Though Devin is Silverstring Media’s Audio Director, today he’s here in his capacity as a game designer! He’s been keenly involved in all sorts of game design tasks throughout Greenhearth Necromancer’s development, helping to flesh out and test aspects of the game’s plant care mechanics, and to create lots of engaging content, be they plants, spells, potions, or icky bugs.
Welcome to the third monthly developer log for Greenhearth Necromancer!
Our monthly devlogs will highlight different aspects of Greenhearth and will share insights into its development. As a semi-idle magical gardening sim, there will be much to share as development continues! This month’s entry is a Q&A with our game designer, Devin Vibert.
Designing a game that lets you grow plants, cast spells, meet your neighbours, and have it all work even while you tend to other tasks is no easy feat. What is a semi-idle magical gardening simulator? How does it work, and what does semi-idle even mean?
This month’s devlog will answer those questions and much more, as we dive into the design behind the mechanics of Greenhearth Necromancer.
From roots to stem, learn about Greenhearth Necromancer’s gameplay…
How did the development of Greenhearth Necromancer start? What inspired it?
Greenhearth Necromancer started as a humble game jam! We’ve tried to maintain a tradition of hosting no-strings-attached game jams every now and then as a team-building exercise and to generate new ideas and have a little fun. For this fateful jam, we had envisioned a balcony garden where, if you accidentally killed your plants, you could just … bring them back from the dead. No sweat. Just try again!
As we mused over the implications of a world where this was possible, it became clear that there were some deeper themes related to humankind’s relationship with grief, community, and labour we were eager to explore. We felt empowered to work toward something with many of the hallmarks of an idle game without the more predatory, time-monopolizing aspects; we wanted a game that met players where they were and didn’t demand any more of them than they were willing to give.
What is a paper prototype, and how did it help Greenhearth Necromancer?
Paper prototyping can be a great way to test game systems through actual play to make sure they work as expected, without having to write a single line of code. Even though we knew we were headed in an idle game direction, we wanted to ensure there was enough strategic depth to the actual act of plant care that players would feel their decisions had a meaningful impact on their plant’s welfare, and this was the way to do it.
Now, I’m a pretty big plant nerd. Suffice it to say, the prospect of inventing new magical plants for Greenhearth spurred me to excitedly throw together an overnight pitch for a system where each location on the balcony had different growing conditions, and you’d need to reconcile those with the needs of each plant species to find an optimal growing location. Claris and Audrey graciously allowed me some time and freedom to cook on this.
To test the concept, I put together an entire tabletop plant simulation game on Miro, complete with cards, tokens, dice rolls, spells, and an action point economy based entirely on plant care. I ran multiple games with most of the Silverstring team, effectively serving as everyone’s Plant Care Game Master for several weeks as everyone tried to achieve their balcony gardening goals. It was a lot of fun and provided a ton of beneficial information for the next stage of the design process.
What is the core gameplay “loop” of the game?
Check on your plants to ensure they have everything they need to thrive – water, fertilizer, and a good pruning regimen, to start. Thriving plants produce resources you can take to market or use in more complex potionmaking and spellcasting, which in turn spurs your plants to even greater, happier heights. Of course, this all takes time, and you’re likely going to have to step away to give your plants time to, well, grow. Don’t forget to check on your neighbours too!
Helping your plants (or neighbours) isn’t always a simple task, but on a macro level, this is the whole game! We want players to get into a rhythm of checking on their garden, knocking off a few gardening tasks, and then returning to the rest of their life to do whatever else they want to do. Run the game in the system tray or as a screensaver! Take a break to go outside and enjoy the sunshine. Get yourself some bubble tea!
What makes Greenhearth Necromancer a “semi-idle” game?
Greenhearth provides opportunities for players at multiple levels of engagement, allowing you to play the game on your terms, in your style — sometimes more passively (“idle”) and sometimes more actively (“semi-”). Used to clickers? Want to click a bunch of times really quickly to get a bunch of stuff? We’ve got you. Water and fertilize all your plants, then prune them to level them up and get a bunch of resources. It’s clicks all the way down, baby.
Or, maybe you’d prefer to set up a beautifully curated engine in your garden, where all the plants in one corner of your balcony work together in seamless harmony to make Number Go Up So Unbelievably Fast? That is also a thing in Greenhearth. Set up your perfect arrangement, cast some spells, step away for a few hours, and return to collect all of the herbs and blooms you could ever want (though a little bit of furious clicking is unavoidable).
Whether you’re feeling like taking a very active or passive role in garden management, and even if that changes for you from moment to moment, Greenhearth will bring something to the table for you. But no matter what, plants take time to grow — so you’ll always be asked to step away, take a break, enjoy your garden vibing away in the background, before stepping back to care for it again.
How deep does the “sim” aspect of the gardening go? How did it change over time?
It’s important to me that there’s some level of verisimilitude in the various plant care tasks. The Greenhearth world is not a high-magic world; gardening problems are still mostly mundane — bugs, diseases, forgetting to water — there just happen to be some more interesting magical solutions to them. And just as importantly, I wanted to ensure that the emotional arc of solving a plant care problem in-game roughly mirrored the real-world one, albeit with significantly less anxiety. As development has continued, we’ve added some extra whimsy to ensure that even when we’re contending with real plant problems in our fake plant game, the stakes are never too high. The considerations always feel a little magical and fun.
