Game Concept
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Genre
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A "subterfuge MMO," with realistic hacking and stealth gameplay, in a single persistent world.


Setting
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It's now the year 2032. In the recent past, a major cyberwar decimated much of the global internet infrastructure. What remains of it has largely been seized by pre-existing power players. Many countries have shunned the global internet and attempted to close their electronic borders (with varying degrees of success), while governments in general have lost much of their power in favor of corporations, loosely-tied criminal and vigilante groups, and even skilled individuals. In a world where information is more valuable than gold (but maybe not Bitcoin), "Spy" may now be the world's top-paying job title.


Objectives
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As a player, your objectives will be... whatever you want! Spycursion was inspired partially by EVE Online -- in that vein, Spycursion will be a sandbox game, where you can play several roles, which may influence your abilities and bonuses/penalties:

* Federal Agent: De-anonymize and track down criminals, contribute to the global order.
* Developer: Create/sell software for other players... perhaps with backdoors.
* Tycoon: Make money by any means necessary (typically business/politics) -- but you'd better keep your hands clean!
* Hacktivist: Hack for a cause; expose corruption and create an open internet.
* Braggart: Hack for reputation; it's all about fame!
* Mercenary: Take jobs for money, from whoever pays the most.

At the core of the game is basically a mini Internet -- simulated devices of all sorts, running software written in an in-game programming language called Slang (short for "Spy Lang"). Some of said software is open-source, some of it is proprietary... nearly all of it has security holes just waiting to be patched and/or exploited! There will be a handful of basic public services (search engine, news, webmail, etc.), and, I expect, numerous public and private services set up by players.

Over time, various events will happen which will encourage -- or force -- players to take some action. Bounties will be placed on well-known criminals, making them a target of other players and feds alike. Cryptocurrencies will rise and fall in value, influencing and influenced by the in-game economy. Software security holes will be publicized, encouraging hackers and putting corporations on the defensive.

Unlike most other hacking games, there's a very "out in the world" element to Spycursion. Wi-fi hacking, phone hacking, and even shoulder-surfing and overhearing are all fair game. Missions will vary in design from the simple ("Trace the sender of an e-mail") to the complex ("Steal a file from an airgapped computer in a high-security facility"). Some can be done from the relative safety of the player character's home, and others will require traveling to another location, possibly risking the wrath of airport security. 

There will also be a single-player campaign, but that isn't well-developed enough to elaborate on right now.


Business Model
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The game will be a monthly subscription, probably costing around $5-12 per month, with the typical "buy more months and the rate goes down" incentives. I also plan to offer a lifetime subscription, maybe only after crowdfunding/launch, though.

Architecturally, the game will use a client-server model with the vast majority of the logic running on the server side. To that end, the client will also be open-source. I like and support FOSS, but there are very practical reasons for this as well:

1) Players will be able to use Spycursion's API and redesign the UI as they please.
2) It's also an anti-cheat mechanism of sorts. Making the client open source forces us, as developers, to ensure that the client only has exactly the information that the player is allowed to have.