"Killer" Features of Your Dream Game

Well, I'm pretty sure there have been topics similar to this, but none terribly recently and none exactly equivalent.

The idea is simple. Many of us Codexers are wannabe indie game designers. A noble few (VD, Naked Ninja, etc.) may actually achieve this lofty ambition, but most of us will just have to live vicariously through others and go about our simple lives. Yet . . . we can still dream.

The idea of this thread is that you post the one or two "killer" features of your dream game (I'm thinking mostly RPGs, but I guess other games are fine). The idea is not to list all of the features or goals of your game, but the one or two things that really make it stand out. These may be a setting, a mechanic, a character . . . anything. Keep it to just a couple of ideas, and give a bit of detail about them. They don't have to be unique ideas, although they can be, but just the key features your game would have that others do not.

Examples (just my personal take, who knows what the developers would have picked as key features):
Fallout: non-linearity; harsh post-apocalyptic setting
PS:T: deep, artful storytelling; novel-like prose for dialog and descriptions
Arcanum: non-linearity; industrial revolution in fantasy world
TOEE: deep tactical turn-based combat
Age of Decadence: choices & consequences; factions

Why am I making this thread? I don't know, I'm bored. It seems less spammy than most spam in that it's about RPGs, and I think it has the chance to generate some interesting ideas and discussion. Plus, most of these ideas will probably never see the light of day any other way, and they deserve a chance.

Okay! Post away. I think this could be interesting . . . I will post my own shortly.

EDIT: Erm, should have said this earlier. I posted short descriptions above just as examples to show the kind of features that I'm talking about, from games that I think we all know. If your features need more explanation, feel free to give as much depth as you'd like in your response.

Power armor, interesting setting, choices worth making, non-retarded non-half-assed mechanics. Turn based and tile based for combat.

2 ideas:

A harsh desert setting sort of like Dark Sun meets Dune; the character is thrown into the setting and must make it out alive to beat the game.

The classic maritime revenge story (Moby Dick, The Mariner's Revenge Song) done as an RPG. The player character has to hunt down a captain/whale/Chthulu-like monster and there are plenty of opportunities for character interaction and choices and consequences. Plus you own a ship so you get to free-roam. Could be done as a sci-fi if this is too unoriginal.

Okay, my dream RPG would include two "key features" that I think would set it apart from past RPGs: a "skill-based dialog system" and "knowledges."

Skill-based dialog system
Two models of dialog have predominated in past CRPGs: the "dialog tree" system (Fallout, PS:T, VTMB, NWN) and the "keyword" system (Ultima 7, Morrowind, Wizardry 8). My preference is for the dialog tree system, but I feel that it can be significantly improved. Most past games using a dialog tree system have incorporated character skills in some way, but not nearly to the extent that, for example, combat does. Typically, character skills act to prune the tree, removing options that are only available to characters with certain stats or skills. However, whenever you select a dialog option, your character says exactly that.

My proposed skill-based dialog system would operate differently. Instead of seeing several lines that your character could say, you would instead see several directions in which to take a conversation (such as "lie", "intimidate", "ask about . . . [one of several options]", etc.). After choosing an option, your character's dialog would then appear on the screen. However, the actual line that your character said would be modified by your stats and skills.

Why is this good? It dramatically improves replay value, makes conversations more interesting and dynamic, makes having varied speech skills important for a speech-based character, and enhances roleplaying options. Two characters with different skills and stats will no longer say exactly the same things in conversation. Diplomats will sound charismatic, scoundrels will tell fantastic lies, and dumb fighters will sound like the brutes they are.

I have posted about this before in more depth, so go ahead and check out my unfortunately titled Mass Effect Dialogue the WAVE OF THE FUTURE?! thread if you're interested in more details. I have fleshed out a couple of examples in that thread, so you can see what this might be like in action.


Knowledges

This idea would liven up character development and interact with the skill-based dialog system to improve the conversation systems in RPGs. What is a knowledge? It is a representation of something that your character knows. My character development system would include several components: stats, which represent basic physical and mental capabilities and cannot be significantly changed in the course of the game; skills, which represent training in various disciplines; and knowledges, which represent specific techniques, experiences, facts, locations, etc. that your character knows. Stats would have numerical values set during character creation and most likely not changed during development, except for in extraordinary circumstances; skills would start low and increase gradually and smoothly as you allocate skill points to them as you develop your character over the course of the game; and knowledges are boolean, either on or off - you have it or you don't.

