LudumData

CritterLab by berkano

[raw]
made by berkano for LD24 (COMPO)
This is a sandbox evolution sim. There is no objective except to mess with the critters' destiny :-)

At the start a single critter is born, with genes shown on the right-hand Genome panel. You can play with the gene values & click on the map to spawn new species. You can interact with the map using the mouse: editing the terrain, smiting critters or editing their DNA.

Critters' survival is affected by a number of factors: genome (which influences behaviour & characteristics); environment (terrain, overpopulation & attacks from rival species) and YOU (if you so choose...)

I posted a lot more info on my compo blog: http://www.ludumdare.com/compo/2012/08/27/critterlab-play-guide-dynamics/. Have a look at that for a getting started guide, tips & tricks and details about the mechanics: what the genes do, the critters biology, how they interact with the environment and rival species.

Have fun!! ~berkano

Windows https://dl.dropbox.com/u/21611/ld24/final/CritterLab.zip
OS/X https://dl.dropbox.com/u/21611/ld24/final/CritterLab.zip
Linux https://dl.dropbox.com/u/21611/ld24/final/CritterLab.zip
Web https://dl.dropbox.com/u/21611/ld24/final/CritterLab.html
Source https://dl.dropbox.com/u/21611/ld24/final/CritterLab-Source.zip
Original URL https://ludumdare.com/compo/ludum-dare-24/?action=preview&uid=11027

Ratings

Coolness 59% 3
Overall 3.03 349
Audio 2.90 199
Fun 2.60 476
Graphics 2.37 570
Humor 1.95 414
Innovation 3.52 115
Mood 2.58 399
Theme 4.29 12

Feedback

mappum
27. Aug 2012 路 01:15 UTC
This is close to what mine was going to be, but with you in the same world as a controllable character shooting them :P
Crushenator
27. Aug 2012 路 03:42 UTC
I couldn't get this running on OSX. Error from my Java Console is:
org.lwjgl.LWJGLException: Could not get the JAWT interface
It's a well documented error so hopefully it's a quick fix and I can try this later.
馃帳 berkano
27. Aug 2012 路 11:09 UTC
Oh no! I had a google, and tried one of the suggested fixes. I also noticed an error in the Mac startup script. New build uploaded, please can you try again and let me know how you get on? (same link as above). If you still see the problem, would be great to get a full copy of the error you're seeing.

cheers!
馃帳 berkano
27. Aug 2012 路 11:16 UTC
@Crushenator, also, if you have any kind of customised Java setup, would be great to find out the details (e.g. which JDK). thanks!
ncannasse
27. Aug 2012 路 13:52 UTC
Quite interesting, but maybe too many options doesn't make the gameplay really understandable :)
DustyStylus
27. Aug 2012 路 14:28 UTC
Really ambitious, and really faithful to the competition theme. I love dynamic sandbox games like this where you just watch to see what happens to the world. Nice one!
1176Studios
27. Aug 2012 路 16:54 UTC
Always love a good simulator
Datw
27. Aug 2012 路 17:18 UTC
Nice concept, but I think that I ran out of things to do rather fast. Nice music, btw.
Kuulog
27. Aug 2012 路 17:29 UTC
Cool little thing to play with. I'd have loved to have seen random terrain generation, though.
Ponte
27. Aug 2012 路 17:30 UTC
Cool simulator. Everybody loves simulators.
jplur
27. Aug 2012 路 17:46 UTC
I managed to generate a guy that thrived in the water, didn't move but reproduced enough ;)

I think you managed to do what a lot of people tried to this competition, good stuff!
Frozen Fractal
27. Aug 2012 路 21:43 UTC
I don't see any creatures. Might be a bug...
馃帳 berkano
27. Aug 2012 路 22:05 UTC
@FrozenFractal they might have gone extinct very quickly :-) Try clicking the map to re-spawn a few times!!
axcho
28. Aug 2012 路 07:36 UTC
@mappum that sounds just like the game I made, Ninjural Selection. :P
ChronoDK
28. Aug 2012 路 07:46 UTC
Quite an impressive god simulator system considering it was made in 48 hours! Matches the theme very well, and the NUKE option is good fun when you are done playing :)
geekygenius
28. Aug 2012 路 09:39 UTC
:D Another slick game! That's 3 (including me) so far! Pretty fun to mess around with. Not sure what I was doing, but it still was pretty cool. Great work!
thewiseguy99
30. Aug 2012 路 04:33 UTC
Great simulator! Relates well to the theme. Well done! PS Appreciate your comments
whilefun
31. Aug 2012 路 12:51 UTC
Pretty cool game! I really like how the idea fits the theme. It was fun to fiddle with different settings and see what happened. It had a good "sim" feel to it and I liked the music. I max'd out around 1350 population and 50 or so species! :)
Jacic
31. Aug 2012 路 20:26 UTC
Very nice sandbox game. It took me a bit to familiarize myself with the controls, but then it was pretty fun. :)
goerp
31. Aug 2012 路 20:38 UTC
I like that you did a sandbox game. haven't seen much up until now. I do find it a bit hard to keep on caring about the creatures in the long run and an itch to nuke starts to creep in much to quickly. Maybe if you had more time they could have had more visual personalities.
Oh by the way: I liked the music. It a bit of an X-COM 2 atmosphere.
Great.
Syarahsy
01. Sep 2012 路 09:27 UTC
Fun little sandbox! It certainly brought out my evil side.
JaJ
01. Sep 2012 路 13:02 UTC
It can get out of hand rather quickly! By the time I had read the in-game help my screen was already covered with creatures! The simulation goes a bit fast for me to follow properly, but I did love to try to kill all other lifeforms with my army of pink monsters. I never succeded though.
dector
01. Sep 2012 路 21:30 UTC
Don't get in it, but it's nice.
evilseanbot
04. Sep 2012 路 06:53 UTC
Couldn't figure out how to keep the little buggers alive.
Problem Machine
04. Sep 2012 路 08:30 UTC
Interesting- it's fun to spawn a population and watch them drift into a few different species. I enjoyed reading the description of the stats in particular, though, since our projects were so similar it was super interesting reading how you approached it.