Colony by Swen
In this game you create your own ant colony by digging tunnels and constructing rooms. But you won't do this all by yourself of course, as the queen you'll acquire servants to do the work for you!
Your goal is to stockpile food for the winter and fend off any threats coming your way. Protect the queen at all cost!
Controls
Moving the Camera use the arrow keys or right mouse button
Creating ants use the "actions" menu in the bottom left corner only works if you have any eggs available
Building rooms use the "build" menu in the bottom right corner, click to confirm
Score
You'll gain 1 point for each second that the colony survives.
Each collected food item grants 30 points.
Types of ants
Queen the most important of them all. You'll lose the game if she dies. She can lay eggs by using the "lay eggs" action in the action menu (if there's one or more empty nurseries available).

Soldier wanders around the hive. Has increased health and damage. Useful for fending off attackers.

Forager digs tunnels under the surface and searches for food. When food is found it will be caried to a storage room that has space left if there is one available.

Builder digs tunnels and constructs rooms. You'll need at least 1 builder to construct rooms.

Rooms
Nursery houses eggs, which can be laid by the queen. You'll need at least 1 nursery to lay eggs.

Queen Room houses the queen. The queen will return here after laying eggs.

Storage drop off point for foragers. Can store around 10 food items. Each stored food grants 30 points.

Screenshots




Tips and Tricks
Build the queens room in the lower part of the ant hill. This gives her a safe place to retreat after laying eggs.
Build the nursery rooms above the queens room. Hatching soldiers here will most likely make them patrol the rooms above the queen's.
Build the storage rooms in the upper part of the hill to decrease the distance foragers have to walk.
Expand early by creating builders. This will become harder later on.
Post COMPO changes
- Increased difficulty
It is recommended to play in full screen (using the fullscreen button in the Unity webplayer)

| Youtube | https://insertcoffee.itch.io/colony |
| Youtube | https://insertcoffee.itch.io/colony |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/46/colony |
Ratings
| Overall | 120th | 3.9⭐ | 27🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 76th | 3.96⭐ | 27🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 189th | 3.76⭐ | 27🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 153th | 4.06⭐ | 27🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 356th | 3.68⭐ | 27🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 557th | 2.667⭐ | 23🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 436th | 3.31⭐ | 23🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 20🗳️ | 11🗨️ |
EDIT : Yep really great ! I only regret that there is no audio
@stefanie-leitch Correct, soldiers only fight enemies that bump into them. I had planned for this feature where ants would warn other ants for intruders and if the queen got attacked that the whole colony would swarm the attacker. Would be a good addition I think.
Very fun game :)
**Things I liked**
- interesting idea and mechanics
- decision making when deciding which type of ant to spawn
- pixel-art
**Things that could be improved**
- add music and sound effect to lighten up atmosphere
- new ant types and a buildings
- upgrading ants by eating foraged food
Nice work done in 48 hours! :smile:
@bloham "Just the Ants get stuck on every corner and my queen did so many times unnecessary because the soldiers don’t move anywhere". Haha, yes, there is definitly room for improvement! Although ants are kind of like that I guess.
@kneehatgames That is such a good idea. Adding a "move to queen room" action. Didn't think of that. Would have been a nice though. I do like that you have to becareful with your room placement and when laying eggs now though.
@mad-scientist-carl Building the queens room deep down is indeed a good strategy :smile: . It's interesting to play around with the placements of the rooms.
@standly007 Those would be very nice additions indeed. Thanks for leaving this feedback.
@saviqq Yes! I'd totally add those!
@cryptomnesic Thanks! All great suggestions. The eggs lay action is manual so that you have control over when the queen leaves her room. But I do agree that it feel a bit tedious atm.
I feel like I had to do more playtesting beforehand. So many good suggestions and ideas.