Dead Channel

You are a burned console operator in the Rind, a seawall slum in the port city of Halcyon Bight. Work comes from a patron whose messages arrive without a route trace, which is impossible, and which you take anyway, because rent is due on Tuesday. Nothing in Dead Channel is timed. Nothing is a reflex test. The ice tells you what it is before you touch it, so a run is a routing puzzle you solve at whatever speed you feel like solving it. THE RUN A fog-of-war grid of nodes. Arriving somewhere reveals what touches it, a probe looks a step further, and the vault is on the map from the start so you can plan an approach before you commit to it. Two meters and no clock: CYCLES — your action budget. At zero the deck drops you, and you keep what you carry. TRACE — how much of you is showing. At the ceiling you are ejected. Six classes of ice, introduced one chapter at a time. Barriers block the way. Sentries block it and charge trace every turn you stand beside them. Ciphers hold every cache next to them shut. Wardens hold the ice beside them shut. Leeches drink a cycle a turn. Veils stop anything beside them being read at all. Magenta stands in your way; amber lets you pass and interferes. Breakers are power against wall, with no dice anywhere. A program either opens that wall or the action is refused before you spend a thing. The tension is scarcity: charges per run, cycles, and how much trace you are willing to wear home. THE NIGHTS Between runs there is wherever you are sleeping this chapter, a market, and a message log. Sleep moves the night on and costs rent, and the cost of living climbs with the payouts on purpose. Delivering is the only living. Failing is never profitable, and no lattice can be learned and farmed, because every attempt builds a new one. Seven chapters, all written. One ending, in three shapes. No ads. No in-app purchases. No subscriptions. Nothing to unlock with money. No account, no sign-in, and no network access of any kind — it runs in airplane mode. No account, no sign-in, and no network access of any kind — it runs in airplane mode. No data collected. Your save stays on your device and is never sent anywhere. An original score of seven tracks, and a switch to turn it off.