you hear some panicked whisper you turn the corner and there a random Tenno just standing there shaking and mumbling to him/herself like they are struggling to control their own body.

 

  -You avoid them: you move on to your next target, they keep standing there trying to take back control, days later their tenno training give out and they die exhausted while also taking the infestation with them.

 

  -You shoot them: the shock from you shot make them lose focus allowing the virus to take over, then a rage fill infested tenno come at you with all of the strength that they have (like a twitcher from Dead space) without weapon but only powers (not well controlled of course) while screaming WHYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!

 

  -You kill them stealthily: stabbing them in a area only Tennos knows that will kill them instantly. They fall.

 

  -They see you: they screams NOOOOOOOO! then explode into pieces, their body splatter on the wall creating an area that disrupt all your powers and damage you with their respective powers while also attract a large amount of Infested to the your area.

 

also having no working machinery or light on an infested ship might be a huge boon to the horror factor 

 

 

(yes!!! after acidently deleted my post twice)

 

TL:DR

Lotus turn Tenno into Bananas

 

I like the idea of having an enemy that responds differently based on the player's reaction, that's pretty cool.

 

-Adding another suggestion to these enemies: They could have some sort of feel of desperation when you're trying to kill them. For example, if you've shot them enough times with your Soma (and somehow they're still not dead), this enemy could start falling apart but also increasing its resistance to slash damage. As they fall apart, they call for help to combine themselves with another and become bigger in stature, and will have much higher health along with the resistance to slash damage. So you're really going to need some variety in your team's arsenal if you want to take these things down.

-Something else I thought of is let's say they can latch onto you and start gnawing away at your Warframe. You're constantly trying to get them off as best you can, but after a certain time of struggling, this enemy will start screaming alerting others that they've caught onto someone and they will agro you. This will make you feel desperation as you try to get the thing off you before the others arrive to finish you off. 

-To go back to the thing latched on your back: As it slowly destroys your Warframe, it could damage your shields and health that in the end will decrease the limit of shields/hp (for ex. Before the thing attacked you: 650 shields. After: 462 shields. This obviously depends on how long it takes you to remove the thing from your back).

 

That's all I've got for now. As I typed this I forgot a few things I was going to say so I'll add them later if I remember.

 

I like the desperation part you're talking about. My thinking on that is kinda like having an enemy go into berserk mode after it loses 50% hp and if you don't kill it fast enough it could do some serious damage.

I love the aggro idea of having an enemy latch onto you and attract other baddies towards your warframe. That would awesome. Seriously.

 

Alright, since you're hellbent on this, I figured I'd do a mockup. Combination of Mass Effect 2's Collector Base, and the secret mission in Starcraft 2: Wings of Liberty.

 

The Lotus hears rumblings of an ancient Orokin vault that contains more undiscovered Prime frames. She sends you the location (which not surprisingly point to a derelict), and you head in. There's just a few Infested here and there, nothing major, and you and your team press deeper into the derelict. As you finally reach the vault and begin to open it, the Lotus messages you, bewildered and asking why you're even there. Turns out the original message (with the directions) wasn't even from her. Whoops.

 

Unable to stop the opening sequence, the vault finally opens and reveals absolutely nothing inside, except for the Stalker. The entire thing was a trap, set up by him, and he's very &!$$ed. The Stalker throws down a unique smokebomb, scrambling your UI for the remainder of the mission, and gives you a headstart. Why? Because it's more fun to see you run. For the remainder of the mission, the UI would essentially be non-functional. Rather than being garbled like when hit by a Disruptor, the UI would instead display false information. Health, shields, and ammo counts would fluctuate wildly, with numbers changing rapidly from one to another. The minimap would display false enemy and ally markers.

 

Players would have to run throughout the derelict, buying as much time as possible for the Lotus to cut through the interference and direct you to the actual extraction point, with a timer ticking down until extraction is available. If the Stalker catches up to a player, they are grabbed, and are killed unless their allies deal enough damage to the Stalker to break them loose. Powers and weapons would only be capable of slowing him down, not stopping him. To help players keep the advantage, several hacking terminals would be scattered about during the run, giving players a choice -- they can spend precious seconds to hack the terminal and lock down a blast door, temporarily buying them more time to escape, or they could take their chances and continue to run.

 

Mission completion would have the chance to give coordinates to the actual vault, which could lead into the introduction of the next Prime frame.

 

This idea is amazing. Having the Stalker be semi-invunerable in a chase type mission would be sweet.

The whole fake transmission and then suddenly at the last second the real Lotus saying, "Why are you here?" really would put a sense of dread into you as the vault opens. Like, "OH. S#&$. What did we just unleash??"

The decision making between locking doors while a teammate keeps him busy or just straight up RUN is a really great aspect to add to it as well.

