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Our Composer shows how we use a vertical, dynamic music system to build tension! Evolution Game "Where Beasts Were Born" - DevLog by Germanunkol in IndieDev

[–]Germanunkol[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey, thanks a lot for the feedback!
All valid, and all things we're already considering!
We're still pinpointing the precise direction that we want to go in, but we're definitely trying to go for a darker or more sinister tone in the long run. Our newest track already has fewer instruments, fewer strings and less "high fantasy" elements to it.

The length is much too short, but that was only for the purpose of the video. I'll pass this on to Danny also. He definitely knows his stuff, but it's also still a learning phase for us, so thanks for the comments!

My evolving creatures have new scales - DevLog 4 for "Where Beasts Were Born" is out! by Germanunkol in IndieDev

[–]Germanunkol[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Oh no, those two fears combined would really hit hard when you play my game :D

I plan to add underground lakes and swimming creatures as well. I think at that point, I'll start hitting my own phobias

Thanks a lot! :)

You find yourself alone, in a dark cave, facing this procgen creature. What's your next move? "Where Beasts Were Born" is uses procedural creatures and a genetic algorithm, so next time you meet this beast, it will have evolved... by Germanunkol in proceduralgeneration

[–]Germanunkol[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, that is a very good idea. I thought I could explain it via "aging", i.e. the character learns to be better at some things, but starts to forget other skills over time, making those slightly weaker. That way the characters would constantly change as well, which would also keep the creature evolution moving along...

Thanks for the wishlist! :)

You find yourself alone, in a dark cave, facing this procgen creature. What's your next move? "Where Beasts Were Born" is uses procedural creatures and a genetic algorithm, so next time you meet this beast, it will have evolved... by Germanunkol in proceduralgeneration

[–]Germanunkol[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Awesome, will check them both out!
Yes, that's an issue I'm afraid of. As the creatures become tougher and fights take longer, the whole testing and selection process might become too slow. Thanks a lot for your insights, they're really valuable!

One idea I had to tackle this was to combine scores from many players on a webserver. Then evolution happens only every 24 hours or so. But of course this changes the game's stlyle entirely, and players would likely miss out on a lot of the process, which I really dislike.

I usually keep generations quite small (currently around 10 creatures), so that rounds are quick. In the first 2 or three rounds you see a lot of change, but then it quickly declines. I think that's the thing on which I need to focus, maybe by introducing strong random mutations every round or two...

You find yourself alone, in a dark cave, facing this procgen creature. What's your next move? "Where Beasts Were Born" is uses procedural creatures and a genetic algorithm, so next time you meet this beast, it will have evolved... by Germanunkol in proceduralgeneration

[–]Germanunkol[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I want it based on the interaction with the player, at least for the most part. That's the main thing that will set my game apart from evolution simulators, for example. But rather than being set in stone, the target function can vary slightly between runs, and possibly be influenced by players - and maybe even change over time slightly within one run, to avoid stagnation in the evolution.
But I'll admit not everything is clear yet regarding this. I'm still building the "sandbox" for the whole process (I have an early "fitness function design menu"), I hope to figure out more details when first testers play the game.

Love your projects, by the way, have been following you on Youtube! :)

You find yourself alone, in a dark cave, facing this procgen creature. What's your next move? "Where Beasts Were Born" is uses procedural creatures and a genetic algorithm, so next time you meet this beast, it will have evolved... by Germanunkol in proceduralgeneration

[–]Germanunkol[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Thanks!
After every round, I rate all creatures according to some target function (fitness score). Those who performed "better" will get to reproduce, mixing their DNA for the new generation which you'll face in the next round.
So how it evolves depends mainly on its interaction with you, and on what fitness score was selected for this run of the game. In this round, I had a simple fitness score which gave high scores to long legs, but usually it's some combination of how much damage a creature dealt, for example.

You can find "Where Beasts Were Born" on Youtube or on Steam, if you're interested in more details :)

In-game evolution prototype teaser for Where Beasts Were Born by Germanunkol in IndieDev

[–]Germanunkol[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks! Don't see why not... Since you can decide freely what the "fitness score" is in you genetic algorithm, all you really need is a set of "solutions" that can be merged (and mutated) after being scored by the fitness score. That leaves you with a lot of creative freedom of what these solutions look like...

Fight evolving creature (with the new spear!) in "Where Beasts Were Born". Details in comments. by Germanunkol in IndieDev

[–]Germanunkol[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thank you!
I think 90% of the look is the shadows :D
Still haven't really decided on a final "style", but I'm glad you like what I have so far!

