Influx27

I can understand people not being thrilled by the idea of a silent protagonist, but that's what the Gameinformer article stressed. I appreciate people's input, but I think we should stick close to the information we have rather than move against it. So, for example, there is no mention of anyone else as silent, so it's safe to say that the regular South Park characters do speak. Also, while Van Buren would have been a terrific game, we're not building on current ideas when we try to insert old ideas. Anyway, another idea I had was about classes. The article stressed real world objects as apart of the character's equipment as well as something akin to a cross between LARPing and actual fighting for encounters. Based off of this, I had an idea about how the standard classes (thief, magic user, fighter, cleric) could be those classes as well as being somewhat real world-esque. My idea is that characters would not use fantastical abilities per-se, but would re-purpose abilities from real-life to fit their class. For example, the thief wouldn't use lockpicks, but a screwdriver to either unlock a door (like you can do with a lot of door that are inside houses), unscrew the lock from the door, or just jam it in and force the lock open (:oP I did all of these things when I was a kid, although I used a bottle opener for forcing a lock). The other classes would follow suit, so the mage would use firecrackers and explosive pellets (think "Happo-Fire Burst" from Ranma ½), the cleric would use neosporin (lol, I'm extremely open to suggestions on this class), and the fighter would use football maneuvers to block incoming hits. There can even be class trainers specific to these types of ideas, e.g. the fighter would train with a football coach (I was going to say Scott Tenorman's dad since he's supposed to be a former Denver Bronco, but Cartman turned him into chili so it'd have to be someone else) and the magic-user would take chemistry classes to make bigger explosions. While not as hilarious as my previous idea, I think this one has definite potential for role-playing.

Anyway, as pmp10 points out, there is some precedent for a RPG in which the protagonist doesn't speak (think Zelda, Dragon Warrior, Chrono Trigger, Fable 1 & 2) and, sticking close to what Trey says in the article, that seems to be what South Park will be. Not the most common western fare, but, like my idea points out, still a source for humor. That's just one idea though. I'd love to see what other ideas people have for South Park. For example, the article also says that the game will be a side-scroller, so does anyone have any fun ideas for what Obsidian can do with a side-scrolling RPG? Personally my favorite side-scroller is Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee, but the only side-scroller RPG that I can think of is the second Zelda game. Oh, and Tigranes makes a good point about my idea getting repetitive, so I would mainly see it as something for special occasions (not every moment is funny, dramatic, or insightful). Otherwise the player character would just do what Link does and project meaningful expressions, or maybe it will be like Half-Life (lol, sort of since that's of course an FPS) and the camera will just focus on the NPC during the brief pause when the player character is supposedly speaking.

Here's the specific section from Gameinformer: Parker has always preferred RPGs that feature silent, customizable protagonists. "One of my least favorite parts of RPGs is having some character stand there and talk, and me not being able to hit a button and skip past," he admits. "That's one of my main things when I first came into the meeting. I was like 'Okay, your character, whoever you're playing in the RPG, can't talk.' That's why I love Zelda so much. You can just fill in the blanks of 'Well, here's what I would say right here.' Whenever I'm playing an RPG and hear this voice go 'Well, what am I gonna do about this?,' I think, 'That's not what I sound like. That's not what I would say.' It always pisses me off and takes me out of it." (Gameinformer Issue 225, page 47, paragraph 2) I'm not entirely sure where you're coming from on this. Trey seems to pretty consistently point to a silent protagonist (e.g. "[...]whoever you're playing in the RPG, can't talk.' That's why I love Zelda so much, You can just fill in the blanks[...]"). I know he mentions Oblivion later in the article, but that's not specifically about this game in particular. It's the same with how Matt likes FIFA: it's anecdotal and not about the South Park game itself.

So yeah, I was originally going to message this to Mr. Avellone (it was either this or just geek out and tell him how awesome I think he is), but it looks like he isn't accepting messages at this time. Instead, I'm going to post this here. I'm sure other people have great ideas too, and maybe the developers will take notice put some of our more choice ideas into the game. So here's my idea (which I think would work beautifully with the new South Park game). I read in gameinformer that the player character will be mute, and I'm guessing this'll be in the style of Gordon Freeman where it's implied that Gordon speaks but the player doesn't hear it. So my idea is that the player character has extremely complex and dramatic conversations with NPCs, but we only hear what the NPC says and never know what the PC says. Instead the camera cuts back and forth between the dramatic NPC and PC who just stares unblinkingly straight into the camera. It could even work that the cut back to the PC is the PC interrupting the NPC, or maybe the PC says something thatl makes the NPC laugh, rage, or pause and reflect. The funny thing that I see is the cuts to the PC just standing there not moving, but people reacting like he's speaking. It'd be the like a cross between the "Dude" scene in BASEketball and the scene between the Black Knight and King Arthur in Monty Python and the Quest for the Holy Grail. What does everyone think?