Moonhaven

A turn-based, dialogue-driven RPG for portable devices

Theme
Moonhaven is a RPG for portable devices such as DS, PSP or the upcoming PS Vita. The game is heavily inspired by Japanese RPGs and allows the player to take on the role of a teenage Witch who, together with her coven of fellow teenage Witches, team up with male Vampires in order to defeat the forces of the Underworld; horrific monsters from folklore and myth. You select your group from several girl witches and boy vampires, who all have specific attributes and skills, then move around an adventure map to complete quests and defeat enemies in combat. The combat is turn-based and focuses heavily on tactics, much like traditional JRPGs for portable devices such as Final Fantasy Tactics and Radiant Historia. The game focuses heavily on dialogue and allows the player to create friendships and romances with their fellow witches and in particular the vampires. Aside from the adventure map and battles, the game consists of different scenes where dialogue is the main focus, as NPCs will approach you for conversations that allow the player to role-play their preferred character. Depending on how you decide to play your character in the dialogues with your companions, it will influence their personality and unlock new abilities that you can make use of in combat, as well as determine which one of the multiple endings of the story you will experience. Moonhaven combines themes from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Supernatural and Twilight with gameplay from previously mentioned JRPGs, alongside story elements from games such as Mass Effect. It is designed to be lightly emergent and re-playable, as players should want to explore all the different romantic possibilities between the Witches and the Vampires, as well as the different tactical approaches (based on your party development) that you can have to all the battles in the game.

Target demographic
The game seeks to take advantage of the fact that stories containing supernatural creatures such as vampires or demons in contemporary settings, especially high school and college environments, are very much pop culture right now. This game is for anyone who is into TV shows and movies such as Twilight, Supernatural, Vampire Diaries and True Blood. More specifically, the target audience is teens between 14-25 years and primarily female. This female demographic consists of young women who are moderate to hardcore gamers that enjoy more recent RPGs such as Dragon Age, specifically the story and dialogues. Most likely they enjoy a select couple of anime series that they watch frequently. No matter the exact IP, they are prone to fannish behavior as compared to just your regular consumer: the play their games and watch their movies over and over, while still finding the activity meaningful. Some of them probably dress up in costumes for specific game or movie launch parties. Several of them will likely attend Comic Con and frequent forums for their TV shows where they might discuss stories and publish fan fiction.

Background
The city of Moonhaven was once an idyllic place to live, until it turned out it was located directly on top of where the Gates of the Underworld are about to open. Moonhaven was once a place of old pagan worship, where magical rituals were undertaken to keep the forces of evil at bay, although not always successfully. The history of the old families still living here stretches back hundreds of years, and part of that history is dark, foreboding, and filled with tales of neighbors and old friends feasting upon one another in their thirst for blood. Magic is strong in this place, and if the omens are just right whenever a child is born, that child is said to possess magical abilities. You were one of these children, as were several other young girls that were born that year. Together, you have created a coven in your high school with help from your librarian, who is one of the few that knows part of the dark history of Moonhaven. Together with your fellow Witches, you travel the city at night to keep your neighbors safe when dark forces roam the streets and seek to further the opening of the Gates of the Underworld and herald the impending Armageddon. As you combat the demonic forces of darkness, at one point you are aided by a group of older boys that seem undaunted by the creatures that befoul Moonhaven at night. They claim to have once lived here, long ago, and have returned to set right the mistakes of the past. You realize these boys are Vampires; strong, agile, immortal, dangerous but oh so attractive. Together you fight back the forces of the Underworld, but whether or not you can actually trust your new-found allies remains to be seen.

Environment
The primary gaming world and their characters will be drawn in anime and should consist of a smaller city at night, when foul creatures roam the streets and fog and fire cloud the vision of anyone that find themself unlucky enough to be out at that hour. This is the time when our Witches meet up with their Vampires and go out to fight back the forces of evil. Typical battle scenes will be taking place in remote locations in the city such as graveyards and parks, or in places that are typically closed at night, for example the school gym or the grocery store all of them dark, deformed and overrun by evil. Between quests and battles, the group returns home or to school to recharge and prepare for new battles. In stark contrast to the city at night, these scenes will be drawn as a bright, American high school, with lockers, libraries and classrooms.

