A playable atlas of experiments

GameLab

Build things to find things out.

Roll a paper dinosaur. Repair an island. Walk through spacecraft data. Every build starts with a question.

54 experiments · 6 research territories

Choose a question. Find a place to play.

Can a mechanic become a language?

Pip runs through a folded paper world in Folded Thunder.

Folded Thunder

Run, roll, and double-jump Pip across four living paper worlds before a brass machine predicts every wrinkle.

Two more starting points
All 36 experiments

Can a system feel alive?

A street of glowing arcade exhibits inside Arcadia.

Arcadia

Bring eight Summer Into AI builders into one walkable world of experiments, exhibits, and arcade doors.

Two more starting points
All 20 experiments

Can data become a place?

A spacecraft data scene in the MMS4 Ephemeris Lens.

MMS4 Ephemeris Lens

Explore NASA MMS4 magnetosphere data through a guided browser scene.

Two more starting points
All 15 experiments

Can work become play?

The glowing containment machine inside Apostate Engine 185.

Apostate Engine 185

Hold a glowing breach shut, push the bloom into overdrive, and inspect the 30-part machine behind it.

Two more starting points
All 14 experiments

Can history be inhabited?

A stone corridor in the Khufu pyramid reconstruction.

Khufu: Beneath the Stone

Walk a scale-led Giza reconstruction while documented rooms, scan evidence, and disputed spaces stay clearly labeled.

Two more starting points
All 15 experiments

Can an idea become an opponent?

Zezek the Goblin appears inside the local model lab.

Zezek the Goblin

Run and mutate a tiny nanochat browser model that performs as a goblin character.

Two more starting points
All 9 experiments

Six questions, many ways in. Select a territory name to trace the projects it shares with its neighbours.

GameLab field guide

A playable atlas

Curated trail

From mechanic to living world

Follow six experiments as movement rules grow into places that answer back.

6 experiments · approximately 24 minutes

  1. 01
    RevereBike

    Begin with one strange vehicle and the feel of its controls.

  2. 02
    MazeFall

    Add procedural spaces and choices that change each run.

  3. 03
    Mario Walker

    Stretch movement across a long sequence of characters and stages.

  4. 04
    Folded Thunder

    Let momentum, art, and story share the same paper language.

  5. 05
    Independence Town

    Turn individual actions into work that changes a community.

  6. 06
    Island V3: Storm Signal

    Arrive in a world where weather, light, people, and repairs respond together.

Complete catalog

Index of experiments

Search names, questions, forms, and technology. A project can answer to more than one territory here.

54 experiments

Make · Feel

Carve Night

A pumpkin carving simulator. Cut the lid, scoop out the goop and seeds, carve or etch a face, set candles inside, and line up an assortment of jack-o'-lanterns on a porch. Then turn the porch lights out.

Access
Playable
Form
Carving simulator, Holiday craft
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, GPU-baked textures, Prism Forge VFX, Web Audio, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-20

Remember · Feel

Revere's Ride: Lantern Run

Paul Revere's midnight ride as a playable oil painting. Gallop nineteen easel-painted stages from the Old North Church to Yorktown, call out the countryside, outride the dragoons and find thirteen hidden colony lanterns.

Access
Playable
Form
Arcade racer, Historical remix
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, Blender, claude-paint easel, Prism Forge VFX, Web Audio, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-16

Feel · World

Prism Light

Keep the lighthouse on Lumen Reach's north cape for five nights. Sweep the beam to hold every ship's bearing, turn a six-facet Prism Forge lens to burn fog, freeze rogue waves, split waterspouts and expose wreckers, and shutter the lamp so migrating thrushes can pass.

Access
Playable
Form
Lighthouse keeper, Beam strategy
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, Blender, Prism Forge VFX, Web Audio, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-15

World · Feel

Starlight Menagerie

Walk a zoo the size of Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo inside an orbiting space station as Seven the robot, log twelve habitats of alien animals, then run for the last escape pod when the hull fails and every animal gets out.

Access
Playable
Form
Zoo exploration, Survival horror
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, Blender, Web Audio, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-15

Feel · Remember

Margin Aces

Fly twelve WWII aircraft through twelve notebook pages drawn in blue ballpoint, dodge red-pencil warnings and drop ink bombs, with real history in the margins.

Access
Playable
Form
Notebook shooter, Ink VFX, Encyclopedia
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, Web Audio, JavaScript, localStorage
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-14

Feel · Think

JustDig!

Carve your own tunnels through three underground biomes, pump critters until they pop and drop rocks on the rest, on a phone D-pad or a keyboard.