In some ways I see knowledges as a natural extension of Fallout's "perks" system or D&D 3.5's feats. However, there's more to my idea than that. Knowledges could also take the place of some of the "behind the scenes" boolean variables that the game designers use to determine whether a character has learned something, or can access a location, or has progressed in a quest. It really just seems natural to me that things your character has learned should be represented in such a way in the game system itself.

There would be dozens, or possibly hundreds, of knowledges with various effects. Having certain knowledges would effectively boost skill or stat values (i.e., the Assassin Training knowledge would boost stealth and poison skills), others would add combat techniques or magic spells to your repertoire, some would open up locations on the world map (for example, you would have to obtain the knowledge of a bandit hideout before you could travel to it), some would effect your character's dialog responses (the Hightower Aristocracy knowledge would allow a character with skill in Deception to make up plausible lies related to nobles from Hightower), some would be required for quest solutions, some would open up sidequests, some would allow you to hit certain enemies more easily (i.e., knowledge of Imperial Defense would give you a bonus to hit a member of the imperial guard, since you can anticipate his moves) . . . and so on, and so on. Some knowledges would have multiple effects (most would have both a measurable impact on your character's abilities, and an influence on at least one dialog option).

Similarly, knowledges can be gained in various ways. Most commonly they would be taught by NPCs or learned from books, but some would be gained spontaneously, while others would be purchasable with skill points. Some knowledges would only be available at character creation, and would depend on the background you selected. Still, most would come from NPCs during conversations. Some knowledges (particularly the combat techniques) would require certain skill levels in related skills before being learnable. Moreover, one stat (most likely intelligence) would have a large overall effect on your ability to learn knowledges. Some would be learnable by every character, while most would require at least a minimum level of intelligence, and a few would only be obtainable by a true genius.

This all sounds complicated, but it should generally be quite intuitive. As your character learns something, you gain a knowledge. It's that simple. Only knowledges that your character currently possesses can be viewed (unlike skills, which you can see even if you have 0 skillpoints). The knowledge screen would be similar to the inventory screen, and could be browsed by category. Depending on the theme of the game, these categories might include:

Combat Techniques: e.g., riposte, whirling attack
Magical Techniques: e.g., channel energy, vanish
Training: e.g., Imperial army training, culinary school
General: e.g., horseback riding, literature
Geography: e.g., bandit hideout, palace exit
Familiarity: mythical creature familiarity, city underworld familiarity
Secrets:

Well, that's it. I really like both of these ideas, and I'd love to see a game that implemented both of them. Hope to hear from others. . .

(1) More elegant procedural gubbins than you can shake a stick at. [used to good effect]
(2) Gameplay being inseparable from narrative - both having depth+subtlety+multidimensionality.

cardtrick said:

Skill-based dialog system...such as "lie", "intimidate", "ask about . . . [one of several options]", etc....

Click to expand...

I still think this is a misleading presentation of your idea. I don't think descriptions of conversation directions could be anything like that brief/vague if the player is to know what his character is aiming for in any but the most straightforward conversations.
I'm sure it could work, but not with one-word options. Even if "lie" leads to a further menu of lies to choose from, that's not how people conduct a conversation: you choose to lie/tell the truth *after* assessing your possible options in lies/truths, not before. It's just silly to force the player to choose between e.g. "lie" and "truth", before informing him of the gist of what lies/truths he's going to be able to tell (which will only be clear to all players from the context in a few cases).

Functionality needs to take precedence over brevity / menu organization.

EDIT: Oh and I like the knowledges bit - probably mostly in its ability to make connections between different areas of gameplay.

Here's one setting I dreamt up recently:

The idea is based around an ancient Aztec/Maya civilization at the end of an ice age. Weird omens start to appear that dictate the end of the world (which is actually what kinda happened when white man came to mexico). Anywho, everything goes to shits, tribes are fighting each other, meteors crashing on the earth and the like and you have to escape to a boat. Lots of hard decisions about wheter helping others, who to trust etc. The whole game would be based within a timeframe of a few days to the end of the world.

@ Cardtrick : I quiet like your "Knowledges" idea. Especially how dialogue could be based not only on skill checks but whether the character had learnt a specific piece of knowledge or not. The way I implement things in my DB this would be completely trivial to add. In fact I was already planning on a sort of encyclopedia that gets filled in as you explore.

