Genesis

Genesis

This ocean has been running without a reset since the day it began. Every creature in it is descended from simple founders, and nothing it does is scripted.

Bodies are cells joined by springs. Leaves turn sunlight into energy, and each shades whatever lies beneath it. Muscles pull in rhythm; because water resists sideways motion more than motion along a limb, the right rhythm swims. Mouths drain energy from anything they touch, alive or dead. Armour resists mouths but is heavy. Bone is cheap structure. Sensors, drawn as eyes, perceive food, mouths and light nearby; a tiny evolved controller turns that into how hard the muscles beat and which way the wave runs. Whether creatures learn to chase, flee or rest is up to evolution.

Creatures that gather enough energy copy themselves with small mutations. When a lineage drifts far enough from its founder it becomes a new species, and every species that has ever lived is kept in the fossil record.

Days and seasons change the light, rocks drift and split populations, and now and then a meteor strikes. Hot vents on the sea floor open, drift and close again over days, throwing up plumes of food, so the deep has rich patches that move and must be found. The open question it is chasing: will it keep inventing new things forever?

Drag to pan, scroll or pinch to zoom; the world wraps east to west. Click a creature to follow it and read its species' record. The tree of life shows how today's species descend from the founders; the fossil museum keeps the most remarkable of the extinct.