- Easy to imagine some Helghast cruiser captain and his crew at the end of killzone 3, when Stahl shows his technologic adances like energy shielding and warp drive engine, sending these to attack Earth, understands their own futur might be on the edge.
- They might've secretly boarded their families and hijacked the destination, for exemple the furthest colony they heard about...
- Not ISA of course, Earth is huge they should be colons from a non ISA origin and their planet/star should have affected they evolution just like Helghan.
I know it'd be weird but how about character customization like Vectan/Hybrid/Helghan. Each with base particularity...
And your squad are specialists you recruit by doing something like missions, accessible by what origins you choose, ... Each specialist has their skill tree.
Your alignment defines how the main player skill tree can evolve. The Best weapons you can acquire also depends on your aliance.
I like to see it as an open-world, strategic, procedural, multi branch story, RPG.
The battelfield should be total chaos and feel like the war is all around with ever changing events...
- sometimes troupers around one or two scorpion tanks...
- sometimes ISA mechs battle Atac drones etc...
- basically a feeling of overwhelming chaos
Try playing a coop conquest game of battelfield 2042 on orbital for a small exemple.
The planet has 3 factions from the start:
- New faction original from there
- Helghast
- ISA
So your cruiser crash lands on the colony, it makes your starting point, you base and the first "safe zone" on the map.
First quests would be to secure, resupply your people and make contact with other present groups and get your first contracts.
As player choosing it's alignment, other factions should unveil for exemple:
VSA update with new VSA gears join and replace ISA
Black Hand
Maybe increased threat from ISA/Helghasts
You can accept attack missions from different contracts vendors in safe zones:
- Capture some scientist or specialist will grant you rewards like:
- Credits, if you bring the person to the faction camp, and a lot of alignment exp.
- A new HUD/MENU fonctionnality OR in some case a new ally in your base you can take in your active squad, then less faction exp.
- Attack enemy convoy
- etc...
As you progress faction Exp milestones, you get more allied with that particular faction and main story unfolds as it closes for others.
As each faction's goal is different the main story should be different too... That makes new game+ very attractive.
Recruiting scientists should have an effect on menu/HUD by the tech they'll add.
Exemple, you get a contract to capture a helghast scientist, you recruit him, he adds a layer on your world map displaying in the "helghast orange/brownish" the "battle weather", icons like:
- artillery strikes
- huge armor column
- snipers
The map has basically 3 types of areas (some exist/accessible only ):
- safe zones: a small percentage of the map
- light intensity battlefield (most quests): a bigger part
- high intesity/full chaos: about half size of the map
Some place should be contextual to player alignment, for exemple:
- Stahl arms factory
- etc...
Map should be changing in the high intesity areas.
for exemple: after a artillery on a zone there should be craters to hide in...
Big cataclysmic events should happen like earthquakes, tornados, ice fall, thick fog.
They should defines the strategy to adapt.
Should you take on of your base's armored vehicle, a sniper in your team, shock troopers...
That should be thought according to mission and map battlefield weather.
Epic secondary/hidden bosses/objectives
Yes there should be elite activities on the high intesity map for highest level players.
Also events are constantly happening, patrols attacking positions, fights, it's never quite.
The teammates you recruit are just recruits at first, but they will tell you something they do care about, their NPC side quests.
Doing these services will unlock more potential from them.
Everything should have an experience gauge even weapons lvls will let you improve handling/precision/reloading then at milestones you can buy new sights/magazines/handles/...
you picked a hybrid as your character, your alignement is New faction, your mission attack an ISA base.
- You take a helghast sniper/recon specialistand an engineer.
- Position your sniper/recon on a high place so your helghast helmet displays AR intels (the focal point aligns perfectly the display while it is a bit out of step on the sides).
- You approach the base which has new faction construction vehicles, your engineer hacks these causing a chaos. The sinper shoots their comms operator, causing the start of the battle...
- While you fight and reposition to keep the tactical advantage a helghast ATAC suddenly attacks the ISA base followed by helghast soldiers and a scorpion tank.
- OOPS! a tornado appears washing away the ATAC and now everyone tries to take cover...