Developer Interview: Time to Morp

Hello, my name is Artjom, and I’m a game development addict. I’ve been making games my whole life, and in Team HalfBeard (the team behind Time to Morp) my role is to make sure that the game is played like an actual game. Additionally, I am responsible for bringing snacks to the office.

We have been creating tiny games for years now, and even released one title called Dude, Stop! We all live in Latvia, share the same office space, do pizza parties where we fight over which co-op game we're gonna play next, and in the remaining time — we work on developing Time to Morp. But our ambitions extend beyond just one type of game, we aspire to create various genres! Just give us time and a coffee, and watch us go!

The idea was always to make a game about cute creatures and automation. Unlike other games focused on automation where conveyor belts are commonly used to move items around, we knew this approach wouldn't work for our game, as our creatures prefer to roam freely rather than sit still on moving platforms. And that’s where the fun part started — inventing all the tools for automating resources, interacting, building, filtering Morps, satisfying their needs, and so on. It took us a while to “discover” a game and figure out how everything fits together. There is no game out in the wild that we could just take inspiration, or “copy homework” from, so a lot of trial and error happened over time.

One of the big changes was that we focused a lot on automation, and our first quest was to create a pump system for filtering Morps based on their needs to move them around the base, which was, as you can already guess — too complicated in a game with cute and colourful creatures. So the big shift happened, and we tuned down the difficulty a lot, and returned the focus to Morps, allowing more fun and relaxing gameplay.

Another change happened when we realised that you can’t expand the base forever, like in any other game about automation — you’ll lose the focus on Morps. Having thousands of Morps in your base would dilute the focus on them, making them feel insignificant and indistinguishable. So we had to come up with a “go deeper” way to play, instead of “go wider”. You level up your Morps, improve their home, build advanced tech to support new creatures, satisfy their needs... Basically, you upgrade your existing base, instead of building a copy of it. This change made Morps more meaningful and integral to the gameplay experience.

I personally played so much of Factorio and Satisfactory, to the extent that I wouldn't be surprised if elements from them influence all my future games. However, I understand that it might be challenging to see the similarities between the more factory-oriented Factorio and the creature-oriented Time to Morp.

Another game that influenced us with its superb world exploration — Genshin Impact! It served as a valuable case study for creating a world that players genuinely want to explore and feel rewarded for doing so. While we acknowledge that we're not at that level yet, we have set a goal to strive for, at the very least.

Oh, that’s our pain point! We are still balancing these aspects, we are arguing a lot about how complex or friendly mechanics should be.

The game looks cute, fun, and relaxing. Creatures are cute and colourful. The Pumps mechanic, used for automating your base, has the potential to be incredibly complex and powerful. In theory, you could even code another game within Time to Morp using this mechanic. So, how do these two worlds coexist in our game? Well, we hope to achieve this through a super smooth learning curve!

Previously, we began the game by introducing Pumps, Filters and Conditions, but players soon pointed out how wrong we were. So we moved complex stuff for later, and introduced easier and faster mechanics that can be utilised with just a simple click! Our goal is that by the end of the in-game tutorial, after players have experienced all the introductory buildings, everything will be crystal clear, and using Pumps will feel intuitive. We aim for players to automate their bases in ways that even we couldn't have predicted!

We have so many Morp designs, that we can publish a book about them! But it’s been super fun seeing new creatures our artist comes up with, and imagining what these creatures could be doing and how they would behave or how they would chase the player! Sometimes we know what Morps we want and how they should look, based on the theme, or the resources we have, but sometimes we go in the opposite direction, and implement a design that we really like, and build a mechanic around it. And we are just starting, actually! The whole team is asking me “Where is a new Morp?” every day, so I bet we will have a lot more opportunities to create new creatures!

Short answer: the one we haven't implemented yet! Initially, we had more complex Morp behaviours, but they proved challenging to automate and play with in the early game. Therefore, we decided to reserve these Morps for the endgame. In a few patches, we hope to reintroduce these quirky Morps in the late-game, where players will be better prepared for Morps to steal their resources or even to be pushed off a cliff by mysterious Morps while hearing their giggling...

Apparently, players really enjoy quests! We had more tasks and objectives in "First Contact" than in the full game, and people actually enjoyed it! So, we had to revisit and revamp the questing system in Time to Morp, making it smoother and adding more steps in between. This approach allows for a slower introduction of mechanics, giving players time to learn them on their own.

We have a huge backlog filled with numerous fixes, improvements, ideas, and Morps that we want to add. Plus, we haven't completed the story yet, introduced all the characters or mechanics, and the map is only half the size it should be. There's so much more we want to incorporate into the game!

For example, one of the mechanics that we want to add is a Rollercoaster! You can take a ride yourself, or place Morps onto it to move them across the map. It should be super fun to build and ride!

Players are requesting Player Housing, for which we've already begun creating concept art. Or fishing, which we've designed but haven't had time to implement yet. Or how about new Ice and Fire Biomes? The possibilities for Time to Morp are vast, and we're excited to release it and see what ideas players come up with that we can incorporate into the game!

Caves. And flying islands, or perhaps even flying Morps? It's a tough choice, but definitely caves to explore alongside your trusty Morp companion!