I just put Dead Reckoning into public beta. It’s a turn-based colony ship sim built in Godot 4, and the central mechanic is Drift — the slow, invisible erosion of your civilization’s values across generations.

You start with 1000 colonists, five resource bars, and five drift meters all sitting at 0%. By the time you arrive at a new world, those meters tell a story you didn’t mean to write.

What’s in the beta: — 20-minute runs — Five interlocking drift paths (genetic, ideological, AI takeover, generational regression, class stratification) — Terminal-aesthetic UI — no HUD outside the fiction — Ten hard-coded events to validate the decision feel — One ending that tells you what civilization you built

It’s rough. That’s intentional. Looking for people who want to play it and tell me what broke, what landed, and what civilization they ended up with.

Free to play, Windows + Linux: https://garanlorn.itch.io/dead-reckoning

#godot4 #indiedev #gamedev

  • Garan Lorn@lemmy.caOP
    1·
    20 days ago

    v0.1.10 — Bug fixes, tutorial overhaul, Mac build

    Thanks to everyone who filed reports and played through the early builds. This is a combined bug fix and feature update based on that feedback.

    Bug fixes

    Event log clipped silently. The Events & Directives column was cutting off text at the bottom with no scroll. In at least one case this hid a decision option entirely. Fixed.

    Emergency interventions fired on single click. One-time-use buttons (Emergency Repair, Power Surge, etc.) committed immediately with no confirmation. They now require a second click — the button shows CONFIRM? and you click again to commit, or anything else to cancel.

    Cryo Bay death count didn’t match the mission log. These are different counts: the log tracks all population deaths, the Cryo Bay tracks only the 300 named colonists individually. The labels now make this clear.

    Character name showed as {character} in the mission log after loading a save. Fixed.

    Tutorial

    The year 0 briefing is now a pre-launch checklist. It opens with your live hull/power/food readout and walks you through what to do before advancing — which research to consider, what power allocation does, what drift will cost you. First-time players get a real orientation.

    The solar system events (Mars, Jupiter, Saturn) no longer have tutorial tips bolted on. Those moved to year 0 where they belong. The events are now pure narrative.

    Fast Transit

    Returning players can skip years 1–15 at the pre-launch screen. The skip runs all real simulation math — mortality, drift, resource decay, the asteroid belt decision, the last Earth signal — then drops you at year 15. A research reminder fires before you confirm.

    macOS

    Universal binary, native on Intel and Apple Silicon. Unsigned — on first launch, right-click → Open to get past Gatekeeper. Standard for itch.io games without an Apple Developer account.