Time is a game mechanic of Impossible Creatures that is used to sequence events and show how long a battle has lasted. There are also many small details that are based on time, such as how long an ability lasts or the duration that must pass before a certain action can be performed again.
Time is an especially important aspect of the Campaign, with many events of every mission occuring at set intervals and some objectives needing to be completed within a certain time limit.
Measurement of time[]
In the original Impossible Creatures, time was measured almost entirely in seconds and minutes. Nearly all events based on time, including the passage of time in the game itself, depended on this system. Anything that was measured in seconds remains to be so to this day.
There is, however, another system of measuring time within the game. It is known in the game's files as ticks, with a single tick being equal to 0.12 seconds. Originally only a small handful of game aspects used this system, but most new features introduced in Insect Invasion are measured in ticks.
Time-based aspects[]
- Functions of most abilities, such as the duration of Electric Burst and Flash, or how long a creature takes to become invisible again.
- How long effects such as Poison last before they wear off on a creature.
- How long flying creatures take to perform most actions; their rate of attack, the time needed to swoop down, etc.
- The time needed to unlock practically anything from Research Levels to genetic amplifications to Clinic upgrades.
- How long a Chamber takes to build a creature in-game, based on the creature itself and not the structure.
- All forms of healing, including the repair of buildings, are based on the amount of hit points restored per second or tick.
- Like healing, Endurance is recovered based on points per second.
- The time required for dead bodies to fade.
- The duration that must pass before in-game alerts are given, such as "Henchman idle".