Desktop Ant Farm Simulator is Leaving Early Access in August
Hey all,
I want to do a devlog on my current thoughts for Desktop Ant Farm Simulator. As I've been tinkering with Update #10, cleaning up text issues, adding another dozen lofi tracks, a new font option, etc, I've realized that the rough edges that were intentionally left rough so that I could start Early Access have been smoothed.
I set out to have a rich full lofi soundtrack, which is as of the current status of Update #10, sitting at 36 tracks. I set out to create an Idle Mode that stood separate from Productivity mode, and the Forager Ants/Nutrients/Age System all went an extremely long way in making a satisfying loop
This whole project started as an idea to make a digital distraction. Something my ADHD coded brain could stare at while I did my real job. The original concept was completed to my level of desire months before Early Access even started. To release it to an actual audience required some basic needs, like settings and controls info. Easily the most boring part of game development. Just writing code to accomplish basic features that exist in every game.
What was left on the drawing board at Early Access launch was that next brush of creative development. How can I make it look better? Make it easier to work on any monitor so that it could just run idly while people do their own thing? What ways can I expand the Idle Mode without making it require *too much interaction? It needed to stay minimal, it's a distraction not a focus.
Over the course of the 10 Early Access patches I addressed nearly all of my thoughts about how to polish this project off, and took several great suggestions from the community to heart. Early Access was the perfect choice for this project. How else was I supposed to focus on making more without it also running in the corner of the monitor as a distraction?
Version 1.0 is not the end of my time working on this. It just marks that level of polish that I feel comfortable selling a project as a complete idea and saying it represents my goal from the outset. There's other systems and ideas I absolutely plan to add but at this point those felt "extra" to the original idea. The second they felt extra, I realized I was feeling happy with the state of the game.
Take a look at the other projects I've released, the formal release is always just the start of the next free-er state of development. Adding fun ideas as I think of them, un-beholden to a timeline or a massive signposted "end". I'm a solo dev making games in my free time after my full-time non-gaming job. The fact I've gotten so many ideas across the finish line feels like a massive personal accomplishment.
So yeah, Desktop Ant Farm Simulator is having its full-release version 1.0 in August. I'm not picking a specific date. I will keep tinkering with Update #10 the next 3-5 weeks and one day I'll pull the trigger and say it's time. I'd be happy doing that today frankly, but I'm going to let it stew for a few weeks.
Thanks all who joined me on the Early Access journey, this was a great experiment and it was a neat way to create a game.
-kyle