Describe your ideal indie occult game.

[SkullTraill]

Let's imagine that some small indie game dev studio (around 10 employees) contacts you and says they will build your ideal game for free. Keeping in mind that this is an indie studio (so no MMORPGs, huge 3D handcrafted open worlds, or highly polished AAA realistic graphics and cutscenes), what kind of game would you ask for?

What type would it be? Combat (Grim Dawn, Noita)? Turn based? Card game (like Hearthstone or Pokemon Go)? Town management (Stardew Valley)? World building?

If combat, would it be 2D, 3D? First person? Third person?

Would there be a story? Or be purely multiplayer? Will there be any co-op elements?

What interesting mechanics would you have? Drawing spells to cast them? Crafting?

Be as detailed as you can. Perhaps an indie studio will come across this thread and bring your idea to life!

 

[KjEno186]

As a fan of Telltale games, a "choices matter" story is appealing to me. Cartoon style graphics are fine. Consider how good games like The Wolf Among Us and The Walking Dead look, for example.

The go-to ideas for occult seem to be in the horror genre, but I think a story demonstrating magical practice in a 'real life' situation would be interesting. It doesn't have to involve typical fantasy elements, and it would definitely avoid 'Harry Potter' notions of magic.

Situations arise, and the protagonist can deal with them in the materialist-realist sense or decide to try out rituals with the end goal(s) in mind. The choice of goals could be part of the story progression with branching outcomes based on what the player chooses. The items found in game and people that one meets make a difference as well. As in life, triggering events in the game would make the player deal with what has already been found up to that point, so choices going forward might not turn out for the best. Concepts like luck and synchronicity could surprise the protagonist, but spirit manifestation should be kept to an absolute minimum, perhaps occurring in a very specific set of ritual circumstances that the player wouldn't discover easily.

 

[Amadeus]

Can anybody remember these? Ages ago. I was maybe 7 when I first saw these.

Ancients 1: Death Watch, Ancients II: Approaching Evil, these were some games I played on a dos 486 PC. This was 2d, yes you could walk around but all you saw were images, repeating patterns. Then images of doors, windows, characters who spoke a few lines. It created an illusion of moving around. 4-5 sets of images similar walls/textures, next area, different building, door, whatever.
I'd do something similar. Plan number 1.

In ancients:
You had some freedom to walk around in a basic town, there were random fights, even in town. All fights were turn based. Then you had to go into the sewers, basic maze with 3-4 floors. Randomly while walking down there you ran into fights. After going through the final door you got teleported back in town with your loot and experience. Each time the maze completion awarded more xp, new skills, increased damage. There was a basic general store where you could sell the loot, even a casino with 4 sections roulette, 4 colors.

Game began with character creation, 4 of them, I can't remember everything but there were mages, priests, warriors, each came with some abilities. You could do 4 of the same. There were maybe 30-40 different images to choose from. There were items, you could give them shields, swords, staffs, bows, slingshot (?), everything was very basic.

In 2026 I'm sure a team of 10 could make a better version of something similar. Much more advanced.
Create characters, mage/warrior/priest/rogue/??? more/ choose yourself. Some storyline. Add areas, sewers, forests, maybe a castle?, objectives, goals. Keep it 2d, turn based in fights. Instead of repeating the same sewer thing, add more to the story. Allow basic customization. Simple inventory like in the ancients games. Some bigger fights, a mystery to solve. Maybe gather 4 special stones to open the final door, unlock the final area, fights.

An old-school style adventure game. With some freedom to explore the areas.

Thinking of 2026, I can imagine somebody creating the game, then adding something nobody wants in there. "Your characters are tired, watch this ad or use 10 energy gems", "you're out of gems, would you like to buy 100 for 9.99? Hurry up, just 4.99 if you buy them in the next 30 minutes!"

 

[Akairyuu]

You know, I've had an idea for a while that I could try and create a VR experience ceremonial magick rituals in Unity, at least how I experience them. I made VR environments before as a Tech Artist. The tricky part would be triggering events when you turn and draw the pentagrams/hexagrams with the handset bit not impossible, and it'd give me some VFX practice

 

[futureshop]

There’s a fun puzzle game called “murdle “ you play an occult detective and have to solve a crime. There’s a new puzzle everyday. It’s quite addictive.

