Designing a shopkeeper game, need ideas

Game Play & Game Design
#1

Since a while I’m thinking about sort of an RGP with reversed roles in terms of shopping - instead of playing an adventurer who visits shops to buy and sell items, you take the role of a shopkeeper in one of those towns.

Now, the problem is, I’m a bad game designer. The challenge is, to make this more than just a funny idea. While I surely can implement the mechanics of a shop and I also think I’ll be able to come up with some usable graphics for it, I’ll need help in making it a real game, keep the player in his role as shopkeeper entertained, challenged, motivated.

Since the items and graphics are borrowed from my Jewelhunt game, they will mostly consist of the typical RPG adventurer equipment, weapons, armor, treasure items and the like.

So I want to start with a sort of brainstorming - what would you like to do in the role as a shopkeeper? What will be fun for you, what should be avoided?

Since this is just starting, feel free to post wild ideas.

Current state of the project - what is there at the moment:

  • Item code from my “Hunt for the lost rainbow jewels” project
  • Many item definitions and magic item mods from that project
  • Item graphics as well
  • Some basic code for the shop itself
#2

hi! First you should play games in this “genre”: potions and Swords on facebook comes in mind and there is a similar game on kongregate

#3

Are you thinking about making this a 3D game where you’re in the first person view of the shopkeeper and 3D models of adventurers walk in and you do business over your 3D counter?

#4

The technology is 2D, still the main shop view will look like a 3D shop, but I chose a 3rd person view, so one looks into the shop. Meanwhile I have a mockup for the shop view - look at the attached image of the message on OGA where I also asked for advice:

I’m not very fond of subscribing to facebook to playtest a game. And I’m not even sure if I want to play other games in this genre, otherwise I’m quite sure I’ll just make a copy of the game that I am testing. Instead I’d like to hear about it the idea from users/players view - what would you like to see in such a game? What sort of activities will you enjoy as a shopkeeper? What do you expect from such type of game?

I surely will only be able to implement a very few of the wishes, but with the project just being born it’s now the time when it’s the most malleabe and shapeable.

I have a few ideas, but I don’t want to write about them yet, because I’m afraid they will narrow responses to a discussion of just these ideas, while I am looking to collect a broad range of ideas first and then try to select the most promising ones.