This may come to nothing, depending on response. I have lots of other ideas filed away that could be turned into TM projects, so no worries if this doesn't go anywhere.
Before you read any further (on any of my writing, really) you should turn back if you are offended by graphic descriptions of violence or other crude behaviour. I'm not really trying to shock and rarely use epithets, but I see the human condition in a warped sort of way sometimes.
Below is a monologue that preambles the subject of the series. It gives a back story that leads into the lead character becoming a...
In presentation, I would likeliest have this monologue run over a slide-show of illustrations in an appropriate style:
I am Fumimura Ito.
My father was the last recorded inheritor of the Fumimura clan Samurai heritage.
I am Fumimura Ito. A rogue. A criminal. A killer.
Six generations ago, my ancestor, Fumimura Atama, by his bravery in battle, established himself as a Samurai. Fumimura Atama was a skillfull killer, but never a refined nobleman. In his era, that was the way of the Samurai.
Over the next four generations, the descendants of Fumimura Atama would serve under the banners of a dozen different Daimyo. Not one of those houses would survive the bloody tumult of that era.
The Fumimura clan produced many skillfull killers. Yet, in the fifty years before I was born -- seemingly calm years --- the house of Fumimura Atama was whittled down. At last, it was only my father, and his father, and their immediate family. These last of the Fumimura Samurai were known assassins and suspected ninja. Feared. Dangerous to too many powerful people.
So it was that my father, Fumimura Kuroshiya, and my grandfather, Fumimura Buichi, were offered employ by a powerful Daimyo, and sent to kill a notodious Samurai in service to his enemy.
I have never learned the details of what happened. My brothers were certain it was a trap, designed to eliminate our clan. Others have since surmised the same. I only know that one day, when I was only eight years old, a woman came to tell my mother that they had been killed.
More, that it was expected that our family would either commit seppuku, or be executed, because the heads of the clan had died in the midst of dishonorable and illegal -- ninja -- activities.
My eldest brother, Yoshi, only twelve, decided that we would all comit seppuku. Even me. Just like the adults. In order to reclaim the honor of our family.
I was terribly afraid.
My other brother, Junbei, who was ten, was also afraid. But I think it was because he saw the fear in me that he decided to go against Yosi's decision. Junbei said that he would defy the Daimyo, and if soldiers were sent to take us he would fight them.
He and Yoshi fought over this, and Yoshi was killed.
Thus, Junbei became the eldes male of the Fumimura clan, and a confirmed killer.
The Daimyo did send soldiers, but by that time my mother had commited seppuku, and I had fled into the forest.
I have been told that Junbei did fight the soldiers. Depending upon who is telling the story, he may even have survived. But I have never returned to that place, and never saw Junbei again.
For several years I lived as a street beggar and a thief. Then, I fancied the notion that my father was a ninja.
Then came the day I saw a duel between two Samurai. By that time, such things were incredibly rare. I watched from my hiding place and they never saw me. It was over in a moment, and anti-climactic. They had both severely injured one another and lay twitching in the reeds.
The older man drowned in the shallow water, clutching blindly at the bank with one hand because the rest of his body was paralyzed from the gash in his spine.
The younger man had been struck in the groin. His testicles were unraveled to his knee and he seemed to have gone mad from the pain of his wound.
When I went to him, he pleaded for me to help him.
I am only a little ashamed that I killed him anyway.
The Samurai were wealthy, by my standards. The ryo they carried was enough to keep me fed for two years.
I kept their swords. Such things were dangerous to fence, and I had determined that I would learn to use them.
By the time I turned seventeen, I had become a veteran criminal. My skills with the Samurais' swords was that of a killer: not artful, but quick and effective. I had also decided that I wanted a gun.
Eventually, my bold crimes made me notorious throughout Japan. Even the Emperor knew my face. I know this because it was drawn on the decree he issued calling for my death.
As I had once before, I fled. Not to the forest this time, but to the sea.
These days, Japan is closed off from the world, so the Emperor's reach stops at the shore. It was an obvious, if difficult, escape route.
I wound up in the crew of a Chinese tarading junk, and absconded with my pockets full of jade when it entered a Dutch port in the Carribean.
For perhaps a decade I roamed the ocean trade routes, learning enough Dutch and English to get by and finally getting myself a gun. An American gun.
As soon as I held the revolver in my hand, I felt it. America was where I belonged. In America, a criminal can be a hero. It is a place for killers.
Not a sympathetic character? Not what you would expect of a Samurai? Well, that much is intentional. The idea is to present a questionable sort of character -- a person who is barbaric and self-serving on the surface -- to play the part of hero in a series of melodramatic Western vignettes. Ultimately, he would tend to a rough sort of moral (if not exactly bushido) code, despite himself...
Pretty obvious that this concept is a knock-off of Kung Fu, with a Japanese protagonist instead of (supposedly) Chinese. Even this has been done before. And you probably already suspect my plant in the preamble... but what the heck. It's only a game.
If you think this is worth pursuing further, or not, post here and let me know. Currently I'm waiting to get my lightning-blasted PC replaced so I can't do anything with the game, or much else, but I can write and do research, and such.
This would also be an excuse to work on some mods. Costumes, at least. Probably some architectural props for flashbacks (I do have moderate experience with modeling), and whatever else comes up. Maybe even some more pirate stuff. But it's only worth the effort to do a big, long-term project if there are people (voice actors, musicians, etc.) who dig the idea enough to work with a TMO "rookie" like me who can't doll out VCs for everything.
If this idea doesn't inspire that kind of interest I'll happily shelve it in favour of something different. Maybe even a collaboration on someone else's concept.