I've always liked customization in my games, but lately I've become more and more genera-savvy and the feeling of "Yeah, I built that. Watch it kick your butt." of sticking lasers on a Mechwarrior 4 Mercs MP3 'mech has been fading.
I've played Roboforge, but being that it is a): a crashy, glitchy old Java game, b):pretty much dead, and c):too... I dunno, impersonal?... and less deep than it seems (physics are a lot simpler than they look for such a sword-fighting/etc-based game)
I was excited for Spore, but after I got it I was quite disappointed at how only cosmetic changes are really made, and how the response I get from my practical, helpful brother when showing him a creature is "you could hide a pair of minimum-size wings here. All creatures have similar capabilities.
I've tried Garry's Mod, but being based on a FPS engine, all the objects are either fragile crates, made of explodium, or made of indestructium and even with Wiremod/Spacebuild/etc., there just isn't much room for improvement. You either use a premade spaceship weapon that damages tanks/ships/bases or you work hard to make something twice as large, half as reliable, and only effective against players/NPCs.
So I was wondering: Can any of you name a game where equipment is truly "Design-it-yourself"?
I don't mean "tech-tree", and the modular build systems of Warzone 2100 and some mech games are still not uniquely "yours".
I mean something where ingenuity can come up with weapons that your opponents can't defend against until they figure out how the heck they even work! Where you can spend lots of time looking at the way another player's equipment solves the same problems as yours, but by an entirely different principle.
I would really love to vent some of my mad-scientist ambitions on something like this.
<P.S. Sorry about all the TVTropes WikiWords, just escaped a WikiWalk and have to deal with a TabExplosion>