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[Quicksand-S]

This looks awesome. I love the new setting for the eggs, with all the nerves/veins around them. The latest iteration of the mother looks really great too.

[HellaciousPuppy]

OMG I love this! Instabuy When do you expect to release it?
I absolutely loved flOw when it came out on ps3 and made a quick prototype of swimmy things:



Your devlog has inspired me to dust it off.
I'll be watching this development intently.

[Vakey Rujevic]

This looks awesome. I love the new setting for the eggs, with all the nerves/veins around them. The latest iteration of the mother looks really great too.

Thanks man, glad you like it. Going to focus on putting the two together up next (eggs inside the mom's body).

OMG I love this! Instabuy When do you expect to release it?
I absolutely loved flOw when it came out on ps3 and made a quick prototype of swimmy things:



Your devlog has inspired me to dust it off.
I'll be watching this development intently.

Really appreciate the enthusiasm for the game. Love your work on the snake like organisms. You really nailed down the physics of organism's movements. Definitely dust that off and work on it.

As for the release date. No idea. I have given up trying to estimate when the game will be done. I do have a deadline for October though to finish the first chapter (Birth) of the game. Two things are happening in October: Indiecade and the deadline for Independent Game Developer's Conference. I want chapter 1 finished for both of those things. And of course, I will also release the first chapter here as well for you guys to play.

[Vakey Rujevic]

Update #20: Mother’s Body (Final Iteration)

Here is the final iteration on the mother’s body. For this one, I changed the look of the head and gave her a neck. I also changed her body’s color to black. It just looks really good with the white lights and blue background. Although I might change that later on.

[jamesprimate]

Gorgeous! Shape even looks maternal somehow.

[Vakey Rujevic]

Gorgeous! Shape even looks maternal somehow.

Thanks man! Means a lot hearing you say the shape looks maternal.

[Vakey Rujevic]

Update #21: Mother’s Body (Hours Worked)

I have tracked how many hours it took me to complete the work on the mother's body and here it is.

Experimentation - 4h 58m
Iteration #1 (Layout) - 2h 15m
Iteration #2 (Art and Design) - 6h 57m
Iteration #3 (Sprite Stretching) - 5h 09m
Iteration #4 (Head) - 6h 40m
Final Iteration - 1h 01m

Total - 27h 05m

Looking at it those numbers made me feel like I have spent way too much time on this body of work. I tend to be a perfectionist and it's hard for me to fully move on if I am not satisfied with something I am working on. I am going to keep reporting how many hours it takes me to finish a body of work and hopefully I will become faster at it (especially once I get the hang of the game's art style).

[Vakey Rujevic]

Update #22: Group Swimming (Planning)

The first scene of the game will have the player’s mother swimming in her environment with the rest of the family swimming along. Also, you will be swimming inside of your mother after being born. For this I need to implement group swimming mechanics. Here is all the work involved for this:

• Moving Platform Physics
• Following Points UI
• Organisms Following Along

Moving Platform Physics

This one is about the physics of how an organism moves inside of another moving organism. It’s easy if the host organism does not move, but once it does the physics engine needs to behave accordingly for everything that is inside of it.



Following Points UI

I need to implement a unity UI tool (or use an existing one) that allows me to plot points that an artificial organism can follow. I have the logic of following a set of points implemented. It’s just that it’s a pain and very difficult to set all the points by hand.



Organisms Following Along

The mother is going to be the one that is going to follow an array of points. However, the rest of the family will be following the mother. I need to implement a system where organisms can follow another organism while maintaining a certain distance and not colliding with it. This one I feel is going to be the hardest!

[VampireSquid]

I have no idea what this thing is exactly but I really like it.  You do a very good job of imparting an organic feel to the creatures movement.  Looking forward to the release.   
 

[Vakey Rujevic]

I have no idea what this thing is exactly but I really like it.  You do a very good job of imparting an organic feel to the creatures movement.  Looking forward to the release.   
 

Thanks man. Making it look and feel organic is definitely one of my main goals for this project.

I am always looking for feedback and was wandering if you could share what made it difficult for you to understand the concept of the game? Was in the introductory post? Or the website?

[VampireSquid]

Vakey,

To be fair to you, I just skimmed through your opening post.  I mostly focused on the pictures.  I did not go to the website.  I didn't mean anything to be insulting I just really hadn't taken the time to figure it out yet and was basically in speed-surf mode.  

That being said, in case there are other like me, I think what I am missing is the core mechanics.  What exactly do you do, how do you interact with the environment?

[Vakey Rujevic]

Vakey,

To be fair to you, I just skimmed through your opening post.  I mostly focused on the pictures.  I did not go to the website.  I didn't mean anything to be insulting I just really hadn't taken the time to figure it out yet and was basically in speed-surf mode.  

