It is 198X. The United States government owns a typewriter. The typewriter is attached to a howitzer. The howitzer is attached to you.

You are a psychoballistic operator. You transcribe documents against a deadline. The transcription pours five colors of psychoplasm into a machine you plumbed yourself. When you hit ENTER on a fresh line, the machine fires whatever it made at a Bigfoot, a polygraph, or a serial killer.

This is a normal job. The benefits are competitive.

WHAT THIS IS

A typing-based turn-based roguelite with significant Zachtronics machine-building elements and a story inspired by Killer7 that will have you developing interesting new opinions about the idea of "national security."

If that sentence didn't help: it's Puzzle Quest plus Wingspan plus Factorio, as if it were also Slay the Spire, and a little bit of Guitar Hero, and Typing of the Dead raised the whole thing.

Don't worry about it. Play it, and it'll make sense.

PSYCHOBALLISTICA

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THE TRANSCRIPTION - for fighting. You fight by typing. Transcription is exact: wrong keys do not land, they only cost you time. Rack lines into the chamber. Stack more for a bigger shot. The clock tightens every line, and the deadline does not care how the fight is going.

THE MACHINE - for firing slugs of concentrated psychic protoplasm (aka "psychoplasm") at targets. Words become fluid. Fluid runs through pipes you laid yourself.

The transmission enters through the input stack. Longer words passing through Sandwich (Horizontal) spontaneously generate a small amount of slurry. Vowel-rich language feeds the Vowel Reservoir, which periodically adds new Circle psychoplasm to the stream. The augmented pour enters the tank. On submit, the tank flushes through the Receipt Printer; total released volume is counted, producing small flat additions to final shell damage. The resulting fluid reaches the Service Barrel and fires.

THE SUBJECT - for the other side of the table. Cryptids, devices, staff, and threats from across the ocean. The subject announces their intent before you type. Read it. Plan around it. Prediction is a skill and the file is sometimes annotated.

THE ASCENT - for the shape of a workday. Thirteen floors, branching. Fights, loot, rest, and everything else. Somewhere in the building there is a vending machine, a payphone, and a man who will sell you pictures of Bigfoot. You know. For tracking your targets.

PROJECT RETURN FIRE

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FINE PRINT

Pre-alpha prototype. Act 1, complete, which is the demo. The art is signage and placeholder collage while the real photographs get taken.

For this prototype, touch-typing is effectively required. However, you do not necessarily need to touch-type quickly if you are capable of planning tactically, making prudent decisions under duress, and creating the world's most degenerate psychoballistic strategy out of copper pipe and a dream. 

An audio-based, transcription-based version of the game for people who need to look at the keyboard to type is WIP pending the prototype's mild to moderate success.

IF PERFORMANCE IS BAD, PLEASE DOWNLOAD THE EXECUTABLE VERSION

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