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[Gazillion]

I'm working on a small jRPG ala Earthbound/Dragon Warrior. In the game's story the player is sent through time and space (think about Doctor Who and all of the Doctor's trips).

At first the main antagonist was a big bad corporation that looked to control dimension travel so they could control everything. I'm finding it hard to link four kids saving the world to a money making machine, I need something more.

I'm okay with a bit of cheese (friendship and love conquers all  ) but I'm a little stuck.

My first scenario was going to be robots chopping wood in a forest which was going to be used in another dimension (so the player would find out about the dimension travel after stopping the robots). The second was going to take place at a concert where the player has to find their way to the main stage to stop the robot-replaced-artist who's song is hypnotising the crowd.

Anyway, does anyone have any ideas I can steal?

[Gazillion]

Browsing further down this forum I see some similar threads. I'm not really looking for advice on how to make a good antagonist (reading those threads will do that) but mostly some ideas on who he/she/it can be.

[SundownKid]

That plot seems a bit similar to "Secret of Evermore", where the main character is warped between different time periods. In that game, he stumbles upon it by accident, but the scientist who created it is trapped there by other people from his own town.

So, you don't necessarily have to make a "big evil antagonist" - you can make it some kind of experiment gone wrong, with the antagonists being your friends that you have to rescue.

[1982]

Antagonist is the second personality of the main character. All the battles we do, are in the end battles against ourselves.

[Pedrosanchau]

The antagonist can be the son of director of the evil company. it makes an antagonist like the heroes (in term of age, design) and story can be easily created with this setup.

Motivation can be what you want:
-just a spoiled brat wanting to be wealthy
-a kid wanting to take his father place and do better than him
-one who want to control dimension through his lost parent's corporation in order to revive them after a sad death

[Gazillion]

The antagonist can be the son of director of the evil company. it makes an antagonist like the heroes (in term of age, design) and story can be easily created with this setup.

Motivation can be what you want:
-just a spoiled brat wanting to be wealthy
-a kid wanting to take his father place and do better than him
-one who want to control dimension through his lost parent's corporation in order to revive them after a sad death

Hmmm I like this. It solves the problem of having kids fighting an adult as the big bad. The kid could also be trying to impress his/her parents not realizing that they are causing problems all over the place.

[Evan Balster]

I've always liked ideological antagonists the best.  Think "watchmen" and the like.

Perhaps the parent is trying to make a better world, while his child abuses the power of the company in a misguided bid to gain his father's approval?  (This would work better with a late teens / early twenties "child")

[Ashkin]

The antagonist can be the son of director of the evil company. it makes an antagonist like the heroes (in term of age, design) and story can be easily created with this setup.

Motivation can be what you want:
-just a spoiled brat wanting to be wealthy
-a kid wanting to take his father place and do better than him
-one who want to control dimension through his lost parent's corporation in order to revive them after a sad death

Hmmm I like this. It solves the problem of having kids fighting an adult as the big bad. The kid could also be trying to impress his/her parents not realizing that they are causing problems all over the place.

And then make a bait-and-switch boss where you easily knock the kid aside, but then have to face his father. Turn the rest of the story into a dark and gritty masterpiece, subverting all expectations. Then, sweep up the awards.

[letsap]

Money making machines can't be tied to a 4 kids story? How many childhood movies did you skip out on? You could have the corporation take out something beloved by children and immediately paint them as the bad guys and provide motivation for the kids in one fell swoop. As for the antagonist's motivation, why is money a bad thing? It can be played for laughs (see Aperture Science) well enough, as well as dark overreaching plotlines.

[Pedrosanchau]

Money making machines can't be tied to a 4 kids story? How many childhood movies did you skip out on? You could have the corporation take out something beloved by children and immediately paint them as the bad guys and provide motivation for the kids in one fell swoop. As for the antagonist's motivation, why is money a bad thing? It can be played for laughs (see Aperture Science) well enough, as well as dark overreaching plotlines.

I think it's difficult to imagine a story between kids and adults without making the adult dumber than normal adults. All the kids movies do that in my opinion.

The kids have broken something that belongs to one of their parents. They were told not to touch it, because it's an important work related thing, so they think they are in big trouble now... unless they can replace it in time, which means going on an interdimensional adventure, which inevitably means using something else they've been told not to touch.

Same as above, as an adult, i'll never let an interdimensional device alone with kids around and without triple laser of death protection.


I think it depends on what he intends to do. If he wants a story child like home alone, he can go for this kind of trip

[raiderrobert]

The antagonist can be the son of director of the evil company. it makes an antagonist like the heroes (in term of age, design) and story can be easily created with this setup.

