Announcing Sipho NPC design contest!


Dear Whirlpool Surfers and Aquarium Caretakers, Sipho team would like to invite you take another opportunity to design Sipho NPCs and have them immortalized in the game

Previous design contest was aimed at smaller and pure-breed creatures to fill in their future habitats. And it has been a wonderful success with many different designs:


This time we are looking for beefy "alphas" that are found swimming along smaller ones. They are big and menacing, but have an exploitable weakness that makes them vulnerable to your attacks even though they are more than twice the size of your Sipho. Maybe one of their sides lacks any kind of defence or their movement is weak and they can be outmanoeuvred. And since these alphas are so old and powerful, they can also have adapted one of non-breed Zooids. These breedless zooids are: Agonizer, Energy Leech, Flail, Grappling Hook, Greaser, Grinder, Muck, Sniper, Soul Eater, Sprayer, Swarmer - any of zooids that do not belong to any of the starting breeds.
Take a look at this example:


It is a Buginis Sipho with a not-of-its breed Greaser, which increases range and effectiveness of connected Zooids. It does not have many weapons nor its sides are very protected from attacks. This is just an example, so go wild!

We will be accepting entries as Layout text. Layouts are data structures we use in Sipho to define what Zooids have been grown where. When you grow a new Spike or a Claw, your Layout is modified to resemble what you have grown. Something like a recipe to grow your Sipho. We can save and use Layouts to define enemies that you encounter in different areas or restore your Sipho when loading the game. Manual Layout management is possible through Aquarium game mode and that's where we ask you to create your event entries.

How to enter:

  • Using latest version of Sipho and Aquarium mode take a screenshot of Layout you would like to submit. Feel free to modify the environment keeping Layout clearly distinguishable
  • Upload the screenshot to our Discord server's #event-entries channel with following formatting:
    **Name:** Name of the layout
    **Author:** Optional author name. Leave it out if you want to remain anonymous
    **Value:** Layout value - shown at the top of Growth mode
    **Description:** Optional Layout description
    **Layout data:** || layout data ||
  • In Aquarium, export the Layout text data as shown in picture below and paste it on layout data. Please keep data between double || marks so it remains spoilered. If Layout data is too long, submit the entry without it and upload layout data as a text file in following message.

Congratulations, you have submitted your Layout! We are looking for as many Layout designs as possible, however we keep our rights to reject some by our judgement or incompatible requirements:

Layout requirements:

  • Layout should not mix breeds and can contain a breedless Zooid. For example: Advena Layout can contain Spikes Zenoplates and Swarmers (breedless), but not Claws (mixing breeds) or additional Greasers (another breedless zooid).
  • Layout value should be under 150-300 nutrition. You can see current Layout nutrition value at the top of Growth screen, under the Sipho name.
  • Layout should be created using Growth mode of latest available version and should contain valid positions and rotations
  • Layout should be created by you or the author rights have been passed to you by the original author
  • Layout should not be already in game or already be a valid submission prior to yours

Once the event ends we will go through all submissions. Submissions that pass the requirement criteria will be added to the game. And we will also credit you, the author, in the game!

The event ends at July 13th 00:00 UTC

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