 

[Kepler]

What type would it be? Combat (Grim Dawn, Noita)? Turn based? Card game (like Hearthstone or Pokemon Go)? Town management (Stardew Valley)? World building?

If combat, would it be 2D, 3D? First person? Third person?

Would there be a story? Or be purely multiplayer? Will there be any co-op elements?

What interesting mechanics would you have? Drawing spells to cast them? Crafting?

The Path 2009 is very close to the premise of a self-investigative occult game by using gameplay to create room for awareness to access an objective understanding of the psychology of oneself. Not by puzzle solving but by self-reflection. Possibly the weakest aspect of modern contemporary occultism that needs the most work which a game like this could help with.

Where empathetic contemplation of the ambience leads to compounding choices resulting in an emotional creation suspended above the rational.
Patience and depth of thinking is rewarded by understanding the abstract play and the result rather than rewarding reflexivity and dogmatic grinding to only understand stats and get instant gratification. It would possibly have players asking others to explain what they got in the end, but any attempt would fail in specifics since it would be designed to be thoroughly understood through the lens of self-awareness.

It would be difficult for those with no experience of and especially aversion to self-reflection.
Even something basic in The Path was satisfying to see gamers lose their minds over in the forums trying to figure out: "AM I SUPPOSE TO PICK THE FLOWERS?!?" as they struggle with their entrenched methods of engagement towards games and try to experience in new way.

Single player seems the best way to go about this.
3D environmental, where choices affect environment to the emotionally of the avatar as extension of the psychological part of the individual.
Could use different methods of world building to fill in a consistent general framework to give different results from various primary narratives.
Secular ethics underlying.

 

[Zelator2148]

Can anybody remember these? Ages ago. I was maybe 7 when I first saw these.

Ancients 1: Death Watch, Ancients II: Approaching Evil, these were some games I played on a dos 486 PC. This was 2d, yes you could walk around but all you saw were images, repeating patterns. Then images of doors, windows, characters who spoke a few lines. It created an illusion of moving around. 4-5 sets of images similar walls/textures, next area, different building, door, whatever.
I'd do something similar. Plan number 1.

In ancients:
You had some freedom to walk around in a basic town, there were random fights, even in town. All fights were turn based. Then you had to go into the sewers, basic maze with 3-4 floors. Randomly while walking down there you ran into fights. After going through the final door you got teleported back in town with your loot and experience. Each time the maze completion awarded more xp, new skills, increased damage. There was a basic general store where you could sell the loot, even a casino with 4 sections roulette, 4 colors.

Game began with character creation, 4 of them, I can't remember everything but there were mages, priests, warriors, each came with some abilities. You could do 4 of the same. There were maybe 30-40 different images to choose from. There were items, you could give them shields, swords, staffs, bows, slingshot (?), everything was very basic.

In 2026 I'm sure a team of 10 could make a better version of something similar. Much more advanced.
Create characters, mage/warrior/priest/rogue/??? more/ choose yourself. Some storyline. Add areas, sewers, forests, maybe a castle?, objectives, goals. Keep it 2d, turn based in fights. Instead of repeating the same sewer thing, add more to the story. Allow basic customization. Simple inventory like in the ancients games. Some bigger fights, a mystery to solve. Maybe gather 4 special stones to open the final door, unlock the final area, fights.

An old-school style adventure game. With some freedom to explore the areas.

Thinking of 2026, I can imagine somebody creating the game, then adding something nobody wants in there. "Your characters are tired, watch this ad or use 10 energy gems", "you're out of gems, would you like to buy 100 for 9.99? Hurry up, just 4.99 if you buy them in the next 30 minutes!"

My DOS multi-player gaming experience was limited to the Medievia MUD (multi-user dungeon) with its corridors made of ASCII characters. But then I discovered Everquest (that my wife called "Foreverquest") and never looked back. I wouldn't mind seeing something like Dungeon Runner again; for a couple of RL dollars you could hire a "bling gnome" that followed you around and picked up all the yard-trash loot so it wouldn't clog up your on-board inventory. Then it would bend over, emit a cloud of yellow gas and poop out gold. Those were the days!

 

[Frater M.M.]

