Garnelenfischer
Shrimp of Doom
Reef war between shrimp colony and nest. Three tracks, five pressure phases, one pressure wave with a decay time.
Reef war between shrimp colony and nest. Two bases face each other, with three lanes of open reef in between. You win when the opponent's nest falls. You lose if your reef base falls. In between there are five pressure phases and quite a few lionfish.
Status: playable prototype, in development. It runs in the browser, it has sound, it speaks German and English, and it's not finished yet. No release date, nothing to buy. This page shows the status and collects people for the playtest.
How it plays
It is a lane defense with an attacking component. The maps are at the top, the construction zone is on the left, and the train commands are at the bottom. Plankton is the currency, and plankton only comes in if you build foragers early enough. That's the first decision of every game: defend or reap.
What you can build
| Unit | Plankton | For what |
|---|---|---|
| Plankton collector | 50 | brings in plankton. Without them, the game comes to a standstill after two phases. |
| Pistol shrimp | 100 | shoots from a distance. The model does this in real life: snap the scissors, cavitation bubble, pressure wave. |
| Stream shrimp | 150 | works with the water instead of against the opponents. |
| Occult shrimp | 170 | the expensive strange one. |
| Armored shrimp | 80 | Troop. Start at your own base and run. |
| Demon Shrimp | 120 | Troop, more expensive, more unpleasant. |
The pressure wave
Each lane has three buttons: advance, retreat and blast. The advance and retreat move your squads, the pressure wave clears the path and then takes time. It's the only button you press too early out of panic.
Three ways up
Role levels on the maps, base levels via experience and plankton, reef guns per lane. All three cost the same plankton that you need for new units. That's exactly what the appeal is.
What's inside
- Runs in the browser, no installation.
- German and English, switchable in game.
- Two levels of difficulty, Normal and Easy.
- Built levels and random levels. The random level is created from a number. The same number always results in the same level, on every device.
- Sound with mute switch, pause on P, restart on R.
The first level is called Riffkante: three lanes, eight columns, five phases, 34 opponents. Your base holds 1000, the nest 4200. This is intentional. You shouldn't just run through.
Why a shrimp marketplace is building a game
Because a small Swiss marketplace for dwarf shrimp has little reach. A guide about water parameters reaches a few hundred people a month. A game someone stumbles upon on Reddit reaches others. If a tenth of them then want to know how a tank like this actually works, the detour will have been worth it.
In addition, the pistol shrimp in the game shoots because the real one does too. You know things like that if you look at tanks all day long. That was already the mechanics of the game, I just had to write it down.
Have a say
Register if you want to take part in the playtest. You will be notified as soon as there is a stand to play in, and before that you will occasionally get a look at the interim standings. No weekly email, no marketing nonsense.
And the real shrimp?
You can find them from Swiss breeders on the free website Marketplace. If you landed here via the game and are wondering whether you can operate a tank like this yourself: yes, with surprisingly little effort. The shrimp care guide declares it without any intention of selling Species profiles show the colours and matching Food from Japan is available directly from Garnelenfischer. However, there are no plankton collectors.