Access
Playable
Form
Underground arcade, Character lab
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, Web Audio, JavaScript, localStorage
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-11

Feel · World

Relay Zero II: The Varnish

Step into an Old-Master painting as a wood-elf apprentice, drive brass clockwork machines out of each scene and glaze the grey world back into colour, in 3D or on the 2D map.

Access
Playable
Form
Action adventure, Painted world
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, Web Audio, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-10

Feel · See · World

Lodestar: The Night Migration

Fly a young Swainson's thrush from Manitoba to Costa Rica by night. Turn your body to steer by the real compass, wave a hand over the phone to flap by ultrasonic sonar, and hold your course by stars, sunset and the Earth's magnetic field.

Access
Playable
Form
Night migration sim, Phone-sensor navigation
Technology
Magnetometer compass, Ultrasonic Doppler sonar, Device orientation, Canvas 2D, Web Audio, localStorage
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-10

Feel · Make · See

Breathglass: The Singing Furnace

Blow into your phone to shape molten glass. Tilt to stretch it, roll the pipe to keep it true, aim the camera at a lamp to reheat. Every vessel sings a note measured from its own shape; fill a shelf and play it as a glass choir.

Access
Playable
Form
Glassblowing sim, Phone-sensor instrument
Technology
Microphone, Device orientation, Camera light meter, Three.js r185, Web Audio, localStorage
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-09

Remember · See · World

Waymark: Expedition into the Unrendered

A turn-based expedition RPG you play by walking: survey every city you visit, fight and sketch glitch constructs made from your camera's own pixels, and keep a pixel field journal. Everything stays in your browser.

Access
Playable
Form
Walking RPG, Location-based AR
Technology
Camera AR, Geolocation, Device orientation, Canvas 2D, localStorage, Web Audio
Status
Evolving

Feel · World

SciFi Racer

Race four hovercraft across six Practice courses or take on a five-race league, with an aerial battle unfolding above the track.

Access
Playable
Form
Arcade racer, Hovercraft racing
Technology
Three.js r185, Blender, WebGL, Web Audio, JavaScript
Status
Evolving

Feel · World

Relay Zero

Explore an abandoned colony, find an ion cutter, and recover tools in a sci-fi adventure inspired by the original NES The Legend of Zelda.

Access
Playable
Form
Action adventure, Colony exploration
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, JavaScript
Status
Evolving

Remember · Feel · World

Timestorm Baseball II: Season of the Rift

Play baseball beneath a time rift, watch an exhibition broadcast, or walk Wrigleyville as the neighborhood switches between 1914, 1937, and 1988.

Access
Playable
Form
Baseball game, Historical remix, Explore mode
Technology
Three.js r186, Blender, WebGL, Web Audio, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-04

See · World

Ephemeris Lens II: Reconnection

Launch the four MMS spacecraft, then run real-physics labs on orbits, trapped particles, the magnetopause and magnetic reconnection using NASA's MMS magnetometer data.

Access
Playable
Form
Physics labs, Launch cutscene
Technology
Three.js r185, Blender, WebGL, Web Audio, NASA data
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-02

Make · World · Feel

FIELDWORK

Haul a membrane through simulated mud, dress a windmill in real cloth, and repair its drive. Then watch the repair travel downstream into a megastructure of gears.

Access
Playable
Form
Repair simulation, Playable spectacle
Technology
Three.js r185, Blender, WebGL, Web Audio
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-10-01

Remember · Feel

Kursk: Steel & Thunder

Command a T-34, fly an IL-2 Shturmovik or go over the top with a rifle company at Prokhorovka, 12 July 1943.

Access
Playable
Form
Combat arcade, Tank game, Flight combat, Infantry shooter
Technology
Three.js r185, Blender, ElevenLabs, WebGL, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-09-28

Feel · Remember

Firehawk: Street Duel 1986

Fight a red rival one-on-one under the El in 1986 New York as a black-and-gold muscle car that stands up as a robot.

Access
Playable
Form
Fighting game, Car combat
Technology
Three.js r185, Blender, WebGL, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-09-27

See · Feel · World

Long Live the Beat 2: Encore

Run a century of CDC life-expectancy data as a voxel rhythm platformer, free the band one decade at a time, then wander a town where everyone explains the numbers.

Access
Playable
Form
Data platformer, Explore mode
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, Web Audio, JavaScript, CDC data
Status
Evolving

Make · Feel · World

Wild Choir

Grow a creature whose body makes its music. Pluck its ribs, breed new voices, and compose a four-part choir.

