Real World Fishing design outline

Working Title

Real World Fishing

Concept statement

Real World Fishing is a video game which depicts the struggle between man and fish. Battle with exotic fish to prove your worth. Collect the high score and become king of all fishing enthusiasts.

Genre

Real World Fishing is an action game to its core and is the definitive fishing experience.

Explanation of process of concept development

The idea for a fishing type game is based on the fact that it's my ambition to make an actual game like this in the future with all these crazy ideas I have and the inspiration I got playing all those types of games as a kid. I thought if that's my goal, I might as well start out my first game project with figuring those types of mechanics out. This game will be pretty basic but I hope to understand the foundation of what makes a fishing type game.

Target audience and competitive analysis

• Target customer

The target customer is someone who values the beauty and serenity of casting their line and reeling in iridescent works of divine craftmanship. Fans of fast paced button mashing and masters of self control will flock to this game like rats. 

Fishing games usually only appeal to casual gamers *spits* but they also have the added benefit of being a fishing game, which means uncle Egg may have a ps2 at his lake cabin but the only game he owns is Rapala Pro Fishing... 

The average demographic of the fish gamer is probably male, age 30+, balding... and I'd assume the majority of players would be American or Japanese.

The upside to having very basic gameplay is the benefit of actually being very accessible, some fishing games I've played use literally one button, not counting menu navigation, of course. I could easily see elderly or disabled persons pick up a relaxing fishing game and have fun.

• Competition

Fishing games don't become hits. The best they can achieve is hidden gem status. The only fishing game I've heard people actually praise to me is SEGA Bass Fishing. 

Despite being a very niche genre there are a few long running franchises, such as:

Fisherman's Bait

I really love the game Fisherman's Bait 2: Big Ol' Bass, I think it's a really underrated fishing game on the ps1, it has some very interesting and unique ideas. 

Reel Fishing

Which has beautiful pre rendered backgrounds to fish from and had more than four entries in the series.

Legend of the River King (Nushi Tsuri Series)

But my game, since it's 2d, is probably going to be more like River King on Gameboy. Which is a very long running fishing game series that has over 10 games, most of which are in Japanese only.

• Unique selling points

This game will feature BBWs (Big Beautiful Water-Dwellers) and will contain within it a secret ending for hardcore fish heads.

Game Treatment

• World Overview

Sadly in this game we will only be experiencing the human's side of the battle. The player will take on the role of a fisherman enraptured with the beauty and elegance of aquatic life in a post-apocalyptic Earth where sea levels have risen and oceans dominate the globe. They will encounter large fish that the player will need to catch to become the greatest in the world. 

• Gameplay

The Player will have maybe 5 to 8 minutes to catch as many fish and possible and can keep 5 to be judged at the end of the time limit. The top 5 fish will add up to be your high score and determine whether you win or lose. If you win, you get a trophy and a GF. If you lose, you sleep with the fishes...

• Mechanics

The fisher will cast their rod into the water, usually this is accompanied by a 'power bar' that lets the player decide his cast strength. Then they must wait for a fish to become attracted to the bait and once the fish is near enough, they must push the action button at the correct time indicated by a striking sound or visual cue. 

The next part of the loop is reeling in the fish, the player must reel when the fish ceases its struggle, if the player reels while the fish is struggling, the tension will go up, if the tension meter is full, the line will snap and the fish will escape. If the player reels in a fish they get the option to catch or release, if the player chooses to catch the fish it will go into his 'bag' which just means its value will be recorded to the overall score. You can keep five fish, once the fifth is caught the round will end.

Assets

• Graphics

The in-game assets will be either taken from stock images or sketched by me in photoshop. I would like the fish to look accurate and the backgrounds will probably be real world locations. I'm not sure how jarring it will look if the fish are photo realistic... maybe it would look something like this!

• Sounds

Sounds can be easily made by me in audacity or sourced from sound databases online. Sounds like: bubbles, lines being cast, chill music and the sound of screaming fish are all part and parcel to the fishing game atmosphere. It is also important to have a cool noise for when the fish bites your hook, something to grab the players attention.

• Fish 

The fish will be diverse. I want a good amount of interesting fish to populate the waters and all of them with different strength properties. I'm thinking maybe about 5 or 6 fish.

• Scripts

I know there's some scripts I can reuse from the tutorial work, such as when we had to make those balls walk around aimlessly, this could be used to simulate a fish swimming about at random until it enters our bait radius. And the script for saving high scores could be modified to fit this game. Oh and the spawner from the baddies game can be repurposed to spawn fish. 

• Background

I want the background underwater to act like a Hanna Barbera cartoon where they keep repeating giving you the illusion of distance, making you think the fish is moving very far