A Deep and Enjoyable Unknown Sandbox Strategy RPG - Monster Breeder 

This feels exactly like a game I would have seen 20 years ago and mistaken for a dream. Like Lego Island.

Finally! A monster breeding game where you AREN'T forced to have sex with the monsters!~

Ah yes, the majestic VarAnus. Truly it is a creature for the most discerning and refined breeders.

I started playing this game a long time ago (after Splattercat's first video on it), here are some hints that helped me out when I got started: 1.) Focus on trying to get at least one really good FEMALE creature to work off of. I had a black bear named "Big Betty" and she was able to rip apart packs of creatures and humans before the end of her life. Made sure she had a few cubs and, lo and behold, they were also man-eaters. The reason I say you should have a good female creature over a male is because it's easier to get males than females in game. Maybe it was just me, but after Big Betty I almost never saw a female black bear outside of her that was sold in the market. Males were a dim a dozen, but females never showed up. 2.) Take all of the fights you can early that don't involve your monsters dying should they get the hell beat out of them. Non-lethal fights will be your bread and butter, alongside murdering criminals, and avoid any and all lair expeditions until you have several very solid creatures or human fighters. 3.) For all that is holy, DO NOT PUT YOUR CHARACTER INTO LETHAL FIGHTS. That might seem obvious, but you will instantly lose your game if your character dies in a fight. Not sure about them dying of old age (didn't get that far because I snowballed), but I know that you can't change your character upon the death if your initial character dies. 4.) Upgrade your facilites as soon as you can. Especially the Monster Hut, since that can then hold temperature controlled rooms later on alongside getting equipment to make the baby creatures grow up into freaks of nature without becoming abominations. 5.) Abominations are bad, but not? If all you are looking for is a martyr, an abomination can usually hold it's own much better than a normal creature. Downside is, they tend to not live long naturally and are rarely very tame. If all you need is to throw bodies at something, abominations can be effective but costly. 6.) Keep an eye out for which markets are currently open, as they do cycle and aren't all open at the same time (save for certain events). Some days the magical researchers will have a shop set up, sometimes the slavers will, and sometimes all you can get are the equivalent of groceries. If you don't pay attention to it, you can miss out on some very fun things because you are too focused on missions or quests. There's more I could put down, but these six helped me out the most I think. Love that you covered this game again, especially since the developer is trying to get the new models out by early next year. This game is a great way to kill a couple of hours without even realizing it!

I appreciate you starting a little bit after the introduction a great way to see the heat of the action and gameplay

Straight off the bat when i read the title i instantly thought of Jade Cocoon. Jade Cocoon really needs a remaster because that game was way ahead of its time.

"..you should actually care for your animals..." 5s later: "So anyway, breeding animals for organ donating"

I want to say, without sounding pompous, I appreciate your vernacular during your videos.

I've been a big fan of this style of game since playing Mail Order Monsters as a kid. The Monster maker genre is full of fun titles. The graphics are pretty close to Impossible creatures, which is a monster Maker RTS released in 2016. More than graphics I think focusing on the sound effects will be more important. You would be surprised how easy and cheap it can be to do your own basic Foley work. There are a lot of great online guides for it.

This game is truly a hidden gem. Watched this video and got hooked immediately! Went straight into the game and spent until 4am playing without realizing the time passing. There are so many elements and things to explore, it's kinda crazy that it's done by a single person. The graphics are not great (even though I love the way the rats look in the game 😂) but don't let that distract you too much. It's really fun!

Your creatures names gave me a good chuckle. I absolutely love the concept for this game! Like you said, it's very unique and I can't wait to see what the graphics overhaul looks like.

Loosely reminds me of an old game I used to play called Geneforge

Go max alchemist. It allows you to lean into the breeding the most. This game is basically breeding Pokemon and really scratched an itch for me.

I used to love Mail Order Monsters when I was a kid on my C=64. This seems like a similar concept, so I wonder if it would still be able to keep my attention for hours like back then...

Me: a non adult monster breeding game doesn't exi- Splattercat:

This reminds me of the old Spiderweb Software line of games called Geneforge, only with more emphasis on the actual creation of monsters. Those are really good games. The Avernum series are phenomenal sandbox games.

I bought this game based on this video, I'm a sucker for games like this. It's the reason I liked Shin Megami Tensei. Looking forward to this developer continuing to focus on this game and others like it.

feels like a monster rancher with a tiny dash of princess maker

Im working on a game and its gonna be an asset flip 😂 i got unreal and no money, but big dreams. So i wont ever judge other devs for doing the same

So you're basically the guy who cries when the Rancor dies.

