Galaxy War: Return of the Malum
Game Design
Document
Overview
A swarm of vicious insect aliens called the “Malum” are about to colonize the galaxy and the only way you can stop it is an all out assault on their territories. Use Turrets, Infantry, Mechs, Allied Aliens and more to annihilate multiple types of Malum before they can reach your home planet. Each Malum has its own special set of abilities and purpose, so be careful how you use your limited supply of minerals and gas as you battle the insect horde.
Our high-quality, graphics and art style combined with sci-fi action goodness will set our game apart from other tower defense games which tend to use a more cutesy or chibi art style. Our game will also focus highly on using skills at the proper times and at precise locations to achieve victory. It will require more player interaction than other tower defense games. Not only do you have to defend, after the defense is finished you must defeat the enemy outpost with your remaining troops, meaning that you will have to have prepared your base to be able to attack not only defend.
Genre
Tower Defense - Tower defense (or informally TD) is a subgenre of strategy video game where the goal is to defend a player's territories or possessions by obstructing the enemy attackers, usually achieved by placing defensive structures on or along their path of attack.This typically means building a variety of different structures that serve to automatically block, impede, attack or destroy enemies. Tower defense is seen as a subgenre of real-time strategy video games, due to its real-time origins, though many modern tower defense games include aspects of turn-based strategy. Strategic choice and positioning of defensive elements is an essential strategy of the genre.
Sci-Fi - Science Fiction is a genre of speculative fiction, typically dealing with imaginative concepts such as futuristic science and technology, space travel, time travel, faster than light travel, parallel universes, and extraterrestrial life.
Platform
Mobile phones and tablets
Android and iOS
Key Features
Sci-Fi tower defense
Modeled after Plants vs. Zombies
Place Turrets and Soldiers to defend your castle
UNITS
Laser Cannon, Infantry Soldier, Heavy Gunner, Psy Corp Marine, and more...
Most Units have special activated abilities
Each non tower based unit has an active ability. The player can chose to use this ability when they want by tapping on the unit and then if the ability has a target system you can click on the intended area or target, however if the ability is an auto fire, it will fire off automatically when the ability is pressed. When the unit is ready their UI art will change along with having a particle effect around them to notify the player.
Upgrade your Units and choose between several variations, for example:
Gun Turret -> Laser Turret / Minigun Turret / Rocket Turret
Infantry Grunt -> Razorback / Wolverine / Dragon
Psionic Adept -> Psionic Disrupter / Psionic Warlock / Psionic Templar
Fight against Alien Forces
Crawlers, Snakes, Burrowers, Reavers, Rollers, Slags, and more!
Activate rare consumables when in dire need
Call upon powerful weapons!
Nuclear Strike, Satellite Laser, Dominus Cannon, Napalm Blanket and more!
Repair bots to heal your Forward Base
Temporary Unit buffs
Hard currency monetization
Players can earn or buy hard currency
This can be used to Unlock New Units, Unit Cosmetics, and Consumables.
Setting
Galaxy War: Return of the Malum takes place in a Sci-Fi universe where advanced Human and Allied Alien warriors fight the insect-like aliens called the Malum, you and your alien allies are the last hope for the galaxy.
Target Demographic
Everyone
Teen+
Sci-Fi Lovers
People who love Star Wars, Starcraft, Aliens, Predator, etc.
Story
Upon attempting to colonize yet another planet named Devios 6 a team of scientists hoped to try out their latest invention which would rapidly terraform a planet so it would be habitable by humans and other life forms that share earth’s atmosphere. Little did they know that the planet that they were attempting to terraform was already inhabited by an ancient race of insect like creatures called the Malum. The Malum as the stories go were vanquished long ago by an alien race known as the Xon who are said to be the guardians of our galaxy. The Xon were driven nearly to extinction and were said to have returned to their home planet hidden away in the furthest reaches of the galaxy. The Xon’s technology was so advanced that when pieces of their broken spacecrafts and weapons were found it took humanity 100 years to translate and unlock their secrets.
As the terraforming of Devios 6 began chemicals were released and drilling began. The vibrations of the drills and the release of terraforming chemicals changed the planet’s atmosphere which caused the planet’s temperature to rise triggering a dormant Malum egg to awaken. This specific egg was shot into space by a Malum queen hundreds of years ago as a fail safe for the Malum race. This egg contained a queen which is able to reproduce asexualy as long as it can find food. Unfortunately for our terraforming brethren the new queen had just woken up and she was feeling hungry.
