You attract the attention of a shark. Maybe they can help you catch fish

January 8, 2021 6:31 PM

You are a new shark in an updated strange blue sea
posted by boo_radley (66 comments total)

That is definitely weird.
posted by spacewrench at 6:35 PM on January 8, 2021

Oh no
posted by BuddhaInABucket at 7:02 PM on January 8, 2021 [19 favorites]

Previously.
posted by smcameron at 7:07 PM on January 8, 2021

Are the updates worth me losing a day out of my weekend?

Aw, hell, who am I kidding? Diving in!
posted by blurker at 7:23 PM on January 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

Sharkwater
posted by ovvl at 7:35 PM on January 8, 2021

This just cheered up my evening. The crabs are really cute! Thank you.
posted by Flight Hardware, do not touch at 8:34 PM on January 8, 2021

I am apparently a slightly cannibalistic shark. Which is fine. And I attract several crocodile shark, which is weird. No details about what they think of my habits. Or if they are on my "friends, not food" diet.
No crusty fishermen in sight.
"Here's to swimmin' with bowlegged women." *beer can crush*
posted by TrishaU at 9:04 PM on January 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

Two tabs open now: this sharky clicker game and the post-insurrection discussion thread.

This is my Friday night.
posted by darkstar at 9:25 PM on January 8, 2021 [5 favorites]

Oh no, I remember this one, but it looks like it was recently updated? I'm only playing three other incremental games right now, I can do a fourth. Yeah.
posted by Hamusutaa at 10:04 PM on January 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

Well, there goes the weekend.
posted by desuetude at 10:20 PM on January 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

You are a kitten in a catnip forest.

Oh dear, now I have sharks in one tab and kittens in the other.
posted by loquacious at 10:40 PM on January 8, 2021 [3 favorites]

No way!!!!!! Yayyyyyy!!!!!!!
posted by lepus at 11:10 PM on January 8, 2021

Shark Game took over my life for a while. It really gets going in the quintillions...
posted by Klipspringer at 1:31 AM on January 9, 2021 [1 favorite]

I liked the paperclip one because it had a story and an ending. I've become 'a shark in the space between worlds'. Is there more in terms of story?
posted by Urtylug at 2:15 AM on January 9, 2021 [3 favorites]

So far I've gone through the gate twice and I haven't found anything different from the last time (except maybe some debuffs to the recycler?). Are there actually any substantial changes?
posted by solarion at 3:11 AM on January 9, 2021

I'm still autoplaying Kittens, though I did a full restart a few months ago. It's shocking how long the first round takes, but it's still a great story. They have social tendency choices this time around, which is cool. Always rooting for them kittens.
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:32 AM on January 9, 2021

You are a goldfish learning to play football
posted by BWA at 6:40 AM on January 9, 2021

"Ate a shark. Wait. No, it wasn't a shark."
posted by doctornemo at 6:51 AM on January 9, 2021 [1 favorite]

Science shark!
posted by doctornemo at 6:52 AM on January 9, 2021

No more science from sponges?!? That was my favorite strategy! :(

(Thanks for the heads up on the update! I've enjoyed this game a lot over the years, because sharks doing science never fails to make me smile.)
posted by mixedmetaphors at 8:14 AM on January 9, 2021

Hamusutaa me too.

I'm excited to look at this update! The other game I'm playing right now (Progress Knight) has a speedy early game and then a slow grind.
posted by Braeburn at 8:54 AM on January 9, 2021 [1 favorite]

loquacious, thank you (maybe) for the kitten game.
I keep expecting something dreadful to happen while I turn catnip into wood for a cat library.
posted by doctornemo at 9:11 AM on January 9, 2021

Oh, the truly dreadful things in Kittens Game come later. Just wait until you’re sacrificing unicorns by the thousands.
posted by showbiz_liz at 9:17 AM on January 9, 2021 [2 favorites]

I ran out of steam on Incremancer, started up Kittens Game, got annoyed with the web interface on ipad, bought the app, and have been slowly ticking away at it for a couple weeks now while I try to get enough resources for the next big technological jump (theology, I think). This is the furthest I’ve ever gone in that game.