Monsters
The enemies you encounter will be supernatural in nature and based on myths and folklore, such as ghouls, zombies, spirits, demons, revenants, familiars, black dogs, wendigos, shapeshifters, werewolves and demi-gods. These are all connected to the impending apocalypse hovering over the city. Many of these encounters are connected to quest mechanics that the player will have to complete in order to be able to defeat the monster, for example by finding the heirloom belonging to the spirit, located in a different part of the city, in order to banish her permanently.

Camera
The camera angle will change slightly depending on what scene you are currently in. When navigating the city on the adventure map, the game will be shown from an isometric view in order to give an overview of potential interactions nearby, much like Final Fantasy Tactics. When switching to a battle scene, the camera will be showing all the combatants from the side, much like Radiant Histora, to bring the player closer to the action. Whenever we step away from the action side of the game and enter the dialogue mode, such as when checking the library, your locker or your room, the game will be in 1 st person view, showing only the backdrop and potential characters you can speak to.

Dialogue
Whenever the player talks to someone, a talk bubble will appear next to the character you are speaking with. The mechanic follows a traditional dialogue tree where you select from a list of options what you want your protagonist to say. Much of the dialogue, especially the ones with your companions, will affect your relationship with them and their opinion of you. Also, your responses to them will affect how their personality develops, allowing you to explore multiple aspects of a character each time you play through the game. Through dialogue, the player will be able to explore different romances with any of the vampire characters, who will all differ in personality, how they treat you, what they ask you to do and what you in turn can develop them into. Furthermore, many of the themes and topics in the dialogues deal with issues that teenage girls go through; such as identity issues and other emotional and philosophical subjects. Rather than confronting these straight up, many real life issues will appear as metaphors in the game. Examples could be magic addiction as a metaphor for drug abuse, fear of demonic influence a metaphor for homosexuality, a vampire losing his soul after sleeping with the protagonist could be a metaphor for guys turning into monsters once they get what they want, etc. As a way to encourage players to go through all the dialogue in the game, when you get to know more about a companion by talking to them or by completing quests they ask for your help with, you will be able to unlock abilities that you can make use of in combat. Depending on how you complete the dialogues will affect in what way these abilities take shape, for example if you are encouraging a character to hurt instead of forgive someone that has done them wrong, their resulting abilities might end up being more aggressive and darker in nature. Each one of these specific abilities may be used in combination with other companions abilities, creating different effects depending on which ones are combined. Furthermore, depending on how you treat a character will change their personality, which in turn changes how they are matched up with other party members and how their abilities combine. Effectively, part of leveling up your character and your companions is to get to know them and unlock their abilities. Part of specializing your party dynamic is by exploring the different ways you can influence a companions personality and figure out how to combine them with other party members, effectively creating a matchmaking mechanic.

Navigation
Adventure Map
Certain places and quests will only be available to you during night, but this is also the time when demons and undead are roaming the land. As you maneuver the isometric map and make progress through each part of the city, monsters and other objects such as quest items or NPCs that you can talk to will be visible on the map. Quest items can either be collected or used in combination with other items you already have collected and are carrying on your person. Dialogues will either be connected to the quest you are currently on, or give storyline hints of the greater story arc. At times these dialogues will lead to combat, but it is also quite common for your companions to offer up their opinion on what just went on, and how you handled a situation.

Library
The library is where your group gathers between quests, and also where a majority of your quest are either started or continued. It is possible for the player to read up on the background information of the city and the places you intend to travel to before you do so, as well as to get tactical hints of how to best combat difficult monsters by revealing some of their strengths and weaknesses.

