A cozy shrine-management prototype and development jumpstart for LÖVE2D

Nurture a forgotten harvest shrine as mystical fox guardians, grant wishes, gather resources, and rebuild the bond between a village and its forgotten kami.

Inari Shrine is a playable LÖVE2D prototype designed not only as a small game experience, but also as a starting point for developers who want to build their own simulation, management, farming, exploration, or cozy-life game in LÖVE2D.

The prototype demonstrates how multiple game systems can work together inside a relatively compact Lua/LÖVE2D project.

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What Is Inari Shrine?

Inari Shrine is a prototype about restoring an abandoned harvest shrine.

You take the role of a new shrine keeper accompanied by mystical fox guardians. The shrine has been forgotten by the surrounding village, but prayers are slowly returning.

Villagers bring their problems and wishes to you.

To answer them, you must:

• Visit the village
• Listen to prayers
• Accept requests
• Gather materials
• Explore the forest
• Discover mysterious spirits
• Tend the shrine's rice field
• Prepare blessings
• Restore the shrine
• Recruit fox guardians
• Gain Faith
• Turn villagers into followers
• Uncover the mystery of the shrine's previous keeper

The result is a small but interconnected simulation/adventure gameplay loop.

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A Prototype You Can Build Upon

This isn't intended to be a gigantic finished game.

Instead, v0.4 is deliberately structured as a foundation.

If you've wanted to make a:

• Farming game
• Shrine simulator
• Cozy game
• Village simulation
• Resource-management game
• Life simulation
• Exploration game
• Quest-driven management game
• Spiritual/fantasy game
• Pixel-art adventure
• Management RPG

...this prototype gives you a playable starting point.

You can take the existing systems, replace the artwork, change the characters, rewrite the mechanics, and transform the prototype into something entirely your own.

What's Included

Three interconnected maps

The prototype contains three primary areas:

Shrine Grounds

Your main base.

Manage the rice field, restore the shrine, interact with your fox guardians, and prepare blessings.

Village

Meet the villagers and discover their prayers.

Different villagers have different needs and personalities.

Forest

Explore for resources, discover spirits, collect Foxfire, and gather the materials necessary to fulfill village wishes.

Wish & Blessing System

Villagers don't simply give you generic fetch quests.

Their requests form the foundation of the game's simulation loop.

A typical request can require you to:

Listen → Understand the problem → Gather resources → Return to the shrine → Perform a blessing → Improve the villager relationship

This provides a foundation for expanding into:

• Quest chains
• Dynamic requests
• NPC relationship systems
• Reputation
• Village development
• Multiple prayer types
• Story events

Fox Guardian System

Four fox guardians can become part of your shrine:

Shiro

The Gatherer

Helps with gathering and resource collection.

Aka

The Cultivator

Helps maintain and improve the shrine's crops.

Kuro

The Scout

Improves exploration and Foxfire discovery.

Kohaku

The Blesser

Helps reduce the material requirements of shrine blessings.

The guardians can be activated or rested, providing the beginnings of a worker/companion management system.

This can easily be expanded into:

• Fox skill trees
• Worker assignments
• Companion progression
• AI behaviors
• Specialized production
• Friendship systems
• Unlockable abilities

Resource & Time Systems

The prototype includes a basic resource economy involving:

• Rice
• Wood
• Herbs
• Flowers
• Stone
• Foxfire
• Faith

Resources are gathered throughout the world and used to restore the shrine and fulfill wishes.

A simple day/night cycle also affects the world.

The Forest, for example, becomes different at night, allowing Foxfire and supernatural encounters to appear.

Shrine Restoration

The shrine isn't simply a backdrop.

Its restoration is a central progression system.

As the shrine improves, new gameplay possibilities become available.

The system provides a foundation for developers wanting to implement:

• Building upgrades
• Technology trees
• Unlockable areas
• Production buildings
• Permanent bonuses
• Base development
• Resource sinks

Spirits & Mystery

The Forest contains supernatural encounters.

Some spirits provide clues about the history of the abandoned shrine.

Rather than requiring traditional combat, the prototype demonstrates an alternative approach:

exploration + interaction + discovery.

This can serve as a foundation for developers interested in creating:

• Non-combat encounters
• Environmental storytelling
• Mystery systems
• Spirit/creature interactions
• Event-driven storytelling

Seasonal & Festival Systems

The prototype includes a simple seasonal progression and a Harvest Festival event.

This provides a foundation for creating recurring calendar events such as:

• Festivals
• Seasonal quests
• Harvest cycles
• Special NPC schedules
• Annual celebrations
• Seasonal resources
• Story milestones

Built for LÖVE2D

The prototype is written in Lua for LÖVE2D.

There are no external Lua dependencies.

The project intentionally uses straightforward systems that can be examined and modified without requiring a large framework.

The prototype includes:

• Map/state management
• Player movement
• NPCs
• Resource gathering
• Time progression
• Seasons
• Quest state
• Relationships
• Followers
• Building upgrades
• Companion/guardian states
• Dialogue
• Story progression
• Save/load
• Event systems
• Optional image assets 

No Art Assets Required

One of the most important design decisions is that the prototype doesn't depend on finished artwork.

The game attempts to load PNG assets when available.

If an asset isn't present, it automatically falls back to Lua-drawn placeholder graphics.

This means you can immediately start modifying the project without first needing to create a complete sprite sheet.

Replace the placeholders with your own:

• Pixel art
• Character sprites
• Tilesets
• Buildings
• Icons
• Effects
• Animations

and the prototype can become the foundation of your own game.

START BUILDING!