[Shyvorix]

For lasting effect. Knowing what they can do to you is the fear. No graphic can keep terror if it does not earn it.

Exactly. Hence this idea would work VERY well IF the animations done to your character are horrifying enough.

Cause think about it, almost EVERYONE would be scared after you sit there horrifyingly watching a large enemy just grab you and start literally stabbing through your back, to your ribs, just crushing and tearing out your insides with gore and horrifying detail, until you either manage to *barely* get out alive or just go down.

Gotta have those horror effects though hehe.

 

Press 4.

 

Wow, sure is scary. Sorry, but this game is never going to have the tense atmosphere you want.

Make the enemies invulnerable to anything until they actually "appear" into the map. So until you get attacked or it begins his attack, he cannot be shot or anything. Similar to Dead Space. Can't do sh** until it actually appears.

In response to OP, I think that an OVERHAUL to the infested faction would be better, and a bit easier IMO,  to implement those changes.

The Tenno may be very strong, but we aren't invincible. /something/ would get it. And it should be gruesome. For fear effect.

[-Synapse-]

Yes! However, if this is to be done we will need some tweaks to our character animations, especially the ones for being downed. One of the things about Deadspace that gave it some tension was the fact that when you died, you died horribly. It kinda had that shock factor that adds a lot to the feel of a space-zombie infested ship and how deadly it would be.

 

As an example, take that situation described in the OP. Your character as it stands now would flop over onto their back and assume a slightly awkward "I'm just chillin' don't mind me." posture and begin scooting around like a dog wiping their business on the grass. What would be ideal is if the character in question reacted appropriately to the injury inflicted on them. If you were impaled -and somehow didn't pass out or die- you'd be on the floor writhing (likely screaming, but these are Tenno we're talking about) in pain and clutching at the wound, which itself would need some work as currently we can't see any injuries on our character models beyond pouring blood all over from everywhere on your body at once. Nothing too extreme, just some slash/stab/bullet hole decals would suffice, coupled with natural-looking 'in pain' animations it could come close to achieving the shock and awe factor.

 

In the end it's the difference between, "Crap my character died, now I have to use a revive. What a bummer." and, "Holy $#!% that looked painful! I can hardly look at this, no more rushing for me."

 

I get the feeling I came of as slightly sadistic with this post, but in all honesty that wasn't the intent. I just get sick of player characters blowing off/not reacting too mortal injuries and extreme blood loss, and the addition of actual tense and scary mission types against an actual threatening faction would highlight how little Tenno react to any and all stimuli.

[Instinction]

Revamping thread to put all ideas into the OP.

[Cpl_Facehugger]

I don't see WF ever being creepy.

Well, I find those desert skates pretty creepy.

But actually scary? I don't think it's possible.

I mean, my clanmates and I back in U10 did some derelict runs and we were all "you know, this would be really creepy if we weren't all unstoppable killing machines."

[WARLOCKE]

What about the sizable amount of players that want nothing to do with dead space warframe? Its best to stick with the playstyle the game already has imho.

[Instinction]

What about the sizable amount of players that want nothing to do with dead space warframe? Its best to stick with the playstyle the game already has imho.

 

You make it sound like this is a suggested overhaul of the entire game of Warframe. Which is not what this is. Read the title, it says "Creepy/horror themed planet and mission types."

 

A planet and mission types on that planet.

[Instinction]

In the end it's the difference between, "Crap my character died, now I have to use a revive. What a bummer." and, "Holy $#!% that looked painful! I can hardly look at this, no more rushing for me."

 

This is what I want.

[Phonxi]

DE should really look at some of these idea for their up coming infested ship 

[KuroNekoXlll]

-le yawn-

my booben, rhino, n trinity aint scared of nothin 

 

come@me

[Instinction]

DE should really look at some of these idea for their up coming infested ship 

 

Those would be good grounds to implement somethings like these. If infested can create whole ships, who's to say that can't make some sort of hideous monster?

Edited February 11, 2014 by Instinction

[KuroNekoXlll]

I mean, my clanmates and I back in U10 did some derelict runs and we were all "you know, this would be really creepy if we weren't all unstoppable killing machines."

every frame and weapon and mod needs a nerf...

 

dead space was horrific cu zof how vulnerable you were at all times and literally 2316 different death scenes..

[Instinction]

every frame and weapon and mod needs a nerf...

 

dead space was horrific cu zof how vulnerable you were at all times and literally 2316 different death scenes..

If you read even the first section of the op, you'd see this was gone over.

Warframes and weapons do not need a nerf.

There needs to be way for enemies to counteract our warframes and weapons.

Read the op for several mentions on this point.

[KuroNekoXlll]

If you read even the first section of the op, you'd see this was gone over.

Warframes and weapons do not need a nerf.

There needs to be way for enemies to counteract our warframes and weapons.

