Description

Required libraries: graphx, keypadc, fileioc

Conway's Ecosystem is a mini ecosystem simulator inspired by Conway's Game of Life set on an 80 by 60 board of cells, updating each tick according to a set of rules, like Conway's Game of Life. HOWEVER, instead of there being only one species of cell, Conway's Ecosystem boasts 9 species, 2 of them being plants, and 7 of them being animals. Animals, unlike traditional cellular automata, can move around and have much more continuity, living and dying not based on neighbor count but due to energy levels, age, and whether or not there are predators nearby (which may hunt and kill them). These species, both plant and animal, can interact with each other to form an ecosystem with emergent behavior. Your goal is to try to craft an ecosystem that is both stable (no to few extinctions) and has variety.

Of course, it is not named Conway's Ecosystem for nothing, as the two plant types, being Shrubs and Trees, both display Conway-like characteristics, albeit with ecological-like additions. Shrubs reproduce, live, and die according to the traditional game of life ruleset, but also have a regenerating energy variable that is decreased whenever plant-eating animals eat from the shrub. Once this energy level reaches zero, the shrub dies regardless of neighbor count. Trees reproduce according to the B2/L0123 ruleset, but with a twist, that being that trees possess a vulnerable sapling phase that does not regenerate energy and is especially vulnerable to consumption. When in adult form, trees have a higher energy cap, update slower, and are generally consumed less than shrubs, giving them a better chance of survival. Eventually, trees will reproduce enough to form what can be described as a forest, representing the base of a food chain.

As for the animals...well it may take too long to fully describe their behavior here. Attached with the binary is a README that goes in depth, and in the program itself is a rules menu that is much more cursory but may be a more comfortable read. There are seven types, those being the Insect, Herbivore, Insectivore, Predator, Apex, Sapient, and Mega, each representing some niche in real ecosystems, their behavior modeling that. Every animal interacts with almost every other animal in a direct manner, whether it be predation, competition, or avoidance, leading to food chains of flowing energy between animals. However, food chains are really really really hard to balance! If hunters are introduced too early, prey do not get enough chances to reproduce and go extinct. If hunters are introduced too late, prey hit critical mass and eviscerate vegetation (or their own prey). Honestly, I don't know if any system is permanently stable, so don't get frustrated if your system collapses after 300 ticks or so, just get the best time you can. There are also some other really important mechanics relating to animals that I won't go in depth here, like sexual reproduction, juvenile periods, decomposition, social behavior, long distance prey tracking, etc. because it would form a wall of text, so if you do decide to download this program, make sure to read the README file or take a look at the rules screen.

Also features:

- Save/load system
- Tools for utility and information
- Zoom and speed settings, due to space constraints, sprites are only visible at 4x zoom

If you find any bugs or anything amiss, please contact me!!!

Controls (also listed on the README and in-program)

- Arrow keys: Pan camera, move cursor, change selection in menus
- Enter/2ND: Change from placement to playing mode, confirms options in menus
- Mode: Hide/show minimap
- Add/Sub: Change speed in playing mode
- Mult/Div: Zoom in and out in playing and placing mode
- Delete: Exit to main menu
- Numbers 0-9: Place organisms, each corresponding to one key. Shrubs, trees, insects, herbivores, insectivores, predators, apexes, sapients, and megas are 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, in that order
- Clear: Remove all organisms from selected cell
- Exponent: Open tools menu

If anyone wants to improve it, I'll share the source code.

Screenshots