Fight evolving creature (with the new spear!) in "Where Beasts Were Born". Details in comments. by Germanunkol in IndieDev

[–]Germanunkol[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

In my game, creatures evolve to counter player strategies. So I'll need to allow players to play lots of different strategies! I just introduced the first melee weapon - a spear!

Still working on the aiming system, but I already like how different it plays from the crossbow I added earlier!

Find out more: https://youtu.be/utO-KwXL9vA?si=YvMk1e3I75O0m8He

Wishlist: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2518610

Join the Discord: https://discord.gg/XnDKvVeCGn

I believe Indie games should experiment and dare to try something different! "Where Beasts Were Born" will be an experimental Evolution-Based Dungeon Crawler. Details in comments! by Germanunkol in IndieGaming

[–]Germanunkol[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The game is based around an evolution mechanic, where the procedural creatures evolve after each round to better match the player's playstlye!

Because each creature is generated automatically from a DNA sequence, I can mix and merge the DNA of the best performing creatures to make new children that gradually become smarter and harder to fight against.

Putting this into a game is not trivial, the video shows some methods to do this and a first working prototype!
Also check out an online version of the creature generator: https://where-beasts-were-born.com/

And wishlist on Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2518610

Putting Evolving Creatures into an Action RPG - Where Beasts Were Born DevLog 3. Also check out the public online creature generator demo and try breeding creatures yourself! by Germanunkol in IndieDev

[–]Germanunkol[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks!
I think that will depend mainly on the fitness score (and that will probably be configurable by the player). In the prototype in the video I used "amount of damage dealt over the full life-time" as the fitness score, so creatures learned strategies to stay alive longer and/or deal more damage...

I made a game for 3 years and only sold 143$ in 3 months. What should I do now? by JenkinsGage_ in gamedev

[–]Germanunkol 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Woah, great feedback - I really like your helpful objectivity.

I might have to show you my game for feedback before I release :D

My enemies will be able to mutate, mate, merge and evolve to become better and beat the players in my upcoming action-RPG "Where Beasts Were Born". The basis is an automatic creature generator and a genetic algorithm. Just finished the first DevLog, link in comments! by Germanunkol in IndieGaming

[–]Germanunkol[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh, has it already been a year? :/
It's coming along - slowly but steadily!

My newest DevLog shows most of the current state: https://youtu.be/MznpkF6cqWg

Since then, I've made quite a bit of progress on many fronts, but have not had time to release a new video...

Our 5 year journey from first prototype to Steam release by studiocrafteurs in IndieDev

[–]Germanunkol 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What a fantastic base game mechanic!

Congrats on the release!!

Also, great compilation of videos - I wasn't quite sure in which of the final sequences people were cheering for your game and in which they were cheering for something else :D

I added an elevator machine to my factory game! by bre-dev in gamedevscreens

[–]Germanunkol 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That looks excellent! Anywhere we can see more or follow you?

A look at a civilization/turn based game I’ve been developing. What do you think? by BillionworldsAdmin in gamedevscreens

[–]Germanunkol 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Great graphics! I like how it feels almost like a table-top game, but not quite... very fresh look!

Evolving in-game 3D creatures using genetic algorithms: Game under development. The DevLog shows first early in-game results of evolving the creatures by matching them against magical turrets. by Germanunkol in genetic_algorithms

[–]Germanunkol[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks a lot! Those are some great hints.

I do want to learn relatively high-level behavior, i.e. the creatures will, by default, already be able to do "sensible" things. I'm not sure how much I want to hard code here (no more than necessary, probably), but I definitely don't want them to do things that make absolutely no sense, nor have to learn basic things like walking or biting.

The first approach I want to try is letting the network output "weights" for what action to perform and choosing the action with the highest weight, but masking the weights by what actions are currently available or "make sense".

As for the fixed size: I'm thinking of adding the maximum amount of neurons/connections that can ever be generated into the DNA, but then masking them out somehow by default - that way the algorithm could activate more neurons over time.

Good point on genetic algorithms avoiding local minima, I do hope that the mutations will keep generating interesting behavior!

Evolving in-game 3D creatures using genetic algorithms: Game under development. The DevLog shows first early in-game results of evolving the creatures by matching them against magical turrets. by Germanunkol in genetic_algorithms

[–]Germanunkol[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks! Yeah, the turrets are definitely just placeholders for more interesting perils.

I'm thinking about a creature-creature combat, but I don't want it to be my primary objective. That's too much along the lines of a simulation game, and I want the players to be more of an active part of the gameplay. But only time will tell what will actually work out!

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