It’s no coincidence that two of the frog’s traits map to the temperature + moisture of your cultivators…

For example, if you place cultivators in the water outside the Carpenter's Shop for easy access in the waking world, only mushrooms capable of growing in water will spawn in the cultivators.

Using the genetic keys of the new species you create you can unlock the paths between the waking and dreaming worlds, explore the land of those still hibernating, and embark on a journey to help restore the lost populations and find out what happened.

Act quickly, for failure to manage your situation will cause a rapidly-spreading merciless threat to the entire facility itself - a Rift Breach

Mudborne is being created by ellraiser, one half of the indie-dev studio, TNgineers. A spiritual successor of sorts to APICO, Mudborne instead focuses on genetic manipulation and generational puzzles to create and discover all sorts of frog species, with experimentation being encouraged.

It originally started as a gamejam entry for FletchFest 2023, with the theme of ‘pond’. Ell had always joked about ‘what if APICO but frog?’ before, and this seemed a perfect opportunity to play with the concept and how to take things in a new direction.

For a hint at which mushrooms you'll need to alter genetics required to open Reflection Ponds, check out the little signs just beside the pool itself - these offer a hint at which mushrooms to use in your magic mud to create the frog that opens that Pond.

You’ll also have more control over viewing and modifying traits, reverting generations, cloning generations, mass-producing frogspawn/tadpoles - plus plenty of other frog species and variants to find and experiment with.

It has since turned into a spiritual successor of sorts to APICO, with a similar menu system and 'collect them all' style gameplay - however Mudborne instead focuses on genetic manipulation and generational puzzles to create and discover all sorts of frog species, who's genetic keys unlock paths between the waking and dreaming worlds...

Use Composters To Encourage Spore Growth If you're not willing to wait for nature to take its course and spawn a few odd mushrooms around the world, you can always use cultivators around the map to grow mushrooms when conditions are right.

In the mud on cold nights, with a Heater and a high Umbrage frog as well as a Dehydratior with a low Saturation frog nearby.

Mudborne is being created by ellraiser, Mudborne Game one half of the indie-dev studio, TNgineers. A spiritual successor of sorts to APICO, Mudborne instead focuses on genetic manipulation and generational puzzles to create and discover all sorts of frog species, with experimentation being encouraged.

I introduce ancestry towards the end of the spawning pools - I didn’t want to have things too complex just for the demo/tutorial region, but in the full game there’ll be a lot more advanced frogs requiring some clever magic mud across several generations to form.

Not only will they offer plenty of cute frog furniture to stash the frogs you create with all these mushrooms in a fashionable abode, but they've got plenty of gear like Hydrators, Dehydrators, and Heaters to allow you to control the climate of a small area using frogs with the correct stats.

In the demo there were only a few traits to play with - the full game introduces you to all 7, not just min/maxxing but also their special effects that those frogs can bring. You’ve seen a glimpse of this with the amplitude frogs and the pressure pads, but there’ll be ribbet powered croakwork, as well as climate modifying properties thanks to umbrage and saturation.