I am attempting to open up peoples eyes to the wrong that is out there in our beloved RPGs. My first task is to complete a game engine that would act like your general RPG. I prefer to call this project a Learning Experience rather than a game, as it is both a learning experience for me and the players (it could be equated to an experiment). It would have the underlying story line that every RPG has (facing some kind of evil, this evil must be destroyed). It is all in the setup that the player decides the outcome of the entire experience (remember, it is not a game). The initial setup (after they choose the character class and whatever) is a dream state where they cannot be violent (not yet) but where they see a creature of, let's say, goblin decent. Once this "dream" state has been completed (does not need to be long, but could determine some of the player's mindset and attitudes to this creature) the player then talks to an NPC about the dream. This NPC gives the player the advice that "It must be the same evil that is causing the death of our stock" and then tells the player "you must fight this evil". So, the player now has a quest… Kill the nasty at the end of the game (you really are going to love the ending). The player then goes to another NPC (probably told by the first NPC) who tells our hero "If the goblin that haunts your dreams is not destroyed, then it will pollute your mind and drive you insane". So now our hero has to fend off attacks in the physical and the mental.

So the player trundles out of town, searching for something to kill that will give the vital experience to increase a level (I haven't removed this, because this is a learning experience for the player, so I want to emphasise my point). Player originally doesn't find any demons out and about, but instead finds some "evidence" that they (the goblins obviously) have been around the area recently. The player then goes back to town ready to sleep for the night…

The player is now asleep in town. The Dream State returns. At first the player wanders around their dreamscape, they wander a little further, they see what appears to be a bad guy (goblin) and so follow. The player then eventually finds some goblins and kills them (quite abrupt right?). Based on a warning from the NPC who told our valiant hero to hunt those that haunt the players dreams (your spirit must return to your body or the energy will be drained and you will die). In the morning you wake to murder news in the town. The evidence points to goblins (because who else would have killed them right?) and our player says that goblins haunted that nights dreams and so the blame is placed on the goblins…

The finale is really quite simple, I am sure you have seen this coming for a while. The player finds out that it is his or her fault that everyone has been dying. The dream-state is really just an expression of the insanity that had plagued their mind, what all along they saw as goblin, was really human. The story is by no means over, this could be the first act in a long game (the player fights their dreams and their wake to redeem themselves). This then would be a game, but I think it serves its purpose as a learning experience, an experiment, and a pretty cool example.