Sail
You wake on a small raft at sunrise, with a hook in your hand. Hook what floats by, build her bigger, raise a sail and go where you like. The sea goes on forever, and every island you find is still there when you sail back.
Sail is a survival and sailing game on an endless sea. You build out your raft plank by plank, rig sails and steer by the wind. You fish, cook and farm in planters on deck, and you dive the reefs and shipwrecks. Villages along the way have traders, and sometimes a letter to carry to the next one. Play alone, or open your raft to friends and sail together.
Lately: sharks, with Peaceful, Normal and Hard settings. A spear, then a bow and an archery target. Flags you design yourself, wrecks worth diving, and candles you can set down that stay lit. What's new in Sail
Playing
Sail runs in your browser on WebGPU. A recent Chrome or Edge on a desktop, with a mouse and keyboard, works best.
Multiplayer and cloud saves work best in the full window. Play at sail.xcud.com, or use the "Play in full window" link in the corner of the game.
Sail is an early preview from xcud Games. It changes most weeks.
Development log
- Why I'm building Sail5 days ago
Comments
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Sail is a beautifully open ended survival game where plank by plank raft building and persistent islands make every voyage feel personal does the difficulty setting affect only sharks or other survival elements too?
Thank you, that's exactly the feeling I'm going for! Right now the difficulty only changes how sharks behave. On Peaceful they turn away, on Normal they bite only if you crowd them or stay in bloody water, and on Hard there are more of them, they're bolder, and blood, splashing and dusk bring them to you. Next come moray eels in the wrecks and caves, wild boar on the islands and stingrays in the shallows, all following the same setting.
Hunger and thirst are the same at every level for now. We're thinking about scaling them too, but carefully: past a certain point, making you drink that often turns it into a game about drinking water, and that's not the game we're making. Whatever the level, nothing kills you outright or strands you.
I really like that approach to difficulty, especially keeping survival challenging without making it frustrating. The plans for moray eels, wild boar, and stingrays sound exciting too! Do you think future updates might add different behaviors or interactions for these animals beyond just making them more aggressive on Hard?
Yes, that's the idea. Each animal should be its own little puzzle, not just the same threat with a bigger number. A few of the plans:
The rule I hold myself to is that every danger gives you a warning and a way to answer it, so you lose to things you could have seen coming, not to bad luck. Sharks already work like that: blood in the water, chum and a fish on your line draw them in. The difficulty setting decides how bold they are, from Peaceful, where they simply leave you alone, to Hard, where they come looking for you.
Thanks for the questions, it's great to hear what people are curious about!
I really love the idea of each animal having its own unique behavior instead of just being another threat to avoid btw, i've really enjoyed chatting with u about your games haha would u be comfy continuing our little game dev convo on another platform? no pressure at all if you'd rather stay here!