VIVID | A Different Kind of Survival Simulation

VIVID does not begin with a hero, an army, or a world that needs saving. Instead, it places you in the life of a plant and asks you to do something that sounds simple in theory but is considerably more demanding in practice: keep it alive long enough to complete its life cycle.

Team Nava Games’ upcoming title is a single-player simulation that combines resource management, survival, and RPG elements within a calm, hand-painted environment. VIVID is currently in development and is planned for release in 2027, while the team has already released a demo that showcases the core gameplay loop.

We had the chance to spend some time with VIVID and complete two different runs. What stood out to us almost immediately was the contrast between the way the game presents itself and what it actually asks from the player. It is relaxing, quiet, and undeniably cozy, yet at the same time it never allows you to switch completely into autopilot. Your plant constantly needs your attention.

Surviving as a plant

The core idea behind VIVID revolves around growing a plant and eventually helping it reproduce inside an ecosystem that is constantly changing.

In the demo, we take control of a dandelion and start from the earliest stages of its development. As time passes, roots begin to form, followed by the first leaves, stems, and eventually flowers. The plant’s growth is not simply based on a fixed animation sequence, as elements such as leaves, their growth angles, stems, and flowers are generated procedurally.

The same applies to much of what happens around us. Random events alter the conditions of the ecosystem and force the player to continually adapt their strategy. In our own playthrough, the biggest challenge was not any one specific event, but the constant need to maintain the right balance between the plant’s resources.

Water, carbon, minerals, and glucose are all essential parts of that balance. Investing too heavily in one area can leave another exposed, and a situation that appears under control can deteriorate very quickly.

There is a small RPG hidden inside VIVID

This is also where one of VIVID’s more interesting elements starts to emerge. The game features a metabolism system that allows us to determine how the plant manages its available resources. We can, for example, increase water or carbon intake, or adjust glucose production depending on the needs of the moment.

These choices are made using metabolism points, but those points are not limited to resource management. They are also used in the skill tree, creating an interesting choice from early on between stabilizing the plant in the short term and investing in its long-term development.

The skill tree is divided into different branches and includes both passive and active abilities. We can strengthen different aspects of the plant, improve the efficiency of specific systems, or unlock abilities that can save us when conditions start becoming dangerous.

As we progress through a branch, the cost increases and stronger options become available, creating a familiar RPG structure within a completely different type of game.

What makes this especially interesting is that these skills were not designed arbitrarily. The logic behind them is based on real characteristics and biological mechanisms found in plants, allowing VIVID to communicate genuine information without turning into educational software.

The ecosystem never stays completely calm

Random events are perhaps the main element that keeps every run alive. During the plant’s development, changes in environmental conditions, extreme weather, or human activity can directly affect its survival.

A heatwave, for example, significantly increases water consumption. A storm can sharply raise the plant’s stress levels, while even a music festival in the surrounding area can negatively affect its growth. There are also events such as smog and forest fires, which form part of the wider event system.

And these events do not simply appear as notifications on the screen. In several cases, the environment reacts visually as well, helping the game communicate changing conditions without relying entirely on numbers and menus.

Stress is another system that needs constant attention. If the plant is pushed too far, things can start deteriorating quickly. Leaves may be lost, reserves can drop, and eventually the entire run can collapse.

There are, however, recovery mechanics as well, so a difficult situation does not necessarily mean everything is over. VIVID allows you to correct earlier mistakes to some extent, as long as you react in time.

VIVID is relaxing, but not passive

That was probably the clearest conclusion we took away from the demo. VIVID has all the traits of a cozy game. The music, the sounds of nature, the movement of the plant, and the overall pacing create an environment that can easily be described as relaxing.

That does not mean, however, that its gameplay is without demands. There is almost always something that requires your attention. A resource begins to run low, stress starts rising, a new event changes the conditions, or you need to decide where your available points are best spent.

Even when everything seems to be under control, VIVID keeps you in a subtle state of alertness. And at least from the runs we played, that balance works.

The game also features adaptive difficulty. If a run is going very well, events can become more demanding, while if the player is struggling, their impact may become less severe. It is an approach that helps VIVID remain accessible without turning into an experience that effectively plays itself.

From one flower to an entire generation

VIVID’s real potential starts to become clearer once you look beyond a single run. The ultimate goal is to help the plant reach flowering and reproduction. Insects that assist with pollination, such as bees and butterflies, are part of that cycle and can appear within the ecosystem as the plant develops.

Beyond that, the game includes a very interesting system built around seeds and genetic inheritance. The idea is that a seed produced by a successful plant can carry modifiers connected to what happened during the previous run and the way the plant developed.

A plant that invested more heavily in its roots may produce different traits from another that had to survive extreme weather or severe water demands.

That seed can then become the foundation of a new run, effectively creating continuity between different generations of plants. This is likely to become one of the most important elements for VIVID’s long-term replayability, especially considering that the final game is being designed around different environments and conditions.

More than a simple plant simulation

VIVID is still in development, and several of its systems continue to evolve. The full version is currently planned for 2027, so there is still time before we see the final form and full scope of the game.

What already exists, however, has a clear identity. VIVID manages to combine a calm, almost meditative atmosphere with gameplay that requires constant attention and careful management.

The audio design also plays an important role in that atmosphere, as many of the natural sounds, including water, birds, crickets, and frogs, come from real field recordings.

After two completed runs, our first impression is positive. VIVID does not try to become stressful or excessively demanding, but at the same time it never allows the player to remain passive.

You can relax while playing it, but you cannot stop paying attention. And when the entire game revolves around keeping a living organism standing against everything happening around it, that is probably exactly the feeling it should create.

For more details about VIVID, the philosophy behind the game, and Team Nava’s plans for its future, you can also read our Q&A with the developers.

For more gaming coverage, you can visit Gaming-Sanctum’s Gaming News section.