Skip to main content

Indie game storeFree gamesFun gamesHorror games
Game developmentAssetsComics
SalesBundles
Jobs
TagsGame Engines
(+1)

I cant remember to have seen it, but it would be a nightmare to implement. First, you have two tides a day. Second, the time shifts by 6 hours a week. If you have  low tide at 10 you will have low tide at 16 a week later and also  at 22:25 the same day. And third, how high the tide gets is dependent on what coast. Mediterranian sea has about 10cm, but venice about 100cm.  If you have walls or rocks you can see the algae and guess how high it will get. Someplace like New York has about 2m. And then there are places like Los Angeles, where you do not have a sinus curve, but  a bigger alternating with a smaller one.

Compare

https://www.tideking.com/United-States/New-York/New-York-City/

https://www.tideking.com/United-States/California/Los-Angeles-County/

https://www.tideking.com/Italy/Veneto/Provincia-di-Venezia/Venice/

My guess is, that most games do not even correctly place the sun in the sky, let alone the moon. Or, gasp, show correctly the phenomenon if you can see both in the sky.

But yeah, i imagine some secret places or clue games could use that as a plot device. But those seldom take real time into account. If you can specifically wait till low tide, it is so suspicous that players will know what to do. And if you play over several days, if you have accurate tide implemented, the  sea level would allow for you secret to show on a different day at the same tiem.

(2 edits) (+1)

I don’t see anything in the OP about making it work just like real life. The mechanics you’re describing aren’t even known to most regular folks anyway, I suspect the average understanding of the tide ends at “water goes up or down at some interval” and that’s totally doable in a game.

(+1)

I have not seen it and wondered why. And then found a very plausible reason. You supplied another one. Most people do not even know how tides work. (Including game devs ;-)

And another one would be, either you have to make additional static images or you have to allow your engine for different water levels. You do not do that kind of thing for some secret.

But I think I remembe two instances with rising and falling water level. Less tide but sea water making the beach dissappear happens in some Mario Kart levels. And in an old Tomb  Raider that had a level in Venice. But I think that was some other mechanism, like flood gates and not the tide.