Maybe I will try the shark one, maybe not.
posted by Mister Moofoo at 10:57 AM on January 9, 2021

Enjoying this one so far, and appreciated having something to help me refocus during class. I prefer the interface to kittens, though I have yet to find anything I like as well as converting the universe into paperclips...
posted by notquitemaryann at 11:27 AM on January 9, 2021 [2 favorites]

maybe we could put links to all these games in one place, so we would know which place to avoid when we have something urgent to do
posted by hat_eater at 12:55 PM on January 9, 2021 [5 favorites]

I seem to have hit a plateau with the sharks. I'm making shark scientists, around 138 of 'em now, and nothing has been added since that capacity.

sharks 1.83K
rays 863
crabs 1.65K
posted by doctornemo at 4:08 PM on January 9, 2021

I made the tremendous mistake of starting this on my phone. Now there is way too much happening for that little screen. And the next technology needs a billion science, with no real multipliers for that on the horizon :(

This would be a fun style of game to code with my kids. Very creative with a simple UI.
posted by qxntpqbbbqxl at 5:24 PM on January 9, 2021

Some other ones I've played recently:
Ethereal Farm currently playing. Leans toward the more idle in terms of pace (i.e. do some stuff, save and leave it for a day) than many others.
Evolve Idle kittens like in scope/length (dropped off this one but kept me with it for a good while).
Gridle has a finite end and is relatively short.
Game Dev Tree has a finite end but is not particularly short.
posted by juv3nal at 6:58 PM on January 9, 2021 [3 favorites]

Every time I click 'Hire Ray' I think, 'what's so good about Ray?'
posted by batter_my_heart at 8:03 PM on January 9, 2021 [2 favorites]

I seem to have hit a plateau with the sharks.

Took a minute to notice, but there's now a 'laboratory' tab that opens up above the central image that lets you start researching. Other facilities you unlock also become tabs up there.
posted by FatherDagon at 9:05 PM on January 9, 2021 [3 favorites]

To anyone discovering this for the first time, this is the updated version. The original was discussed in the "previously" linked in the third comment above. You'll find some good guidance there.

Last time I did this, a few weeks ago, I believe I got stuck on some kind of 6-way portal things that I couldn't get through.
posted by intermod at 9:31 PM on January 9, 2021 [1 favorite]

it is especially pleasing to me that FatherDagon enjoys this game
posted by boo_radley at 10:38 PM on January 9, 2021 [2 favorites]

Took a minute to notice, but there's now a 'laboratory' tab that opens up above the central image that lets you start researching. Other facilities you unlock also become tabs up there.

Oh my gods thank you.
posted by desuetude at 11:11 PM on January 9, 2021 [1 favorite]

>there's now a 'laboratory' tab that opens up above the central image that lets you start researching

That's way too subtle.

On the plus side I've built up a lot of resources waiting for something to happen.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 11:40 PM on January 9, 2021 [2 favorites]

"there's now a 'laboratory' tab that opens up" - yes, I did not see that on my own. No idea how long it's been there.
posted by doctornemo at 7:54 AM on January 10, 2021 [2 favorites]

Is it worth getting the very expensive upgrades for 1000m or 80b science before going through the gate or should one just go through the gates as they open?
posted by roolya_boolya at 1:22 PM on January 10, 2021 [1 favorite]

Is it worth getting the very expensive upgrades for 1000m or 80b science before going through the gate or should one just go through the gates as they open?

I remember doing it just to see whether they unlocked any other research, but that stuff doesn't carry over, so for efficiency's sake I think you just go through.
posted by juv3nal at 3:07 PM on January 10, 2021 [1 favorite]

One interesting aspect of this game is that there's a tax on volume (I.e., it costs more than ten times as much to buy 10 fish as 1 fish ten times, etc.) I don't remember anything like that from Cookie Clicker.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:21 PM on January 10, 2021

It's worth getting a whale chorus before saving your game to a text file and coming back to it three years later.
posted by Phssthpok at 11:28 PM on January 10, 2021 [3 favorites]

So the multipliers with the worlds, how do I read those?
posted by MattWPBS at 5:10 AM on January 12, 2021

