Island Before Dark

Cinevva's analyzer read this game's design doc and its source, then wrote the brief below. "Make your own" hands it to the game creator as your opening message, so you start from a real spec rather than a one-line idea.

Create a playable low-poly third-person survival game titled “Island Before Dark.” Show a small circular tropical island floating in a bright blue ocean, viewed from an elevated over-the-shoulder/third-person camera that follows the player. Use a pale green grassy island with a sandy shore, a cyan-blue water disc surrounding it, a light blue sky/background with atmospheric fog, soft shadows, and simple stylized low-poly geometry. Populate the island with several leaning palm trees, chunky brown-and-green rock/cliff blocks, scattered logs, and small red mushrooms. Place a stone campfire ring at the island center with an orange cone-shaped flame visible; the fire’s protective light should only become active after the player lights it.

The player is a simple stylized survivor: an orange-brown capsule-shaped body with a small tan spherical head, casting a soft shadow. Start the player near the center of the island. Provide third-person movement using WASD/arrow keys and a touch joystick on mobile; support jumping with Space. The camera should follow the player, with movement speed around 4.2 and ordinary gravity/jump behavior.

The game loop is a timed gather-and-survive challenge. Begin paused behind a centered dark translucent start overlay titled “Island Before Dark,” explaining: gather 5 wood and food, build a campfire, then survive until sunrise; night drains health unless the player stays close to the fire. Include a “Start surviving” button and the desktop controls hint. Once started, give the player 100 health, 3 food, 0 wood, and a 90-second countdown displayed as “Day 01:90” (counting down to “SUNRISE”). Place exactly five collectible logs and six collectible red mushrooms around the island. The player can collect the nearest resource only when within roughly 2.3 world units: gathering a log adds 1 wood, gathering a mushroom adds 1 food, then hides/removes that resource. If no resource is close, display “Move closer to a palm log or mushroom.” Use keyboard E or a prominent bottom “Gather” button.

Provide a bottom action bar with “Gather,” “Eat,” and an orange “Light fire” button. Eating consumes 1 food and restores 22 health up to 100; if health is already full, say “You are already healthy,” and if there is no food, say “No food left.” Support Q for eating. Lighting the fire requires 5 wood, consumes those 5 wood, changes the HUD to “Campfire: burning,” activates a warm orange point light around the central fire, and displays “Campfire lit — stay close tonight.” If the player lacks wood, display “Need X more wood.” Support F for lighting. Do not allow actions before start or after the game ends.

The HUD should be a fixed, clean, rounded dark glass-style interface over the game. At top left show Wood as “0 / 5” with a brown progress bar, Food as a number with a gold/orange bar, and Health as a number with a red bar. At top right show the countdown and “Campfire: unlit” or “Campfire: burning.” At upper center show the objective “Gather before the sun goes down,” with the hint “Find logs and mushrooms, then spend 5 wood to light the campfire.” Show temporary centered messages for gathering, eating, and fire actions. Keep the interface responsive and include touch-friendly buttons.

The countdown should run only while playing. When the remaining time falls below 45 seconds, treat it as night: drain health at about 1.8 points per second unless the player is within about 4.3 units of the island-center campfire while it is lit; near the lit fire, health does not drain. The player wins when the timer reaches zero, showing a centered end overlay titled “You made it to sunrise” and copy about the fire holding through the night. If health reaches zero first, show “Night claimed the island” and explain that the player should gather faster, eat sooner, and build the fire before dark. Both end screens have a “Try again” button and Enter-to-restart behavior. Keep the art simple, colorful, and toy-like with soft shadows, no realistic textures, and the camera/HUD composition matching a compact browser game.