Roadmap

High-Level Roadmap:

• Sandbox Mode - Underground

Sandbox Mode is a game mode which omits plot narratives/cutscenes and exposes all of the underlying configuration and settings of gameplay through UI. The intent here is to create developer tools which improve the pace of development, and then to expose those tools to early users in an effort to quickly identify what's fun and what's working/not working. The user quickly gains an understanding of the features of the game and is able to be chaotic and destructive in engaging with the world.

Underground is a camera perspective. The underground perspective shows the colony's nest. The user is able to watch ants dig out the nest, move food into the nest, move sand out of the nest, watch ants be born, die, etc.

One major advantage of implementing this first is the ability to easily, and continually, dog food functionality without writing tests.

• Story Mode - Underground

Story Mode is a game mode which always runs in "real-time" and is not able to be sped up by the user. Story Mode does not run for an indefinite period of time - instead a story is a 3d/7d/30d commitment to maintaining a colony from inception.

Story Mode involves a basic "character creation" screen for the Queen. This allows the user to set Queen's name and color. The story begins with Queen falling from space, through the sky, and landing on the ground. She lands in an egg shell which cracks upon landing and she emerges unscathed, but hungry and cold. The world is covered in fog of war. The player is able to ping locations close to Queen, Queen senses the ping and wanders in that direction. With a little effort, Queen is able to be led to food, eats, and is then led to a crystal-adjacent location to begin digging a nest.

• Breathwork Exercise

Breathwork Exercise is a cutscene which turns the entire screen pitch black. The user is then prompted through a breathing exercise - inhale, hold, exhale, hold. This continues for a while. Calm music slowly fades in over the course of the exercise and the UI slowly shifts from pitch black to Satellite View. The UI transition effect for this is a first-person perspective of someone opening their eyes as if they were waking up from a deep sleep.

• Basic Satellite View

Basic Satellite View is a first-person POV showing the inside of a cluttered, technophilic satellite. It's not a simulation and is a point-and-click experience. One monitor, prominently displayed, clearly shows the ant colony simulation. If the user interacts with this monitor then they are returned to the ant simulation and are unable to return to Satellite until next day. There are other monitors, but most are disabled for Basic Satellite View. One enabled monitor allows the user to see stats on the progress of their colony. For example, growth rate over time, food storage, deaths, births, etc. Another allows the user to see their own progress. For example, how many days in a row have they engaged with the Breathwork Exercise and how much time have they spent in meditation.

• Sandbox Mode - Above Ground

Sandbox Mode - Above Ground is a top-down view of the outer world in which the ant colony explores. This perspective does not involve gravity or sand fall physics, but introduces the concept of pheromone paths. The nest is in the center of a large, circular area. Varying quantities of food appear in random locations around the circle. Food appears in random locations around the circle. Ants leave Underground View, appear on Above Ground, and begin searching for food. Ants leverage pheromone pathways to find food more quickly.

Player is able to create and destroy pheromone trails, place food, spawn ants, ping locations to lure ants, etc.

• Story Mode - Above Ground

Story Mode - Above Ground introduces the concept of day/night cycles and fog. When night approaches, the fog rolls in. The fog forces ants back to Underground View and destroys pheromone trails. When dawn approaches, the fog recedes. Some aspects of the environment shift during the night, but primary food sources remain in fixed locations. Ants begin each day searching for food again and it takes them some time to find food and more time to establish optimal pathways.

• Enhanced Satellite View (Stretch Goal)

Enhanced Satellite View brings more of the monitors online. One of the monitors allows for scanning the planet to detect weather events and adjacent, unlockable areas for ants to expand into. Another monitor allows the user to record notes about the progress of the colony as well as themselves. The user is able to take screenshots of the colony and make a digital scrapbook documenting their journey. Another monitor provides the ability to converse with an AI embedded into the satellite. The AI acts as a comedic therapist.

• Journal Exercise (Stretch Goal)

The Journal Exercise is exposed through the Scrapbook monitor in Enhanced Satellite View. The journaling exercise is expected to be completed in a few minutes. It's an opportunity to record positive affirmations, acknowledge successes, and record important events - for both what's occurred on planet as well as in the players real life.

• Comedic AI Therapist (Stretch Goal)

Comedic AI Therapist is an implementation of ChatGPT which is fed journal entries and game state and engages the player based on these states. It's not intended to be anything near a replacement for real therapy. It's more trying to be a means to increasing engagement, providing emergent textual behavior, and to make the feeling of being trapped in space feel less lonely.