... I may (MAY mind you ) look at doing something like that for Scars. I LOVE lore in games and rewarding players for exploring/talking/reading. Finding a rare book which gave you some useful piece of knowledge etc is very cool. I am already planning on having rare traits/spells taught that way, but this would extend this idea...

Something to think about :D

* A small, manageable gameworld full of procedural hooks and dynamics.
* An ensemble cast of well developed NPC peers living, fighting and developing alongside the player character.

* Ability to import my savegame from Wizardry 8

My current ideal would be something along the lines of a completed dwarf fortress or incursion with xcom style tactical combat. A procedural world made compelling by its detail, including the simulation of psychology and motive along with infinite tactical variety. Narrative would ideally emerge from game play, as that is the only way to achieve true non linearity and replayability.

Why can't the gamer Gods deliver me an AWESOME Rpg concept... such as...

.... A NON-Post-Apocalyptic Sci-Fi Party-Based RPG. And not Star Wars.

I'm talkin bout Traveller and Space Opera.

Imagine if you will, a game, 200 hours long. You can have up to 5 NPC's in your party. It's the year 2999 (or 3999), and the world is gonna party with cryogenics, neural computers, terra transformation and interstellar gwarbling. Cannabis is legal. There are floating anti-grav silent vehicles among the 300-story skyscrapers. Plasma pistols are relatively primitive. Psionic dangers run rampant. People move regularly to neighboring terra transformed planets, which vary drastically in their gov't's, cultures, language, appearance and atmosphere. You'd visit your cousin in LA, but the population there is 195 million andthe way of life is wickedly stressful. Your dog has a speech converter vocal implant, but he still conceptualizes like a 3 year old.

And there are faraway planets, with severe civil unrest and wars. You can be a mercenary, a rogue, a rebel, a noble, or drifter.

Non-Linear with maximum C&C.

Setting:
I'd love to have a low-fantasy, low-magic setting. Humans are not the only sentient species, but the whole civilized "known" world consists of them. There are no big kingdoms, realms, states, political entities, civilizations consisting of other races.

The whole world should be harsh. Humans are developed to a european-mediaval like level, but settlements are sparse. The harshness of the world and the geogrpahical conditions (dark swamps, deep, dangerous magical forests; harsh mountain regions; cold, dry tundras and stepps) haven't allowed them to form greater political entities than isolated villages, state-cities and small kingdoms.

The whole world should be filled with mystical lore and superstition believes, tales of dark beings in the forest, unbeliavable riches guarded in deep caves by foul and vile monsters. And these things are not only legends, they exist in this world. However the common average townsfolk will have very little contact with magic, monsters, mystical weapons, fantasy creatures (also sentient "good" ones) because they are very rare.

Real encounters with these mystical aspects of the world are quickly turned into exaggarates tales shrouded in legend and become part of the world's lore...

For the 99 % of the population knowledge of the world is very limited. Some isolated towns don't know much of the world outside their very townborders or their nearest forests.
Less isolated living people maybe know the fortress of the local lord or king and maybe the town and wildness in mid-range, but - like with magic and magic creatures- other lands, people, kingdoms etc. are shrouded in mystery and tales.

When imaganing how this world could look and feel, I always think of the movie "Sleepy Hollow". The town is isolated with little contact to the outside world. It is filled with superstitious and uneducated folk. The surrounding forests and wilderness are dark, threatening, filled with an aura of vile magic and supernatural occurences.
The whole gameworld should feel like a morbid, surreal dream.

I didn't think of any details concerning the player character or the plot, but I think such a gameworld would be a nice counterpart to the political, rational gameworlds like D&D (or at least thats how they are presented in pc games ).

A free-form game like Pirates!, but with a good skillsystem behind it and tons of fun character interactions with people in the towns/ports.

Basically a great free-form Pirate RPG with good roleplaying opportunities. That could be fun as hell. A deeper merchant system, the ability to rob stores, getting good quests in towns, threaten/butter up the governors, flirt with/annoy barmaids, challenge people to duels.

So, Pirates! with a huge RPG injection.

I will just paste the outline of a game concept I came up with a while back.

Setting:

Hybrid Fantasy/Sci Fi, Think Arcanum/LOTR with a crashed spaceship full of marines thrown into the mix.

Theme Summary:

Your a member of a strike force returning from a distant star system on a damaged ship, along the way something goes wrong and said vessel drops out of hyperspace and crashes into strange world (rather like Unreal). After crashing, you emerge into a low-tech fantasy world (with a low level of magic), torn by apart by war. The crash hasn't gone unnoticed.

