I'm sort of a connoisseur of these kind of games, they're my favorite. I've spent years googling and downloading obscure games from the 90's trying to get my fix. There are some good programs out there but the mainstream hasn't taken to creating something special since the late 90's, save for a few indie projects. It seems like artificial genetic evolution games waned in popularity, then the advent of neural networks seems to have taken the people that were interested in further study and development to focus on that.
Here's some the games I've found and I still play from time to time, this has literally been years of looking so I hope you guys have some fun;
Darwins Pond- The first evolution game I stumbled acrossDarwin Bots- This game has an executable DNA language you can code your own organisms in, watch as random mutations change your bots into something completely different , or design the ultimate killer and pit it against some of the top bots of yesteryear. (Development halted in 2016 but the game is still playable)
Species ALRE: Probably the most recent and well known out of this niche genre, I watched the creator struggle to make this dream come true and eventually get on steam where the development has accelerated dramatically. Create an environment and watch these worm like creatures speciate and adapt to the environmental pressures around it, very very addicting. Predator/prey relationships can develop too.
Biogenesis: This game looks deceptively simple, but I've probably logged over 1000 hours in it. I'm linking to the Color Mod, it's a maintained version of the game with a lot of additional changes. Creatures are made up off lines and colors, each color corresponds to an ability. Green is photosynthetic and converts atmospheric CO2 into Oxygen. The enviroment will always realistically balance itself out to Earthlike atmospheric conditions. Watch as the organisms speciate and adapt to it's enviroment. This game looks like an acid trip when it's running.
Gridword: This one is probably my favorite, it's an indie game on Steam that plays similar to the other games. The catch is these agent based bots are controlled by a genetic neural network. You can start with a primordial soup and wait for something to evolve, or you can plop in a generic ancestor and watch the organized chaos ensue. There's a lot of different parts for the agent to take advantage off, and it rewires the neural net through genetic evolution. For emergent behavior, this game takes the cake. I've seen agents start working together and create proto multicelluar masses. Very very intriguing.
For an honorable mention I'll include Grandroids. I've been waiting for this game for just over 8 years. Steve Grand, the creator of the first three Creatures games ran a KS 8 years ago to create the ultimate artificial life simulator. He's apparently been hard at work but all of his public updates ceased over the years ( apparently if you're a backer he updates you on his website, and they're content with progress I guess).
These are just a couple of the games I've found over the years, but they're by far the most interesting. Does anyone else have any recommendations or games in a similar vein?
I hope you guys find the same joy of these games as I have, and maybe the genre can grow.
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