For the last Community Questions of 2018, the good folks over on the Seed Discord server brought their A-game and posted all kinds of questions for us to answer, covering a variety of topics. Unfortunately, we couldn’t reply to everyone, so here are those we could. We hope you enjoy!





Xeu100: How far will you be able to develop a colony? Will development go until it is a large-scale city or will it expand into bigger nations?





Mundi: “We aim to scale communities with both of these ideas in mind. Our goal is to reach communities made up of thousands of players - we could potentially reach those numbers by connecting multiple communities to build nations. The government tool will also add a layer on top of that.”





Dylan75015: If we a colony was to form a democratic republic, would we see the political division of our Seedlings and are we going to see them voting by their own choices?





M: “Voting is in the hands of the players, not the Seedlings. So, if political divides would happen in a community, that would be a part of the meta-game.”





Dani悲しみRamen®: Is religion going to be addressed?





M: “Whether it becomes a feature or mechanic, we can't say. But, we would love to see it emerge from the meta-game, among players and the community. You check out an article discussing spiritual expression in Seed over on the Context page here .





![AF] Namechanger Eric: Will there be drugs in the game, and will they affect the Seedlings? Would it be possible to produce said substances and sell them legally or illegally?





M: “We don't have it on our roadmap currently as there are so many other features to work on, but it's one of the things we want to include in the future! It's something we find super exciting!”





![AF] Namechanger Eric: Will there be hidden features other players simply cannot access? Say for criminal activity?





M: “Due to the flexibility of most of the systems, they should allow for both legal and illegal activities. So, everything will be created in a way that they shouldn't hinder any criminal activity, but no hidden features. We shall see!”





Octo17: In Seed, will you only have one central “village” or will you be able to branch out with your seedlings and create new colonies?





M: “That really depends. Having Seedlings spread across multiple colonies would potentially become confusing for a player. But, Seedlings could, in theory, become emotionally attached to other Seedlings from different settlements and desire to relocate to be closer to them.”





Dark_PT: How much will the game cost?





M: “To be honest, we can't confirm anything right now. It's such an important decision that it needs to be handled with discretion. Sorry that we can't give you a proper answer at the moment!





Target: Will you be able to trade or exchange seedlings with other players?





M: “That is something that we're looking into. As there will be some form of churn rate of players, abandoned Seedlings could potentially create problems for players in the community. A solution to this could be some form of Seedling adoption.”





[AF] Czarhollow: Are you going to make some kind of achievement lists for Seedlings? Or will there be a fame system that Seedling can increase or decrease?





M: “That's a really cool idea! We've discussed something similar, but nothing has been decided. We should definitely brainstorm around this!”





[AF] Czarhollow: Will players be able to influence how Seedling interact with each other, or will it be dependent on the AI and the traits of the Seedlings?





M: “Seedlings have their own will, with their preferences and attractions, and deal with social situations in different ways. Players can gently push them into relationships, but if done so too much, they might start resenting other Seedlings. Traits like charisma can also affect their relationships with others, so it's all about balance. Well, this is how we're considering it now…”





Username: Would there be the possibility of Seedlings to learn biohacking skills to "hack" into other Seedlings owned by other players?





M: “Interesting! Definitely would love to hear some ideas about this concept!”





[AF] Czarhollow: How will the time in Seed pass compare to real time?





M: “In the current build, 24 hours in-game is roughly an hour in real time, a week in-game lasting 24 hours, and a year in-game lasting a week in real time. These are only rough parameters that we're going with currently. The idea in the future will be to stray away from the Gregorian calendar and develop our own time and date system. This will also rely on balancing to find the perfect time scale.





Even though time goes faster, Seedlings will still walk at a reasonable pace. Time will be cut down for manual tasks, such as cooking or labor, as that would become super boring!”





Eapple: Will all buildings have interiors, and if so, will the interiors actually serve as a mechanic or just for visuals?





M: “Interiors will definitely serve as a mechanic as you'll need interiors for shelter and production. You'll be able to furnish every apartment and place machinery inside of factories. It won't just be a black box on the inside of a building....unless you want to create only a black box! That’s up to you.”





Tinium: Will there be in-game mechanics to maintain a state of war/peace between communities?





M: “It's in the interest of the players to maintain peace and push for prosperity, rather than it being a feature. Chaos will have an effect on the Seedlings' mental health and ruin the economy. But having said that, it's something we'll see further down the line during testing phases.”





[AF] True The Summoner: Will there be events that take place for example like a plague outbreak. If so then have to be such a kill.





M: “We have talked a lot about these types of events! What we would aim to do is to have them randomized to remain impartial among communities. An idea could be that a plague spawns from a rotting corpse – animal or human – to build a sense of tension. Of course, though, we don't want Seedlings to be in a constant state of emergency as that would become such a burden. It's a balancing issue.”





GGMarZhill: Will there be a system of social class within Seed? And will the upper classes have more influence over others lower on the social ladder?





M: “This will highly depend on how players structure their community. I guess some communities will be built in a very socialistic way, where everyone is treated as equals. And some will be built around more hierarchical structures, where there will be a divide between the rich and the poor. In that case, the richer will probably have more power and influence.”





Dylan75015: How long would it take to colonize all of the planet?





M: “There's no real way to answer that. The planet will be vast and settling the whole thing would take an immense – and intense – amount of organization and work to do so!”





Capt Cabose: Will there be any microtransactions?





“Monetization is still being designed, but if there are microtransactions, they won't be aggressive. We don't want anything that's pay-to-win, speeds up production, or affects the in-game economy.”





Jacomo223: Will foods be predefined or will ingredients have values to them so that we can make our own dishes?





M: “We don't want the cooking system to become overly complicated, but we want some freedom to create a variety of dishes from a bunch of different ingredients. We want Seedlings to prefer certain foods over others, but the full depth of this system is still not finalized. Certain Seedlings will be better at cooking than others, which means they're more likely to be hired in a restaurant, for example.





We're inspired by the cooking system in Zelda: Breath of the Wild, as well as the simplicity of the Rimworld cooking system.”





Dylan75015: Is it possible for Seedlings to be able to raise animals?





M: Most likely. We feel raising and farming animals is something that will be super exciting and interesting addition to gameplay. But, it's not too much of a priority at the moment — something that will come further down the line.





So that’s it for 2018. We really hope you’ve enjoyed this series! There’s more to come next year, and we’ll update you on development next month.

See you in 2019!