Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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jztemple2
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Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by jztemple2 »

I picked up Megaquarium at 35% off on the Steam Summer Sale. I'd gotten the previous game, Big Pharma, from this developer and thought it was pretty good, so when Megaquarium was announced I started following the newsfeed. When it was released out of Early Access I still waited, but the reviews have been pretty good and the developer has been very active in taking feedback from the community and making timely updates. And Steam Workshop support is in beta, so I took the leap.

This is a tycoon game, but on the light side. Nothing too heavy duty, not really even any spreadsheets other than a simple profit/loss chart. You build tanks and supply the associated support equipment, hire staff, put in fish and then with the Science, Prestige and Ecology points you earn you can unlock more fish, equipment, decorations, that sort of thing.

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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by Daehawk »

Looks neat. I want to love this type game but usually find them difficult and complicated. Im still wishing for a great arcade sim like this where I can build Flynns or my old hometown one. I got one that looked perfect but turned out to be a click fest where i had to click to repair and click to empty the change box and so on..yawn. Not looking for mobile crap on my PC. Ill look into this. But $17 is above my price point for this type game. $8 is about my limit.
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by jztemple2 »

Yeah I'd say that this game is going to appeal to folks who don't want to deal with a lot of complications in a tycoon game. Also supposedly all the fish names and details are authentic so it can be a learning experience as well. The game tutorial is presented as a series of missions, but the real fun will be in Sandbox mode.

Also I think I was wrong about Early Access, it released at 1.0 back in September. There have been about twenty updates to make fixes and also add features, the last one in April. The Workshop beta went live a few days ago. This is what the dev had to say:
Why beta?
Firstly it will give modders a chance to get used to the workshop and upload their creations before the full public launch. By the time the public launch comes it should be nicely stocked with all manner of things to play with!

Secondly it gives everyone, modders and players alike, a chance to give feedback on features, request new ones and report bugs.

With that in mind, please take extra care using mods during the beta period. I recommend that you manually save any existing games before applying mods in case they break the game.

Another note: the new mod manager in-game is in English only currently. When the full launch comes it will be localised into your local language.

How long will the beta last?
This depends on the volume of feedback/requests that come back. Somewhere between 2 and 6 weeks is probable.
Here are a few projects already available in the beta:
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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Here's a larger aquarium I've built as part of the campaign. Playing on Normal difficulty I've not really had to worry about money flow, as I earn more than enough each day to pay salaries, maintenance and still be able to expand. There are also difficulty levels of Hard and Brutal which make it more of a challenge, but right now I'm happy to just enjoy the easier Normal difficulty.

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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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Steam Workshop support for Megaquarium launched today, with the developer posting his own mod of a nurse shark plus three videos on how the mod was made.

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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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Megaquarium is also on sale at 40% off till July 30th.
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by jztemple2 »

Another cool thing, you can walk around your aquarium in first person:

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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by jztemple2 »

For those who might be interested, there is a DLC for Megaquarium to be released on June 4th called Freshwater Frenzy.
Freshwater Frenzy is the first Deluxe Expansion for Megaquarium. It adds a brand new environment for you to explore and master – freshwater!

Your new inhabitants
From the prehistoric Arapaima to the infamous Piranha, Freshwater Frenzy is packed full of new species to discover. There are new care requirements to learn and demanding new aquascaping requirements to fulfil. From floating cover to bogwood, providing everything your inhabitants need will challenge even the seasoned curator!

Become a breeder
For the first time in Megaquarium history you will be able to rear baby animals in your aquarium. But make no mistake, fulfilling the unique breeding requirements of each animal is no easy task. Then there’s raising the young themselves, a job fraught with difficulties and requiring your constant attention.
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Ready, get set, hybridize!
Some species can even be hybridized. By selective breeding you can create color and pattern combinations that reflect your style.
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Introducing pH
If that wasn’t enough, some animals will require you to maintain a specific pH in the tank. Will you satisfy this with clever use of passive sources? Or will you let the machines do the heavy lifting? The choice is yours.

Accessories and posters
Accessories are a brand new tool in your arsenal to optimize your aquarium. Equip them on your staff for powerful bonuses, but choose carefully, only one accessory may be equipped at a time. Disseminate facts and fun by placing informative posters around your aquarium. Their value relies on the contents of the connected tank so design your exhibits wisely.
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Reptiles and new tanks
Reptiles such as turtles and crocs require land as well as water. Thankfully there are new tank designs which fulfil this need. Meanwhile, tanks with suspended platforms can be used to bridge different areas of your aquarium together, while exciting your guests with a thrilling new perspective!

Freshwater masterclass
Explore everything that freshwater has to offer by completing the Freshwater Frenzy campaign. Each mission will challenge you to make the most of the new additions and explore the game in new ways.

