About

Game Changer - The Football Match Fixing Game is a football (soccer) game with an unusual slant: Rather than managing a team or controlling a player, you play as a match fixer bent on corrupting leagues all over the world for profit!

The game was inspired by the match fixing scandals that have been so prominent in the media in recent years. With match fixing already the topic of best selling books and an upcoming movie, we thought it was a great idea to explore in a video game. The match fixing concept has allowed us to design a game that blends elements of a conventional football game, a crime game, a betting sim and an RPG, and set it all in a darkly humorous world we hope players will really enjoy!

Platforms

Game Changer is a free-to-play game which is being developed for iOS, though we have a strategy to port it for Android (including potentially Ouya) using Marmalade if we meet the Android stretch goal in this funding campaign.

Become Mr Fixit

In Game Changer, you play Mr Fixit, a dubious sort of character who wants to make his millions by betting on fixed football matches. Mr Fixit travels to different countries (which are unlocked as you progress in the game) dabbling in more and more prestigious, high stakes football leagues, each with their own special challenges. While his fixing efforts crush the dreams of millions of oblivious football supporters, Mr Fixit can win big and furnish himself with some nice gear.

Early Mr Fixit Concept Sketch

Mr Fixit has a number of different ways in which he can fix games. These include bribing different players and referees with money, luxury items and girls, or digging things up to blackmail them with. He also has to watch out for officials and the police who would love to stop him corrupting the beautiful game (unless he gives them what they want). He has to hang out in the right places to befriend vulnerable players, find the weaknesses that will tempt a referee to do what he wants, and hire runners to help him.

Mr Fixit makes his money by both gambling on the games he's fixed and doing jobs for nefarious crime lords (who are a lot higher up the chain of corruption in each country he visits than he is). As he progresses through the game the character development model allows you to increase things like his influence in the crime world with cool items he can buy with his gambling winnings, and experience he gains from completing fixes and jobs.

Pictures from the development of Mr Fixit's look

Mr Fixit's World

Mr Fixit's journey to the top begins with him meddling in the Malaysian league. In Game Changer, for legal reasons, the teams, players and leagues are all fictional, but each country has one or more professional leagues which Mr Fixit can interfere with and bet on. As he gets success fixing games and winning money in the small stakes Malaysian league, he unlocks other countries where he can go and start a more profitable career in corruption. He can go back and play with any of the countries and leagues he has unlocked at any time.

As well as leagues to corrupt, each country also has its own crime bosses who offer Mr Fixit work. Working for crime bosses gets you more money and experience, along with other benefits like special items, but if you fail it has worse consequences in terms of your money and character stats. It is up to you whether Mr Fixit gets involved with these shady characters or not.

Shady dealings!

Each country also has some story elements which will affect how you play by throwing up new challenges or opportunities. These include rioting supporters, over zealous football governing body officials, bent police forces and more.

Mr Fixit can travel to different countries he has unlocked using a map screen. When he arrives in a country, you see a three quarter town view which will have a number of buildings Mr Fixit can interact with to do different things in the game. The most important ones are:

Mr Fixit's House - Wherever you move, your runners will set you up with a nice house where conveniently, all of your stuff will already be in place. They'll even make sure your luxury cars are waiting in your driveway.

The Bookies - This is where you go to bet on games. Different bookies in different countries offer you a different betting limit and some different bets you can place (see the section on gambling in Game Changer below).

below). Shops - These are where you go to spend your ill gotten gains on things to help you in the game, or things to pimp out your Mr Fixit. Some items will only be available for Mr Fixit to buy in one country.

Massage Parlor - Speaking of pimping things out, sometimes you'll need girls to help persuade players, refs and officials to throw games or turn a blind eye to your dealings, or you may want to enlist their help to get some blackmail evidence on somebody. You can find them here.

Clubs, Hotels and Bars - These are where you go to meet players and other characters you'll need to build up a relationship with to execute your fixes.

The Underworld - Here, you can get and turn in jobs from the big crime syndicates in a country, and also recruit small timers to be your runners.

Bribe Top Players!

Gamble



The gambling element is one of the most interesting and fun things about Game Changer. Each country you play in has a schedule of football matches, with early levels having games you can fix and bet on for low stakes every few (real time) minutes, and the leagues further on in the game offering you more complicated bets where you can win big (like final score or number of goals scored rather than just which team is going to win the game).

The fixes Mr Fixit puts in place on matches have a percentage chance of working (because in real life, buying off a player won't guarantee you the result you want), so the more things he has done to set up a specific result (for example bribing a goalkeeper and the referee, rather than just the goalie) the higher the certainty that a bet he places on that game will win him money.

Bribe Coaches and Officials!

The gambling system is introduced in the tutorial portion at the start of the game, and as the bets available become more complicated these are introduced with some in-game guidance through quests or advice from non-player characters. This means that what starts off as an easy way to make in game money soon becomes a very strategic and challenging gameplay element, but it is built up to so the player has a chance to learn how it all works. We want to avoid the sense of "grinding" and make the routine things Mr Fixit needs to do to progress and make his money interesting and fun to do in their own right. You have a lot of choice when it comes to how much you gamble with and the types of bets you place, so you can imprint your own gameplay style onto this part of the game; If you play your Mr Fixit as a big risk taker, you'll have a completely different experience to if you play him as a cautious, strategic gambler.

Mr Fixit

Mr Fixit's PDA

When you are playing Game Changer, you have access to Mr Fixit's PDA, which basically means you get to use your phone or tablet as a phone or tablet!

Mr Fixit's PDA is a part of the game's interface which features a number of "apps" that he uses to keep track of all of his shady dealings. These include:

Messages - Effectively Mr Fixit's inbox, this gives you any important updates regarding the things you are working on in the game, as well as messages from in game characters that contribute to stories and quests.

News - This is Mr Fixit's news feed. As well as news stories relating to things he has done or might like to do (for example you may see news stories about a manager being fired after his team unexpectedly loses because you fixed their game), this also features fun news stories about the players and other newsworthy characters in the game. This is where a lot of the game's humor comes through, and adds color to Mr Fixit's world. We have a "real life" football writer on board who will be creating funny and interesting stories around the players in Mr Fixit's leagues, making the news feed believable and engaging.

Jobs - This is a task list for any quests or fixes you are currently involved in.

Life Coach - Mr Fixit's life coach app helps teach him to be a more effective person! This is where you will see his character stats and inventory, and it also features a daily fun "affirmation" or quote to help motivate him...

Bets - This tracks the bets Mr Fixit currently has on and shows the percentage chance of bets winning as a result of the fixes he has put into place.





Early Wireframe Map for Mr Fixit's PDA

This static map of our PDA prototype shows how the PDA's mini-apps all fit together (this was built as a development and information architecture exercise rather than part of the aesthetic design, so the finished article will look a lot better!).

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