# Stage 1: broaden

Part of the [shape exploration](README.md). Done 2026-10-02. Result: a pool of 29 candidate shapes, each described as
a loop and not as a genre label. The pool is for the market assessment to judge; nothing in it is chosen.

## The pool

Who raised it: **U** = the user, **C** = proposed by Claude and accepted by the user.

| # | Shape | The loop | By | The user's words |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | **Cards** | play a card → the simulation runs → a new stable state, or a runaway | U | "The player influences the ecosystem through event/material/seed cards and sees it bloom into the next stable state (balanced feedback loops) or spiral out of control (net positive or negative feedback loop)" |
| 2 | **Harvest** | take some, leave some → what is left decides what grows next | U | "The player can harvest the outcome or even control the outcome by harvesting something and letting other things go into seed" |
| 3 | **Alchemy** | gather → experiment small → apply big | U | "Collect ingredients, combine them in isolation, check how that plays out, then try to bring that change to the macro system" |
| 4 | **Taming** | win a creature → it changes the ecosystem by being there | U | "Ranging from cute to deeply strategic, where the tamed creatures play a critical role in how the ecosystem plays out" |
| 5 | **Character and base** | makes the game personal; not a loop by itself | U | see [brief.md](brief.md) |
| 6 | **Pets as the actors** | the player can't act inside the ecosystem; the pets can | U | "Think of SimCity: you can not stop a crime or a fire, your 'pets' can do those. The player is not part of the ecosystem, the pet is." |
| 7 | **Idle factory** | the ecosystem is also a production chain | U | "Build a massive, diverse, fricking beautiful ecosystem that also functions as an idle factory." |
| 8 | **Tipping point as a new level** | pass a point of no return → a different balance → different actions needed | U | "A new level. The cave is always in balance, but there are different balances. A new balance requires different player actions." |
| 9 | **Async PvP** | another player meets your cave when you are away | U | "Async PvP would be awesome, King of Thieves or early NMS style." |
| 10 | **Run** | a fresh cave each time, random offers along the way, see how many balances you pass through before the run ends | C | "Can be a VERY tight gameplay loop, and the player could shape the environment so that it would support the run… introduces a bit more character centricity than the rest, but that's cool, works very well with the deck building aspect." |
| 11 | **Catalogue** | every distinct balance, creature and reaction found gets recorded; the pull is the empty slots | C | |
| 12 | **Breeding** | two creatures or plants combine into a third with mixed traits; the rare result is the prize | C | |
| 13 | **Orders** | someone asks for an output only a particular balance produces; steer a cavern to it and deliver | C | "Can be hard, as the ecosystem is complex and volatile." |
| 14 | **Expedition** | walk a chain of caverns with different climates, carry something from each into the next | C | "Calls me, if travel had some limitations, and you had to prepare for a journey, and could return with new mechanics, seeds, elements… I'm just worried that it would make the gameplay loop too big. And again, we are not building this for me." |
| 15 | **Caretaker** | upkeep and decoration of one place that is yours | C | "Required, but not enough. A caretaker is a 'powder game' + 'alchemist' combo, both of them are just toys, not games." |
| 16 | **Diagnosis** | a cavern is doing something strange; observe, form a guess, test it in a small space, then fix or reproduce it | C | |
| 17 | **Riding out an event** | a known event is coming (fire season, storm, flood); prepare the cavern so its balance survives it, then watch it hit | C | |
| 18 | **Rules for pets** | the player gives pets standing rules (eat this, avoid that, nest here) and doesn't steer them; the fun is the rule set working unattended | C | |
| 19 | **Visiting and gifting** | walk through another player's cave as a guest, take a cutting or a creature home, leave one behind; no contest | C | |
| 20 | **Prep cycle and run cycle** | the release / prep cycle shapes the environment; the run cycle pushes the character through that environment towards breaching a cave that has a new element, mechanic or biosphere | U | "There's one shape I'd love (but let's see if audience analysis supports it)… careful, this might be TWO games." |
| 21 | **Seed crafting** | build one seed or spore from trait parts in a few slots, plant it, watch what that combination does to the cavern | C | "Seed crafting (and breeding in general): good, add." |
| 22 | **Deck-building run** | the environment is given; the character goes along a pre-calculated path; the player reacts to the environmental threats with the deck | C, changed by U | "Yes, with more involvement: this could be a deck-building run… stuff further can be too long, unless we introduce some fast-travel system." (Proposed as an auto-gardener run.) |
| 23 | **Holding a line** | a spreading thing (fire, gas, blight) travels along known paths; the base grows, the environment pushes back | C | "An awesome game mechanic, you grow your base, the environment pushes back. I LOVE Creeper World. But we are walking away from no-violence, but it's fine, we are in a discovery phase." |
| 24 | **One trigger** | arrange a cavern, then set off a single event and watch the chain reaction run | C | "This could be a VERY unique gameplay, at the risk of being a toy, not a game, but that's not a verdict, just a challenge." |
| 25 | **Naturalist** | rare moments happen in the ecosystem; be in the right cavern at the right time and record them | C | "Very interesting, might become a very annoying whack-a-mole… unless we allow the player to control the chances of that event happening at a location, because it becomes a taming game." |
| 26 | **Knowledge loop** | the same cave restarts on a fixed cycle; nothing is kept but what the player has learned | C | "A bit harsh, but can be useful when combined with meta-progress (Magicraft-style)." |
| 27 | **Same cave for everyone** | each day all players get one identical cave; afterwards they compare which balance they reached | C | "Interesting, needs more juice." |
| 28 | **Exhibit** | caverns are built as displays; visitors arrive, react, and their interest pays for new species | C, with a warning | "Not even NMS planets are very share-worthy, people rather show off their builds, unique loot. Add, with this comment." |
| 29 | **Creature requests** | creatures are characters with wishes about their habitat; grant one and the creature stays, changes or brings another | C | "That's brilliant." |

## Proposed and not added

| Shape | The loop | Verdict | The user's comment |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tile laying | draw a random cavern piece, place it next to the others; what touches what decides the reactions | not added | "Digging is very involved, I'm not sure I want to go that way. The cave system is WFC, so we can just go 'add wall here, make opening there', and it would work, but I definitely do not want pixel or tile-based digging." |
| Merging | two of the same thing combine into the next thing up; the result goes into the cave and changes it | out | "Too basic, overused concept, no." |
| Shared cave | many players each make one small change a day to one common cave | doubted, not added | "How is this feeding into joy? Not sure." |

## How the rounds went

| Round | What was asked | What came of it |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nine questions, each with a menu of answers: the hand, the actor, the unit of play, the surprise, the tension, the trophy, the thinking, the stolen loop, the embarrassing ones | The user found the list leading and used it as ideation material only. It produced shapes 1 to 5 and most of [brief.md](brief.md). Unit of play, and partly surprise and tension, went to [audience-factors.md](audience-factors.md) |
| 2 | Seven open questions | Shapes 6 to 9 and the fantasy sentence. Two questions were the wrong kind: one asked what the user personally wants from the toy, one asked for a detail inside a single design. This gave the rule that stage 1 only widens the pool |
| 3 | Six shapes proposed by Claude | All in (10 to 15) |
| 4 | Four shapes proposed by Claude | All in (16 to 19); the user added 20 |
| 5 | Twelve shapes proposed by Claude | Nine in (21 to 29), three not added |

The user closed the stage: "We have enough very interesting stuff already, proceed to next stage."