Densoro

I've got an idea for a horror game where your character isn't limited by clunky tank controls and awful combat, because I find that limits the player's ability to take the game seriously enough to be scared. Once you start yelling at the screen to stop being such a pansy, all the thrills are kinda gone. Rather, the horror will come from you being stupidly outmatched, because no matter how athletic one human being may be, we're still squishy and breakable.

The problem is, I'm not 100% sure how to balance this so that it remains scary. There won't be any crazy Devil May Cry combos, no easy Zelda-style defenses, but you will be able to sprint, jump, strafe and pick up melee weapons. What can I do to stop that from becoming Ico?

A lot of triple-A games these days are trying to incorporate personal choice, with excellent examples like Mass Effect and Deus Ex...and not-so-good ones like Fable. But meanwhile in Type-Moon visual novels, you get games where one single choice puts you on a totally different plot-rail. Even if you ignore the abundance of hyperviolent 'bad end' paths, you still have totally separate plotlines with different villains and themes. Where Mass Effect was always headed toward an ultimate showdown with the Reapers, Fate/Stay Night can make your greatest enemy Gilgamesh, Archer, or the Holy Grail itself all depending on what you do.

D'you think more traditional gaming can take after visual novels in this regard? Where rather than amazing writing only slightly changed by your choices like Bioware gives us, or being so impersonal that you can kill everybody or nobody (Way of the Samurai), you have grand, artistic, emotional paths waiting at the end of each choice, all with full production values and character development. Is that asking too much? And more importantly, would you be interested? =P