What is the shape of the game?

Last week I went through some inspiration for the visuals of the game. I've also been brainstorming how this game will play.

Right now I've decided for certain that Lethal Company will be in the first-person perspective, with randomly generated mazes and randomized monsters. I want it to be "infinitely replayable."

The actual shape of it, however, I've been brainstorming. Here are a few of the ideas I've had:

• A classic roguelike-style horror where the player goes through a pre-determined number of randomized levels before finally reaching some kind of boss or ending. Pros: Separating the game into different levels gives a great sense of progress. Cons: This would make runs very long. For this project, I don't want to force players into long play sessions.
• Single-level based; the player enters one level, does the objective, then escapes back home. Pros: each run is so short, the game begs to be replayed. Cons: Lacks depth and is too repetitive! It would require a difficulty slider.
• A pre-determined number of randomized levels with a finish line, as in a roguelike. BUT after each level, the player has a choice to cut their losses and go back home with the points they earned, rather than risk losing them to a game over. Points would allow the player to buy special items to help them on their next run.

I like that final option the most so far. Rather than asking players, "Do you want easy or hard?", it's fun to just increase difficulty over time and let them decide how far they want to go. If you have a wildly different idea for how to shape a random-based, roguelike-style game, I think that would be interesting to hear.

It's hard to talk much about how I'll be designing monsters or maps, since I'd be stepping around a core mechanic of the game. I'm going to try to get the first version of Lethal Company to a playable state before I reveal that.

Besides that, here's some of my concept art.

Next week I'll finally show some clips of gameplay that I'm testing.