well currently i am modeling using 3ds max. The engine side of things im using the source SDK, which is a bitch with one person since im not really into the whole game programming. So if we do the side scroller, your saying turn based? and the UDK is nice dont get me wrong, there is even a side scroller implementation available, if that is what your referring too. For Map editors UDK has one, as well as source SDK, but come to think about it, it might also have a side scroller function..
this is the type of game that i would want, lush, nice looking graphics, fun gameplay and well just a great game overall. I was thinking we would use Unity 3d, it uses C# which is generally easier then C++ and can help with the porting to Ipod touch. So now that we have that figured out, Recruiting the help for our cause, would you mind getting that figured out with me? via Email, or this forum not sure how much free time you have, but we can collaborate. Again email is yesman538@gmail.com i would like to talk in a more fast paced conversation so we could get more done. Thanks again for the input, really helping me a lot.

I think I might have better luck finding the kind of thing I am looking for if I look for actual games, complete running games.

With Freeciv, Crossfire RPG and Battle for Wesnoth, I get not only the game engine but at least one actual game that the engine actually runs.

Complete games to use as plug and play modules, requiring very little compiled code change in order to be able to be used to represent different aspects of or scales of a single world or universe.

I am not looking to develop new compiled programs on the scale of any of those three examples, I am looking for a fourth such thing, one that can show people 3D views of the same things and places that they can be shown using these three.

Ideally one would even be able to import Freeciv and Crossfire maps instead of having to hand build maps from scratch trying to make them represent the same landscapes and interiors that I already have maps of in Freeciv and Crossfire formats.

Or another idea I suppose would be a 3D client for Crossfire. One that connects to a Crossfire server and, given what a normal 2D client is given, renders 3D scense for the player showing those things in the pretty way that players seem lately to insist upon.

Time spent looking for such tools is time taken away from completing the worlds themselves, scripts for creating maps of cities given the Freeciv specifications of them and all those existing chores that are needed anyway regardless of what clients players ultimately end up using to connect.

So maybe if you are going the 3D route instead of making a town or landscape or region or whatever that one could describe construct and display using either of these three tools I already have up and running, my interest becomes okay great that sounds nice, but it would be really nice if as you build it you keep in mind the idea of being able to plug it into other worlds other places and of being able to use it to run/display/play other worlds other places other monsters etc.

Maybe that comes down to "great game idea, is it going to be moddable, so people can tell it about their own town, their own zombie hordes or potential victims, even their own monsters or cities or civilisations or whatever?"

i am totally with your idea, and am willing to use any of those engines, but if you could draw out what you mean, so i can see it in a better light. Right now im not grasping how turn based would help with the fps i have in mind?

It probably wouldn't, unless it could bring in funds thus helping on the fundraising side or clarify plot backstory narrative or whatever (storyboard).

http://www.gamedev.net/community/forums/topic.asp?topic_id=591005
that is the help forum i set up, and are you still wiling to work on the project??

I will be keeping an eye out for world-mechanics implementations capable of having such things as zombies and arenas and malls poured into them, but I am not going to be much help in building such a thing partly because I find it utterly ridiculous that such a thing does not already exist.

I am sure it must already exist. I suspect the problems do not lie in programming such a thing but rather in the licensing of them. (The programming is almost certainly already done somewhere, it just might be hard to get permission to use it. That is why I usually include GNU among my search terms when searching. Free and Open Source search terms often bring in stuff that is not useable, because both are popular keywords useful for gaining free search engine traffic to pages about things that are not what I am looking for.)

Alright, well any help matters i appreciate the help so far, thank you!

A recent post in the Announcements section might help the sidescroller project:

http://www.gamedev.net/community/forums/topic.asp?topic_id=584993

Good post, checking it out now.