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[Osteel]

Terraformers

Story Driven Incremental Mobile Game

TERRAFORMERS is an idle, time based mobile game where players use little creatures to restore barren, dusty planets back to their natural states by cloning Terraformers and flying them to surrounding planets. Each Terraformer has the special ability to restore biomes of planets, completely transforming it into a livable world. However, different types can only work on specific biomes, requiring new types to be discovered in order to complete the different planets. Occasionally, when a planet is completely restored, the Spirit Tree will sprout a new Terraformer, adding it to the player’s collection. Whenever clones are generated, Terraformers unlocked in the collection will have a chance to be cloned. Because cloning terraformers is random and space is limited, selecting the best planet to send ships to will play an important role in the time management aspect of the game. Throughout the game, players will uncover datalogs which will uncover the story of the galaxy.

Prototype artwork and functionality

Spirit Tree (collection) & Terraforming Planets

Terraformers is being developed by a small team of three people. We all currently work in the industry as designers, developers and producers, but love to continue to work on games in our spare time. As a starting project, we decided that Terraformers would be a good chance for us to release something together and are currently working on securing additional funding to see it through.

We hope to have more to share, so please check us out.  

[Osteel]

In order for the player to send Terraformers around the galaxy, they will need to visit the Cloning Facility on the main Home Planet.

The lineup is random, picked from a weighted list of unlocked Terraformers and their rarity. The player can do a few things here:

• Swipe left to load the front Terraformer onto the docked ship (we're still working on how this will look)
• Swipe right to reserve the Terraformer (limited spacing)
• Tap on a reserved Terraformer to return them back to the front of the line
• Discard the front Terraformer (limited uses/time)
• Regenerated the entire lineup (discards are and creates a new list)

Because each Terraformer works on specific biomes, players will have to manage the randomness of the lineup to best suit their needs. Reserving, discarding, and switching ships will allow them to create optimal groups. At any point, the player can then send the ship off to a planet to unload the Terraformers to begin their work.

Cloning Facility WIP

On the more art-side of things, we've been working on potential shaders for the game and opted for a unlit/toon style look. Here's what it looks like so far:

[Jesse Ko]

The terraformers look adorable! How complex do you plan on making the galaxy path for the planets (such as multiple branching paths or a straight line)? Also, do you need to fully terraform a planet before you can move to the next one?

[Osteel]

Thanks! We're excited to see what kind of Terraformers we can come up with.

We've been heavily inspired by games like Tinker Island where the maps is laid out based on a story. However, we will definitely have branching (we'll post a gif of how that works soon). Our aim is to have choice between where to send ships, as there are limited ships and travel takes time, much like any incremental/idle game.

New planets will only be available once their prerequisite planets have been completed, again, due to story content. We also plan on allowing planets to be revisited to find additional story content/Terraformers. This is to prevent players having no use for certain Terraformers if their current story planets don't require their types.

[Osteel]

Being a story driven incremental game, we plan on having characters that dialogue with the player. Specifically, these will be different citizens of the Home Planet (where the player is from), each with a specific role to play in the game.

Dialogue is being pulled externally, though we're looking to switching to using Google Docs or something, so that localization can be "easily" (it's never that simple) done.


We've also sat down and planned out the flow of the planet unlocking. At the moment, we've settled on having 20 planets to Terraformer. As you complete them, new planets will become available via the Intergalactic Highway System.

In the gif below, the flashes indicates the planet is being completed (hacked just to showcase).

In other news, we're in the process of hiring a concept artist to join us. Hopefully we'll have something fun to show soon!

[Osteel]

It's been a while since the last post, but we've been trekking away on progress. We've recently began doing some concept art to help visualize the key screens/locations of the game, starting with the main planet: Home Planet.

The original sketches:

Then, taking the elements from each that best suited the planet, we combined them into the following concept which we will use to create the 3D models:

Home Planet is essentially the main hub/menu for player interaction. It is a technology advanced world with all the luxuries. Each of the larger buildings on the planet represent a location the player can visit by tapping on:

Spirit Tree (top): Is where the collection of Terraformers will exist for players to view which they have unlocked.

Cloning Facility (right): Is where players will create clones of the different Terraformers they have unlocked and load them onto their ships.

Starport (left): Is where all the docked ships exist. Players can select the ship to load Terraformers onto as well as launch it to a new planet destination.

Galactic Archives (bottom): Is where the story will exist. Throughout the game, players will uncover Data Logs as a collectible item which, when read, will give some insight into the backstory of the game.

[Osteel]

Progress has been steady and we have finally begun modelling our Home Planet. In the meantime, our concept artist has continued to work out the visuals for the different areas of the game. Here are the two latest:



This is the Spirit Tree with a specific focus on the UI (so ignore the gloomy backdrop). As mentioned in previous posts, this where all the unlocked Terraformers will exist as a collection screen for the player; one for each type. The concept only shows two examples of Terraformers, but there will be a larger assortment of types.

Players will be able to examine each Terraformer in their collection which will give important information such as their biome types, strengths and speed.

At the start of the game the Spirit Tree will look withered, similar to the concepts. Throughout the game, as the galaxy is restored by the Terraformers, it will grow back similar to what we posted in our last concepts.

This is the Cloning Facility where players will generate clones of their unlocked Terraformers. Currently the concepts are just staging the environment and lack the UI, but this definitely helps us get a better understanding of the layout for this scene.