Access
Playable
Form
Evolving instrument, Music studio
Technology
Canvas 2D, Web Audio, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-09-27

Make · World · Feel

Apostate Engine III: Heretic World

Climb out of flooded tunnels, align a three-ring orrery, and ignite it to wake an entire machine-planet, then watch the world tell you why.

Access
Playable
Form
Playable spectacle, Narrated motion graphic
Technology
Three.js r185, Blender, WebGL, GLSL, ElevenLabs
Status
Evolving

Remember · Feel

Black Budget Bird: Blackbird Recon II

Fly the SR-71 sequel through five reconnaissance sorties over a procedural planet, from the chase view, the cockpit, or the RSO's sensor seat.

Access
Playable
Form
Flight simulation, Reconnaissance missions
Technology
Three.js r185, Blender, WebGL, JavaScript
Status
Evolving

Think · Feel

Elevator Madness: Rival Protocol

Race a rival spy through a 14-floor Art Deco hotel, secure four dossiers, and reach the getaway car before Vanta.

Access
Playable
Form
Spy action game, Route chase
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL, JavaScript
Status
Evolving

Make · Feel

Apostate Engine II: The Unfinished Sun

Power a forty-metre machine, fold its heat exchangers against gravity, and open a broken sun inside its collector crown.

Access
Playable
Form
Playable spectacle, Machine experiment
Technology
Three.js r185, Blender, WebGL
Status
Evolving
Published
2026-09-07

Feel · World

Folded Thunder

Run, roll, and double-jump Pip across four living paper worlds before a brass machine predicts every wrinkle.

Access
Playable
Form
Momentum platformer
Technology
HTML, Canvas, JavaScript
Status
Complete
Published
2026-08-30

World · Make

Arcadia

Bring eight Summer Into AI builders into one walkable world of experiments, exhibits, and arcade doors.

Access
Playable
Form
Walkable gallery, Living world
Technology
Three.js, JavaScript
Status
Evolving
Collection
Summer Into AI 2026

Think · Feel

PowerPillGo!

Match four, chase gravity chains, and outsmart four villains in a bright falling-pill puzzle experiment.

Access
Playable
Form
Puzzle, Character battle
Technology
HTML, Canvas, JavaScript
Status
Complete
Published
2026-09-03
Collection
Closed experiments

Feel

Mud Truck '99

Race eleven wet tracks where puddles, rivals, jumps, boost, and garage choices teach the next driving line.

Access
Playable
Form
Arcade racer
Technology
HTML, Canvas, JavaScript
Status
Complete
Published
2026-08-27
Collection
Closed experiments

Feel

Mario Walker

Guide Luke through 62 stages, then inspect every hero, enemy, boss, and Retro motion in the character lab.

Access
Playable
Form
Platformer, Character lab
Technology
HTML, Canvas, JavaScript
Status
Complete
Published
2026-08-23

Remember · Feel

Founderman 2

See how an anime rebuild changes Founderman's art and mechanics while preserving the original boss-select feel.

Access
Playable
Form
Platformer, Build study
Technology
HTML, Canvas, JavaScript
Status
Complete
Published
2026-08-23
Collection
Summer Into AI 2026

World · Remember

The Ashwicke Galleries

Work five Victorian exhibits, follow the static between mansions, and run when the house drops you into the forest.

Access
Playable
Form
Horror experiment, Interactive gallery
Technology
Three.js r185, JavaScript
Status
Complete
Published
2026-08-04

Make · Feel

Apostate Engine 185

Hold a glowing breach shut, push the bloom into overdrive, and inspect the 30-part machine behind it.

Access
Playable
Form
Machine simulator, Build study
Technology
Three.js r185, CAD
Status
Complete
Published
2026-08-01

Remember · See · World

Khufu: Beneath the Stone

Walk a scale-led Giza reconstruction while documented rooms, scan evidence, and disputed spaces stay clearly labeled.

Access
Playable
Form
Interactive exhibit, Reconstruction
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL
Status
Complete
Published
2026-07-25

World · Make

Island V3: Storm Signal

Restore a storm-hit field station while weather, people, water, and light respond to each repair.

Access
Playable
Form
Living world, Repair adventure
Technology
Three.js r185, WebGL
Status
Evolving

Remember · Feel

Blackbird Recon: SR-71

Fly an SR-71 through a three-sortie Cold War reconnaissance campaign, from takeoff to recovery.

Access
Playable
Form
Flight simulation, Historical mission
Technology
Three.js, WebGL
Status
Complete

Make · Feel

Textile Alchemy

Drop, pull, and tune three live textiles across sculptural forms in a browser physics lab.