The game starts with you on your ship, where you have a timered level. Do you rescue as many people as you can? Or do you leave the wounded and grab some supplies before heading to the escape pods? The options you take here determine your initial options on the ground.

Having crashed, you will discover the nature of the world your on. The bulk of the survivors set up shop at the wreck, salvaging equipment intent on attempting to escape the world. You get put in charge of a recon team, your goal is to find out whats going on and secure/aquire resources etc. Initially you will be quite well equipped, have access to advanced armour, smart guns, and the like.

As you head out you will bump into the natives. Your interactions with them will resonate massively. You could, for instance, make out your some kind of god. Do a display of force and wipe out a village with smart weaponry and instantly make them your bitches. Alternatively you could try and subtly help one faction, or just steer clear and act like you have a prime directive. The choice is yours, but ammo and power cells will be finite and in short supply. A good player could decide to go native early on, this route would enable you to blend in better as well as conserve hi-tech resources for later on.

The game would be party based, but party members would have their own moral code. You could control their actions (ala BG), but you couldn't make them attack someone they didn't want to. How you control your party is up to you, recruiting natives would be an option as well.

Goal/Endgame:

The early goal would be to escape, to do this the ship would need to be repaired via acquired resources, and possibly manpower. Near the wreck would be a screen that displays progress - your actions determine how fast this progresses. Some actions may lead to you being disowned by the other survivors ( leaving you without a ride), or possibly make it impossible for the ship to be repaired. The endgame would display your fate, as well as the impact of your decisions on the planet/factions.

Stats and stuff:

The game would be stat based (with options/dialog determined off them). One of the scenarios for example could be a first contact scenario, where a group of knights jumps you. for the first time. If your a dumb character you'd only have two options, flee or fight. As a high int character you could fire for effect into the air scaring them away, or try and initiate communications. As well as the player set stats, you would be able to choose an initial profesion that sets your initial abilities and what gear you start with. A medic would start with a boosted doctor skill, and have a lot of medkits.

Mechanics/Engine:

Flexible, but probably a NWN/NWN2 style 3D camera. Combat could be either RTwP or Turnbased.

I'd love to see something like what Bethesda failed at with Radiant AI and Peter Molyneaux talked about in regard of Fable 2, but done right. Some kind of Uber-AI that runs the entire game world.

The existing games already provide a lot of AI systems for almost every occasion. We have an AI for just a common individual (The Sims), a business-running systems (Tycoon Games), castle management (Stronghold), city management, empire-running AI, and lots of others. Some of those systems even work decently. My point is that all of them could be utilized in a CRPG to create a deep and varied world.

In a simplified form this could look in a following way. A commoner would resemble an NPC from The Sims. He would eat, sleep, entertain himself, clean his house and go to work. A businessman would do all of the mentioned above but would also be controlled by a business-sim AI. He would hire commoners, buy the resources, produce and sell his own goods. A castle lord would tax the businessmen, manage the castle troops etc. In case of danger for his vassals he will send troops to defend them. The soldiers can have their hierarchy too. A lord decides how many soldiers to assign to do the job, but it is the captain's tactical AI that is to control the squad up from that moment. The lord, in his turn, obeys to his sovereign, who makes decisions of a more strategic nature. The overall hierarchy would build up to the king who is controlled by AI system that is similar to the one of a big strategy games.

Should such a system be implemented, a single action of the player could lead for a whole avalanche of consequences. For example, the death of a king (by your hand) could even start a civil war between the power-hungry lords.

Such a system also opens up a vast amount of opportunities for the player. If an NPC could be a merchant, a captain, a general, even a king why can't the player?

The key benefit of that system is that it provides a lot of varied content without requiring an unreasonable amount of writing, scripting done for individual NPCs, etc. On the other hand, writing such an Uber-Ai would require even more work, so I doubt anyone would bother to make such a thing. Moreover, I also doubt that modern computers are capable of handling such system resource wise.

Being a god and laying the foundations for a religion.

Photo-realistic graphics [well, doesn't need to be photo realistic, but beautiful and WITHOUT BLOOM!] combined with object and scenery descriptions. Descriptions having a great importance also in the gameplay and offering vital information. Descriptions about the environment your character sees, about what he hears, feels, smells. Descriptions make the game more immersive, especially if well written.

