indiegame.fan
Gulugulu header art

Gulugulu

Your AI is coding. You supervise like middle management. Feed its tokens to a Gulu, hatch 63 species, then send 3–10 favorites into Office Stack-Up: a 20-shift physics roguelite about connecting elemental desks, beating KPI, buying upgrades, and going bankrupt professionally. No AI required.

Steam Page
Developer
Publisher
Release
Coming Soon
Steam Reviews
No reviews yet

Does this feel indie?

Vote based on whether this game feels indie to you. You can change your vote at any time. Results earn an IGF score after 10 accepted votes.
No votes yet
Vote on More Games
Game contextLatest: IGF Team
ContextThe evidence factors used to assess whether this game belongs on IndieGame.Fan.Status
Notes
Latest Contributor: IGF TeamEdit notes
Search Google: Who developed Gulugulu?Developer scaleThe operating scale of the game's developer.
Search Google: Who published Gulugulu?Publisher scaleThe operating scale of the game's publisher.
Search Google: Is Gulugulu self-published or published by Mobi Studio?Publisher statusHow the game's publishing relationship is classified.
Search Google: How is Gulugulu and Mobi Studio funded?FundingThe known source of funding behind the game.
Search Google: Who controls the creative direction and IP for Gulugulu and Mobi Studio?Creative controlWho appears to retain creative control of the game.
Search Google: What is the release status of Gulugulu?Release statusWhether and how the game has been released.

Media

14 items

About the Game

THE AI WORKS. YOU MANAGE THE DUCK.

Claude Code or Codex is busy producing code, confidence, and occasionally code with confidence. Meanwhile, you are watching a progress bar like a highly compensated supervisor. Gulugulu gives that important management role a purpose: a tiny pet lives at the edge of the desktop, acts out every think-code-error cycle, and eats the output tokens. The money was spent either way. At least now something cute got lunch.

NO CLAUDE OR CODEX? YOU STILL GET THE DUCK.

Gulugulu is a complete pet, collection, fusion, and roguelite game without an AI coding tool. Click for coins, hatch eggs, raise 63 fixed species, build a backyard, fuse new recipes, and play Office Stack-Up normally. Claude Code or Codex adds live coding reactions, output-token feeding, and optional locally generated variants. It is a bonus coworker, not a landlord. The core game needs no AI tool. AI features use your own signed-in Claude Code or Codex CLI, an internet connection, and available provider quota; Gulugulu does not collect an API key.

YOUR LAST HONEST JOB: CLICK THE GULU

Output tokens feed your active companion EXP. Clicking earns coins. On Windows, typing restores stamina while counting key events only — never the text, never the code, never the variable name you will deny writing. Spend the proceeds in the backyard on eggs, companions, and fusion.

CLOCK INTO OFFICE STACK-UP. HR HAS LEFT THE BUILDING.

Office Stack-Up is part of the Early Access launch build. Pick 3–10 species from your collection and clock into a complete 20-shift run. Six elemental office desks are shuffled every time, because assigned seating might lead to dangerous expectations such as stability. Hire Gulus and airdrop them one by one. Matching elements stick, bodies collide, and every employee already in the pile becomes real terrain for the next recruit. Build a tower more than ten Gulus high, bridge several desks, or create a very expensive landslide and call it restructuring.

DROP. STACK. CONNECT. CLAIM IT WAS THE PLAN.

Fire, Water, Grass, Electric, Ice, and Normal Gulus form shared-element paths through tall, overlapping piles. Connect one living tower to several matching desks and a performance pulse sends notes flying, lights up the whole office, and turns your organizational chart into revenue, combos, and multi-desk payouts. Every shift has a rising KPI and a bill waiting behind it. Hiring costs inflate, seats fill, and physics remains stubbornly unimpressed by your five-year plan. Miss the target or lose control of the books and the company goes bankrupt with admirable efficiency.

THE SHOP SELLS UPGRADES. THE INSPECTORS SELL PANIC.

Clear a shift and choose upgrades for elemental skills, workforce plans, dual-element synergies, and management actions. Reroll the offer, skip for a refund, move desks, expand the roster, fire three workers, or take a loan that keeps appearing on future payslips like a bad architectural decision. Shifts 5, 10, 15, and 20 bring Rush, Power Limit, Crosswind, and Final Audit inspections. Survive all 20 to graduate. Then continue from Shift 21 in Endless Mode, because apparently passing probation only unlocks unlimited overtime and a higher personal revenue record.

63 SPECIES, PLUS WHATEVER THE AI THINKS A SPECIES IS

Hatch and collect 63 fixed species built from every non-empty combination of six elements. Raise same-tier companions to max level and fuse them into new recipes. Some multi-element recipes unlock reproducible AI-variant slots that a local Claude Code or Codex CLI can design. Elsewhere, an AI hallucination costs three hours of debugging. Here, it may hatch with ears. If generation is unavailable, classic-recipe and Workshop fallbacks keep the egg honest.

LET YOUR AI INVENT A PET NO ONE ELSE HAS

Ask your local Claude Code or Codex to design a reproducible variant with its own name, colors, silhouette, and questionable number of tails. Keep the result as a local appearance, or publish and install compatible creations through Steam Workshop. Your AI finally gets to ship a unique design. Code review is optional; taste is not.

A BACKYARD FOR YOUR ORGANIZATIONAL PROBLEMS

Let companions wander, incubate eggs, browse the recipe-based Pokédex, and train beyond the fusion tier cap with materials earned from Office Stack-Up. Your collection is real; management remains theoretical.

KEY FEATURES, FOR THE QUARTERLY REVIEW

  • Office Stack-Up at Early Access launch: play 20 shifts of workplace physics, stack living towers more than ten Gulus high, connect several of six elemental desks, hit KPI, pay the bill, and restructure directly into the floor.
  • Build-defining upgrades: combine elemental skills, workforce policies, dual-element synergies, rerolls, refunds, desk moves, layoffs, expansion, and regrettable loans.
  • Four inspection days: survive Rush, limited power, changing crosswinds, and a final audit conducted by people who were not there for the previous 19 shifts.
  • Endless overtime: clear Shift 20, continue from Shift 21, and chase your highest exact local revenue until the org chart collapses.
  • A coding-aware desktop freeloader: AI output feeds EXP, clicks earn coins, and Windows keyboard charging counts events without reading content.
  • 63 fixed species: hatch, raise, collect, and fuse every non-empty combination of six elements. Completionism was cheaper than therapy.
  • Optional productive hallucinations: local Claude Code or Codex can design reproducible variants, but the full pet, collection, fusion, and Office Stack-Up loops work without either tool.
  • Steam Workshop sharing: publish and install compatible creature appearances through the game’s Workshop.