I plan on creating an RPG to begin my education on non spawning systems so as to create a game world that sustains itself though reproduction death and predator prey relationships. I plan on using a basic 2D grid based RPG to contain my prototype to make sure it is doable without having to deal with processing and physics issues.

I do have 2 years experience with C++ and assembly languages from working towards a degree in Computer Software Technology along with a functioning story-less RPG that I made in high school. I also have a degree in mathematics.

Hi and welcome

I plan on creating an RPG to begin my education on non spawning systems so as to create a game world that sustains itself though reproduction death and predator prey relationships

This is an very interesting topic. You should read up the history of ultima online, if you are planning to include this in a multiplayer RPG. They did something similar once (it has been removed later on).

Interesting.

What kind of population sizes do you intend to have? If we are talking realistic populations to prevent a player decimating and bringing a species to extinction (e.g. millions, hundreds of thousands) how do you plan to handle instancing the creatures to prevent excessive memory consumption?

Will this purely be a non-interactive simulation, or will players be able to enter the simulated world and a battle of "kill or be killed" survival of the fittest against the creatures?

You might want to speak to Norman Barrows here who is working on a stone-age simulation of some kind, i am guessing he is doing something similar internally on a smaller scale.

I'm thinking about having about 20 zones which certain animals can navigate and have them big enough that they are able to stabilize. I plan on this being a single player or Lan for the time being, just to make sure I don't have to deal with large group problems, but this is mainly to flesh out the idea and while the game may be fun I don't plan on selling the prototype without it having at least a couple side quest lines available for the player to learn more about the mechanics. If anything I think I may give out the game for free with only the basic randomized quests for a quest board and a stable wilderness.

of course the villager AI is nonexistent for now. I plan on working on that side of the fence after finishing the groundwork for wild animals since I feel civilization could prove to be more difficult, and I don't want to deal with 2 big problems at once. Better to work on the wilderness to get some experience first. The villagers will stand in place and you can interact though talking and trading, I don't want them wandering off nor do I want to waste the time setting up a temporary code to keep them in line.