Video game musings: The Visionaries

Maybe you’ve heard, but it seems somebody is shopping around a new He-Man movie treatment in Hollywood. Of course, with an IP such as He-Man, if the movie ever does get made, it will without a doubt result in a subsequent video game tie-in. This made me think of another old 80s cartoon series that would probably also translate well into a video game: the Visionaries.

Maybe you’ve heard, but it seems somebody is shopping around a new He-Man movie treatment in Hollywood. Of course, with an IP such as He-Man, if the movie ever does get made, it will without a doubt result in a subsequent video game tie-in. This made me think of another old 80s cartoon series that would probably also translate well into a video game: the Visionaries.

For those who’ve never heard of this particular series, Visionaries – Visionaries: Knights of the Magical Light, to be exact – was a half hour animated television series from 1987. It was set on the planet Prysmos, where technology has failed and a new Age of Magic has sprung up. The cartoon focused on the Spectral Knights and the Darkling Lords, two warring factions that gained magical powers from Merklynn, the resident wizard of Prysmos.

Anyway. The Visionaries game. We’ve already done a number on a few other 80s cartoon series and how they could be refitted into next gen video games, but we missed out on these guys, so here goes. Think World of Warcraft, only without the MMO aspect and more high-tech junk lying around. Things will start at the beginning of the animated series, where Merklynn calls upon the various warriors and self-styled knights of the Visionaries world to try and complete a series of trials in order to gain great power.

The gimmick for the characters in the animated series was that they had animal totems that represented their personalities and how they completed the trials they faced.

Players would go through the same thing. There will be a set of trials that can be completed in multiple ways. Whatever methods players choose to go with in order to complete the trials will affect what totem animal they receive, kind of like how the Tarot card choices in the Ogre Battle games dictate the main character’s alignment, skills, etc.

Players would also be able to choose whether or not they gain a staff. In the cartoons, some characters had staffs which granted them powerful magic but could only be used for a limited number of times. Those who didn’t have staffs were made able to activate and pilot vehicles, instead. The animal totems could be activated via a series of button presses, in deference to the special verses that the characters in the cartoon had to recite in order to transform.

Towards the end game, you’ll have to face a few monumental decisions: will you choose to permanently ally yourself with whoever you’re currently allied with, will you defect to the other side or – and this will probably be the hardest path – will you strike out on your own and build an empire from scratch? This would probably open up a chance for some large-scale tactical battles like those in the Suikoden series.

Each decision will also lead to more choices: will you stay in your current role or usurp whoever is the current leader? If you choose to build your own empire, will you ally yourself with another or will you go on a conquering spree and subjugate the whole population of Prysmos under your iron rule?

Once you’ve established your own kingdom, you can also recruit either from the Spectral Knights or the Darkling Lords, although who you get will be based on with whom you’ve built relationships or, if you chose to be evil, whose minds you’ve poisoned against their friends. Of course, there will also be knights who’ll offer their services for a not so modest sum.

Well, that’s pretty much it. Yeah, it’s ambitious and tries to be a lot of things at once. And it probably won’t really be marketable. It’s still fun to dream, though. What about you guys? What are your ideas?