Features
5 levels in a freshwater-focused campaign
30 freshwater species
7 new tanks
4 accessories to equip your staff
Dozens of new objects including decorations, plants, equipment and posters
4 brand new paints to keep your aquarium looking “fresh”
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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My father said that anything is interesting if you bother to read about it - Michael C. Harrold
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by jztemple2 »

Two new items to get you in the swim :D :D

New free update: v2.0.3 Ledger, Live Cultures and many more tweaks and improvements!
v2.0.3 is now live!

Ahead of the launch of Freshwater Frenzy tomorrow today(!) I thought I would push the base game update a day early so people could get used to some of the new features before diving into the expansion.

Ledger
The animals ledger (found via the little fish-book icon in the bottom right) allows you to view all your animals and tanks in one place.
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If you switch the filter to problems, it will only show you tanks/animals which have problems associated with them - very handy!

Live cultures
Live Mysis, Live Lug Worms and the new Live Artemia are all now Live Cultures.
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This means that these food dispensers need to be fed themselves with Zoo Plankton. Don't worry, your old saves will work just fine, but you may need to pop down a couple of extra Zoo Plankton dispensers.

Tunnel tanks now generate prestige!
Support has been added for tanks themselves to generate prestige. The small and large tunnel tank will each have a chance to generate a new prestige thought when your guest views it. Just like every other prestige thought, a guest can only enjoy an object once. So don't go filling your aquarium with 100% tunnel tanks - it won't work!

Three new achievements
To celebrate the launch of the expansion I decided to add 3 new achievements. They focus on sandbox play and can be completed with or without the expansion installed.

Sandbox Trials - Standard - In Sandbox mode, reach rank 12 using the Standard preset on normal difficulty or higher.
Sandbox Trials - Limited - In Sandbox mode, reach rank 12 using the Limited Supply preset on normal difficulty or higher.
Sandbox Trials - Completionist - In Sandbox mode, unlock every animal using the Quick Start preset on hard difficulty or higher.

That's some of the highlights but check out the following list for all of the changes.
Spoiler:
Ledger added.
Live cultures added.
Moon Jelly now eats Zoo Plankton.
Guests don't like seeing food/tool dispensers now! Put them behind the scenes with your filters. ;)
You can now set default paint for new construction by right clicking on the paint in the build menu.
Improved messages - growth events have a clickable link to the animal and you get a message when a tank is too small for an animal to grow up.
Tunnel tanks generate prestige.
Increased prestige of some of the more prestigious animals (some sharks, green turtle).
Costs of most animals have gone up a small amount in a balance pass. The cost of some high prestige (12+) animals has been increased quite a bit as they were underpriced before. Noticeably the Whale Shark and Manta Ray both cost 2-3x what they cost before.
New reliability icon tells you estimated time between breakdowns so it's more useful in making judgements between equipment.
Tweaked equipment reliabilities so that they remain useful throughout the game.
The aquarium can now be closed. You can find the toggle by selecting the entrance.
A number of sharks and rays require skill now.
Autofeeder cannot be used on as many animals due to previous change. The time between breakdowns has been increased to make it more competitive.
Research window now scrolls rather than shrinking the projects. It also has unlimited capacity now.
Build menu scroll speed has been capped for when the menu gets very full (with mods!)
Improved tooltip for growth icon.
Tweaked tooltip for tank depth and require tank depth icons for compatibility with expansion.
Tweaked tooltip for warning/danger to icons for compatibility with expansion objects. It now shows the size as a range. "Fish" has been replaced with "Animals" so that it can include reptiles and mammals. Mechanically nothing has changed. It basically means any animal that is not a crustacean, starfish, clam, gorgonian, soft coral, stony coral or anemone.
Added new icons for starfish, clam, gorgonian, soft coral, scavenger, anemone and empty dispenser.
Guests holding balloons can go inside toilets now.
Animals move between containers e.g. they will move between all parts of the u-shaped tank.
Small tunnel tank has an extra container at the top to allow animals to swim over.
Mega tank is now a large tank instead of huge. It doesn't need its own category.
Food dispensers appear before the fish in the search so they are easier to find.
Improved scenery placement on tanks with sunken floors. The scenery now appears at the cursor instead of below it.
Messages with enclosed objects do not jump to the top when you pick one up.
Creator mode starts on rank 12 so you have access to better staff.
The quick start preset has been tweaked to work better with the new achievement.
3 new achievements: Sandbox Trials - Standard, Sandbox Trials - Limited, Sandbox Trials - Completionist.
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by jztemple2 »

Now available: The Freshwater Frenzy DLC!

Also the base game is on sale at 50% off till June 18th.
The first deluxe expansion for Megaquarium is available now!
A new chapter in Megaquarium history. Freshwater Frenzy is the first Deluxe Expansion for Megaquarium. It adds a brand new environment for you to explore and master – freshwater!

It is now available to purchase:
Today I want to draw your attention to two features which I'm excited to share with you.

