An Ode to ! Fishy !
According to Google Trends, one of the most searched for videogames of the past 5 years was the browser-based Slither.io.
The game was a spiritual successor of sorts to Agar.io, combined with the classic Snake.
The core gameplay loop of both games seems as old as videogames themselves: consume smaller beings to get bigger, avoid being consumed by bigger beings, repeat.
Both the 2009 indie game Osmos and the 2003 PS2 classic Katamari Damacy follow a similar pattern.
However the first game to incorporate these concepts was a Flash game uploaded to Newgrounds in February of 2003, the auspiciously titled ! Fishy !.
! Fishy ! was developed by XGen, a moniker that would eventually become a full fledged studio based in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.
Founded by developer Skye Boyes, ! Fishy ! would be part of a trio of early hits for XGen that included Stick RPG and Defend Your Castle.
Though ! Fishy ! bears a striking resemblance to the 1982 Intellivision game Shark! Shark!, as well as the After Dark fish tank screensaver for the Macintosh SE/30, the game was actually inspired by Odell Lake, a 1986 educational life sim developed by MECC, the same team responsible for The Oregon Trail.
! Fishy ! would see numerous clones over the years, most notably PopCap’s Feeding Frenzy series.
On a personal note, one of my first programming experiences was an ActionScript test in college where I had to make a ! Fishy !-esque game using ripped Kirby sprites.
Tragically Skye Boyes passed away in October of 2015, with his wife Kaelyn Boyes assuming control of XGen, posthumously releasing his final work The Low Road in 2017.
