Let's go with
If you've never played 999, the easiest way to explain it is to say it's kind of a mix of the films Saw and Cube. This game's a visual novel using "choose your own adventure" styled mechanics with a point and click interface that has you solving puzzles and trying to unravel the plot.
In a nutshell, the basic theme of the game would be the "Desire to escape". According to the director, the setting "you're trapped somewhere and trying to escape" embodies mankind's principal, primitive, and instinctive desires. "Where do mankind's inspirations come from?" was the line that got him thinking.
Throughout the game, you deal with the different sides of people and the way that they interact with each other under a high stress situation. Survival instincts. There are several branching paths in which your decisions impact the ending. In fact, multiple playthroughs are actually required to get the whole story. You have to fail at least once in order to get the True Ending-- but even then, you don't get the whole story unless you fail even more...! This is how the theme is incorporated throughout the game. Through these different "scenarios", you get to discover how exactly these "strangers" are connected to each other through the events that happened 9 years prior to them getting kidnapped.
This is a Symbolism heavy game, with the number "9" being at the core of things. For instance, the characters were based on the concept of "Enneagrams"...which brings me to the DOOR SETS!
~SPOILER WARNING KIND OF in case you ever want to play this game~
The first set of doors is Door 3 + Door 7 + Door 8, which corresponds to Santa, Seven, and Lotus. the only doors you go through (unless you brute force it and make most of the other characters hate you, scoring you the Submarine Ending) are Door 7 and Door 8. That's the Lotus and Seven pair and they're kind of the not in the "know" (At least not directly!) characters.
But let's talk about Door 3. You DON'T go through this door (again, unless you force your way in), so you kind of mostly ignore it...(kind of like with Santa) until you realize there's some kind of secret behind the door and OH BOY NO, SNAKE'S CORPSE NO (only not really).
Then the last set is Door 1 + Door 2 + Door 6 which corresponds with Ace, Snake, and June. These are pretty important in relevance to the plot (Ace and June being pretty much the whole reason for the game happening in the first place and Snake's "disappearing" act in order to get revenge and wow.
I just really love this game, let's stop talking about it, though.
~~SPOILERS END HERE~~
Where 999 deals with the desire to escape, my game is more of a "Quest for Power". Trickster Gods fight it out in order to prove who the superior God is. There are 4 different representatives: Loki, Susanoo, Hermes, and Anansi. They want to prove to the others that they're the best, and thus, challenge each other to a strategic combat game.
I honestly want to incorporate more of the "trickster" motif into the game mechanics so that it can go more with the theme. Maybe change up the paths so that you honestly can't move through certain blocks? If not...something that forces players to cooperate or betray each other would be interesting.
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