Land animals
Freshwater Frenzy introduces the first land animals to the game. They are:

Eastern Long-necked Turtle
Dwarf Crocodile
Green Anaconda

All three are reptiles and have some extra requirements compared to most of the other animals in the game.

First off then require tanks which provide some land out of the water. This is provided by a set of new tanks called "beach tanks".
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Another interesting requirement of the reptiles is that they need light to flourish. Only a select few other animals in the game have this requirement (mostly corals) so it's nice that the lights have some additional use in the expansion.

Accessories
These are a brand new mechanic unique to Freshwater Frenzy. Each staff can now be assigned a single accessory which helps them as they go about their work. There are 4 to choose from:

Backpack - doubles the food carrying capacity of the staff member.
Sneakers - increase the fitness talent of the equipped staff member, increasing their speed and making them better at cleaning and gift shop tasks.
Feeding stick - increases the feeding skill of the equipped staff member, but only if they are feeding an animal which 'requires skill'.
Tool belt - increases the fixing skill of the equipped staff member, while also removing the need for them to carry a toolkit.
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I spent days carefully designing each of them to make the choice between them as interesting as possible. I think there is room for each of them even in a fully ranked-up aquarium.

Full animals list
To finish, here is a full list of the animals in the game.

Convict Cichlid
Midas Cichlid
Red-Striped Eartheater
Amazonian Angelfish
Butterfly Ram
Discus
Guppy
Gardner's Killifish
Cardinal Tetra
Congo Tetra
Blind Cave Tetra
Tinfoil Barb
Giant Hatchetfish
Boeseman's Rainbow
Red Bellied Piranha
Pacu
Adolfo's Cory
Redtail Catfish
Ripsaw Catfish
Sunshine Pleco
Porcupine River Stingray
Electric Eel
American Paddlefish
Arapaima
Fan Shrimp
Panther Crab
Eastern Long-Necked Turtle
Dwarf Crocodile
Green Anaconda
American Manatee.


I hope you enjoy the expansion. Don't forget to leave a review once you've made an opinion on it. :)
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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This is on sale for $15 right now.
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by Paradroid »

jztemple2 wrote: Sat Jun 29, 2019 1:18 am This is a tycoon game, but on the light side. Nothing too heavy duty, not really even any spreadsheets other than a simple profit/loss chart.
That's why I've never bought it. The asking price of around £20 seems a bit high for this level of tycoon game.

Granted, I could buy it when it's on sale, but it's never high enough up the priority list.
I no longer post here.
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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The devs announced their biggest DLC yet!



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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by Carpet_pissr »

The base game was on my wishlist. How does this compare to the previous pharma game from this dev, JZT?
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Sep 21, 2023 10:04 pm The base game was on my wishlist. How does this compare to the previous pharma game from this dev, JZT?
This isn't at all like Big Pharma. This is like a Planet Zoo lite. Set up tanks and other displays. Pick out which fish and other creatures to put in the tanks, and each has special requirements like water temp and food, and some can't be put in a tank with other certain types. And they need a certain amount of room in the tank per fish, etc. And then you hire staff and provide things like bathrooms and snacks.

It's a tycoon game but with a lot of focus and attention to detail on the creatures and some real solid research on them to boot. And you have to manage your aquarium to make sure customers are happy and spending money of course. You can buy new fish or breed your own and sell them. It has a surprising amount of depth for a small game.
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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Deep Freeze In-depth: Polar Dome Preview!
In case you weren't aware, Megaquarium is getting a new expansion: Deep Freeze



This time we are focusing on the polar dome, a brand new tank with a whole lot going on.
I'll let folks read the article if they are interested, but I'll post a few of the images:

Enlarge Image

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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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And today the DLC Megaquarium: Deep Freeze - Deluxe Expansion was released. Note that there is not a non-Deluxe Expansion version, the designation "Deluxe" is because this DLC is significantly larger than the previous two expansions. There are also the usual bundles.

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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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I'm going to pick up the Deep Freeze DLC before the sale ends in a couple of days, but I thought I'd share this image posted by someone who finally completed the entire campaign and maybe went a bit overboard building their final aquarium. Very impressive!

Enlarge Image
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

Post by Daehawk »

The original game has been on sale for like $7 for a bit now. Not sure its still going on though.

EDIT: yep still is...70% off.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/600480/Megaquarium/
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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Just a quick look at the inside of one of my tanks.

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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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Colorful fish. You making money? And is that early in the game?
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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Daehawk wrote: Wed Dec 06, 2023 2:46 am Colorful fish. You making money? And is that early in the game?
I'm early in the third campaign mission (of ten) and yes I'm making money, but then I'm playing on Normal, not Hard difficulty.
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Re: Megaquarium by Twice Circled

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This is a brief video showing off my completed Elmshorn Aquarium, which is the third campaign mission, from the point of view of a visitor.

My father said that anything is interesting if you bother to read about it - Michael C. Harrold
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