Gameplay Enhancement Suggestions from a Long-Term Life-Sim Player
Make Activities Interactive Instead of Passive Animations
Activities such as playing soccer, badminton, water gun fights, or snowball fights should allow players to control the characters directly (like playing a mini sports or shooting game), rather than simply triggering preset animations. The game should also display the score of both sides.
(This would greatly increase the fun and engagement and greatly improve engagement and replay value. players will no longer feel like thereās nothing to do! Even lightweight mechanics would make free time activities feel meaningful.)
Add Ingredient-Based Cooking for Better Life Simulation
Cooking a dish should require the correct ingredients and quantities; otherwise, the character can only order delivery or go out to eat.
(Cooking would feel much more rewarding and motivate players to go shopping. Shopping and cooking will all feel more fun and meaningful! This would naturally create stronger connections between cooking, shopping, budgeting, and daily planning.)
Characters should be able to use strangersā belongings (e.g., sleeping on a strangerās bed) instead of being completely restricted. However, this should lead to consequences: NPCs may scold, warn, or even become angry and try to fight if the behavior is too intrusive.
Increase Movement Freedom & Reduce Invisible Walls
Characters should be able to jump, climb walls, cross fences, obstacles, and vegetation, and walk on any surface without being blocked by invisible āair wallsā from buildings or stairs. Similar to GTA Vās high level of freedom, players should even be able to place characters on rooftops.
(Most players dislike air wallsāthey break the sense of exploration and immersion.)
Iād love to play one generation to the next. E.g. Start off in medieval times and as generations change, new objects appear and access to new thingsā¦ It would be interesting to also have fantasy and sci fi worlds as well.
Credit all images to Gemini AI and Chat GPT as I am terrible at drawing
I totally agree with you. Itās really interesting and it will make InZoi unique. Starting a dynasty, for example, from the Middle Ages to the present (such as Crusader Kings and Civilization), can really be a distinguishing feature of InZoi from other games of this genre. Otherwise, you can change 10 generations, and the world will remain the same as before.
Yes. I have already written that this should be the case when using the first or third person for manual control. Mini-games should be for example: cooking, cleaning, baseball, vending machines, etc. For example, as implemented in the new game - NTE.
Weāve already discussed this. The current system is designed the way it is for a reason. Dishes in the game are very complex in composition, and buying all the ingredients for them would be quite tedious. Thatās why thereās a balance now: some dishes are cooked simply for money, while unique ones require ingredients. If we strictly require all products to be present, weād have to completely redesign the purchasing interface. Right now, every vegetable, seed, or item has to be bought separately. And if I need 20-30 different items, it becomes a problem.
Iād suggest an option where dishes that require ingredients give mood bonuses when consumed. Then there would be some point to visiting the store, but if the player doesnāt need it, they can still cook regular food while increasing their cooking skill.
That would be wonderful. But then how would we create world boundaries if we get rid of these walls? Right now, in something like Cahaya, there are small hedges that create a logical obstacle. If they can be jumped over, what then? Weād end up hitting a transparent wall just the same.
Yes, thatās a brilliant idea. But in scope, thatās enough for a whole separate game, if not several. Can you imagine how many game mechanics weād have to work out if we started playing as peasants in fields and monarchs, gradually progressing through industrial revolution mechanics and beyond?.. And then also advance into the future!.. Thatās incredibly ambitious!
But considering that questions about this were in the survey that the developers conducted, I think theyāre considering this direction for the game. Very far in the future, most likely, and contingent on the seriesā success, but theyāre considering it. And thatās very encouraging!
Oh! Thatās a really cool idea! Iāve always dreamed of a game like this!
I once bought a wonderful game on Steam called āAncestors: The Humankind Odyssey.ā You play as a monkey, developing your tribe, skills, and so on.
I thought the developers would continue the game in the next installment because the ending was promisingāthe monkey already became human at the end. But apparently they lacked the enthusiasm or something to continue.
But I donāt think the developers of Inzoi will go down that path, because it would be a completely different game. Maybe someday theyāll make a new game like Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey. Iād like to hope so.
I get what youāre saying, haha. If they do see it as something possible, Iām willing to pay for DLC/Expansion content for it, too. A workaround would be making cities/towns/worlds that fit the time period and then we have the option of leaving that world or remaining there. So instead of us travelling from Cahaya to Bliss Bay, we could take a ship/carriage/steam train/wagon/stage coach/horse etc from one period to the next
Yes, a fantastic option for DLC! Iād be willing to pay for something like that too, because I can imagine how much work it would require. And if we could decide for ourselves when to advance our dynasty further in history by relocating - it seems to me this would really allow us to combine the existing gameplay with different historical eras!
Of course, script refinement and adaptation of mechanics would still be needed, but at the same time this could prepare the game for implementing a āChallenge Modeā, where certain actions would be prohibited (or allowed) within the chosen playstyle. For example, in the Middle Ages or when playing on an āuninhabited islandā, you could wash clothes by clicking on a basin or just on water instead of using washing machines. And so on. That would be thrilling!
