The Darn Life.exe — A life simulation game

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Hi everyone,

I’ve been working on a small solo project called [The Darn Life.exe] for more than a month, now I have a early demo for testing.

It’s a choice-driven life simulation set in China, starting in 1994.

Each season, life gives you an event and you make a choice. Those choices affect your happiness, health, wealth, and experiences. Some consequences are immediate, while others may come back later.

The current demo focuses on the high school years and ends with the Gaokao, but there are already several possible routes through the demo.

The idea is not to become a hero or save the world. It’s just about living one ordinary life and seeing where your choices — and things outside your control — take you.

So I’d really appreciate some honest feedback, especially about:

  • Is the basic gameplay loop clear without explanation?

  • Do the choices make you curious about what happens next?

  • Does the old Windows-style UI add to the experience, or does it get in the way?

  • Is anything confusing, tedious, or unnecessarily slow?

  • After reaching the end of the demo, would you actually want to continue this life?

The demo is playable in English and Simplified Chinese.

Thanks for taking a look!!

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Hi guys,

A little while ago I posted about my demo and asked for feedback. Since then, I ended up making a pretty major change to the game.

Originally, the idea was to simulate an entire life through cards and choices — school, university, work, relationships, family, health, and eventually death. But while playing it, I started feeling that I was building a lot of systems without making the central idea much stronger.

So I cut most of that.

What the game is now?

You only play through your student years. During that time, you make a series of choices about things and how you respond to different situations. When your student life ends, the game sends the history of those choices to an AI backend.

Then The Darn Life.exe predicts the rest of your life.

The new version uses generative AI, and I know that’s going to be divisive. I’ve already had someone describe it as unnecessary “AI slop”, which is fair feedback and made me think about how the game comes across.

I’m not interested in using AI to generate the game design, or replace making the game itself. I’m using it specifically as the prediction engine: the game collects structured information from the player’s choices, and the model interprets that history into a possible future.

I think this is the area AI fits perfectly.

I’ve also added Japanese, so the current build now supports English, Simplified Chinese, and Japanese.

The demo is playable in the browser on itch.io:

Looking forward to your feedback!

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I can relate to the conundrum whether to buy new books or keep using old ones.

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I like the way the cards slide left and right.

Are the questions also AI generated or are they pre-scripted?

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Hi kraasch, thank you very much for trying the demo! All these cards are designed based on a typical Chinese experience who born in the 1980s. Truly appreciate your connection to it.

Now, there are around 80 cards in local database, I wrote 50% of it and AI did the rest. Of course, AI did the whole prediction part. The general idea is that, you make choices during your studying year, AI is for predicting your future life.

I was trying to capture the retro vibe, and highlight a hard truth of life that we can’t really control anything. I am not sure if I pulled it off. :thinking:

You’re the first feedback since I launched the demo. I was wondering, whats your future life is like? Do you like it? : )) Do you want to play the demo again?

Thanks again mate, for your feedback.

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I like a few things about the game: how it is asking questions, the swiping left and right and the generation of story.

I feel for being a full game there is something missing. It is not quite fun yet. It might do good if it is part of a bigger set up.

I also found a visual problem. In the end when the result is shown it creates a nice scrolled output. But much too fast for anyone to read along. So after the output one has to scroll all the way back up manually.

In my opinion you had very creative ideas and managed to pull off the vibe you intended. So well done!

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hi kraasch, you got the point, it still lacks some game elements so far, its more like an interactive narrative than a game.

TBH, the whole thing started with a very simple idea, I wanted to capture the helplessness and absurdity of life. I didn’t really start this prototype with a bigger game structure in mind.

Another thing I wanted to explore was, whether AI could have a good use beyond being a coding assistant .

Anyway, thank you very much for taking time to play it and for your genuine feedback. I really appreciate i t.

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