That being said, in case there are other like me, I think what I am missing is the core mechanics.  What exactly do you do, how do you interact with the environment?

Not insulting at all. Most people will go through the information in speed-surf mode so it's great getting your perspective on the matter. Thanks Matt! Feedback like this very important to me.

I shall update the first post and give a little more info about the core mechanics from a first glance point of view.

[Vakey Rujevic]

Update #23: Group Swimming (Follow Points UI)

As part of my group swimming work, I have finished implementing a UI in unity that allows me to easily create a set of points that an organism in the game can follow.



This was very easy to implement. I am using Unity’s EdgeCollider2D. And I have created a script that reads all the points form the EdgeCollider2D, disables the collider, properly transforms the points to the organisms transform (position, scale, rotation), and finally has the organism follow the points. Oh, and I also created the visual represention of the points when the game is running, as well as the current point the organism is going towards (as shown in the gif above).

Some other features I implemented is the ability to follow the path in reverse order and to loop the path indefinitely.

[Vakey Rujevic]

Update #24: Birth Place - Center of a Plant

I took a break from working on the game and when I came back my gut was telling me to change it. The change is more about putting greater care and focus around the behaviors of the main organism species. After doing research on many different kinds of animals, I have designed what I want the species of our main character to be.

Part of that is how an organism of that species is born. The original plan was for you to be born inside of your mother and make your way out. This new species however gives birth differently.



You are born at the center of a giant plant where the nectar or pollen of the plant is located. This is the most moist and nutritious part of the plant, and also the hardest to get to making it the safest place to lay eggs. Once you hatch you will start making your way out of the egg, which is an adventure itself because what’s hard getting into is also hard getting out off. This journey will be the first chapter of the game known as Birth. Here is the first outline of the plant in the game right now:



This is just a small part of the plant. The plant will be much bigger.

[Vakey Rujevic]

Update #25: Art Style

The art style is something I have been having hard time with. Not so much developing one, but more so picking one. There is the vector based art style where all the lines perfect and simple. I have explored the painting like art style, the graphic design one, experimented with various different colors pallets. But the one art style that just rings true to me is the rough sketchy art style. Here are some sketches of what I imagine the art style of the game to be:









Hope you guys like. These are early sketches and the art style will become more refined as the development of the game progresses.

[Vakey Rujevic]

Update #26: Breaking through Barrier

Finished implementing the ability to break through the barrier. For this one, I am using the same breaking physics engine I implemented for the egg hatching. Here is what it looks like:



This part of the game will be introduced early on in the game right after the player hatches from their egg. I want to teach the player how to attack, and breaking through a tight barrier would be a great set up for that lesson.

[Vakey Rujevic]

Update #27: Plants

Been working on creating plants that bend correctly with physics. Here is what I got:

[QOG]

The art style of the game is a lot of fun, interested to see where you go with this.

[Vakey Rujevic]

The art style of the game is a lot of fun, interested to see where you go with this.

Thanks. Here is what I got so far for the art style. All of it is still rough draft and it will keep changing and improving as I continue making it.

[Vakey Rujevic]

Update #28: Indiecade Rejection Feedback

I submitted my game to indiecade​ this year and it was not accepted. Below you will find the feedback I received for my submission. Love the feedback I got because it gave me confidence that I am going in the right direction. Not bumbed at all about not getting accepted considering the game is at such an early stage of development. Here is the prototype that was submitted to indiecade:

http://organizamgame.com/#/play/5

Feedback

The game is beautiful and intriguing. The mechanics are easy to get used to. The games presents a clear idea of what the full game will be, I would recommend for this game to be further developed (more levels and specially audio) to be considered again as part of the festival.
It seams to have a great potential.


I enjoyed playing this work-in-progress game and guiding the little organism through the maze. Both visual design and audio design were very well executed. The game was beautiful to look at, the colors complemented each other nicely, and the little organism was quite cute. The background music was soothing and helped immerse the player into the universe of the little organism. I felt really calm while playing this game and there was something peaceful about guiding the organism.

Although the controls were very straight forward and the game was easy to learn, certain moves felt a little awkward. For example, when pressing the attack button, the little organism would always move to the left. Perhaps this was supposed to reflect the organism's natural body movement, but as it stands, the attack control felt a little too unpredictable as I didn't know how the organism would react. Similarly, I found it difficult to block while facing downward. It seemed that whenever I pressed the blocking button, the organism would start moving in an upward direction. This made it difficult to effectively block certain attacks from monsters/other organisms.

The story of a habitat that is slowly diminishing has a lot of potential, but due to the brevity of this prototype, I wasn't able to really get a feel for this aspect of the game. I want to encourage the developer(s) to continue working on this aspect of the game as it could potentially be used to raise awareness about important environmental issues.


Great game, the visuals are gorgeous and gameplay feels good. I think this prototype has a lot of potential and that you have a great start!