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Phylogenesia Automatorum's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Fun (Overall enjoyment) | #4 | 3.719 | 4.040 |
| Uniqueness (Originality of the game) | #4 | 4.271 | 4.640 |
| Balance (Speed of the game) | #5 | 3.204 | 3.480 |
| Overall | #6 | 3.452 | 3.750 |
| Theme (How well the game fits the jam's theme) | #17 | 2.614 | 2.840 |
Ranked from 25 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
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Comments
This is a really interesting game.
I didn’t feel like I had much agency; just kind of trying things and clicking to see what happens
I don’t think you implemented pressure here, but I’m not 100% sure.
It looks sophisticated, and I found it interesting.
This is a really interesting game.
I didn’t feel like I had much agency; just kind of trying things and clicking to see what happens
I don’t think you implemented pressure here, but I’m not 100% sure.
It looks sophisticated, and I found it interesting.
Hey thank you very much! The agency is definitely abstracted out a layer due to the way the plants follow their own rules, and even when upgrading their characteristics, you really have to know what to look out for when watching the simulation if you want to see the effect that you've had. I agree it could have been clearer for sure, AND, I also wanted to implement a direct form of agency where you were able to specifically click to build walls and place/kill plants, but that was out of scope for the demo.
I was going for a more abstract evolutionary pressure, where the growing number of plants were competing for the limited simulation space, and also the pressure of meeting/beating the increasing simulation reset costs, but the concepts were definitely not as apparent as most other entries in the jam!
In any case, thanks so much for playing it!!
I find the tweak-run-watch loop engaging. Some more direct agency would be cool, but I think much more important is that the effects of the buy/tweak phase on the run phase are really obvious.
Made me think of Loop Hero btw.
Just to let everyone know, I now have a web version of this game up now! It's probably entirely too late since the initial voting rush has happened now, but it's there now for anyone who wants to try it :)
Yes! I was right when I thought this would be the best game submitted to the game jam, absolute masterclass love the artwork and the mechanic of the game, heck makes me want to make some games with similar mechanics the Conway simulation feels so good. 10/10, can’t wait to see where this game goes!
Also, I 100% get how adding too much content can make balancing really tricky on this small of a time deadline, but I would love to see this game extended another layer like The Perfect Tower where you run simulations which you gain some outside currency which you can use to get permanent simulation upgrades. Love this game
Wow, thank you so much! That's incredibly high praise! I did have quite a few ideas on where I was going to take this that have been left unimplemented like a third type of point that rewards plants living across ticks, running multiple simulations simultaneously, sidegrade/replacements to certain plants that would essentially give you different loadouts, and as you have suggested, some kind of metaprogression where your starting runs become stronger etc...
Thanks again for playing the game and for your kind words!
Really nice relaxing little game. Feels pretty zen to just let things run and see what happens. I love trying to power up a single plant as much as possible to just watch it take over. Definitely has some balance issues but since it's a game jam submission made on limited time I think its completely understandable. Almost feels like a prototype or vertical slice to show off a really solid game idea.
Thanks! Plant indeed goes brrr (sometimes...)
Nice game! I had a really easy time finishing after the initial part, while my first few times it just seemed completely impossible to outscale due to how you don't get enough points to even buy an upgrade if you're unlucky enough with initial spawns. I feel like that could be balanced somehow, but I guess it would feel much worse to lose an entire long run.
Hey thank you very much! Yes, balancing was an absolute nightmare and you can absolutely win starting with any plant, although some definitely take a bit more luck than others (that's why Conway is always there as an initial choice if the other two plants are subpar)! As you noticed, I found that if I made costs scale in the crazy way that the points do by mid-end game (which is very dependent on your mutations), early-mid game was almost impossible to survive through, and like you said, it would have felt bad losing a run where you were starting to snowball. I don't have much experience with incrementals but I do have some ideas for future balancing passes though! Thanks again for playing!
The game is very fun and original, music is relaxing and layered albeit a bit repetitive. Balance could use some work but overall still pretty engaging :)
Thank you! I was overall quite happy with how things turned out. I think the music was great (even if the loops were a bit short like you said), but having them come in one by one depending on which plants you take always brought a smile to my face while testing and watching others playtest!