To be scrapped:
- anything that isn't how you would expect things to be done 200 years in the future. trash picking is one that stands out.
- anything that isn't related to combat or appearance.
- unlimited ammo (except for the lower-powered starter rifle).
To be implemented:
- economy based completely on combat. credits raised through winning combat-based competitions e.g:
a) holding the leader board for a streak
b) kill streaks
c) hardcore mode for all events, where loot is taken from victims
c) achievements (e.g 50 kills or 200 kills in one day - all combat based)
d) match wagers
e) arbitrage of weapons/augs
- allow set up of matchmaking death matches to give opportunity for new players to compete with other new players for practice.
- massively increase competition of groups, perhaps allow different naming schemes, such as clans, factions, organisations, with their own drawbacks and merits. make advantageous to be a part of these groups.
- review of all weapons ensuring alignment with theme. consider ability to upgrade/modify weapons, give weapons names, etc so they can become bespoke.
- trim away skyworld, remove backdrop of planet and make it a space station i.e a neutral meeting point for all players.
- completely overhaul the tileset so that cartoon style is minimised slightly, using silver and coloured class as opposed to all blue. big project but a must.
- overall soundtrack. enforce a rule of fitting the music to the atmosphere. a fight between 2 remaining players after a 20 man match should have more intense music.
- introduce fighting in space with ships that are as customisable as weapons. lots of freedom for different scenarios/arenas. for example, destructive asteroids in a belt or close to a planet which would change the backdrop and could include satellites to dodge.
- introduce augs which can either be permanent appearance based (cheaper), permanent ability based (very expensive) or temporary (less expensive but not cheap). each aug balanced out with a counter. for example, a targeting module would allow auto targeting but would never be permanent and could be jammed with a cheaper module, limited to a short space of time only. a self-destruction module could also be used to inflict damage within a radius upon death.
- gambling of credits on matches, both your own or as an observer. disallow betting on other players if part of the match, only allowing betting on yourself so the system cannot be gamed this way.
- improve special effects. i have a particular vision for this but it's pretty hard to articulate. for example, different ammo would produce different visual effects depending on surface. some ammo could ricochet off certain surfaces. would allow interesting game modes to be made based on this. important to incorporate different surfaces into the tileset revamp.
These are some of the ideas I had in mind when Zone was released plus refined with experience playing other games of the same theme.