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[Nirur Torir]

But what kind of things would you leave lying around in such a game?

There's usually some kind of items you can get in Pokemon games... I think that having these items be "gift-oriented" rather than "function-oriented" would be best. Maybe like a couple of fancy food items that heal your monster a little or something like that, but the skinning being more important than the gameplay impact. That will encourage the givers to focus more on the hunt being high-quality and enjoyable than the goal, which will discourage developing grinding-style challenges.

Planting berry trees, that each person can only pick from once (or once/week)? You could have berries from distant areas be slightly better, and then continue to improve as their berries get planted elsewhere. I like the idea, but I don't know what would be a good way to keep 'perfect berries' from cycling around and replacing weaker ones.

You might be able to tie that in with legendaries. Say make a generally less useful type of berry tree, but if it only gets 10-30 visits before it expires, it has a chance of being picked for a visit by a legendary.

[Arx]

So I made this thing for a cell phone that is fairly good at figuring out what kind of biome you're standing in (water, desert, forest, etc.) and since I tend to default to game making when trying to figure out what to do with a program I write, I thought it would be cool to make a monster catching game where you walk around in real life and encounter monsters based on your environment.  Maybe the weather too.

Have you read The Painted Man by Peter Brett? This concept is really similar to one of the main concepts of the novel.

I really like the idea of setting traps and baiting monsters into them. I really like this in general, actually.

[BlitzDungeoneer]

You're not the only one, Arx.
This has my full interest.
Currently, consider this a PTW.

[IndigoFenix]

So I made this thing for a cell phone that is fairly good at figuring out what kind of biome you're standing in (water, desert, forest, etc.) and since I tend to default to game making when trying to figure out what to do with a program I write, I thought it would be cool to make a monster catching game where you walk around in real life and encounter monsters based on your environment.  Maybe the weather too.

Have you read The Painted Man by Peter Brett? This concept is really similar to one of the main concepts of the novel.

I really like the idea of setting traps and baiting monsters into them. I really like this in general, actually.

I think I'm going to go with a fey theme, actually.  That would tie them in well with the idea of them being connected to nature.
It would also allow there to be some in-story explanation for why the game might work differently in cities and out in the wilds (i.e. places with no wifi or phone service).

[Xantalos]

I enjoy this concept very much! PTW.

[Eric Blank]

This is pretty damn cool. Will you be doing this on android or apple devices?

Also also, will the game include mythical creatures such as ghosts, goblins, kobolds, djinn, demon dogs, bigfoot, or whathaveyou, or just pokemon things?

[IndigoFenix]

This is pretty damn cool. Will you be doing this on android or apple devices?

Also also, will the game include mythical creatures such as ghosts, goblins, kobolds, djinn, demon dogs, bigfoot, or whathaveyou, or just pokemon things?

I'm making it in Phonegap, so it should be compatible with all major cellular devices.

As for the creatures themselves, I don't really have a clear vision about how they will work.  I'd like there to be some kind of procedural generation involved, but procedural generation is tricky when it comes to artwork.  One possibility is to make several templates (humanoid, quadruped, insect, amorphous, chibi, etc.) along with various features (heads of different animals, elemental themes) and mix them together at random, or based on their environment, and then allocate abilities based on these features.  If anyone has any ideas, feel free to share them.

[darkflagrance]

You could try going with a primitive, throwback aesthetic to evoke nostalgia from your users. For example, maybe you could use a style similar to tamagotchi or gameboy sprites. A more abstract style might be easier to mix and match, and viewers might be more willing to use imagination to compensate for any deficiencies in the sprites.

You could also go the symbolic route initially, and use character sets such as ASCII for biome or elemental families as placeholders before you work on procedurally generating art styles. For example, maybe dragons would all be Ds with different colors, borders, backgrounds, etc.

[Eric Blank]

You could make simple base sprites and write a script to modify that base in certain ways that you've also set up, the way toady did with DF by making base creature definitions and then allowing the game to modify that to create a forgotten beast. Make a dragon sprite, make a modifier that gives it spiny scales, or one for a longer snout or horns, then gives the sprite a pattern layer to give it stripes, mottling, spots etc. And finally a color layer depending on biome to camouflage it, or make a venomous/poisonous animal stand out with bright colors.

Could end up something like the monster hunter games in terms of bestiary, where everything looks like a total badass.

[IndigoFenix]

I'm working on a script for procedural generation similar to DF's forgotten beast system.  Procedurally generated abilities as well, mainly taking inspiration from a variety of mythical beasts, fairies and demons and mixing them all together, so you might have a creature with a paralyzing song, a flaming bite, or an alluring gaze.  Making the artwork fit together and look natural is easier said than done, of course, but using a primitive or retro style could make things easier.

[IndigoFenix]

I (finally) got the GPS/mapping system working.  It has a primitive-looking 'radar' aesthetic, with little blips representing roaming monsters and simple lines representing houses, roads, etc.  I might improve on the graphics, but I kind of like it as it is.  It looks less like a game and more like a device that an actual extradimensional monster hunter might use.

Next comes the monsters themselves.

I've given some thought to the style of the game, and I think I'm going to go for a more 'realistic' design than most monster-collecting games out there.  Catching them will be fairly easy, but training them will be harder.  They will be more like virtual pets than collectibles.  You will need to feed them to keep them alive, train them if you want them to do what you say, they will need time to heal if injured, and they may die if neglected or pushed beyond their limit.  After catching them you will be able to interact with them in a virtual room 'inside' the device.  After training them you will be able to take them out into "real" space without them running away.

The creatures will have a fairly complex psychology.  They will have at the very least two separate meters relating to the opinion of their trainer: love (how much they enjoy being around you) and respect (how likely they are to obey commands).  They will formulate opinions about other monsters as well.

[Spiderking50]

You could always use a sort of geomorph style like Dave's Map generator (Look it up). That way you could easily mix and match body parts on a template (like bipedal or quadrupedal). In addition, a pixel art sytle could also be really good for your monsters because of its gridlike structure, it would be easy to make line up the generated parts.

[IndigoFenix]

So... I hope it's clear to everyone here why I decided to put this project on the back burner.

Now that we've seen how a game like this functions in practice, does anyone have any ideas about how the concept might be improved?

[FallacyofUrist]

So... I hope it's clear to everyone here why I decided to put this project on the back burner.

Ho yes. Definitely, yes.
NINTENDO, YOU IDEA-STEALING THIEVES. WHY MUST YOU BREAK POOR INDIGO'S HEART?
~~~
Improvement... hm. Randomly generated monsters?

[Sanctume]

I've seen AR concepts on cellphone cameras at least 3 years ago.  It was a simple find friendly monsters and pop bubbles type kid game.

I saw the Bluestack and Geolocation hack where you can play Pokemon Go on the PC.  The guy just moved his location to Central Park in NY and capture stuff.