Animalkind, the charming village-building game, has an unexpected development story, as it originally started as a hardcore survival game. In a recent interview at GDC, Steven Jian, CEO of Uncommon Games, shared how the initial idea was reworked due to the challenges posed by cooperative survival games. And of course, with this, the target audience for this game has changed.
Goodbye to fights, hello, adorable neighbor!
We were heavily influenced by survival games, like Valheim, which were on the rise at that time, said Jian. However, as we developed the game, we noticed that player progression was diverging, making it difficult for everyone to enjoy the experience together. This type of dynamic can create rifts in a group, especially if a player misses several sessions and falls behind in terms of progress.
With this in mind, the team decided to focus on the most appealing aspect of these games: base building. We halted development and asked ourselves why not just concentrate on that, eliminating combat, Jian explained.
Animalkind retains some exploration and resource gathering elements typical of survival games, but replaces action with the recruitment of adorable villagers, who have their own needs and desires. Players will build and decorate houses for these characters while collecting the resources they need.
In addition to the cooperative mode, there will be an area called Nature, where players can interact and collect unique resources. With a voxel-based design, Animalkind allows for environmental modification, but the studio insists that these changes do not ruin the game’s aesthetics. We are working to ensure that players can create pleasant and not chaotic landscapes, Jian added.
There is still no release date set, although Uncommon Games plans an alpha in the coming months, with the possibility of a beta or early access later in the year.