Some of my favourite "occult/magick" games were Grim Dawn/D2R, Aardwolf MUD, and Halls of Torment. Ideally, I tend to prefer solo games that I can pause and just relax.

Also, I don't think I've ever played a game where it's based on an actual grimoire or some kind of traditional spells/rituals or whatever. I think it would be nice to collect relevant materials to craft a spell/ritual or encounter actual creatures from a grimoire in a game and learn something as well as play.

 

[Accipeveldare]

Let's imagine that some small indie game dev studio (around 10 employees) contacts you and says they will build your ideal game for free. Keeping in mind that this is an indie studio (so no MMORPGs, huge 3D handcrafted open worlds, or highly polished AAA realistic graphics and cutscenes), what kind of game would you ask for?

What type would it be? Combat (Grim Dawn, Noita)? Turn based? Card game (like Hearthstone or Pokemon Go)? Town management (Stardew Valley)? World building?

If combat, would it be 2D, 3D? First person? Third person?

Would there be a story? Or be purely multiplayer? Will there be any co-op elements?

What interesting mechanics would you have? Drawing spells to cast them? Crafting?

Be as detailed as you can. Perhaps an indie studio will come across this thread and bring your idea to life!

You could do an Undertale style game with the 2d pixelated graphics and movement and make it based on someones journey of initiation in a secret order. The fights could be spell based and you could add shadow work which improves your stats over time.

 

[Swampdweller900]

The first thing that jumps to mind is a combat game where you play a shaman and do soul retrievals. The dynamics would mirror what a lot of Zelda games have done, where you journey into the underworld, or astral project, and you end up in a place that's geographically similar to the overworld, but just ever so spooky and different. In the overworld there's towns and people and everything looks normal, but you get some ability at some point and can identify evil witches or demons or people possessed. Then you jump into the underworld/spirit world and find them and battle them. You have to find clients and people in need of soul retreavals, and sometimes avoid villages of paranoid or religious folk in the overworld, but then you can joruney to the underworld and pass through them and do what you need.


I like the idea of a card game, too. Maybe something where the deck is a combination of spell ingredients and curses, and sort of similar to Gin Rummy and a little like Exploding Kittens (which is based on some other game and I can't recall the name) for some action cards to liven things up.

So let's say a card game with 6 rounds. Everyone gets dealt 1 curse and 6 more cards to start, with the other cards possibly having more curses included. You can only resolve a curse upon you if you collect the right kinds of herbs and ingredients and lay down the collection. You collect cards from the deck in a pull one discard one fashion, and can pick up the last person's discard. There's a few cards where you are allowed to draw at random from another player, force a player to discard some cards, etc. You can discard groups of 3 or more of the same card. The discard is placed in a line so everyone can see it, and while you can't discard a curse, you can pick up a whole row of discard as long as you use the oldest card you pick up on that turn. You do out when you have no curses left, but can't go out with more than 3 unused ingredient cards without points against you, and each set of cards put down arezero points, but stay out of discard. When you go out, the round is over, and anyone left holding cards goes out with 10 points for each curse, and 1-3 points per ingredient. Lowest score wins, highest score is cursed with dealing next round. Each deck has minimum 1 more curse per person, on top of the 1 dealt to start. So you can play hard mode with 10 more curses in a deck, or easy with only 1 more per person and let luck and fate guide you.

So, for example: I'm holding an Evil Eye Curse card (needs hemlock, belladona, holy water, and soil from a grave to dispel). I'm dealt Mugwort, basil, myrrh, basil (again!? ugh), holy water, and belly button lint (funny useless card meant to frustrate people). Then I play turns until I get a "pick your poison" card which lets me pick 2 cards from another player. I place that in front of me, not in the discard. I get another basil and a belladona from them. Next turn I see someone put down a hemlock, but another basil gets discarded on top of it before my turn. That's ok! I have 2 basil and can put down 3 for no points against me. But I'm not there yet. I get a grave soil from the deck and discard myrrh. So that hemlock looks good, now, but it's collecting more strays I'll have to either accept or try to put down as triplets. Then next turn I pick up hemlock, basil, and a few more things on top of it, including my old myrrh, and go out. I end up with a few penalty points, but everyone else still has their curse cards and gets higher scores than me.