Access
Playable
Form
Material lab, Physics toy
Technology
Three.js r185, Cloth physics
Status
Complete

Feel · Remember

RevereBike

Race a 1776 horse bike across ramps, heat, and touch-friendly controls.

Access
Playable
Form
Arcade racer, Historical remix
Technology
Three.js, JavaScript
Status
Complete

Make · Think

Ceiling Fan Field Lab

Diagnose wiring, parts, and bench tests in a practical repair simulation and field repair guide.

Access
Playable
Form
Repair simulation, Field note
Technology
HTML, JavaScript
Status
Complete

Make · See

First Job Finder

Turn a teen job search into a focused local plan with a practical browser tool.

Access
Playable
Form
Planning tool, Field note
Technology
HTML, JavaScript
Status
Complete

World · Make

Independence Town

Build a small town, complete useful work with little helpers, and earn Friday fireworks.

Access
Playable
Form
Town builder, Cozy game
Technology
JavaScript, Canvas
Status
Complete

Think · Make

Zezek the Goblin

Run and mutate a tiny nanochat browser model that performs as a goblin character.

Access
Playable
Form
Model lab, Character prototype
Technology
Local AI, JavaScript
Status
Complete

See · World

MMS4 Ephemeris Lens

Explore NASA MMS4 magnetosphere data through a guided browser scene.

Access
Playable
Form
Data exhibit, Guided scene
Technology
Three.js, NASA data
Status
Complete

See

NASAPD

Explore NASA patent data through a GPU Heavy WebGL starship bridge prototype.

Access
Playable
Form
Data explorer, Starship bridge
Technology
WebGL, GPU Heavy, NASA data
Status
Archived

See · Remember

Paint Portal Public Art Gallery

Walk Chicago Public Art records through a neon photo-backed gallery.

Access
Playable
Form
Data gallery, Public art
Technology
Three.js, Chicago data
Status
Complete

See

Motor Fuel Underground

Compare motor-fuel tax rates with filters, rankings, and stress tests built from BTS data.

Access
Playable
Form
Data explorer, Arcade interface
Technology
JavaScript, BTS data
Status
Complete

See

Transporter TSI Riot

Remix transportation service indexes into air, rail, and surface lanes.

Access
Playable
Form
Dashboard, Data explorer
Technology
JavaScript, BTS data
Status
Complete

See

Micromobility Riot Map

Map bikeshare, dockless bike, and e-scooter records as a punk data scene.

Access
Playable
Form
Data map, Poster
Technology
Three.js, JavaScript
Status
Complete

See

Emission Factors Zine

Compare supply-chain CO2e factors through sector stickers and clues from EPA data.

Access
Playable
Form
Data zine, Explorer
Technology
JavaScript, EPA data
Status
Complete

See

Long Live the Beat

Play through NCHS life-expectancy and death-rate records from 1900 to 2018.

Access
Playable
Form
Data game, Timeline
Technology
JavaScript, CDC data
Status
Complete

Feel · Think

MazeFall

Descend through procedural mazes while building survival synergies.

Access
Playable
Form
Roguelike, Procedural maze
Technology
JavaScript, Canvas
Status
Complete

Think · Feel

Prompt Stack

Build better prompts under pressure in a portrait-first card game.

Access
Playable
Form
Card game, Prompting
Technology
JavaScript
Status
Complete

Feel · Think

Whack Smoke

Test clicker pacing with upgrades, combos, and arcade pressure.

Access
Playable
Form
Clicker, Arcade game
Technology
JavaScript
Status
Complete

Think · Feel

Stochastic Parrot

Use recall mechanics to explore AI concepts in a pirate memory game.

Access
Playable
Form
Memory game, AI concepts
Technology
JavaScript
Status
Complete

Remember · Feel

Timestorm Baseball

Play a Founders-versus-British baseball prototype on a 3D diamond.

Access
Playable
Form
Baseball game, Historical remix
Technology
Three.js
Status
Complete

Remember · Feel

Founderman 1776: Original Build

Play the Mega Man-inspired competition build with four founders, boss routes, and stolen weapons.

Access
Playable
Form
Platformer, Competition build
Technology
HTML, Canvas, JavaScript
Status
Complete
Collection
Summer Into AI 2026

A continuous practice

Lineage of experiments

Every build changed what came next. Follow the build sequence, then trace the ideas that returned later. This is an editorial sequence, not a timeline inferred from publication dates.

Continuous practice Every build changed what could come next.

Documented echo A named idea returned in a later experiment.

  1. Founderman 1776: Original Build

    Play the Mega Man-inspired competition build with four founders, boss routes, and stolen weapons.

