The Tree of Life

A top-down adventure game about emotional power, developed as a part of Guildford Game Jam: Power (2018). In this 2D sandbox, the player-controlled main character possesses a special power, allowing her to heal her ill mother through the surrounding world. After venturing deeper into the forest, however, the player must confront the realization that the cost for this is the death of everything nearby.

The game was developed as a part of a 6-person team.

January 2019 Update: After a busy 2018, I finally got the time, over the month of December, to update the gameplay loop and add more character to the world. The Tree of Life required quite a lot of polish after the game jam, it was created during, in May 2018.

As of the latest build, the world is much bigger, and procedurally generated, outside of the starting- and endgame areas. The gameplay loop is more balanced, making each venture into the forest/island more tense, as time goes on, as the resources around Mom start to deplete, the longer the game goes on. The journey to the World Tree, and the engame area, also requires some player ingenuity, avoiding the marsh area and any enemies. The player can now, also, teleport back to Mom at will.

I still intend to post a follow-up update, as there are still some animations and audio fx missing. I also need to create a sprite for the enemies in the game, as they are placeholders right now.

The code for the game, can also be found on GitHub, alongside the Readme, laying out my plan for everything left to do on the Tree of Life.

Controls

  • W/A/S/D : Movement
  • Space : Collect energy
  • LShift : Deliver energy
  • LCtrl : Teleport back to Mom

Credits

You can download The Tree of Life here. As mentioned above, source code can be found here.