I have an idea for a game: It's the usual "a princess is kidnapped by a dragon and a brave knight is on a quest to rescue her" story. But you (the player) plays as the princess, who is somehow helping the knight on his quest.

The issue is that since the player is playing as a trapped character, I want to make the player feel trapped, but I don't know how to do that.

My original idea is that the princess telepathically communicates with the knight and tells him what to do. But this doesn't work, the gameplay is identical to the player playing as the knight. How can I make the gameplay feel like the player is playing as the princess (and thus feel trapped) instead of the knight?

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[–] EarMaster@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

It made me think of indirect games like Black & White, Dungeon Keeper, The Settlers or The Sims. You can give orders but you cannot directly control your characters / units. If you limit the amount of orders, add a delay / the possibility for an interception or introduce areas where your orders can't reach your hero it could do the trick.