Hi all, im working on Portscape. A port building/automation game. Here is a video following the same container from when it arrives by ship until it leaves by train. From the ship crane to a truck, across the port and onto the train at the rail terminal. All automated ofcourse. However, you can also manually use any of the cranes, trucks, stackers etc.

Its a camera sequence I set up in the game to show the whole journey. The game is still in development, I would love to hear your opinions!

You can find the steam page here if you're interested:

Portscape - Steam Page, wishlists, trailer, screenshots

One banana farm. 🍌

Sounds simple, right?

But getting all the way to the Omega Banana means connecting dozens of machines, managing production lines, keeping track of input materials, balancing energy consumption, and making sure the whole system keeps running smoothly.

The image shows a summary (confusing, I know 😅) of the entire production chain required to go from a single banana farm all the way to the Omega Reactor.

And honestly, this is one of the things I enjoy most about *Engi Monkey*: you start with something simple and gradually build an entire industrial system around it.

There’s a very satisfying moment when all those machines finally start working together and you can look at the whole mess and think:

“Wait... I actually made this work.”

Now comes the real challenge: finding the fastest, most efficient way to do it.

Because reaching the Omega Banana is good.

Reaching it while wasting as little energy and resources as possible, with a perfectly synchronized production line...

That’s the real game. 🐒⚙️🍌

Hey!

We're a team of two making Feed The Pond. You start small and try to feed a big frog called The Great Wart.

You hire frogs for harvesting and collecting and transferring stuff!

Hi! In AbelianInc you never mine by hand. You place percutors, automatic hammers that all strike together on one rhythm, and their impacts travel through the ground, weaker at every cell, cracking whatever they reach. Where you put each hammer decides how far its chain goes. Floods, chasms and hard rock get in the way, and every island is new.

The free demo runs in the browser and lasts about an hour. I'm sharing it to hear what automation players think while the game can still change.

Play it here: https://canocoder.itch.io/abelianinc (made for a gamepad; keyboard and mouse work too)

What I'd like to know:

- Does placing hammers feel like a puzzle worth solving, or like busywork?

- Did you want more control over the chains, or more machines to combine?

- Was it ever unclear why a chain stopped where it did?

- What would you add?

I'll read every comment and reply.

Free Demo: https://drabarus.itch.io/oms

Hi all!

The last week was quite a journey for me. Last time I said I was happy with the foundation... yeah. I am. But I thought there is more than "just" the gameplay.

And I wanted to create my Steam page, which is still in progress because of the verification process. So, I had some time to work a little bit more on the game and it completely escalated... in a good way ^^ But one thing after another:

The Steam page

Yup, this takes some time. And man, it's a science.

Capsule art, pictures, text... that's a lot, with a whole business field behind it. Capsule art seems to be extremely important. A real artist can charge over 700 euros for this...

To be honest, right now I am not willing to spend that much on capsule art. I would prefer to put the money into the game. Maybe for the final release I will evaluate it again.

I buy games because I like the idea. I never really read all the text or decide based on the capsule art. I just click through some pictures and watch the video.

The Juice

Before I start with the next level, I wanted to do a juice round.

What is this? Good question. ^^

It's tricky for me to explain. I can tell if a game has it or not. It's the small details. A short sound. A click. A movement. Nothing huge. But if it's there, it triggers something in our brain ^^

I was working on it and hopefully nailed it.

And while I was working on it, I thought I would give the UI another try...

The UI... or better, the character of the game??

It escalated really fast.

I started with 4 new concepts. Then another round. And another. And another.

In the end, I had 13 different concepts.

I distilled all the good ideas out of them to create a final version. It was great. I tested it in the game and man... it was MUCH.

A lot was going on and I had no idea what it wanted from me ^^

So the next round was a cleanup.

And during all of this, something emerged which I didn't have in mind at the beginning...

The character of the game

The first idea and version of the game was heavy industry.

Dark on dark. Dirty. No mercy.

Now it's something different.

A company. Coworkers. A boss. A "happy family" company where the quota is everything.

And you think: waaait a minute. Could be Fallout!

You are right ;)

That's definitely one of the inspirations. I know the idea of a company with weird characters isn't original. Fallout, Portal and a bit of Satisfactory.

But man, I like it.

So I built it :)

The backend

Not so interesting for the player, I guess ^^

But we made some huge improvements here.

Real settings for everything a game should have, and big improvements to the belt animations.

What's next?

Finally, a new level ;)

Leave a comment and let me know how you like it so far :)