1 month had passed since the planet had “gone dark” and all communication had been lost with the terraforming team, so military had sent out a scouting party of space marines to find out what is happening. Communication had also been lost with the first and even second scouting party so the military sent a full battleship battalion towards the planet. It was soon discovered that the whole planet had been infested with Malum. Once the battleships were seen by the queen she shot out 10 eggs into space toward nearby inhabited planets and the spread of the Malum began.
It is your job as an Allegiance commander to hunt down and destroy all Malum in the galaxy and bring peace back to the milky way. You have heard stories of the Xon and it is your mission along with killing the Malum to research and find the Xon’s home planet so we might ask for their aid.
Backstory
As a new commander you are still wet behind the ears and are criticized for making the smallest mistakes. People know you are a capable soldier but have yet to see you lead a victorious battle. How will you fair as a commander?
Story Synopsis
Bug-like aliens are attacking planets. Kill the bugs at all costs.
Project Scope
Locations
Luna - Story Beginnings at training grounds
Sirus 2 - First small scale battle
Kanrio - First large scale battle
Melzah - Planet of the Xon
Delios - Planet of water
Magmarta - Planet of fire
Ungalo - Jungle Planet
Jenta - The home of the Allegiance capital city.
Ganto - Closest planet to the Malum home planet.
Devios 6 - Home planet of the Malum Queen.
Game Play Levels
There will be a total of 100 levels in the game. These levels will be broken down into 10 different locations that the player will visit, each location having 10 levels in it.
Gameflow
Player enters the Galaxy map and select a planet.
Player selects a stage on that planet.
Player begins with few supplies and uses these to select which units they wish to take with them to the stage.
Player begins with a little gas and minerals to build a couple of initial heroes.
Malum will invade in set waves.
Player defeats Malum units and earns minerals and gas to build more Units.
When all waves have been defeated, the player must now defeat the enemy forward base which has its own defences.
When all waves and the enemy base has been defeated, player is given a score and a star ranking.
Player is taken back to the Galaxy map and is able to progress further or replay previous mission to achieve higher star rankings.
Mission map is not linear, and at certain points players will be allowed to choose which direction they would like to travel, resulting in different outcomes and rewards.
What genre? TD Sci-Fi
Tower defense (or informally TD) is a subgenre of strategy video game where the goal is to defend a player's territories or possessions by obstructing the enemy attackers, usually achieved by placing defensive structures on or along their path of attack.This typically means building a variety of different structures that serve to automatically block, impede, attack or destroy enemies. Tower defense is seen as a subgenre of real-time strategy video games, due to its real-time origins, though many modern tower defense games include aspects of turn-based strategy. Strategic choice and positioning of defensive elements is an essential strategy of the genre.
Sci-Fi - Science Fiction is a genre of speculative fiction, typically dealing with imaginative concepts such as futuristic science and technology, space travel, time travel, faster than light travel, parallel universes, and extraterrestrial life.
■ What platform
[Mobile/iOS/Android, Steam, Standalone PC, Console...]?
iOS
Android
■ What demographic
Ages 11-35
■ competitive landscape
Plants vs Zombies
core mechanics
Core Gameplay Loop
Place units in set positions on the map in order to defend your forward base against a stream of incoming Malum Aliens.
Use the gas and minerals collected from your miner-bots and slain enemies to upgrade your units and their abilities or to build entirely new Units.
Use and target your unit's skills at the most opportune times in order to win.
If you would like to purchase units you may buy some units outright, however there is a Gacha system in the game where you can roll for a chance at an exclusive higher tier unit.
Mobius Gate: Gacha factor - User receives a random Alien Unit (poor, low, middle, mid-high, high, epic, legendary). At the highest levels, each unit will be able to upgrade into three power tiers that will increase their power and one of two final tiers that will drastically alter how the unit is used. This allows players to specialize their defenses and play style.
Primary Gameplay Loop
Enter area ->
Start battle ->
Hire / Build Units ->
Place Units ->
Use skills ->
Defeat enemies ->
Gain Minerals and Gas ->
Upgrade Heroes ->
Win match ->
Go to next battle ->
Secondary Gameplay Loop
Beat Area ->
Get star rating for area ->
Gain Experience ->
Buy/Unlock New Units ->
Buy/Unlock Consumables ->
Enter new Area ->
Tertiary Gameplay Loop
Repeat stages for higher ranking ->
Get additional premium currency ->
Open the Mobius Gate ->
Score placed on global leaderboard
introduction of the core mechanics and first time user experience:
Log in the game
Asks you if you want to log into your Android or iOS game account
User is shown a 5-10 second clip of Malum invading a city
User is taken to the screen where he can select or buy units
User is given hard currency to buy a new unit at that screen for a set price
User is taken through tutorial showing him how to place the base units and his new unit
User is shown how tower defence combat works
User is told how pivotal attacking units are in the game
User s shown how to attack enemy base once defense has completed
User completes tutorial level
User is taken to the store where he is given a “Free Spin” on the mobius gate.
