What is Virtual Ocean, and what do
I do in it?
Virtual Ocean is, well, a Virtual Ocean. It's basically a
thriving ecosystem out in cyber-space. In Virtual Ocean,
you get to "tag" a fish, and make decisions for
it as it grows and reproduces. When we say tag, we mean
tracking the fish, and watching it's progress much like a
marine biologist, or any biologist for that matter, would
do in nature. You goal is just to try and help your fish
survive in Virtual Ocean. To find out how to do this,
keep reading.
Time
-
In Virtual Ocean, each day counts as a month. So, every
day your fish will age one month, and if your fish is
about to have babies, those will come one month closer.
Your
Animal -
This section on the display will show you several
statistics on your and your fish, your User name, the
species of your fish, it's age, it's gender, and it's
thoughts. The thoughts section is always good to look at
after you make the fish do something. For example, if
your fish just ate, it might say "Mmm,
angelfish...".
Community
News -
Here there will be a news story posted every day. Usually
it will be just a random news story, but sometimes it
will be about pollution in the Virtual Ocean, or even oil
spills. These are events that can occur in sectors of the
Virtual Ocean. For example, one day there might be an oil
spill in your sector, and you fish could die from
contamination.
Cafeteria -
In this section, there will be a list with all the foods
that your fish can eat. If you want to eat, select an
item from the list, then press the "Eat it"
button. If the item you selected is a fish that lives in
your sector, your fish will eat it, and say who's fish
they ate. That persons's fish will then be dead since you
ate it. You can only eat someone else's fish once a day.
If the item you select is not something that a user can
tag, it will just say "Mmm, food.". You can eat
as many of these types of things as you want.
Mating -
Here your fish can mate. What you do is, if you know the
name of someone's fish, and you would like your fish to
mate with that fish, make sure the "Choose"
button is marked, then type the user's username in, and
press "Mate". If it is possible for your fish
to mate with that fish, it will ask the user who tagged
it. Otherwise, it will tell you what went wrong in it's
thoughts. If you don't knwo the name of anyone's fish,
just select the "Random" option, and press
"Mate". If there is no fish in your sector that
meets the requirements, your fish will tell you that you
should move to a different sector so it can find a fish
that is suitable. Otherwise, it will tell you which fish
it asked to mate. The next time the user who's fish you
asked to mate logs on, they will have the option to
either say yes or no to your request. If they say yes,
you will mate, and it will display how many children you
are going to have. If they say no, you won't get a
notification, you'll just have to assume for yourself
that they said no. Once you have mated, it will say how
long it will be until the are born, and one they are, it
will say how many children you have. Your children will
also be added to the population count. You can only mate
once.
Location -
This section will show you what sector you're in, what
it's like, and how many of each species live in it. It
also gives you the option to move to another sector, in 4
different directions. The sections are numbered
horizontally from A to I, and vertically from 1 to 6. You
can move around to any sector you want. Why would you
want to move to a different sector. Maybe there are a
large number of species in your current sector that hunt
your species, and you don't want to be eaten, maybe you
want to find a place with more food, or more mates.
Death -
Some time or another, unfortuanately, you fish will die.
There are a few ways it can die - age, being eaten, or
pollution of some sort. When your fish dies, you will get
a message that says it died, and that your account was
deleted. Once your fish dies, you can feel free to get
and tag another fish.