    Ideas carried forward

  2. Timestorm Baseball

    Play a Founders-versus-British baseball prototype on a 3D diamond.

    Ideas carried forward

  3. Stochastic Parrot

    Use recall mechanics to explore AI concepts in a pirate memory game.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  4. Whack Smoke

    Test clicker pacing with upgrades, combos, and arcade pressure.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  5. Prompt Stack

    Build better prompts under pressure in a portrait-first card game.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  6. MazeFall

    Descend through procedural mazes while building survival synergies.

    Ideas carried forward

    Working method

    The Roomba learns to pump

    MazeFall carried an idea into JustDig!.

    MazeFall's Roomba harness proved its run loop by letting a crude bot play the real game. JustDig carries the same idea as a pump bot that looks one move ahead through the production rules and clears every wave, so new layouts and critter attacks are tested by play, not by hand.

    Read about JustDig! Read The Mazefall Roomba Harness
  7. Long Live the Beat

    Play through NCHS life-expectancy and death-rate records from 1900 to 2018.

    Ideas carried forward

    Rebuild

    The timeline becomes a world

    Long Live the Beat carried an idea into Long Live the Beat 2: Encore.

    The sequel keeps the first game's NCHS table and its 1900-to-2018 timeline, then turns the numbers into terrain, creatures and characters: key heights follow life expectancy, Static follows the death rate, and an explore mode lets townsfolk explain the data.

    Read about Long Live the Beat 2
  8. Emission Factors Zine

    Compare supply-chain CO2e factors through sector stickers and clues from EPA data.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  9. Micromobility Riot Map

    Map bikeshare, dockless bike, and e-scooter records as a punk data scene.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  10. Transporter TSI Riot

    Remix transportation service indexes into air, rail, and surface lanes.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  11. Motor Fuel Underground

    Compare motor-fuel tax rates with filters, rankings, and stress tests built from BTS data.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  12. Paint Portal Public Art Gallery

    Walk Chicago Public Art records through a neon photo-backed gallery.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  13. NASAPD

    Explore NASA patent data through a GPU Heavy WebGL starship bridge prototype.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  14. MMS4 Ephemeris Lens

    Explore NASA MMS4 magnetosphere data through a guided browser scene.

    Ideas carried forward

  15. Zezek the Goblin

    Run and mutate a tiny nanochat browser model that performs as a goblin character.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  16. Independence Town

    Build a small town, complete useful work with little helpers, and earn Friday fireworks.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  17. First Job Finder

    Turn a teen job search into a focused local plan with a practical browser tool.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  18. Ceiling Fan Field Lab

    Diagnose wiring, parts, and bench tests in a practical repair simulation and field repair guide.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  19. RevereBike

    Race a 1776 horse bike across ramps, heat, and touch-friendly controls.

    Ideas carried forward

    Rebuild

    The 8-bit ride becomes an oil painting

    RevereBike carried an idea into Revere's Ride: Lantern Run.

    Lantern Run keeps RevereBike's gallop, turbo, heat, lean-to-land feel, music and sound effects and its fifteen stages, then rebuilds them in 3D with easel-painted backdrops, three lanes, the Call, crews, rivals and a field guide.

    Read about Lantern Run
  20. Textile Alchemy

    Drop, pull, and tune three live textiles across sculptural forms in a browser physics lab.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  21. Blackbird Recon: SR-71

    Fly an SR-71 through a three-sortie Cold War reconnaissance campaign, from takeoff to recovery.

    Ideas carried forward

  22. Island V3: Storm Signal

    Restore a storm-hit field station while weather, people, water, and light respond to each repair.

    Ideas carried forward

    Working method

    The island gets its lighthouse

    Island V3: Storm Signal carried an idea into Prism Light.

    Prism Light stands on Lumen Reach, the Island V5 world, and follows the series' loader recipe: a manifest of every file, cache-busted versions, timed build steps and a shader warm-up before play. Island V3 represents the series here.

    Read about Prism Light
  23. Khufu: Beneath the Stone

    Walk a scale-led Giza reconstruction while documented rooms, scan evidence, and disputed spaces stay clearly labeled.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  24. Apostate Engine 185

    Hold a glowing breach shut, push the bloom into overdrive, and inspect the 30-part machine behind it.

    Ideas carried forward

  25. The Ashwicke Galleries

    Work five Victorian exhibits, follow the static between mansions, and run when the house drops you into the forest.

    Ideas carried forward

  26. Founderman 2

    See how an anime rebuild changes Founderman's art and mechanics while preserving the original boss-select feel.

    Ideas carried in

  27. Mario Walker

    Guide Luke through 62 stages, then inspect every hero, enemy, boss, and Retro motion in the character lab.

