I think we easily have enough items, descs and floor plans for an alpha. Now we need to hash out mechanics and get the coding started. I.e. all the hard stuff.
More on Identity, Notoriety, Evidence and Heat:
Identity and Evidence: Anyone who sees you commit a crime adds to your identity and evidence score (even something like pulling out a gun.) You can immediately remove those increases by killing that person. But their body too generates some evidence if it's not destroyed (say placed in the dump.)
Killing anyone creates evidence. Certain items (Chainsaw, certain guns, ect..), certain combat methods (HTH, biting?) or certain deaths will generate more or less than average evidence because they are more or less noticeable. (Modus Operendi)
When YOU get wounded, it generates more than average evidence, and generates some identity as well. This evidence and identity can only be removed by a time consuming clean up action, and may be based on skill. Something like "Forensics" knowledge should be the primary determiner of how much evidence you leave and identity you generate when you kill and when you clean up.
Certain objects, like security cameras, will increase identity and evidence hits when you commit a crime near them. This value however should be modified by whether the player is wearing a mask or face covering. An If X then Y but if Z then A statement.
At a certain threshold of identity, say 100%, every law enforcement officer that sees you will recognize you. Others may recognize you too.
Other ideas for reducing evidence/identity per crime increase, or after the fact: burning down houses to destroy evidence, changing clothing or appearance, wearing masks and disguises. Hacking police databases and destroying evidence.
Heat and Notoriety: When you complete criminal actions, you generate both heat and notoriety. The action committed determines the extent of both. Heat determines how large of a police response is called to any criminal action, and is factored in with identity to gauge when police forces raid your safe house. Certain people should choose not to deal with you if your heat is too high.
Notoriety is a long-term modifier that affects heat, but also dictates a lot of other things that can happen to you. High notoriety may make you the target of other criminals as well. It might serve as a "level" to get access to more connected drug dealers, weapon dealers, fences and the like. It might have an effect on your results in prison.
Long term scales for heat and notoriety:
Heat should have a llllaaaarrrrgeeee scale, and be fractional in increases, because we don't want it giving you 1 out 100 total possible for heat for every item you steal, or every drug deal you make. There needs to be pacing involved in heat gain, so the increase in police attention is noticeable by the player. Heat gained from criminal actions might also be increased under certain circumstances, like performing actions in front of cops. We could approach the situation like in real life...what kinds of behaviors would get police VERY interested in that particular suspect, very quickly. Suicide bomber vest? AK47? A Tank? There are all sorts of places we can tie things into these mechanics, while keeping a lot of it from the player.
Notoriety likewise needs to have a large scale to accommodate paced game play, since it and heat are intrinsically tied. Heat should be able to spike independently of notoriety. Notoriety should probably have the largest scale of all.
All things, probably even notoriety, should decay over time.
Laying low should really be a benefit. There should be a rest option, of sorts, where the player just has to pay upkeep for their living space and food, so they can bleed off the attention from epic criminal feats. That said, Heat, Identity and Evidence should be able to go to values above 100%, so the player can really go over board and not know it. Evidence should probably decay slower than everything else, since law enforcement keeps that information for a long time (Finger Print databases and DNA databases) and evidence will need to be used in any trial system.
A hierarchy of stats for coders, of sorts.
Notoriety
Evidence
Identity
Heat
Foreseeable issues: The game is going to have to recognize when something has been done once and shouldn't be counted against the player a second time. Killing multiple people should increases all the relevant scores. Pulling out your gun, putting it away and pulling out again shouldn't be two crimes. So tracking criminal behavior has to be tied to actors somehow, where each object and each person witnessing a crime tracks what's been done and knows to exclude the right redundant actions. It would be helpful I think if all that information is deleted when the player changes areas, leaving only the modified Identity, Heat, ect.. scores, so the game isn't have to track a ton of shit building up over time.
How I see it working:
Player stands at house. All scores are at zero. Player is totally unskilled and totally unprotected against identity/evidence. (No gloves, no hood, no mask, no jump suit.)
Player forces entry into the house. (Heat +1, Evidence +5, Identity +5)
Player steals objects. (Heat +5, Evidence + 5, Identity +5, Notoriety +5)
Home-owner sees player. Player is trespassing. (Heat +5, Evidence +10, Identity +15)
Home owner hits player with a bat. (Evidence +10, Identity +10)
Player kills home owner with knife. (Evidence -10, Identity -15, Heat +20, Notoriety +20)
Corpse created (Evidence +10)
Player takes body and runs, and buries it at the garbage dump. Corpse destroyed (Evidence -10)
Result for this one combined burglary/murder: Heat: 31/10,000*, Evidence: 20/100*, Identity: 20/100*, Notoriety: 25/100,000*
*Theoretical maximums
What I think this system can accomplish:
With different possible combinations of scores, I think you arrive at different kinds of criminals.
Low notoriety, high identity, high evidence, high heat = A new punk about to spend some time in prison.
High notoriety, high identity, low evidence, low heat = The notorious criminal the authorities know about, but can't touch for lack of everything.
High notoriety, low identity, low evidence, high heat = The professional, anonymous criminal cops lose sleep over at night.
High notoriety, low identity, high evidence, high heat = The accomplished but sloppy criminal who the authorities just need to identify before they've nailed them.
Low everything = either a new criminal or a criminal who has been in hiding so long, virtually everything about them has been forgotten.
High everything = A criminal mastermind that's not going down without a fight.
High notoriety, low everything else = The legendary criminal that can't be touched. KAISER SOZE!!111
I think you arrive at a pretty good spread of criminal types through this. That there are many aspects that play off each metric will add layers of depth for people to get into, characters specialized manipulate the system in different ways. With notoriety we don't even need levels, we just need an xp pool for skills and perhaps stat growth. Notoriety will in the end control the pace of the game and how fast the power scale is doled out to the player.