Shou Tucker will love this game... He can't wait to starting new game, get married, have a daughter and pet a dog...

Hats off to the designer. The graphics don't bother me too much, tbh Thanks Splattercat!

Closest thing to "Mail Order Monsters" I've seen yet. Sold.

A old game that had a interesting system to it that similar in theme with cross breading was a game called Genewars by Bullfrog games. It was a interesting rts of it's time but it doesn't appear to be on gog

I bought this game last year, totally awesome. The combat is hard but great.

This looks fun, wish I’d known about it yesterday when I was buying games. Love that they put in achievements for EA. This will probably be the next game I get, thanks for covering it!

A couple days ago, I was thinking about this game, remembering your previous video. The reviews are really good for this game and I wanted to know it had grow. Thanks for putting out this one. I'm gonna buy the game for sure.

Been checking in on this game every now and again since the Dev first posted in the monstertamer subreddit. Glad to see how far it has come. It also happens to be on sale right now which is awesome. Guy has done a lot with not a lot of resources, it would be amazing to see him joined by someone great with sound, and another with the art skills to push the game towards just a bit more polished. The game may be great, but part of the fun in any monster tamer game is the aesthetics of the creatures, and when you have so much going on in your game complexity wise you really need a good UI to make it approachable to its full potential audience. Still, anyone reading this should definitely grab this gem while its still on sale if you're hesitating even a little bit.

"And this is one of weirder ones." I regret to inform you that it most certainly is not

This reminds me of a Bug Breeding game that I loved (long ago in Kongregate), I'd definitely play this

Since you say the auto combat is good I’ll try it again. I’ve been avoiding it because the one time I used it was in an execution with 6 creatures on my side and somehow one of my creatures got fatally injured and died the next turn.

It will be nice if game end up like a Guild with one professsion more or less. Need to make family, train a heir. Or just go deep in vivisection and necromancy and make main character immortal by infusing some sick monster parts)

Having lots of monster rancher vibes with this one but it’s a very good thing cause I loved that game so this one is going into my collection.

the chuckle at the eugenics joke got me

Been waiting for this or The Corpsmen to get to a good place. Supposedly the Corpsmen has an update coming "in a month+" dated September 22 as per the devs.

This is just like the pet store from S1E5 "Xavier: Renegade Angel".

I've played quite a bit, something that helps is getting upgrades that increase the stats of your monsters instead of their to hit chance abilities. Once you got like at least a level 5-7 and start breeding or crossbreeding, those sweet sweet increased stats make your creatures kids have increased base stats :)~. If you have a mage great! You can actually tame some insects with the buff even if you haven't gotten the tameness rune yet. Insects and rats are cheap, but their endurance suffers so once they go through some fights they have a high chance of getting crippled and only being useful for breeding. For me buying an alchemist is more important than a blacksmith although with the caveat that the alchemist should have some skill you really want those potions for crossbreed and tameness they help a lot. Upgrading the monster kennels and the hatchery are a must the upper upgrades with temperature controls keep your monsters from dying or being sick for 4 months in out of a year. In the beginning when you have untamed creatures send them to the lethal prisoner death fights get them levelled and maybe participate in some lethal tournament fights or just breed the monsters and focus on taming the kids, I usually have them fight until their untimely demise or focus on breeding at high levels if they have great stats.

Did I really check for this just hours after it was uploaded?! Whow!

I was listening to the video from another room with but when I heard *Black Var Anus* at 4:49 I immediately stormed back in to see what's currently on the screen.

i was reluctant to click this video based on its title, it reads like we should expect anime girls and tentacles, thankfully there was no need to worry.

its like if blood bowl, was spore

$20 bucks has me on the fence. I love the depth and how it helps keep you engaged. I definitely want to make a all rat build

I played this game after you posted your first video and I built a team of snow bears which I found as the best creatures and I made a team of humans archers so I could shoot 2-3 times in a turn I wish the game was multiplayer

This game looks great and this is my first time watching your content but this kinda crunchy strategy games sounds fun! I’ll add it to my list for my next paycheck!

Really interesting game. Also - I loved the tangent about your friend dog ^^

Feel like a more arena oriented Jade Cocoon, you could make your own monsters and kind of cross breed them or something. It has been a while since I've played the game, but it was alright for the most part.

