Got nothing clever here.

(The following is a series of ideas and concept thoughts I have had regarding a possible Gex 4. While I would like to expand on these ideas personally, I have enough on my plate as is and there probably would be a Gex 4 by the time I finally get around to making it. So instead, I donate this pail of ideas to you all. Do as you like with it, expand and prune however you see fit, enjoy it is all I ask.)











Gex 4-Ever

Alternate Titles

Gex 4: Gecko Harder

It’s The Gexs

Gex: Back’n Action

Now That’s What I Call Gex



Synopsis

Years have passed since the events of Deep Cover Gecko, Gex having settled down from that secret agent nonsense and back to what he does best: Channel Surfing. And this time, he’s not alone. Though his Special Agent Gex-tra (as she’s called herself since the wedding) is still on the Agent track (Director actually), Gex now has three little ankle biters proudly following in their father’s footsteps: Sally, Murtle and Barney. All watched by the ever-faithful eye of Alfred the butler turtle

However, one crisp Saturday afternoon, the whole family is spending their time together, Barney vegging on the couch with his dad, Murtle vlogging about the latest SMG4 rumors and Sally giving Liquid Ocelot the business on her tricked-out FlyBoy 32, one by one the family is taken until only Sally remains. It’s not until the Wi-Fi seemingly crashes that she notices Dad and the others are missing. After some training with Alfred, Sally must now go on a journey into the Media Dimension to find suspect number 1 to this Gecko-napping: her father’s old nemesis and father, Rez: Lord of the Media Dimension.



Gameplay

As one would expect, you begin your adventure within the Gecko domicile, a safe place to get acclimated to the controls. On the surface, nothing seems to have changed, but that’s only because you’re in ‘The Safe Zone.’ While you do have the chance to go with Alfred for a little tutorial, it’s probably much more fun to explore the house, poke around in your siblings’ rooms while they're not around and check some ‘priceless’ memorabilia from your dad’s heyday.

Once you jump inside that T.V. portal however, all bets are off, and you soon learn the structure is going to be a mite different than Gex’s old adventures. With the rise of corporate interests and greed, not to mention the growing of media in areas beyond mere television, remotes are no longer going to cut it for interworld transport. Now it comes in the form of cold, hard cash. Trouble is, Dad forgets and changes the bank account numbers so much that Mom had to personally put all the paperwork in her name, and Sally can’t seem to get ahold of her on the phone. Luckily, the world you’re going to be bouncing and tail-whipping through have loads of cash, chief among which, by order of financial interest, are Platinum and Crystal Credit Cards. Send it all down to Alfred and he should be able to exchange the stuff for real world dough, giving you more worlds to explore, an upgrade or two for your arsenal and maybe even an expansion pack for worlds you’ve already unlocked. From there, the course is clear: knock down every punk who stands in your way; find, receive or otherwise ‘borrow’ those Platinum and Crystal cards; find your family and the chump responsible for their kidnapping, and get back home just in time to help Awesome Possum kick Dr. Machino’s butt.



Aside from the change in collectables, what sets this game apart is the way you interact with the worlds. Each member of the Gex family has their own costume, quips and ways the world reacts to them, and you’ll be able to return to worlds as each of them after Sally saves them from the hand of fate. For instance, you start off your adventure on the rooftops of a starlit city fresh from a 50s noir delight. Sally, being the gamer gal she is (and if you happened to buy this on the PlayStation family of consoles) dons the uniform of her favorite law enforcers (besides her mother of course), Carmelita Fox, traversing the city with massive leaps and an electric targeting shot equipped to her first-person view. Fellow officers won’t fire on you, but most of the crooks and vermin lying in wait won’t be too happy to see a flatfoot fox-gecko snooping on their turf. In contrast, Barney, outfitted in his best cosplay of The Mighty Monarch, is more than free to glide through criminal territory while coppers and even regular citizens will be ready to fight back, as well as the boss of the world taking potshots before you even reach their arena. Murtle meanwhile wanders the streets clad in an absolutely simple fursuit and Gex wears his classic trenchcoat and fedora from his Gangster TV days. Don’t fret though, all collectibles can be collected by any member of the family (barring costume specific restrictions) and you can switch to any member provided you aren’t falling, moving or in a heavy scrap.



World Ideas

Neon Nighthaunt- Classic dark city, looking for a hero to save or punish

My Sinful Sixteenth- Heavily inspired by the works of VivziePop, with hints of suburban madness for good measure. Murtle’s town for sure (all her quips specifically are bleeped out)

When Calamari Goes Bad- Ah, Martial Arts films, a Gex staple, this time, mixed with a little Splatoon-style squid invasion and some educational travel tips for anyone looking to take a trip.

Stranger Than Fanfiction- Oh dear, you’ve landed in the world of fanart. Be prepared to meet some of the strangest mishmash of enemy designs you’ve ever seen, and watch out for those pesky bots posing as checkpoints and health pickups.

The Best Little Post Office in Texas- Whether you’re Sally or Barney, you’ve come to kick ass and chew bubblegum, no cat silencers required! (Open season on pigeons though) For extra fun, jump into a Nile box on the conveyor belt. Who knows? You might end up in another world, or a secret hideaway, or even right back where you started, but wherever you go, you’ll absolutely, positively be there overnight.

The Nuts N’ Bolts Superstore- From fancy candy to overworked and emotionally unstable cashiers, from forgotten mascots to animatronic floorshows looking for some ‘support’, you’ll find it all at Nuts ‘N Bolts.



The Twist

After gathering your family back up, Alfred lets you know that he’s homed in on Rez’s location and the brute appears to be expecting company. After fighting your way through his studio setup and facing down the big bad however, Rez hits you with the bombshell that he had nothing to do with Gex and his family’s capture, having been too busy trying to get his own podcasting/TV special off the ground. After this is proven by Murtle, the family is stumped as to just who could be behind this.

Which is when an infuriated Alfred leaps from behind the scenery, demanding you thrash Rex once and for all. However, when the geckos refuse, Alfred begins to let his persona go and taunts Gex about how blind he was to everything; how Alfred seemed to be the only candidate that applied for butler duties, how the turtle needed no time to be acclimated to Gex’s habits, and especially how he liked his sandwiches cut.

When it still hasn’t gotten through Gex’s head, Alfred pulls off his mask, revealing himself to have been Gex’s mother all along.

The poor gecko begins to spew her sad backstory (amid Barney playing the world’s smallest violin, Murtle and Sally proverbially kissing the sky, and the game itself begging you to skip). It is true that Gex’s Mom transformed NASA into a techno-chimp eatery, but she only had the place for a year before the bottom fell out of the themed restaurant business, and she was back at square one. This was all just in time to find out Gex had become a rich celebrity for saving that darned television he loved so much (the first time, anyways). Bottom line is, even if she found a way to live rich vicariously as Alfred, she hated how her son was teaching his children to be such layabouts as him and finally decided to enact her plane to steer them from television for life. But if she couldn’t scare them straight, then all she could do was wreck all other roads BUT straight. While the family was running about on their little adventure, Gex’s Mom had a new rocket setup, once which would knock out the internet connection of the whole world. Television, internet, everything with a signal would be dead and (in her mind) modern folks would be too dumb to know how to fix it.

Needless to say, this is something Gex and co. can't allow, with Gex even having to make an uneasy alliance with his father for the sake of a common goal.