Imagine a game world that's driven by the high-tech concept of augmented reality, where a kind of digital veil is cast over true reality. Effectively it would be a world within a world, each level of the game populated by what's actually there and the in-game digital illusion of what's there. I'm thinking of a utopian/dystopian dichotomy, with the player sometimes able to "pierce the veil" and see the utopian world for the dystopian world it really is.

My question is, given the theme, what kinds of gameplay might this suggest?

One idea might be a gardening / survival split. I'm thinking of almost a kind of theme of reality glitching in and out of phase at timed intervals. The utopian world would be filled with assigned tasks, crafting, maybe puzzles. To fit the theme of "all's not well in paradise" both task success and failure would advance the plot, which in turn would bring on bouts of reality glitching, revealing the ugly true reality.

The dystopian world would be filled with threats, most initially to be evaded or hidden from. I'm thinking of sweeping "eye of Sauron" monitors that can't be looked at, characters that turn into monstrosities, patrol drones, etc.

Another part of the idea might deal with freedom of movement versus contraints. The utopian world would be constrained, orderly, with access points and barriers. The dystopian world would allow parkour-style movement over a wider, crumbling area where doors and walls are shown not to be real.

Thoughts? Different ways to take this or things that could be added?

In general I like split-world (or time manipulation) games like this; I'm currently playing Radiant Historia actually. But I'm having great difficulty thinking of a way that a dystopian reality/utopian VR could make for a somewhat hopeful adventure rather than a game world that felt depressing and futile. I've seen portal fantasies that work by having the main character initially in a dystopian setting, then managing mostly by accident to escape to a fantasy world, then at some point they discover the two worlds are connected and the dystopian nature of the magicless world is actually artificial and can be repaired or ended. I've also seen recurrent delusion mechanics like the game Sanitarium where the dystopian reality of the beginning isn't the whole real world and the fantasy side of things allows the player to sort of cheat enough to escape the local dystopia and clear up the crime/injustice that caused it. Or there's the game Dragon Quarter which uses the 'living inside a bomb shelter/generation ship and forgot about the outside world' plot, which is also solved by breaking out of a local dystopia. If the dystopia is unnatural in some way, that suggests a way for the player to fix it and restore a natural better world. But you're proposing that the dystopia is the reality, and the fantasy is only VR, with no real powers of magic or time manipulation. That situation doesn't seem to give the player any tools to fix the world.

It remindes me of They Live .

My question is, given the theme, what kinds of gameplay might this suggest?

If the player would have some device to pierce the veil, then it could be dangerous to use it. Eg. if the player use it, he is able to see the world as it is (to solve some riddles), but on the other hand the one controlling the illusion would be able to detect him.

Maybe the player could control the illusion too, it would work like magic for utopia world view (control others indirectly by changing the world), but would not work for dystopia.

The first thing that comes to mind is some kind of VR/Real life game where things you do in VR effect the real world and vice versus.

For instance maybe you go to an old library that is nothing more then a ruin in RL, switching to VR Mode lets you traverse a recreated version of the Library allowing you to access areas in accessible in RL. A broken staircase might exist in VR letting you reach the second floor of the library switching back to RL lets you pick up a gardening book on the second floor.

Moving a set of pillars in RL could be part of solving a jumping puzzle in VR.

The player might planting crops in RL and then access the weather control system in VR to ensure they receive water and sunlight.