Tankbar sits quietly along the bottom of your screen: a strip of warm water with a few little fish in it. Click the water and food flakes drift down while the greedy fish race for them. Hover over a fish and it wiggles happily; hover over a puffer and it puffs. Curious fish follow your cursor. Every so often a pearl bubble drifts up, and if you are too busy to pop it, it collects itself.
Underneath the coziness is a genetics engine. Each fish carries a genome (species, pattern, three color genes, size, fin length and traits), and the game paints it live, frame by frame. There are no sprite sheets and no recolors. Breed two fish and the Nursery shows you the exact odds before you confirm. Parents are never used up, and nothing is ever secretly rerolled.
When it is time to work, start a Focus Tide. A tide line rises, the music softens, and your fish earn double pearls until you are done. The music comes from three procedural radio stations, Lo-fi Reef, Deep Calm and Rainy Glass, composed live on your computer.
Tankbar also has an optional online mode called the Harbor, planned for launch and signed in with the Steam account that owns the game: gifts that arrive as a box on the sand, tank visits, Fish Shows judged half by genes and half by player votes, and a weekly community Tide. There is no player market: fish are for keeping and giving. Your tank never depends on the Harbor.
Tankbar is a one-time purchase. No ads, no microtransactions, no loot boxes, no energy meters. An optional cosmetic Supporter Pack is planned for launch day for anyone who would like to say thanks. Just fish.