Read the op for several mentions on this point.

read it again for the 2nd time, saw nothing bout it

 

a nerf is exactly what we need to feel the anxiety and pressure

 

again we are predators in 99% of the time BECAUSE WE CAN, not the prey

and a really easy way to make us said prey would be o make it so we were unstoppable killing machines, i can burn through like 2000 enemies in half an hour with a freakin support frame.

 

idk give people nightmare mode with dragon keys on everybody at the same time lol

nightmare derelicts?

 

and yeah maybe just need to be less visible, i see a hoard of infested infront of me, some of the first things ima do is make sure i have a clear shot at blowing them all to bits with ogris

 

more dispelling enemies maybe, just in a way thats logical and not insta-cancel ability

[Instinction]

read it again for the 2nd time, saw nothing bout it

 

Counteract Tenno abilities and weapons:

Spoiler

So an idea was for enemies not to be affected/injured by powers/weapons, UNTIL they actually are "activated", somewhat like in Dead Space where you can't injure a necromorph on the ceiling even if you see it, until it falls to the ground "activated" by your proximity to it.

 

Another idea was the mobs themselves would counteract the Tenno abilities.

Much like the new leader types, the new Hyena pack, and Ancient Disruptors.

For example, have a leader type drains your energy and slows your movement speed whilst spawning fast moving creepy "popcorn monsters" reminiscent of Halo's Flood, that come and attack you and leave Toxic dots on you.

These mechanics already exist in the game, they just would be implemented in a different fashion to give off that creepy/powerlessness feeling. (I for one actually got that kind of feeling when going up against 4 Hyenas with no energy and my HUD totally skewed.)

 

Enemies you really want to avoid:

Spoiler

This is something hugely lacking in Warframe. All enemies, basically regardless of level, can be facerolled instantly.

Why not have enemies you SERIOUSLY want to avoid.

Examples would be the Witch in Left4Dead.

The Regenerators in Dead Space 3, which are unkillable by all conventional means and all you can do is slow them down by shooting off their limbs.

The Deathclaws of Fallout.

 

These are enemies in other games, that unless you are incredibly prepared, you actively try to avoid encountering for fear of your life.

 

Firetempest-

"...there needs to be some bust your balls enemies you rather avoid.

Plus if they are not part of progression IE not getting parts for rare weapon #86 they become a land mine for ability spammers and people cant whine its too hard to get x item from it because they are made to be avoided. Its far more feasible to make for example the harvester Escape mission scarier. But you're still just a super infiltration party. Assassinating bosses in vulnerable locations.

It's pretty feasible to have something outclass your team if its prepared and it should be presented that way. Would make the transition into any stealth system make sense when you're not constantly painted as a god.

Just really really ridiculously good at killing grunts."

"They just need hyper Stalker type enemies with no reward or mod tied from them. Or they just become tense loot chests.If they offer no reward and avoiding them means you don't need a revive, They become "oh S#&$" enemies and impend the death march of #4 across maps and you don't need a whole new race to do this."

[Quimey]

I would play 100% those maps all the time

[Dude_on_the_Moon]

good ideas

[Royce_Bracket]

Despite how awesome the concept of Warframe being scary is, there is one part of this suggestion that would probably never work, and that is scaling a "scary" enemy based on stats. The funny thing is, that there is no good way of scaling the power of an enemy to gear. As for individual mods and weapons, the sheer amount of combinations possible would make adjusting stats nigh impossible. As for DPS, it's just too iffy. Just making the thing plain strong would be a terrible idea, as it would just serve to irritate newbs, or people using low leveled gear. Perfect examples are the Stalker/Harvester. With a decent team, the Stalker tends to get killed before he can so much as notch an arrow in the Dread, and as for Harvy, we've all seen the results in the Invasions.

 

Horror in Warframe would have to be handled in a different way, and in my opinion, the Escape mission (From being captured by the Harvester), can be an excellent way to go. It creates the all important sense of powerlessness required for any Horror game. The closest thing right now to horror however, is RNG. I shudder at the very thought of obtaining Ember Prime without purchasing Prime Access...

[Sixty5]

The most terrifying thing about Dead Space was the aiming.

[Brasten]

The problem is when you pull contrived excuses for taking away a player's powers or the usefulness of those powers (I include guns as powers for this), you generally end up with anger. An example of contrived would be not being able to shoot clearly obvious enemies that are just hanging out... upside down. That is 100% contrivance and immersion breaking. That would be like saying that someone in the Aliens setting with a flamethrower and prior knowledge can't start torching Eggs until they get close enough for the first Facehuger to pop out.

This will hold even more true if the encounters are not designed and executed well. Example, see the history of the Stalker and the at times imbalanced leveling/damage output from him. Players didn't "fear" him, they got pissed off that he was one or two shooting them in their low-ranked new gear.