Great dialogues with lots of different choices and realistic NPC reactions. Tons of different outcomes and possible solutions to even the most mundane and simple fetch-and-bring quests. A lot of meaningful choice and consequence, and also choices and consequences outside of quests and combat, and realistic NPC reactions to all of your actions.

galsiah said:

cardtrick said:

Skill-based dialog system...such as "lie", "intimidate", "ask about . . . [one of several options]", etc....

Click to expand...

I still think this is a misleading presentation of your idea. I don't think descriptions of conversation directions could be anything like that brief/vague if the player is to know what his character is aiming for in any but the most straightforward conversations.
I'm sure it could work, but not with one-word options. Even if "lie" leads to a further menu of lies to choose from, that's not how people conduct a conversation: you choose to lie/tell the truth *after* assessing your possible options in lies/truths, not before. It's just silly to force the player to choose between e.g. "lie" and "truth", before informing him of the gist of what lies/truths he's going to be able to tell (which will only be clear to all players from the context in a few cases).

Click to expand...

This is a fair criticism. I had a little more explanation and an example in the post I linked to, though. The options in that case were:

cardtrick said:

1) [Tell the truth:] Doc Roberts sent me to retrieve smuggled medicine.
2) [Tell a partial truth:] I'm here to meet a ship.
3) [Lie]
4) [Seduce]
5) [Intimidate]
6) [Flee!]
7) [Attack!]

Click to expand...

Not all options are one word. As you can see, it would be up to the designer (er. . . me?) to include all relevant information in the option. So, there are two options for telling the truth, and both indicate what information your character would give away. These options would still come out in different ways depending on your stats (again, see the linked thread if you're interested in more details, like what would actually come out of your character's mouth upon choosing one of these options).

Radiant A.I.!

Some sort of survival horror RPG. PC only, turn-based combat.

The game is largely silent, with few encounters. Each encounter is a potentially deadly boss-fight. Say, have 10 fights the entire game. Each fight finished would be the equivalent of finishing a chapter, or a level, and it gives you skill points to allocate to your character.

Character creation is simple, assigning points to different skills, and with a fixed number of attribute points to be assigned as well. You name, sex, appearance is customizable, which is an easy trick as you can be referred to as 'Captain' or the like for the game, anyway.

I like the idea of low-tech isolation, where melee is probably your main option but you sure would kill for gunpowder or a longbow. Setting would be 1500-1600s, on a longboat that has gotten messed up in an unexpected storm. Based on your leadership/captain abilities, XX number of crewmates survive the storm with you, and the game begins.

You run up against some rocks at about 100 meters from a small port town. Close enough where you can see the fires and smell the death. The end game objective would be to simply escape alive. Not sure how this could be resolved, maybe by repairing your boat, taking one from the town, ect. You have to deal with crewmates going crazy, possible mutinies from your underlings, and with some sort of supernatural horror from the dead town, all while stranded there. Something like that, with an atmosphere full of dread. I want blood, I want unforgiving death coming from all angles, I want mature themes and not shooting zombies in the head. I'd like the game to end with things not exactly explained to you at all, something like Silent Hill before you reach the end bosses.

1. Huge, highly interactive and perhaps randomly generated world that reacts to all player's actions. Add some decent AI and you have a winner. Just imagine how cool would it be to start as a barbarian warrior, unite all barbaric tribes under your command and then invade a neighboring kingdom successfully overthrowing the king and becoming one yourself. Then you could... well, rule! There would be no limit to that. You could wage wars, negotiate with neighboring civilizations, set taxes, take care about economy, hire advisors, set new traditions and customs etc. All those choices would affect your realm and perhaps the whole world.

2. Game design that makes all classes play differently. Currently RPG's allow you to choose a class but put you in a specific scenario which doesn't give you many opportunities to role-play your class. I mean in D&D being a rogue means only that you fight worse than a warrior but you can use special 'thief' skills (which only come in handy in some situations depending on a scenario). In my dream game a thief would be given opportunities to do all 'traditional' thiev'y stuff - using rooftops to navigate the cities, stealing from some random npc's houses, contacting with fences to sell your goods etc. I want classes to have more meaning than being a bunch of modifiers to your character sheet.


Damn, when I finally learn some programming I'm starting the development of my own roguelike.

Modular quest design that forms to the goals and values you set at character creation.

Open movement and party action among factions similar to 4X empires.

