v0.1.1

Excited to share this development build of Garden Party.

For now, we've hewn pretty closely to our source material - Party House from UFO 50. The initial shop of vegetables and plants is more or less borrowed verbatim. There are a few tweaks here and there (e.g. plants don't shuffle together to fill gaps when one is removed like party guests would), but for now gameplay largely mirrors the moment-to-moment and long term strategic structure  of our inspiration.

Our goal is to mutate this framework to handle the specific problem of cultivating a small scale ecosystem in your backyard. We want to work with specific plants, animals, and insects of the Prairie biome near where we live, but also embrace the issues presented by working in a tiny Chicago backyard. We're corresponding with some ecologists and botanists to get more expert opinions, but those will be the next big moves for this project. Expect a big update once those messages come through.

The version we have right now has some quirks. MON and POP don't really connect perfectly to the problem we're working through. Maybe "nectar" and "host plants" - qualities key to supporting butterfly populations?  Changing those resources will necessarily dramatically skew the actual card file. Plants also suggest positional relationships to me - garden tools like sprinklers or shade plants supporting more fragile neighbors. Party House cared very little about position, so that will likely become a big differentiator.

I also really feel the total lack of "juice." The pop in effect when a plant appears is a good start, but this game needs feedback animations, sounds, and transitions something fierce.

- Cameron