After the previously link I played this game incessantly for weeks(?) and got so frustrated with the UI that I started rewriting it in Reactjs but the project fell by the wayside. I'm glad to see the updates and am trying to resist a new obsession.
posted by bendy at 9:06 AM on January 12, 2021

So I had a history [1, 2] with the shark game, culminating in my breaking the shark game [3]and leaving it. Now I have a new computer and I'm back! From what I can tell the biggest new update is that there's a progressive tax imposed by the recycling machine. So now the more you recycle the less efficient it is. There's an upgrade in the laboratory to make increase the threshold for decreasing efficiency, but that thresshold is still going to result in near zero efficiency once you get into the sextillions/septillions/octillions/lots.

So for what that means in terms of strategy, while I'm just racing through to collect essence and artifacts and increase my climate level, I'm fine with losing a bunch of stuff to the recycler just to get enough to feed the gate quickly. But once I've collected all the level 10 artifacts and start going into just hoard as much as I can hoard, then I think I'm going to need to "buy" things with the currency you buy them in and avoid the recycler as much as possible. It's going to be like a whole new game. And of course the cheat I used to break the game the last time will not work anymore.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 6:39 PM on January 12, 2021 [3 favorites]

Gah! It lost my data on my iPad. I still have entries for all the stuff I had, but they all read NaN.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 5:37 PM on January 13, 2021

ChurchHatesTucker: Did you see my "I broke the game" post? That NaN basically means you want up past infinity.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 6:25 PM on January 13, 2021

Nah, I was nowhere near high enough for that to be it.

It's interesting that it remembers which world I'm in. I did lose my progress totem, though.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:21 PM on January 13, 2021

So I'm getting "you see new updates swimming toward you. Click to update." I click, but it's not clear what's updating. Anyone have any idea?
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 10:14 AM on January 14, 2021

So looks like there was a recent update according to the Discord (https://discord.gg/PK2mfJSk). Not seeing the "you see new updates" message when I load the page and import. Maybe try exporting then clearing temporary internet files/cookies.

Also, Whale Chorus has been buffed. I'm getting 1.44 essence per hour... and I've set myself a calendar reminder to check back in a few weeks.
posted by erikred at 4:35 PM on January 14, 2021

Oh, I just noticed the new "swapped producers and pr oduced" option on the grotto. Super helpful. And I just got a whale chorus, which there wasn't much point getting before.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 7:12 PM on January 14, 2021 [1 favorite]

Also, Whale Chorus has been buffed.

Not any more! I was getting 1.44 or 2.88 essence/hour but now only get 0.002/hr.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 12:11 PM on January 17, 2021

Not any more! I was getting 1.44 or 2.88 essence/hour but now only get 0.002/hr.

I think it depends on the world and the modifiers, right? I'm getting the 2.88 in a Haven Ocean.
posted by MattWPBS at 7:00 AM on January 18, 2021 [1 favorite]

I'm currently getting 1.44/hr on a Marine (2) world with a Totem of Whale (2). I'm thinking the totem may be a multiplier, but I didn't note when I picked them up (it was after my first Chorus, below.)

Before that I was on a Tempestuous World (6) which made a Chorus pointless, as the Essence was crazy low (0.0003 or something/hr) and the Chorus died from the environment rather quickly.

Before that I was on an Abandoned World (1) and the Whales never showed.

Before that I was on another Marine World (2) and my first Chorus got 0.98 or something.

Not sure what the world modifiers indicate. They seem loosely correlated to difficulty (but the Abandoned 1 was much harder than the Marine 2s.) Also, I'm not sure what the point of difficult worlds is. They don't seem to offer commensurate rewards in Essence or totems.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 9:40 AM on January 18, 2021

Yeah, it doesn't seem like the difficult worlds offer anything more than a challenge.

Been through about 5 worlds including a couple of Havens; whale chorus remains stubbornly low. Guess I just have to luck into one with a high multiplier.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 10:01 AM on January 18, 2021

Do you have Whale Totems?
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 10:26 AM on January 18, 2021

Yeah, to level 4. I dunno; highest chorus I've had recently is 0.2-ish.