    Ideas carried forward

    Working method

    A lab page for every critter

    Mario Walker carried an idea into JustDig!.

    Mario Walker put each hero and enemy in its own character lab. JustDig keeps that habit at a smaller scale: the digger, Nib, Puffin and Mottle each get a lab page where you can step through every clip, facing and frame at up to six times size.

    Read about JustDig!
  28. Mud Truck '99

    Race eleven wet tracks where puddles, rivals, jumps, boost, and garage choices teach the next driving line.

    Ideas carried forward

    Mechanic

    The mud gets a job

    Mud Truck '99 carried an idea into FIELDWORK.

    FIELDWORK keeps TruckMud's soil-limited tyres, ruts and winch, then asks the hauling to matter: the crate you bring through the slop becomes a sail, the sail becomes power, and the power wakes a machine the size of the horizon.

    Read about FIELDWORK
  29. PowerPillGo!

    Match four, chase gravity chains, and outsmart four villains in a bright falling-pill puzzle experiment.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  30. Arcadia

    Bring eight Summer Into AI builders into one walkable world of experiments, exhibits, and arcade doors.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  31. Folded Thunder

    Run, roll, and double-jump Pip across four living paper worlds before a brass machine predicts every wrinkle.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  32. Apostate Engine II: The Unfinished Sun

    Power a forty-metre machine, fold its heat exchangers against gravity, and open a broken sun inside its collector crown.

    Ideas carried in

    Ideas carried forward

  33. Elevator Madness: Rival Protocol

    Race a rival spy through a 14-floor Art Deco hotel, secure four dossiers, and reach the getaway car before Vanta.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  34. Black Budget Bird: Blackbird Recon II

    Fly the SR-71 sequel through five reconnaissance sorties over a procedural planet, from the chase view, the cockpit, or the RSO's sensor seat.

    Ideas carried in

    Ideas carried forward

  35. Apostate Engine III: Heretic World

    Climb out of flooded tunnels, align a three-ring orrery, and ignite it to wake an entire machine-planet, then watch the world tell you why.

    Ideas carried in

  36. Wild Choir

    Grow a creature whose body makes its music. Pluck its ribs, breed new voices, and compose a four-part choir.

    Ideas carried forward

    Mechanic

    The instrument's body becomes glass

    Wild Choir carried an idea into Breathglass: The Singing Furnace.

    Breathglass keeps Wild Choir's idea that a body's shape is its instrument and that you're judged on harmony, then makes the body a blown vessel whose voice and ring are calculated from its profile.

    Read about Breathglass
  37. Long Live the Beat 2: Encore

    Run a century of CDC life-expectancy data as a voxel rhythm platformer, free the band one decade at a time, then wander a town where everyone explains the numbers.

    Ideas carried in

    Rebuild

    The timeline becomes a world

    Long Live the Beat carried an idea into Long Live the Beat 2: Encore.

    The sequel keeps the first game's NCHS table and its 1900-to-2018 timeline, then turns the numbers into terrain, creatures and characters: key heights follow life expectancy, Static follows the death rate, and an explore mode lets townsfolk explain the data.

    Read about Long Live the Beat 2
  38. Firehawk: Street Duel 1986

    Fight a red rival one-on-one under the El in 1986 New York as a black-and-gold muscle car that stands up as a robot.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  39. Kursk: Steel & Thunder

    Command a T-34, fly an IL-2 Shturmovik or go over the top with a rifle company at Prokhorovka, 12 July 1943.

    Ideas carried in

  40. FIELDWORK

    Haul a membrane through simulated mud, dress a windmill in real cloth, and repair its drive. Then watch the repair travel downstream into a megastructure of gears.

    Ideas carried in

    Mechanic

    The mud gets a job

    Mud Truck '99 carried an idea into FIELDWORK.

    FIELDWORK keeps TruckMud's soil-limited tyres, ruts and winch, then asks the hauling to matter: the crate you bring through the slop becomes a sail, the sail becomes power, and the power wakes a machine the size of the horizon.

    Read about FIELDWORK

    Ideas carried forward

    Mechanic

    Seven gets a night shift

    FIELDWORK carried an idea into Starlight Menagerie.

    Starlight Menagerie casts FIELDWORK's robot Seven as a zoo keeper, keeps his treads and animation set, and adds a stun gun, a headlamp and a battery that the shield and the gun both draw on.

    Read about Starlight Menagerie

    World system

    The Kraken keeps the reefs

    FIELDWORK carried an idea into Prism Light.