Lockers
Whenever the player visits their locker, sometimes an NPC will be waiting for them there. This can either be a companion that wants to talk about their problems and thoughts, depending upon previous conversations with the player, and enables the player to explore different storylines specific for each companion with multiple possible endings available. At times the lockers can also be a place for other NPCs in the game to give you quests or challenges, which usually requires you to visit the library to continue on with the quest and eventually ends up with you going out on the adventure map to complete it.

Room
The protagonists room is a place for rest and secret conversations. By resting here after each trip out into the night, the player will regain health and magic. Furthermore, this is where most of the romantic conversations will take place, as the player will be visited by vampires who will be interested in learning more about the player or talk about themselves and others. Each one of the vampires will be possible to flirt with and even start a relationship with, depending on your dialogue choices. However, vampires are vain and jealous creatures who will insist on the player staying away from all other vampires aside from themselves (which will be very difficult considering that every other vampire will be trying to get the player to like them).

Battle
Rules
Whenever a player engages in battle, the game will change into a battle scene where you will see your own group members, the enemies you are up against, as well as any terrain that you can make use of in battle, all placed on a grid. All combat is turn-based, where players are able to take their actions whenever their meter has reached full. It is possible for a group member to opt for waiting when their turn is up to allow another character to perform their action before they will in order to set up combinations. Your movement and your action meter are all dependent on your class and your skills. You perform an action with a character by selecting it on a panel that appears, displaying traditional options such as attacks, spells or items.

Companions and abilities

The group constellation and its dynamic varies depending on what combination of characters you are using for your party. Overall, each Witch is a ranged spell caster that can be specialized in several different ways of casting spells. For example, a summoning Witch can conjure minions that help out the party by attacking enemies, a dark Witch uses hexes and curses to lower the attributes of enemies in order to make them weaker in combat, a white Witch knows healing spells, a time Witch can manipulate time and space during battle, granting additional actions to the party and allowing them to redo previous actions, while a thunder Witch can create elemental effects on the grid, affecting enemies on them. Vampires are usually more melee focused, using either their fists or weapons to defeat the enemies. For example, one vampire will be able to fly around the grid and charge enemies with his spear, while pushing them away from where they want to be. Another vampire is able to cloak himself in shadows, disappearing and reappearing behind enemies to surprise and backstab them. Yet more vampires will be able to go toe-to-toe with foes, using their tremendous strength to swing a large sword at them, while another vampire prefers ranged combat and throws knives at the enemies.

Chemistry Bar
Based on your decision making during dialog, when preforming tasks, and when interacting with other characters in the game, your chemistry bar will be affected, as well as the chemistry bar of those characters you interacted with. The Chemistry bar is a two sided bar divided into two colors, red and blue. As you make decisions that make your relationship more positive with a character, that characters meter moves towards blue. When you make decisions that distance you from another character, that character meter moves towards red. Based on your relationship with each character your battle experience will change (see combined attacks). Chemistry bars indicate characters relationships to you and other around them. Not every bar will be an even split of red and blue. Some characters will have different personalities, some more volatile (red) and

some more affectionate (blue). Stronger positive and negative chemistry both have their perks. Strong attacks result from both, but the effects of those attacks that make them different.

Combined Attack
Players can combine two characters abilities to unleash a more powerful attack. Based on whether the relationship (chemistry) is more red or more blue, a different combined attack will take place. On the chemistry bar there are tick marks that indicate a new level of chemistry. As you hit those ticks, your team attack changes and becomes more powerful. The Getting a completely bad relationship (all the way red) or completely good (all the way blue), will unlock an ultimate attack. Some negative chemistry combined attacks will be more powerful but may result in damage to your character or other negative effects. Positive chemistry combined attacks will be weaker than negative chemistry but will have added bonus effects such as paralysis or poison.

Personality in Battle
Bases on how the story has changed your characters might have different actions happen in battle. For example if someones relationship meter is really in the red and the story led you down a path where their girlfriend had just died, they will be more of a loose cannon. So in battle they might attack without you giving the command. Another example is if two of your characters are dating and their chemistry bars are in the blue, one might heal another without command.