Complex behaviour from simple scripts

Since the expansion of the DNA system to include variables from the shoaling/swiming the fish have had much more "control" over their behaviour.

In the past the shoaling variables were preset by me so that the overall effect looked pleasing. This also includes other parameters that affect the way the fish swim, like water drag factor, swim strength and the like.

Passing all this data in DNA (with mutation) has produced several shoals in different areas of the lake where the fish display distinct characteristics specific to their local environment.

1) Aretias. Three feeders in a relatively enclosed space providing the same food type one prim at a time.
The fish, as expected, are mostly the same breed based on the available food (red). Behaviour wise, they form a dense shoal that stays together quite well and is constantly on the move. As food prims are released individuals will head for them, closely followed by the rest of the shoal. If the first few fish to arrive at the food fail to eat, (the goal seeking code is deliberately very simple and thus not totally accurate) then the dense shoal following will most certainly find it, if only by accident. My own conclusion is that by staying with the main shoal there is a much increased chance of feeding, and thus reproducing, and that this has been demonstrated in the survival of DNA which favours close shoaling.

2) Themiskyra (South). Single feeder providing 3 food prims each time, open space.
By contrast to the Aretias fish, the fish clustered around here have developed an entirely different and unexpected strategy. There is only one feeder and the fish seem to have realised they don't need to swim around in search of other sources. Providing 3 food prims each time also increases the chance an individual has of successfully feeding, even if other fish see the food first.
The net result is the fish tend to stay sat on the bottom or swiming very slowly, well spaced out with no apparent shoal structure other than being in the same general area. When new food becomes available, indiviuals will jump up to it, as if they'd been lieing in wait to ambush it. Then once it has gone they settle back down on the bottom again, waiting to pounce on the next round of unsuspecting food prims...


Conclusions? I can only say that part 2 of the DNA passing is a success and that I'm continuing work on mating.

Looking to the future I'm re-working the way the different scripts interact in an attempt to further seperate out their functions and make the script collection a more organised "brain".

I went to take a look at the fish, but couldn't find them. I found the feeders and I think one fish, but it looked a bit dead. Let me know when you get them running again - I'd love to see them.

I`ve got landmarks to some of them. IM me in-world, and I`ll take you there.

would it be possible for these fish to exist independant of the feeders and by that I mean could you set up a mini-eco system whereby big fish eat small fish, small fish eat bugs/plants, and so on such that the fish would simply thrive or die without outside intervention?

It would be cool to set up a sim in which not just fish, but a variety of animals fed off of each other and reproduced. I wonder what it would take to set up an independant/stable virtual ecosystem.

Visit Terminus.

Surina, have you ever made the code for your simple, original fish available to the public? I'm working on an A-life park and I'm new to scripting. I'd love to see what you started with.

an open source fish perhaps, lol

Cool project, hopefully you can eventually sell the fish & related items