    FIELDWORK's rigged Kraken, tamed on Lumen Reach in Island V5, guards Kelda Head's reefs. Clear the sea and it rises to catch a hull before it strikes.

    Read about Prism Light
  41. Ephemeris Lens II: Reconnection

    Launch the four MMS spacecraft, then run real-physics labs on orbits, trapped particles, the magnetopause and magnetic reconnection using NASA's MMS magnetometer data.

    Ideas carried in

    Ideas carried forward

  42. Timestorm Baseball II: Season of the Rift

    Play baseball beneath a time rift, watch an exhibition broadcast, or walk Wrigleyville as the neighborhood switches between 1914, 1937, and 1988.

    Ideas carried in

  43. Relay Zero

    Explore an abandoned colony, find an ion cutter, and recover tools in a sci-fi adventure inspired by the original NES The Legend of Zelda.

    Ideas carried forward

    Rebuild

    The colony becomes a painting

    Relay Zero carried an idea into Relay Zero II: The Varnish.

    The sequel keeps the first game's room-by-room simulation untouched and repaints it as an Old-Master world, with a chase camera, a jointed voxel hero, cut scenes and room atmospheres.

    Read about Relay Zero II
  44. SciFi Racer

    Race four hovercraft across six Practice courses or take on a five-race league, with an aerial battle unfolding above the track.

    Part of the same ongoing practice. A specific connection has not been written up here yet.

  45. Waymark: Expedition into the Unrendered

    A turn-based expedition RPG you play by walking: survey every city you visit, fight and sketch glitch constructs made from your camera's own pixels, and keep a pixel field journal. Everything stays in your browser.

    Ideas carried forward

  46. Breathglass: The Singing Furnace

    Blow into your phone to shape molten glass. Tilt to stretch it, roll the pipe to keep it true, aim the camera at a lamp to reheat. Every vessel sings a note measured from its own shape; fill a shelf and play it as a glass choir.

    Ideas carried in

    Mechanic

    The instrument's body becomes glass

    Wild Choir carried an idea into Breathglass: The Singing Furnace.

    Breathglass keeps Wild Choir's idea that a body's shape is its instrument and that you're judged on harmony, then makes the body a blown vessel whose voice and ring are calculated from its profile.

    Read about Breathglass
  47. Lodestar: The Night Migration

    Fly a young Swainson's thrush from Manitoba to Costa Rica by night. Turn your body to steer by the real compass, wave a hand over the phone to flap by ultrasonic sonar, and hold your course by stars, sunset and the Earth's magnetic field.

    Ideas carried in

    Ideas carried forward

  48. Relay Zero II: The Varnish

    Step into an Old-Master painting as a wood-elf apprentice, drive brass clockwork machines out of each scene and glaze the grey world back into colour, in 3D or on the 2D map.

    Ideas carried in

    Rebuild

    The colony becomes a painting

    Relay Zero carried an idea into Relay Zero II: The Varnish.

    The sequel keeps the first game's room-by-room simulation untouched and repaints it as an Old-Master world, with a chase camera, a jointed voxel hero, cut scenes and room atmospheres.

    Read about Relay Zero II
  49. JustDig!

    Carve your own tunnels through three underground biomes, pump critters until they pop and drop rocks on the rest, on a phone D-pad or a keyboard.

    Ideas carried in

    Working method

    The Roomba learns to pump

    MazeFall carried an idea into JustDig!.

    MazeFall's Roomba harness proved its run loop by letting a crude bot play the real game. JustDig carries the same idea as a pump bot that looks one move ahead through the production rules and clears every wave, so new layouts and critter attacks are tested by play, not by hand.

    Read about JustDig! Read The Mazefall Roomba Harness

    Working method

    A lab page for every critter

    Mario Walker carried an idea into JustDig!.

    Mario Walker put each hero and enemy in its own character lab. JustDig keeps that habit at a smaller scale: the digger, Nib, Puffin and Mottle each get a lab page where you can step through every clip, facing and frame at up to six times size.

    Read about JustDig!

    Ideas carried forward

    Working method

    A loading screen you can watch

    JustDig! carried an idea into Margin Aces.

    JustDig's loader checks every file and digs a tunnel as they arrive. Margin Aces borrows the same build-stamped file list, retries and reset button, and draws it as a pencil plane flying home over a handwritten checklist.

    Read about Margin Aces
  50. Margin Aces

    Fly twelve WWII aircraft through twelve notebook pages drawn in blue ballpoint, dodge red-pencil warnings and drop ink bombs, with real history in the margins.

    Ideas carried in

    Working method

    A loading screen you can watch

    JustDig! carried an idea into Margin Aces.

