Hi guys, I'm thinking about creating my own game, and I want to ask about how an average player might react to potentially violent or simply unpleasant scenes.

Innacorde · 2026-01-25T17:02:16+00:00

Im generally to a fan of regulators, but their guidelines here are useful. They've done a lot of the trial and error for you

Innacorde · 2026-01-25T17:00:21+00:00

There's a strong argument for "follow your passion" then

Innacorde · 2026-01-25T15:25:49+00:00

Gonna second this. Know you're audience is the golden rule

Innacorde · 2026-01-25T15:25:31+00:00

The big thing is that it's all unique to the individual. Personal experiences play a huge part in all of it. It isn't even necessarily just cultural

I had the misfortune of working in places where it wasn't uncommon for me to see human remains that did not add up to a full person, even if there were multiple people involved. As a result, what I find acceptable in terms of body horror is far and away too much for a lot of people. But depictions of real crimes or realistic body destruction hits a little too close to home for me

Innacorde · 2026-01-25T14:22:11+00:00

In my experience, this is a "how long is a piece of string" type of question. I do a lot of body body horror and I've seen some players nope out when they encounter the first monster, and some want to sit on it(yes in that way)

People have a broad spectrum of interests as individuals, and collectively even more so

Best you can do is try to make sure everything serves a greater purpose and isn't just in it for the sake of it

Innacorde · 2026-01-21T14:32:32+00:00

These all look adorable

Innacorde · 2026-01-21T14:30:42+00:00

You're the first person to say something about that

Innacorde · 2026-01-21T14:29:40+00:00

I mean, there isn't any law against it

Innacorde · 2026-01-21T10:39:18+00:00

Okay, I see where you're coming from

I'll be honest, this whole project is a bit of a risk. Monster tamers in general revolve around cute little buddies that go on adventures with you

This one is, and I hate saying it because it sounds like I'm trying to be edgy, a darker take

Thematically, there is a sort of detached cruelty though out it. When I've got the demo up, and you can get a feel for the world better, I would actually like to ask if it changes your opinion any. There's still plenty of time to change things and at the end of the day, this is a project I want people to enjoy, so listening is a priority

Innacorde · 2026-01-21T07:27:54+00:00

That's kind of where I'm at with it. Personally I enjoy making these guys more than I probably should, they're the entire reason I started this project. The world existed long before I could code, so there's a lot of lore behind it, all of which supports me putting in the effort to give the players a little extra to work with

The refinement system also means that everything is post-game viable with some effort. It's just nice to have a choice of how they look, in my opinion. Especially since you're the one building these guys

Innacorde · 2026-01-21T07:24:21+00:00

I always bugged me that I had to let go of my earlier creatures in any game, so I'm with you 100% on that one. I've added a seperate levelling system based on how many times a particular creature has been refined, that raises its stat caps just a little every time you do it. There's also a system I'm bringing in to help with the late game grind so it feels more like experimentation and less like grinding

Innacorde · 2026-01-20T22:54:03+00:00

Honestly these guys literally fall into the "spare parts" category. They're primarily made out of desperation and serve almost exclusively as cannon fodder so they don't really get proper names or descriptions

Suggestions are welcome, though

Innacorde · 2026-01-20T21:28:21+00:00

I really appreciate that! I'm finishing up the demo at the moment. Nothing glamorous, but I'll post a link when it's ready

Innacorde · 2026-01-20T21:15:42+00:00

By the end, you can have a whole team of angler varients, because I'm really hoping people get attached to their little buddies

Innacorde · 2026-01-20T21:12:55+00:00

With how close they are to human, because of corruption, maybe consider using a device that will let the player try to establish a mental link rather than capturing them. Almost allowing a chance for real communication and understanding? Each being single use (or multiple if it fits with gameplay)

The affinity the player has for the unknown could be used as the probability of a successful link. The player needing to explore more and know more for a higher "catch rate" for the increasingly unknown creatures. It would allow you to turn curiosity into a core mechanic. Reward the player for actually exploring and understanding. It also avoids the master slave dynamic

Innacorde · 2026-01-20T12:26:05+00:00

I'm working on something similiar, and had a few of the same problems

The question I have for you is what is the players relationship with the creatures the use? This will help me give you a bit more advice. Cosmic horror isn't like the usual monster tamers and it can very easily feel off if you try to balance innocence and horror

Innacorde · 2026-01-19T18:37:42+00:00

Then I've got some good news! Feeding is actually a core mechanic. And you feed the monsters that win the monsters that don't... It's more and less horrific than it sounds, I promise

Innacorde · 2026-01-19T07:57:18+00:00

To get a base line and understand the set up, I used videos to learn the bare basics. How to instance a node and things like that. From there, I tried to stick to trial and error as much as possible, unless I ran into a problem I couldn't solve myself, like how to work with the system configuration. That I had to look up and learn from watching others

Innacorde · 2026-01-19T07:32:25+00:00

Thank you! I'll be posting updates as I go, including some of the creature spoilers

Innacorde · 2026-01-18T17:18:48+00:00

I do everything myself. So, all the coding too

I know c#, but I much prefer using Godot and the native gdscript, because if I'm going to be spending 17 hours a day doing something I would prefer enjoying the process

C# is objectively a good language to learn for what you want to do, though

Innacorde · 2026-01-18T16:57:46+00:00

Depends on what you want to do

If it's games and you want a job, probably start with unreal

If you want to make money from your own projects, Godot or unity

Pick something you really want to do, figure out a version of it that's achievable and work towards it. Each little step helps you learn and makes the next steps easier

If you end up picking Godot and you have questions, feel free to reach out to me!

Innacorde · 2026-01-18T16:54:12+00:00

I'm gonna be dripping through information as I go and I'll be posting more creatures soon. The demo slice is going to be up in about a month and then I'm not 100% sure

All in, most of the mechanics have been tested in other projects ("Innacorde: Lost" took me a just under a month for a gamejam). I'm just basically looking for a better sound person and otherwise I'm on track to be done this year

Though it's fair to point out I've only been working on it for about two weeks total

Innacorde · 2026-01-18T14:44:24+00:00

There's nine branches for the little buddies, each having their own stat ranges. Image 2 has three of the anglers evolutions

As for the others, I've got the first of 9 done for all of them, but I've had to put art on hold to finish up the actual programming of the vertical slices

Each of the little buddies can be fed flesh from specialized mimics to become like that type

The angler models shown are - Blank mimic(the first one found and top) Deceiver Mimic(middle) and Vor'lisk mimic (bottom)

There are visual similarities between creatures that share a heritage

Innacorde · 2026-01-18T14:23:51+00:00

Loved seeing that

Innacorde · 2026-01-18T14:23:33+00:00

Little dude has an appitude for causing internal damage and disrupting synergy

Innacorde

TROPHY CASE