User receives a random middle tier Alien Unit (poor, low, middle, mid-high, high, epic, legendary)
User is able to click the mobius gate again however, if the user does so this time is prompted that he does not have enough hard or soft currency to open the mobius gate again.
User is shown how to navigate back to the map to the second stage.
User is shown that the new unit must be added to his stage team to be able to place it in the current stage.
User begins second stage combat
75% through the level user’s base is hit and taken to 50% health by an enemy barrage of crawlers.
User is gifted hard currency and then prompted to “Speed Repair” their base by using gifted hard currency.
Once second stage is completed User is taken back to the map
User is shown another 5-10 second clip that shows them winning the battle.
User is shown to the “Developer Deals” screen where they are prompted to invite 3 friends to play to earn a “Good Friend” voucher which on their next Mobius Gate opening will guarantee at least a High tier Alien Unit.(one time per account)
retention hooks:
Compelling long lasting gameplay
Replayability
High level gameplay for serious players
PvP
Leaderboards
New content patches
New Events
Daily and Weekly Missions
monetization hooks:
Mobius Gate: Gacha factor - User receives a random Alien Unit (poor, low, middle, mid-high, high, epic, legendary)
Hard end game levels make you want to buy premium currency to help you through
Leaderboards make you more inclined to spend on making your defences stronger
PvP invasions make you more likely to purchase to make your base stronger
social features:
Achievements
PvP
Leaderboards
Friend Invites
Shop
Mineral Booster 100% 2 Hours: Use your mineral booster to boost the amount of minerals you mine by 100% for 2 hours
Mineral Booster 100% 6 Hours: Use your mineral booster to boost the amount of minerals you mine by 100% for 6 hours
Mineral Booster 100% 12 Hours: Use your mineral booster to boost the amount of minerals you mine by 100% for 12 hours
Mineral Booster 100% 24 Hours: Use your mineral booster to boost the amount of minerals you mine by 100% for 24 hours
Miner Speed Boost 2 Hours: Miners will mine minerals 100% faster for 2 hours making the gathering “tick” generate at .5 seconds instead of 1 second.
Miner Speed Boost 6 Hours: Miners will mine minerals 100% faster for 6 hours making the gathering “tick” generate at .5 seconds instead of 1 second.
Miner Speed Boost 12 Hours: Miners will mine minerals 100% faster for 12 hours making the gathering “tick” generate at .5 seconds instead of 1 second.
Miner Speed Boost 24 Hours: Miners will mine minerals 100% faster for 24 hours making the gathering “tick” generate at .5 seconds instead of 1 second.
Nuke: Eliminates enemies in an area of effect 5x3 squares
Cryo Wave: Freezes all enemies on field for 10 seconds
Napalm Blanket: Burns the field on a 5x3 radius for 30 seconds
Contract Kill: Deal massive sniper damage to 1 target
Mobius Force: Pushes enemies back to the edge of map
Citadel Repair: Instantly repairs the citadel to full health
Bundles
In this tab you will be able to buy bundles of items which are the “cost effective” way to buy in the game. You may look here for daily, weekly, and monthly deals as well as deals for holidays or special events
Units
Certain basic units may be purchased here however the more expensive units must be acquired using the mobius gate.
Boosts
Boosts are consumable items that are used to get past especially difficult levels as well as enhance player experience during gameplay
Mobius Gate
The Mobius Gate is the “Gacha factor” - User receives a random Alien Unit (poor, low, middle, mid-high, high, epic, legendary)
Ethereon Crystals
Ethereon Crystals are the “Hard Currency” in this game and are purchased with real money and also can be earned in small amounts during gameplay milestones.
Positive feedback loop:
Mine Minerals to place troops:
Mine minerals
Want to mine minerals faster
Offer Free one time 10 minute Mineral
Booster 100% and Miner Speed Boost
Realise how great the boosts help
Buy Mineral Booster 100% 2 Hours
Buy Miner Speed Boost 2 Hours
Play longer than 2 hours
Realize it is more “Cost Effective” to buy the 24 Hour Boosts
Buy Mineral Booster 100% 24 Hours
Buy Miner Speed Boost 24 Hours
Want to play as long as possible to utilize boost