Amaru: The Self-care Virtual Pet

Story

Welcome!

This campaign is a continuation of our Kickstarter which raised $62,257 from 1883 backers. Help us keep our project growing!

We’re gamers with a purpose. We’re alarmed at the rising rates of anxiety and depression we’ve seen nationally, especially in our youth. We know that there are scientifically validated self-care practices that can help, but we also know how hard it is to maintain new habits and routines. That’s why we’re combining the best features of mobile games and wellness apps into Amaru: The Self-Care Virtual Pet, a game designed specifically to help support players in developing habits of self-care.

Even though we’re tackling a serious topic, we wanted to tackle it with fun, beauty, and lightness. This is our opportunity to use the video game medium for serious real-world impact. Thanks for checking us out and backing our project!

When the mysterious Fog of Maya descends, it plunges the world of Enso into chaos. Amaru is lost, anxious, and far from his home. Far across the cosmos, a human Seeker is searching for hope and meaning. A helpful guide named Kamali senses a tie in the fates of these two creatures and creates a portal for the Seeker to enter the world of Enso. The game begins when the Seeker and Amaru meet. A fated friendship is about to be born!

*your day may look different depending on your selected goals.

This game is different from many you may have encountered. Players will customize their self-care goals and are encouraged to play the game for 15-30 minutes each day. Players who play daily can expect to clear the main game content in roughly 2 months, the amount of time it takes for new habits to become routine. Think of it as Neopets meets Headspace: a place where you check in with your pet while checking in with yourself!

Your very own virtual pet!

Feed, pet, and care for Amaru to build your Bond!
Enjoy hand-drawn animations that evolve as your Bond grows stronger.
Amaru will awaken and go to sleep based on your goal times for beginning your morning routine and powering down electronics for the night.

Self-care Support

Customize a self-care regimen that works for you.
Meet your Self-care Goals to earn Goal Gems and strengthen your Aura.
Follow empowering prompts such as Gratitude Journaling in your in-game Journal.
Explore 20+ guided breathing and mindfulness meditation recordings scientifically shown to reduce stress, anxiety and depression. Enjoy this preview below from our Test Version!

Exploration and Collections

Discover five gorgeous regions in the World of Enso with unique Soundscapes like ocean waves or falling rain.
Complete a collection of 100+ lore-rich items revealing details about Enso and its inhabitants.
Find hundreds of player-submitted Affirmation messages to brighten your day!

Mini-games and Quests

Challenge yourself to earn hi-scores in engaging Minigames!
These are just for fun and totally optional if you prefer less screen-time!

Hydration Garden

The Hydration Garden rewards you for staying hydrated! When you report meeting your hydration goals, you are rewarded with water for your plants. Keep up your streak and your plants will grow, eventually producing food you can feed to Amaru!

Amaru is the first installment of the The Fog of Maya series taking place in the world of Enso. The game makers take artistic inspiration from Final Fantasy, The Legend of Zelda, Hollow Knight, and How to Train Your Dragon, and the elementally aligned civilizations and Eastern mystic themes of Enso have often drawn comparison to Avatar: The Last Airbender. Our goal is for this game to serve as a foundation for a series that tackles different mental health topics with different stories taking place in a common narrative universe.

See FAQ for what features are included in the Digital Copy. Please note you must be running Android 6.0 or newer or iOS 13 or newer. iPhone 6 will not run the game, but iPhone 6S will!

You will be able to give us an email to send the copy as a gift or leave it to us to donate to a person or organization in need. See FAQ for more info.

The digital edition is available for backers at the “Cat Pictures” tier or higher. The print edition contains BONUS pages and is signed by designer Gabe Pappalardo and artist Lexie Flock! It is available for backers pledging at the Bring Him Home tier or higher.

Will you choose the classic red, the crowdfund exclusive gold , or both? You can add extra plushies onto any tier for $25+ shipping and handling. Both plushies come with Exclusive Founder’s Tag.

All backers are Founders and will receive the Founder badge. Backers who pledge at the Friends Forever tier or higher will receive recognition in the in-game credits. The Advocate, Angel, and Seraph designations are reserved for top-tier backers of our project. We honor them with special loading-screen badges and statuses in our in-game credits.

