Unusual Browser Games

[Shrapnel]

I'm sure you've heard of this before.  I've visited many browser game sites, played a few, and find myself becoming bored with the same kind of game.  I've visited sites that give lists of browser games, but even though I find games that might be interesting, the descriptions are not very clear on what the game is like and I don't want to sign up for an account to a game I'm not going to play.  With the expierence in this forum, someone has to know of some really cool games (your own game right  ).  Here's just some of what I'm looking for but if you have other recommendations of game with unique features, I'm willing to listen:

Users can create their own magic items or research their own spells.
Any kind of highly customizable game might be interesting (i.e. customizable by the user)
Any kind of game where you might be the captain of a starship or maybe even a naval vessel.
A RPG that allows ownership of land or a stronghold of some type.
Unique magic systems with more unusual spells.  (Most games seems to stick to your basic damage, healing, buffing, and debuffing spells.  What about Conjuration or Transmutation spells?  Rune magic? Blood magic?  Demonology?)
Game with more adult themes (nothing pornographic, but I mean they don't shy away from romantic/sexual themes to spice the game a bit.)

[dsheroh]

Well, umm...  My own game-to-be? 

I've only got a demo of the combat interface up so far, at http://demo.sherohman.org/traspel/lite.html, but I hope to have user accounts and a leaderboard up this weekend.  It will have a few of the elements you mentioned:

Users can create their own magic items or research their own spells.

Building and customizing your spells will be a (if not the) core component of gameplay.  Enchantment will also definitely figure in, with the possibility that it could be the more prominent element if you choose to focus on equipping your minions rather than on throwing spells in person.

A RPG that allows ownership of land or a stronghold of some type.

Plans include exploration and establishment of a lair as a base of operation for your wizard.  After all, you can't do spell research without a library of dusty tomes and a lab full of things that are about to explode, can you?

Unique magic systems with more unusual spells.  (Most games seems to stick to your basic damage, healing, buffing, and debuffing spells.  What about Conjuration or Transmutation spells?  Rune magic? Blood magic?  Demonology?)

Conjuring minions is also definitely in my plans.  I hadn't thought about transmutation, but I suppose it's a possibility.  Rune magic/blood magic/demonology seem less likely, just on the basis that I'm not sure that they would be meaningfully distinguished from the default magic system.  OTOH, the default system could easily be considered a rune magic system if you're so inclined, I just call the symbols "sigils" rather than "runes".

[Murzim]

You should try Booty Master. It is not about spells but it is highly customizable and users create a lot of different items.

[Shrapnel]

No Murzim, I said I wasn't interested in a pornographic game...oh wait it's not that kind of booty. 

Thanks for the suggestion, I will check it out.

dsheroh,

Looks good.  I will be keeping an eye on it.

[Shrapnel]

I doubt there is a game like this around, but what about a game that uses a character's happiness as part of the game?  In most games the player has a character that is all work and no play.  He/she is either fight monsters all the time or working on conquering his/her neighbors all the time.  What about enjoying the fruits of one's labor?  What about enjoying fine food and women (men I suppose for the lady gamers)?  A character could have a happiness trait and it could even affect his other stats.  An extremely happy character could enjoy bonuses to his/her attack and defense or an unhappy character could suffer negatives for the same.  This would represent the morale of the character.  Anyone know of any games like that?

[dsheroh]

I doubt there is a game like this around, but what about a game that uses a character's happiness as part of the game?  In most games the player has a character that is all work and no play.  He/she is either fight monsters all the time or working on conquering his/her neighbors all the time.  What about enjoying the fruits of one's labor?  What about enjoying fine food and women (men I suppose for the lady gamers)?  A character could have a happiness trait and it could even affect his other stats.  An extremely happy character could enjoy bonuses to his/her attack and defense or an unhappy character could suffer negatives for the same.  This would represent the morale of the character.  Anyone know of any games like that?