The “sim” aspect of the balcony gardening is pretty robust. Every plant species has specific light, humidity, watering, and fertilizing needs, as well as different rates of maturation and flowering, varying pest and disease susceptibilities, and so on. Plants respond to their environment as well: a plant situated in a location that’s too sunny or dry consumes water more quickly; a plant that you accidentally overwater is more susceptible to diseases until it dries out, and a plant in perfect conditions will be happier, grow faster, and bloom more frequently. However, you can engage with all those specifics only as much as you want: you can create the absolute perfect conditions for your plant by delving into all the numbers, or simply keep an eye on how happy it is and what its immediate needs are.
What makes Greenhearth Necromancer different from other idle games?
Like any idle game, Greenhearth has a fair amount of pointing-and-clicking. However, the layers of both realism and magical whimsy in the plant care system necessitate some careful thought on the player’s part, beyond what an idle game might typically expect of them — you have to think at least a little bit before you click everything.
Plants can be overwatered, so mindlessly watering every plant can have drawbacks. Pests could attack your prized plant, forcing you to adjust your garden plans on the fly (pun intended). Plants themselves can develop personality quirks that fundamentally change how they interact with other plants.
Your garden is a community unto itself, with all sorts of messy contradictions and asymmetries and big personalities. That said, we never want these complications to feel unnecessarily punishing, so there’s always a way to come back if things really go sideways with one particular plant.
How does necromancy feature in the game, and how does it fit with the “cozy” aesthetic?
It’s easy to imagine necromantic magic and ‘cozy vibes’ as opposing forces, but I just don’t think it’s true because that assumes you’re using necromancy for Bad Things!
In Greenhearth, you use necromancy to care for your plants, and from there, the cozy only grows stronger. Undead plants will gradually develop their own personality traits. Referred to as Quirks, these can distinguish a plant even from others of the same species, giving your hard-won mature plants an attitude all their own. You can also name your plant: it’s way more personal if you’re trying to save Bob the Fern Queen from an unfortunate Zombie Slug infestation.
Lastly, necromancy is how the stakes stay low, a key aspect of many cozy games. Obviously, it’s not ideal when a plant dies, but you’re always one quick necromantic spell from getting it back in the game.
What aspect of the game design are you most proud of?
It might sound silly, but I’m very proud of how much enthusiasm I put into fleshing out each of the plant species on offer in Greenhearth. It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to put a bunch of my random pop science and gardening knowledge to work in a game development setting, but then also, there’s magic!
We have a taxonomic system for Greenhearth plants that informs how new species might grow and behave, as well as how they are named. Every plant has a “proper” scientific name and one or several common names that are based on the folklore surrounding the plant or its historical uses. Their native habitats inform their preferred levels of light, water, and fertilizer. As an example, Feywood Trees generally grow near riverbeds; this gives them high light needs and higher water and fertilizing needs as they’re accustomed to the open sky and nutritional bounty a nearby river provides. They also attract faeries, who prefer their strong limbs for hanging lanterns and other party decorations. You may have to shoo said faeries away if they start causing trouble!
Are there any tabletop or other alternative games that helped shape the game’s mechanics?
Greenhearth has some engine-building in it, and while I don’t think we took any direct inspiration from a particular tabletop game, a few of us are big fans of several engine-building games like Power Grid, Caverna, or Settlers of Catan. I took inspiration from some of the character abilities in Sentinels of the Multiverse that let you set up cute little synergies, turning one element type to another or allowing for healing where you usually take damage, when I was thinking about Quirks, or how we envisioned spells and potions interacting with plant care systems.
I’m also a huge fan of area control tabletop games like El Grande, Pandemic, or Vye. Greenhearth obviously isn’t that kind of game. Still, I’m pretty sure my desire for crunchy and interesting placement decisions, as well as the enduring idea that elements (in this case, plants) sharing a space should influence one another, can be traced to those kinds of games. There’s definitely a bit of that in Greenhearth.
What does “game balance” look like in a game like Greenhearth Necromancer, and how do you achieve it?
I’d argue that game balance in Greenhearth is chiefly about striking an equilibrium in how different levels of player engagement are rewarded. Ensuring that the numbers are all the correct numbers is very important, too. Still, a casual player should be able to enjoy the game roughly as much as a player highly motivated toward optimization. They might get different things out of the experience, but there’s got to be something good there for both of them!
How do we achieve that? It’s hard. We’ve strived to ensure there are multiple ways to tackle any problem in the garden. Some are inherently more efficient. That’s ok. You can spend time meticulously researching every last bit of information about a plant to produce the happiest plant in the world. You can also just slap the thing down in any ‘ol pot and figure it out through trial and error. Both are viable. We don’t judge, and neither will the plants; if they die, you can just bring ‘em back! So yeah, you’ll be able to optimize if you want, but if you don’t? You won't be penalized; things may just take a little longer. That’s a balancing act I’m constantly thinking about.
Bonus question: What games are you playing now, and is there one you’d recommend to folks who can’t wait to play Greenhearth?
Aside from wrapping up my billionth playthrough of Baldur’s Gate III (exaggeration) and my weekly Civilization 7 shenanigans with Lucas, the last few weeks I’ve been getting back into Potion Craft: Alchemist Simulator. It’s a management game with very satisfying physical interactions and sandboxy crafting system where the careful act of correctly brewing a potion is abstracted as movement across a map, with various destinations representing a successful brewing and movement governed by which ingredients you add and in what order. It’s a kind of wild way to reimagine crafting, and I love brewing quirky little potions for my weird little medieval customers!
Thanks for reading all about the game design of Greenhearth Necromancer! If you don’t want to miss updates about the game, subscribe to our newsletter and wishlist the game on Steam!