Rules to make pet unalive

[matt-dray]

Some combination of

• Age (older)
• XP (lower)
• Level (?)
• Species (?)
• Time since last interaction (high)
• Happy (sustained low)
• Hungry (sustained high)
• Dirty (sustained high)

[matt-dray]

Could this be done with an HP bar? For example, a pet has 10 HP and 1 HP is removed each time the hungry and dirty statuses reach the maximum value. Reach 0 HP and be unalive. Maybe HP isn't recoverable, but 1 HP is added per level gained. Maybe the HP score is secret.

There would be need to be an HP-loss system for prolonged hunger/dirtiness, otherwise you could reach the max status values and never be punished for it. Retrospective calculation of the duration of these max values could be a bit awkward; need to be aware of the scores at the last interaction, then how long it would take to reach the max, then the duration since that point was reached.

[matt-dray]

I think all species should enter a fourth level, a 'senile' (choose a better word) mature level in which they're susceptible to be unalive. I think the sprite is the same for all of them: a sort of little melting-blob guy (source: my ageing face).

A pet can only die once it's reached level 4. Each day there is an x% chance of being unalive. That chance is determined by blueprint values. More XP, less chance. More hunger/lower happiness, more chance. More historical hunger/lower historical happiness, more chance (would need a hidden counter of 'length of time that the pet has existed in with max hunger/min happiness values'). Greater 'age' (days), more chance. More time since the first day of level 4, more chance. Etc. Time since last interaction could shortcut a lot of this, too.