Potential Game Mechanics

[El_Psy]

I for one am thoroughly enjoying what little Empires of The Undergrowth has to offer. It reminds me of the Alien campaign of a very old PS2 game called Aliens Extinction. I personally love the concept of controlling a hive mind from a single queen and a few drones. To an ever growing and devouring hive/swarm/empire.

So since I lack any kind of game design skills, I have decided to throw out any idea's I come up with on here. I don't expect them to noticed, but if it gives one of the designers inspiration that would be enough. Feel free to post or add to the idea's I put up. Chur from New Zealand!

 

[El_Psy]

Cannibalism!

Now as far as I researched(couple google searches) Ants do not eat members of their own colony(Who da thought?) However they do eat members of others! At least as long as they belong to a different species. Therefore I see no reason why Dead ants can't be used as food to feed the Colony. Otherwise fighting against other ants is purely costly.

Now I am not totally against that concept for Balance reasons. But it does seem like a waste to watch all those Ants get slaughtered and leave their bodies to waste anyway in the ether. Honestly one of the best parts of this game is seeing my lil goons carry away the dead to be devoured!

My suggestions for balancing this mechanic would be to simply make the food amount very low. Maybe 1-3 food for eat dead ant. Perhaps 1 for workers and 2-3 for soldiers.

Feel free to add or change this as you desire.

 

[El_Psy]

ZOMBIE FUNGUS!

Ophiocordyceps unilateralis as anyone who saw the trailers for The Last of Us might know. Is a nasty fungus and takes control of the minds of insects
and forces them to act... Bizarre.
Now obviously there are limits to this control but I think it could make for a great challenge in some levels.

Here are some of my ideas.

Upon breaking into certain chambers, one may discover a fungus spore or infected insects of some sort. The moment ants interact with it, they are either immediately infected or a dice roll determines it(higher or lower chance determined by level and type of ant EG Soldier ants are more resistant?) Once infected, a member of that particular "Pheromone group" will slowly grow the fungus and after a period of time it shall explode and spread it to all nearby ants.

Now this would encourage the Player to keep Ant units in as many separate groups as possible, instead of lumping them all together. Though you could also add in a mechanic that allows you to sacrifice members of groups by clicking on them or something. The idea being if you do not pay attention and isolate the infected, it shall spread and claim more ants or even you Queen.

You might even make the Ant act oddly, perhaps being slower to respond, or refusing to attack or work. Or even staying beside the Queen as the fungus slowly spreads. This is when the ability to pick our certain members of a group would be ideal.

Like before, thoughts below!

 

[MikeSlugDisco]

- The reason dead ants don't get eaten is, quite simply, gameplay reasons - we have to carefully balance food levels and the amount of jobs the ants have to do. Imagine if every time an enemy ant died, a food collection job was created; very little else would get done.

- Cordyceps is a fascinating concept and definitely something we want to do in the future. Just too fun a concept not to do.