Party members with Sims-like AI.

Realistic combat, sword fighters don't have to work up to techniques and they die from hits. D&D characters are only human up to lvl 5, then they become supers.

Survival strategy mechanics. Interesting places.

NiM82 said:

Your a member of a strike force returning from a distant star system on a damaged ship, along the way something goes wrong and said vessel drops out of hyperspace and crashes into strange world (rather like Unreal). After crashing, you emerge into a low-tech fantasy world (with a low level of magic), torn by apart by war. The crash hasn't gone unnoticed.

Click to expand...

Have you ever played Outcast?

Oh, there's so many different things I like, if you'd put all in a single game, it'd be a horrible mess.

I'd love a new RPG combining elements of RoA, TES and Ultima VII.
From Ultima VII, interface aspects are the first that come to mind: A player-based inventory that can be expanded by carrying containers on your person. You can carry lots of junk with a backpack, a small pouch is only good for some small items, etc.
Also, an item-based interface: If your character doesn't have map and compass, neither do you.
From TES, the close-up 3D perspective and skill-based character system, except done right, without levels but an extensive skill-tree.
From RoA, it gets simulationist aspects such as diseases, weather, the need for proper equipment (from bedrolls to snow boots) as well as a travelling system based on map travel and a world where it takes days, rather than minutes, to travel from one city to another and where you can naturally camp in the forest.
However, due to the elements of TES and Ultima VII mentioned before as well as logical improvements, map travel is neither automatic nor as simple as choosing a road to follow unless you have a good map and compass. You can always travel cross-country and also travel through the world in realtime, where most of the terrain is procedurally generated at runtime. Central locations are completely or partly static and special locations may be placed randomly like Fallout's special encounters.

Of course the game should feature all the qualities of a great RPG: NPC shedules, dialogue trees and NPCs that are highly interactice, i.e. can react to many different variables. I don't care much for an intricate, highly detailed story, although lore and NPC background are appreciated.

I guess I could've thrown Gothic in there somewhere, and I'm not sure about combat. Maybe simple gesture-based, except the different attacks should feel more meaningful, more like in Gothic rather than in Morrowind. Oh right, Mount&Bladeish. That wouldn't be bad.

Also, I'd like greatly improved input customization, that lets me configure keys, key combinations, the use of menus as well as context-sensitive keybindings.
Gothic (2) for instance has some hardcoded keybindings, where either a specific key or a key assigned to a specific action has a predefined meaning in the dialogue or trade interface. It really sucks to find out your right mouse buttons has two conflicting functions because it's also your block key. Good job as always, PB.

My idea is similar to what Cardtrick is proposing, but I'll take it one step further.
What about NPC's you can actually talk to?

Everyone has played old text-parsing adventure games.
Alot of you have probably had a conversation with a chatterbot online.

What if you could combine the two and use the result as a dialog system for a game?

I have actually played around with this concept in a flash based adventure game that
I'm on again/off again working on (read that to mean I'll probably never finish it.)
I have been trying to develop a system where you can teach an NPC. The way it would
work is that every NPC would start with a blank brain and the dev would teach the
NPC everything it needed to know by simply talking to it and teaching it in plain
english.

There is a flash based chatbot named Haylie done by a guy named London Crosby:
http://knytetrypper.com/botlist.htm

Haylie works this way. Example:

dev: What is your name?
bot: What is your name?
dev: Fred.

The bot now knows that when someone asks "What is your name?" the answer is "Fred".
I looked at what this guy did and tried to expand on it to use in a game, It works great
but the problem is that I haven't found a way to get flash to store this information to
be retrieved later. I was able to store the information in a shared object (flash cookie) but I haven't figured out how to retrieve it yet.

The point is that if it can be done in flash actionscript it can be done better in a more advanced language and could therefore be used in a game.

Instead of choosing a pre-defined response or a wiki keyword in dialog, you would actually converse with the NPC by typing actual questions etc. and the bot would respond with whatever the dev taught it to respond with. In this way you could create NPC's that truly had distinct personalities and you could even program certain keyword combinations to trigger specific game variables. You could take it even further by implementing text to speech.

A less restrictive magic/combat system, based not on pre-packaged spells but on the creativity and resourcefulness of the player using his/her skills in a dynamic environment. More emergent gameplay, but not too complicated - something tight and self-sustaining, a disordered order. No leveling up, no phat loot, just a pure unadulterated creative role playing experience.