If you’re wondering what the Microbe Stage will entail, as always, we recommend you read our GDD (Game Design Document), especially its subsidiary pages linked at the bottom of the main page.
http://thrivegame.wikidot.com/microbe-stage-gdd
For those who have read it, what could be made better? Are there any holes? Things that are difficult to understand? General suggestions for how mechanics should work?
Welp, See my bio: The GDD does do a great job of hyping the reader up
But a question: What ended up being the final decision for starting the game with mitochondria or without? (I’m still for without)
That’s one thing I think we as developers need to clarify (see here). Although at first I was for having mitochondria, I think we should make the starting cell as simple as possible. Every organelle we add creates more front-loaded complexity for the player. If they start with only one type of processing organelle (such as cytoplasm) then they’re introduced to the concept of compound processing without overwhelmed by it.
The plan was all along to have no mitochondrion, it’s just that the current cell is a placeholder (you also start with a flagellum which in the final version you shouldn’t begin with).
“To progress into the Multicellular Stage, the player will need to develop the ability to bind with other members of their species through the use Bonding/Binding Agents. This allows them to form colonies with their fellow species members.”
This is not true some microbes bind with another species of microbe
We considered this but thought it too difficult to balance from a gameplay perspective. How do you know which species you can bind with? What if other species bind with you even if your species is pretty pitiful - is that the equivalent of completing the stage by luck?
It not by a button but by random change like when you eat a cell it somehow didn’t get digested or two cell somehow stuck to each other