So in coming across Jason VandenBerghe's
2018 followup to the video I posted in the OP, he brings up an aspect of game design which has been somewhat neglected, namely the fundamental psychological drives of Tend and Befriend. Put forward as the corollaries to Fight or Flight, he notes that a significant portion of people don't want to play games based on adrenaline and action, that many people want to take a Stardew Valley or Sim City approach to fun where they can tend to virtual "crops" and develop and nurture relationships with the imaginary friends the game provides without having to worry about being attacked in any way.
Now while I don't expect to see this in 1.0, it got me wondering if there are ways that LT could explore this Stardew Valley approach to fun. Given the extensive moddability, I would say DUH, of course it can. But the question is how. Narrative focused mods are an obvious route, but we've discussed the possibilities of procedural narrative elsewhere, so instead I want to focus on mechanics for caring and tending. Though I’m using the term “crops”, I’m referring to any entity or system that requires tending to to gain a benefit from.
Some initial questions:
1. What objects/systems/NPC entities should we create for the player to care about? What are the "crops" they can tend to and how do those function? What existing systems can we repurpose for this sort of play, and what new ones will have to be implemented?
2. How do we show the player that their tending to these crops are having an impact on their well being? What should be the results of negligence or of poor planning/time management?
3. How could we achieve player-npc parity so that regular NPCs would engage in these caring activities, and at least give the impression of genuinely caring about their "crops"?
Perhaps the most obvious “crops” are space life. Unlike Stardew valley, LT is a dynamic and living universe, so an actual ecosystem & food chain are probably more appropriate than SV’s simple scheduling. However a thought that’s been rattling about in my head is nested content generation, in that there is a basal self-contained ecosystem unit. For example, say there is an ecosystem unit called a “Tree”, which provides potential food and shelter for primary and secondary consumers while said “Tree” exists in a self contained “Grove”. This grove is a higher level self-contained unit, where the trees and any animals within its boundaries are aware of each other and can compete/cooperate for the food and shelter resources each Tree provides, for individual/group safety, and for mating. The “Grove” itself exists within a “Forest” of multiple self-contained Groves, which can serve as territories for Forest-wide predators, while the Groves are also aware of the other Groves within the Forest and can coordinate their own breeding according to the resources available within the Forest. I Imagine that this wouldn’t be too hard on LOD either, as the details of the Trees and Groves can be simplified into general stats for the Forest… just a thought, I’d like to get some feedback on this.
If those Forests are the Wildlife, then players could tend to and be stewards of the Forest, clearing out unwanted predators, bringing in resources such as asteroids and ice for the Forest to grow, harvesting the Trees and Animals it produces. And while this could come to involve a fair bit of infrastructure by itself, there’s also the possibility for fully controlled greenhouses/gardens. Perhaps large glass spheres, where the player can establish a custom ecosystem, to grow and harvest different crops, be they plant or animal. And like SV, space life could produce its own resources which could then be refined/processed into secondary goods.
If being a simple space farmer doesn’t have enough appeal, you could incorporate husbandry, or even better, genetic engineering via a parallel to the tech tree (making transgenic space life might be very interesting to play with
)
Extending past the Space Farm metaphor, you could take advantage of other systems already in place such as trade and manufacturing, turning your little “farm” into an estate which not only produces crops but imports other goods and materials to fuel a collection of small stations and factories, somewhat similar to Josh’s trailer park idea.
If you were to extend this type of play even further, into perhaps being akin to Animal Crossing, you could hire workers, attract residents, or utilize slaves for this Space Farm/Plantation/Town to do much of the work for you. These residents would have their own demands and emotions such as providing personal residences, particular structures & systems in your zone of control (eg. security perimeters, trade hub of a certain size, beautification, energy independence, etc.), demands for having good relations with their fellow residents, demands for you having good relations with particular factions. You could incorporate systems for these residents to “socialize” with one another, such as gift exchanges, inviting each other over for game night, regular gatherings at the Estate lounge and bar, and so on.
There really is a lot of room for adding non-combat gameplay, especially in this Stardew Valley/Animal Crossing-esque form. And there are a lot of ways these functions could be incorporated with the larger game, such as your estate being a fortified homestead on the frontiers that could grow to become the heart of a new imperial region, or be less fortified in a much safer region of space where you have to pay taxes for protection and access to trade infrastructure.
So, thoughts? Additional ideas for non-combat Tend & Befriend gameplay?