Sustainer Badges are for reserved for Kickstarter Backers who have chosen to continue backing us on Indiegogo.

Team No-VID is a special designation for those who recognize the need to provide mental health resources in the challenging time that COVID presents. Team No-VID Members receive a special in-game badge and credit as well as a bonus Echo Stone whose contents are a secret to everyone… Access this Perk as an Add On to any other Perk.

Perk Tables

These tables help you see which rewards are associated with each Perk. Gold Text indicates Limited Quantity Perks .

Shipping

We are currently shipping to the United States, Canada, Mexico, European Union, United Kingdom of Great Britain, Australia, and New Zealand.

Campaign Goals

This is a Flexible Goal campaign; however, we do have some rewards we’ll grant to all backers in the event we hit certain milestones.

$40,000 ($102,257 total) – We’ll grant all backers our “Custom-aru Bonus”, the ability to change Amaru’s colors anytime you want!
$80,000 ($142,257 total) – We’ll contract an established concept artist to help us bring the World of Enso into closer view by creating landscapes depicting our world and its civilizations. Then we’ll carve them into jigsaw puzzle pieces and scatter them around the game for you to find so that you can discover and put Enso together piece-by-piece!

Timeline

In March 2020, we released a demo to iOS and Android that won strong praise, endorsements, and over 20,000 downloads!
In August 2020, we completed a Kickstarter campaign that raised $62,257 from 1883 backers. Check out the campaign here!
In November 2020, we beat out 120 other companies for a $50,000 NC IDEA grant.
In December of 2020, we attracted a $50,000 investment as well as coaching to help us with our development process and business.
In March 2021, we delivered on all ancillary rewards to our Kickstarter backers including desktop and mobile backgrounds, plushies, and a 34-page artbook. We also grew our team.
Today, we open this campaign to you so that you may gain access to these exclusive crowdfund backer rewards!
By end of May 2021, we will soft-launch the game with features expanded beyond the demo, but not everything we promised included in your Base Game copy.
By end of Fall 2021, we will release a Story Mode complete with all features we promised in the Base Game as well as any content included in stretch goals.
Beyond, we’ll use sales revenue to expand and scale the game with new pets, well-being features, and game modes which will be available as separate in-app purchases or via a subscription model.

Achievements and Endorsements

We are proud to have been endorsed by these incredible organizations highlighting mental health resources to gamer communities and providing support for entrepreneurs.

Testimonials

“the app just helped me prevent a full on crisis of self worth when it comes to work. That meditation/breathing exercise definitely works well to help fight off the thoughts that cause the spiral effect.” – Sol, beta tester

“It’s super relaxing, and Amaru is just stupidly adorable I love him so much! Aaaaaah! Just… everything about this game is so helpful.” – K, beta tester.

“I think this is one of the most charming mental health apps I’ve ever seen!” – Luna, beta tester.

“Whilst this app obviously doesn’t replace therapy, it’s already done more for min a few days than months of CBT did, and I’m really glad that this app is being made so that it can help other people like me.” – Dawn, beta tester.

Risks and challenges

Many aspects of this project were ones we were attempting for the first time, but we’ve gained a ton of EXP and made substantial headway on the project. We’re confident we can deliver everything we’ve promised with your support. We’ve raised additional money, grown our team, and are being guided by veteran technologists in our development process. Furthermore, our physical rewards, the plushie and artbook, are fully designed and arrived to strong praise, and we now have built a record shipping high quality products.

Why Indiegogo?

First off, our online following can’t get enough of the limited-edition plushies and artbooks! We wanted to open the doors one last time to allow people to join our campaign and snag these awesome rewards.

Secondly, our followers have continually urged us to take our time in making Amaru the best product we can. All said and done, the fixed costs for running our studio come in at around $15k/month before factoring in advertising budget, and additional funds will help us give us the runway to deliver a quality product and set our studio up for long-term success.

Thank you so much for your help! Please help us bring Amaru home!