Torn City (http://torn.com) has a "happy" stat which factors into the effectiveness of some (all?) in-game actions.  It's not a very active mechanic in the game, though.  Your max happiness is determined solely by how nice your house is and it's basically just another bar like energy - certain actions reduce it and it regenerates (very slowly) without requiring you to take any action.

[Chris]

You mean like a game where you use transmutation on excelit crystal to summon a player customizable demonic nymph you can have romantic relationship with but before that you need to invent a spell so you can conjure a skeleton crew and go on a voyage on your shadowship to a remote island where is a stronghold and some land that was left as a heritage by your uncle but before you enter the stronghold you need to perform a blood ritual to prove you are the rightful owner? 

[Shrapnel]

You mean like a game where you use transmutation on excelit crystal to summon a player customizable demonic nymph you can have romantic relationship with but before that you need to invent a spell so you can conjure a skeleton crew and go on a voyage on your shadowship to a remote island where is a stronghold and some land that was left as a heritage by your uncle but before you enter the stronghold you need to perform a blood ritual to prove you are the rightful owner? 

Wow!  Where's that game!?

[SirStompsalot]

Regarding the adult:

Saizen Media did the UI work for a browser game called (I believe) Temptation. http://www.saizenmedia.com/temptation/ [Not work safe]

However, it's in Russian, so I can't come up with anything on it.

[Delifisek]

It called customer (user) created content.

For example x-wars was this kind of game. Users can design own ships.

And later (after some turns)...

People find, generating some kind of ships more efficent than other kinds.

So ? every one going to be same race and faction to get good bonuses for certain type of technology.

Then game balance is broken. And devs can't (or won't) find a solution. And game is dead.

In this kind of games, keeping game balance is hard and not impossible. If you keep your game balanced, i believe it was become very popular.

[lolninja]

Then game balance is broken. And devs can't (or won't) find a solution. And game is dead.

In this kind of games, keeping game balance is hard and not impossible. If you keep your game balanced, i believe it was become very popular.

You need to be careful, because if a certain build starts to gain a following you can't just go waving the nerf bat, because there is nothing worse than spending hours testing different builds and options for the devs to go changing some numbers and suddenly your super build is worthless, which nullifies all the players hard work. /me is still saw from Sony's changes to SWG.

Looking at games like Warhammer, I know its a different type of game but its mega competitive and prone to 'super lists' which are the flavour of the month, what Games-Workshop does when they find an imbalance within the game they find the 'super' armies weakness and builds a new army to poke at that weakness. For example one army came out which allowed players to mechanise all of there troops in cheap transports, which basically overloaded your opponents anti-armour weapons, for a good 6 months this was the cookie-cutter list everyone was using at tournaments, since then the next two armies have had super effective anti-armour units, which has help tame this list, without upsetting the people who own the mech lists.

What I'm trying to say is, not go nuts with the nerfing but buff the counters to lessen the power of the broken builds.

So say you have a build of ship were the player drops in 100s of lasers and some meaty shields, you could counter that by adding an emp weapon, the people with the silly builds will start getting taken out by less tweaked ships, and the balance will change.

[dsheroh]

Then game balance is broken. And devs can't (or won't) find a solution. And game is dead.

In this kind of games, keeping game balance is hard and not impossible. If you keep your game balanced, i believe it was become very popular.

What I'm trying to say is, not go nuts with the nerfing but buff the counters to lessen the power of the broken builds.

So say you have a build of ship were the player drops in 100s of lasers and some meaty shields, you could counter that by adding an emp weapon, the people with the silly builds will start getting taken out by less tweaked ships, and the balance will change.

Yep, that's basically what I was going to say.  Make sure that every option has a weakness.  Then, if 90% of the players decide that a certain build is the ultimate, then the other 10% just have to build to exploit the "ultimate" build's weakness and they can easily knock out the players using it.  Balance and diversity will be quickly restored because nobody wants to make themselves an easy target by adopting a widespread, well-known set of vulnerabilities.