TBH though I think I've probably reached the end of the current content. I have enough totems that I can rip through most worlds in 10m or so; and although it keeps offering me higher and higher worlds they don't seem to be getting any more difficult.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:18 AM on January 18, 2021

They don't get more difficult. They get easier. I mean the gates get more expensive, especially if you don't have gate controller totems, but everything multiplies faster. When I was ripping through the game last time, one of my last challenges to myself before deciding I wanted "lots of everything" was how fast I could get through a world, and 50 seconds or so was the lower limit I hit. Because you have to click thorugh different pages, you can't get through much faster than that. But you can get lots of everything. Highly satisyfing. I recommend it.

In Haven world, climate level 833, I'm getting 1.44 essence per hour right now. I also have totem of whale up to level 4. But I don't see a multiplier for it in the grotto, so I don't know if whale totem applies to whale chorus.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 12:04 PM on January 18, 2021

It doesn't. But Time Anemone does.
posted by Too-Ticky at 8:28 AM on January 19, 2021 [1 favorite]

Weird trick on Tempestuous worlds where your Chorus dies: You apparently can have more than one Chorus, just not two or more. So, you can add another Chorus as soon as the first drops to 0.9. It rounds down to an even 1, but your essence rate will be nearly doubled (briefly.)
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 10:16 AM on January 20, 2021

I had forgotten this since the last time I played this game, so it probably bears repeating:
The way to get more essence for each run is to pick a world with a high climate level. You can see more options by refreshing the page (ending up back at the Gateway) and again, clicking on Worlds. You can basically do this as often as you like.
Choose your World, but don't do in just yet. First go back and pick artifacts, if you want any. Then enter your chosen World.
posted by Too-Ticky at 4:32 AM on January 24, 2021

I do the opposite. Refresh til I'm offered artifacts I want. Then I get the artifacts and go pick the highest climate-level offered.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 6:44 PM on January 24, 2021

New updates have arrived! The changelog states:

New Frontiers 0.11 - New Foundations (2021/1/27):

New, greatly improved UI for everything.
Rebalanced stuff.
Added world themes, so the page now changes color depending on what world you're in.
Added a TPS/FPS setting, to make the game smoother and nicer to look at, or chunkier and easier on performance.
Custom purchase amounts.
Added a 'grace period'. Ice doesn't build up if you have no income for anything.
Artifact descriptions and distant foresight planet properties are useful.
See 5 artifact choices instead of 3. On that note, buffed base essence to 4 per world.

I've definitely noticed the world themes: each planet has their own color scheme. It looks very nice.
posted by Too-Ticky at 11:57 PM on January 29, 2021

There seems to be a bug in the game with (at least) sponge increments.

My sponge is increasing at 443B/s, but the sponge itself should be contributing 20.7T/s (I have a lot of sponge). It's like the sponge self-income is being ignored.
posted by It's Never Lurgi at 2:38 PM on February 1, 2021

My whale chorus seems to be *always* 0.002/hr now; no matter what world I choose.

An annoying bug on worlds with tar too: no matter how many purifiers I throw at it, the tar keeps bouncing between zero and non-zero, killing off my livestock.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 4:09 PM on February 1, 2021

So can someone help me figure out: Am I better off building machines that process things rather than processing by clicking the function. Like if I want spronge, should I build a spronge smelter? Will that get me cheaper spronge than processing it myself periodically? Also, spronge requires residue. Should I get a bunch of residue machines instead of recycling stuff?
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 8:42 PM on February 5, 2021

I have no idea about the relative efficiencies of machines versus manual processing (iirc there are upgrades for the machines so it may depend on if you have those or not?), but one thing machines do is you can let them run unattended.
posted by juv3nal at 4:19 PM on February 7, 2021

Right now I'm getting a slightly better deal with the auto-transmuter (12 sand + 4.9 crystal = 1 sharkonium) than with clicking (15 + 5 = 1). I have all the research upgrades, though. I'll have to pay attention to what the baseline is. (I don't think any of the artifacts affect efficiency, do they?)

My whale chorus seems to be *always* 0.002/hr now; no matter what world I choose.

The Time Anemone seems to be the thing that affects essence. I'm guessing you've got a 'power 3' one?
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 11:06 AM on February 8, 2021