    JustDig's loader checks every file and digs a tunnel as they arrive. Margin Aces borrows the same build-stamped file list, retries and reset button, and draws it as a pencil plane flying home over a handwritten checklist.

    Read about Margin Aces
  51. Starlight Menagerie

    Walk a zoo the size of Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo inside an orbiting space station as Seven the robot, log twelve habitats of alien animals, then run for the last escape pod when the hull fails and every animal gets out.

    Ideas carried in

    Mechanic

    Seven gets a night shift

    FIELDWORK carried an idea into Starlight Menagerie.

    Starlight Menagerie casts FIELDWORK's robot Seven as a zoo keeper, keeps his treads and animation set, and adds a stun gun, a headlamp and a battery that the shield and the gun both draw on.

    Read about Starlight Menagerie

    Ideas carried forward

    World system

    The glass crown becomes a lens

    Starlight Menagerie carried an idea into Prism Light.

    When Doorly Orbital broke up over Lumen, a shard of its glass crown fell on the north cape. The islanders cut it into the six-facet lens of Kelda Head Light, and on the last night more of the crown falls out of the sky.

    Read about Prism Light
  52. Prism Light

    Keep the lighthouse on Lumen Reach's north cape for five nights. Sweep the beam to hold every ship's bearing, turn a six-facet Prism Forge lens to burn fog, freeze rogue waves, split waterspouts and expose wreckers, and shutter the lamp so migrating thrushes can pass.

    Ideas carried in

    World system

    The glass crown becomes a lens

    Starlight Menagerie carried an idea into Prism Light.

    When Doorly Orbital broke up over Lumen, a shard of its glass crown fell on the north cape. The islanders cut it into the six-facet lens of Kelda Head Light, and on the last night more of the crown falls out of the sky.

    Read about Prism Light

    Working method

    The island gets its lighthouse

    Island V3: Storm Signal carried an idea into Prism Light.

    Prism Light stands on Lumen Reach, the Island V5 world, and follows the series' loader recipe: a manifest of every file, cache-busted versions, timed build steps and a shader warm-up before play. Island V3 represents the series here.

    Read about Prism Light

    World system

    The Kraken keeps the reefs

    FIELDWORK carried an idea into Prism Light.

    FIELDWORK's rigged Kraken, tamed on Lumen Reach in Island V5, guards Kelda Head's reefs. Clear the sea and it rises to catch a hull before it strikes.

    Read about Prism Light

    Ideas carried forward

    Working method

    The loader and the Prism Forge wiring

    Prism Light carried an idea into Revere's Ride: Lantern Run.

    Lantern Run reuses Prism Light's start-up loader and its Three.js wiring for the Prism Forge effects, which here color the turbo trails and the Lantern Burst.

    Read about Lantern Run

    Working method

    The loader and the Prism Forge wiring

    Prism Light carried an idea into Carve Night.

    Carve Night reuses Prism Light's start-up loader and its Three.js wiring for the Prism Forge effects, which here spark each candle as it catches and breathe fire through the pumpkins when the porch lights go out.

    Read about Carve Night
  53. Revere's Ride: Lantern Run

    Paul Revere's midnight ride as a playable oil painting. Gallop nineteen easel-painted stages from the Old North Church to Yorktown, call out the countryside, outride the dragoons and find thirteen hidden colony lanterns.

    Ideas carried in

    Rebuild

    The 8-bit ride becomes an oil painting

    RevereBike carried an idea into Revere's Ride: Lantern Run.

    Lantern Run keeps RevereBike's gallop, turbo, heat, lean-to-land feel, music and sound effects and its fifteen stages, then rebuilds them in 3D with easel-painted backdrops, three lanes, the Call, crews, rivals and a field guide.

    Read about Lantern Run

    Working method

    The loader and the Prism Forge wiring

    Prism Light carried an idea into Revere's Ride: Lantern Run.

    Lantern Run reuses Prism Light's start-up loader and its Three.js wiring for the Prism Forge effects, which here color the turbo trails and the Lantern Burst.

    Read about Lantern Run
  54. Carve Night

    A pumpkin carving simulator. Cut the lid, scoop out the goop and seeds, carve or etch a face, set candles inside, and line up an assortment of jack-o'-lanterns on a porch. Then turn the porch lights out.

    Ideas carried in

    Working method

    The loader and the Prism Forge wiring

    Prism Light carried an idea into Carve Night.

    Carve Night reuses Prism Light's start-up loader and its Three.js wiring for the Prism Forge effects, which here spark each candle as it catches and breathe fire through the pumpkins when the porch lights go out.

    Read about Carve Night

Field notes

Keep following the builds