Motivation can be what you want:
-just a spoiled brat wanting to be wealthy
-a kid wanting to take his father place and do better than him
-one who want to control dimension through his lost parent's corporation in order to revive them after a sad death

Hmmm I like this. It solves the problem of having kids fighting an adult as the big bad. The kid could also be trying to impress his/her parents not realizing that they are causing problems all over the place.

I too like this idea of using a son. Perhaps you can use as motivation the fact that the protagonist is attacking his family fortune, basically vengeance with a little greed mixed in. It's a classic motivation.

[Chromanoid]

Many kids do things they shouldn't do. When I was <=13 years old a friend and I broke into a summerhouse and we stole some gardening tools and built a hut with pretty dangerous traps around it (with barbed wire and scythes etc.), we also threw frogs into a lake unfortunately some frogs flew over the lake, we chased oxen, played strange games like firing a sharp arrow into the air as high as we could then we tried to let it fly through the bow when it came down (while holding the bow horizontally like a ring), we had fights with other kids with slingshots and sticks, we threw sand at each other and unfortunately at a car next to us (after realizing this we rubbed the sand off the car with a wet rag to "clean" it), we dropped a big balloon filled with water onto another kid from a height arround 10m... I think I was a pretty well-behaved kid, so many kids will do much more dangerous/idiotic stuff.

What I want to say is: Just drop the heroic character of the kids and give them some idiotic ideas. Most children are neither "innocent" nor heroic. How about this: The 4 kids bully another kid and chase it into the laboratories. The chased kid gets caught by the robots or accidently falls into the dimension travelling machine. The 4 kids want to rescue the kid out of remorse. With some ugly discussions between the kids about if they really should rescue their victim you could add additional depth to the characters.

The antagonist just does some illegal reasearch and wants to get rid of witnesses...

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

maybe the corporation is headed by an only child spoiled brat kid who inherited the company is resentful that the 4 hero kids picked on him in school

[alto]

or you could make it a wario sort of thing where s/he always wanted to be their friend but was too much of a spoiled jerk to do so properly. I wouldn't want to play as a group of kids who are bullies. I'd just feel bad for the one they picked on and lose on purpose

[RamSteelwood]

I like Pedrosanchau's idea.
A slightly different take on it (and basically stolen from disney's 'meet the robinsons' and twisted a bit)
the father of the hero(es) is the inventor of the time machines, and an all round good sort really.  the antagonist is a bitter rival/disgruntled employee type, perhaps being manipulated by another person.  the hero is either tricked or does something wrong that allows the antagonist to steal a time machine, so the hero takes another machine along with his pals to go and try to undo any bad stuff and get the stolen time machine back.
and maybe there's a little father/son rift at the start, and by the end the father realises that his greatest invention is his son... 

[Sniperrr]

The antagonist can be the son of director of the evil company. it makes an antagonist like the heroes (in term of age, design) and story can be easily created with this setup.

Motivation can be what you want:
-just a spoiled brat wanting to be wealthy
-a kid wanting to take his father place and do better than him
-one who want to control dimension through his lost parent's corporation in order to revive them after a sad death

Hmmm I like this. It solves the problem of having kids fighting an adult as the big bad. The kid could also be trying to impress his/her parents not realizing that they are causing problems all over the place.

And then make a bait-and-switch boss where you easily knock the kid aside, but then have to face his father. Turn the rest of the story into a dark and gritty masterpiece, subverting all expectations. Then, sweep up the awards.

What? No. After building up the son so much you just sweep him outside and waste all the player's interest and anticipation for the big boss battle with the son? Total let-down. Then just introduce a character who the players don't care about and say "this guy is new villain check him out". He's like a space flea from nowhere. Doesn't work.

At the very least, build up the father somewhat, if he's going to be the true final boss

[tsameti]

Well, how about in the final battle you're fighting Megacorp Jr. and he's possessed by the Specter of his Father's legacy.

The only person who can damage the specter is Jr himself, and he takes damage from his dad. You fight using damage reflection, confusion spells, and other tricks while keeping Jr and your party healed.

In addition, every few rounds the specter summons lesser specters (which are probably particular memories or hangups) which when defeated give you a turn or two to actually control Jr.

You help him free himself.

[Capntastic]

That's a really cool idea, I'd go one further to have it be that the original Megacorp dude wasn't even 'evil', but the kid's perception (the specter) of him is what drives him to do bad things, trying to appease motives that never existed in the first place.  That way the victory isn't about a particular 'evil badguy person', but a victory of trying to appease people to the detriment of oneself.  Really drive the themes of interpersonal perceptions, all of that tough stuff.