Thank you for entertaining me. Not sure how difficult it stressful your job is. But your job makes my job a tiny bit less stressful. I feel like I am hanging out with my dudes while I work. I wish you and your family the best.

I was really hoping this would have been a modernized Impossible Creatures.

If the developer would drop 50% of the mechanics, this looks like a game I would really enjoy! I love the cross-breeding, but selling organs does not require a UI imho.

Graphics are something I have a fairly low bar for but those monsters should look more different. I'll be adding it to my steam list (where I track games rather than where I buy them if alternatives exist) for once it reaches v1.1 (always wait for he post release patch)

WOW, haven't seen this in a while Splatty. Thanks for reminding me it exists, certainly a unique game.

lol the bear looks hungry. no wonder if he eats no meat ;)

Splat you really need to develop a name generator so the rest of us can enjoy such epic names as we saw in your game today. Thanks!

The description of how the cross-breeding works makes me want to get this just to try and make a crocoduck. Please tell me that's a thing. :)

It’s a fun game and the dev is committed highly recommend it gets better and better

I feel like this game has heavy Monster Rancher inspirations. With that being said Splattercat, Monster Rancher 1 and 2 DX are on Steam.

this game has the potential to become a cult classic if it becomes more known.

Love this game, I was really into it last year. I have been wanting to get back to it but im waiting for new models because the variety of monsters is a little low right now. Eventually the dev is making it so you can cross any monster with any other monster and that's gonna rock

When I was younger, I invested a lot of time into the Monster Rancher series games. Would love to find another game with those vibes and this might be it. Going to pick up the demo and see what I think.

Reminds me of a old game I used to play. Mail Order Monsters...

I found this game a while ago when i was trying to find a game with a cool monster breeding mechanic like the first dragon warrior monsters. I'm not a type of person to care about graphics much but i couldn't decide to pick this up yet.

Had my eye on this for a while, been checking in now and then, just been waiting for 1.0 to be within sight before grabbing it, hopefully not too much longer to wait.

the bear looks curse af, The game itself seems nice

This looks so unique and interesting! Thanks for sharing the game!

YEA! THE MONSTER BREEDER! Your previous video on this got me into it, and I love it!

This is like a dark Tamagotchi

I never get the complain about "It looks asset-y"... I mean, that's what assets are for... And I simply don't care how much stock-assets were used if the game itself is actually good. I don't play games for the graphics (that's what movies are for - at least for me), but for the gameplay!

Massive Monster rancher 2 vibe from the PS1

ThankYou SirSplatt

I find this strangely intriguing

An elephant and a pigs DNA just won't splice.

I'd watch a series of this.

14:29 that was one of my favorite parts of the original star wars battle front 2. Kill 20 guys in 1 life get the frenzy rifle. Get the frenzy rifle enough it's permanent

8 GB for both ram and Disk space? This game will be heavy. Good game idea, could use engine that more friendly towards low-end computer. Still look forward for eventual release.

love the story about the dog. been there before.

ah yes, the mythic Black Var Anus!

It's looking great, wishlisted

Idk man, i would totally play this game 15-20 years ago

I liegit checked in on this game yesterday to see how its coming along. I@m super excited for what it can become and the current monsters are much better then they were. Its probably my next urchase whwen i have loose cash

1.0 should be coming out around mid 2024.

I wish there was a monster breeder game like Dragon Warrior Monsters. I haven't seen any comparable to it.

i love indy games. doing quasimorph now and obviously Kenshi!!

Cuddles , that name just puts the fear in me :P

Oh great timing, I was wondering the other day how this game was doing since you covered it before

Whoo. I got a little worried at the notification...

Monster Name: Black Varanus Splat pronunciation: Black Var-Anus

I miss the old monster breeder for PlayStation 1 or 2 can’t remember

woah, they made a game about me?! 😏

Tell my why an Indie Game made by 1 dude has more depth than a game made by 9,000 developers?

this is pretty interesting. I think I'll give this a go.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh that kind of breeder.

Already a fan.

Fascinating game! i was wondering if the MC, after they die, has a dynasty system? That would be AWESOME! Gonna wish list this one for sure and wait for my next paycheck. Christmas expensive this year. lol

I'm gonna check this out!

This with the combat of Etherlords.

Glad they are literally Monsters and not Human-like.

Felt like the aesthetics would have benefited from a Heroes III approach instead of early 2000s 3D.

Been waiting to see whats new about this game

Seems like a cool game!

splattercat should do a video on vintage story its a hardcore minecraft-like game with eldrich horrors too.