====

Jump-scare games like Deadspace and the way Husk/Reapers are used in Mass Effect rely on fear of the unknown. Once the things are know they have less of an impact. These games can get away with it because they are not normally repeated content, you normally don't replay them 4, 5, 10, 20+ times. For a game like Warframe that is noting but repeat content you can't escape this problem and crutch design for "horror" games.

You can't build "horror" Warframe around jump-scares. I get where your coming form on making enemies to avoid, which takes on more of a dread angle. However there is a fine line between dread and annoyance. Take the long gone and unlamented Nervo thrown out by Seekers, the little blue balls that put you in perpetual shield drain-stun lock. While this could be seen as an enemy to fear, it was far more an aggravation.

The new Mark 2 Hyenas are perhaps better examples, however that's only because they aren't known yet (see above about knowledge and jump-scares). You can't take player knowledge away once its gained. Once something is known it becomes less terrifying in the true anxiety producing way you folks want to experience. And like jump-scares the more an enemy is repeated, the less terrifying they become.

What Deadspace, the first one, does correct (and that I don't think can be done effectively in Warframe) is setting the atmosphere.

http://deadspace.wikia.com/wiki/User_blog:The_Milkman/How_Dead_Space_Still_Scares_Me

The Milkman calls it right with how the Ishimura is dark and confining, limiting movement and vision. Movement and freedom of movement is an increasingly large part of Warframes core game play, to the point that people get ragey if you threaten to take their Zorencopters away. Isaac didn't bring his rocket hammer or his 2 meter long great sword with him... although Fangs and Dual Zorens would have actually been better for the confines of the Ishimura. Give Isaac some decent chopping weapons and ninja speed/reflexes and you suddenly have a very different experience, but I digress. So it becomes a questions of how do you build that creepy atmosphere that will make the jump-scares viable and not just laughable predicable?

Deadspace vs Deadspace 3 in a way. At certain level it just goes from creepy to gross.

How do you address the freedom of moment without removing it? How do you address player powers/weapons without removing them or breaking learned/expected game mechancis? If you can't address these two questions without just removing or negating them, then any "horror" experience in Warframe is going to feel tacked on at best, or a cheap shot and a gimmicky contrivance at worst.

Milkman also calls out a point that Warframe has issues with, which is the "difficulty" spikes of just have to slog through wave after wave trash enemies...or not so trash enemies when its a pack of high level Disruptor and Toxic Ancients you have to push through.

====

Let me put a picture in your heads as to what you are trying to take on here.

You are trying to make Power Rangers into a Horror show. And you are not allow to take away their suits, weapons, powers, or giant robots.

Good luck with that.

Edited February 11, 2014 by Brasten

[Instinction]

-snip-

 

You posted a lot so I want to address a few things.

 

Jump scares/closet monsters and repetition.

I believe in Warframe, since we are nearly invincible visages of death, that jump scare and closet monsters would be a good way to go to add some sort of horror aspect to the game. This would go in tandem to some extent with the part of the op talking about monsters you REALLY want to avoid.

I'll also address restriction of freedom of movement as well.

 

My simulation would go like this:

 

You are your team of 4 unstoppable killing machines are running along through through a tight, dark corridor in a derelict (new infested?) ship.

The ceiling maybe is not so high, and the area not so wide, but for the most part, you are still able to cruise along at normal Tenno breakneck speeds.

You're going along and come around a tight corner, when suddenly a hulking massive Infested Beserker (one of those enemies that you seriously do not want to tango with) comes crashing through one of the corridor walls, blocking your path. You have only a second before it notices you and your squad, and you must quickly decide what action you are going to take.

Are you and your squad going to try and quickly run to lose it and escape its gaze?

Or are you all going to try and focus fire on this beast and try and kill it quickly before it has the chance to inflict massive damage on you and your squadmates?

Maybe there is also a countdown timer going off until ship destruction so you must also factor in whether the time to find a new path will outweigh the damage you might take; but then again if your team wipes, and the monster is still lurking what do you do from that point?

 

---

 

So in that, the freedom of movement is not removed, it is the area in which you have to move and the visibility that is restricted.

Also, repetition would not be such an issue because levels are randomly generated in Warframe, so it's not like you are going to come across this same monster down this same path every time you play this level. Maybe only give it a chance to spawn in the game (Obviously DE loves their RNG). Or maybe there is something that triggers this monster that is hard to notice but possible to avoid if you're paying attention.

 

One of the problems of this game, is that people see it as a game that they cannot lose. To lose basically means you were in a defense mission and the cryopod got taken out because you and your teammates weren't paying attention. That's pretty much the only time I have ever "lost" in this game.

 

Why shouldn't this be a game where you have a chance of losing? Isn't that apart of what makes games fun when you win? Is because you knew you beat unfavorable odds through preparedness and skill?