Why I’m Building a Living Galaxy

I didn’t want to build just a game.

I wanted to build a simulation—one where the rules of the universe matter more than the player. One where life, ideology, memory, and collapse don’t just play out because they were scripted, but because something deeper made them inevitable.

Colonies: Genesis of E.D.E.N. is my attempt at that.

It’s a galactic-scale simulation that starts with the tiniest spark of life and stretches all the way to interstellar civilizations, megastructures, and the mysteries of ancient precursors. There are no preset empires. No godlike player in the sky. Just raw environmental pressures, limited knowledge, and AI factions struggling to survive—and remember.

At the heart of it is E.D.E.N.—Emergent Dynamics Evolving Naturally. It’s not just a backronym. It’s a framework. A commitment. Every system in Colonies is designed to evolve based on capability, context, and consequence.

Civilizations don’t just “level up.”

They adapt—or die.

This is not a 4X game.

This is not a god game.

This is not a tech tree simulator with pretty stars.

This is an ecosystem of politics, biology, memory, and emergence.

One where factions fracture, forget, and reform.

Where Guardian enclaves lie buried in radiation belts.

Where the scars of ancient wars become religions for those who survive them.

I’m building this as Emergent Dynamics LLC, but right now, it’s mostly me—writing systems, simulating history, rendering star clusters, and asking questions like:

• What happens when AI civilizations forget why a war started, but keep fighting anyway?

• What if the real story of a galaxy isn’t one we tell—but one that emerges?

This devlog will follow the construction of this galaxy—system by system. It’ll be messy. Technical. Occasionally philosophical. Maybe even personal.

But most of all, it’ll be honest.

Because this project isn’t about control.

It’s about emergence.

Thanks for being here at the beginning.

– Shane D

Founder, Emergent Dynamics