Ludum Dare 59 Entry

💻 ESCAPE_OS

A Chaotic Management(?) Game

You are the Panic Protocol Artificial Intelligence - PPAI v7.4.9, the newest state-of-the-art AI installed on corporate civilian spaceships that travel through territory of carnivorous alien beings. Your role is to ensure the preservation of company assets, also called employees.

Primary instruction: Herd survivors into escape pods, prioritizing high value targets to protect the company's interests.
Remember: Not all employees are equal. Protect the Shareholder Value (SHV) at all costs.

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📋 INSTRUCTIONS

Your goal is to safely evacuate high-value targets (like the Captain and the CEO's Nephew) while managing the alien threat. You interact with the ship's systems to manipulate the environment and guide the panicking humans.

🕹️ CONTROLS

• Left Click: Toggle doors, activate airlocks, and deploy fire suppressors.
• [E] Key: Toggle Signal Mode (Comms).
• [Q] Key (in Signal Mode): Cycle through available Signal types.
• Left Click: Apply current Signal Mode to selected area.
• Right Click: Cancel Signal Mode.
• Mouse Wheel: Zoom Camera in/out.
• WASD / Arrow Keys: Pan Camera.

⚙️ SHIP SYSTEMS

• 🚪 Doors: The primary way to route AI. Humans and Aliens rely on pathfinding. If you close a door, they recalculate. Use this to lock aliens away or force humans down a specific corridor. Warning: Aliens can eventually break through locked doors.
• 💨 Airlocks: Activating an airlock triggers a depressurization sequence. It kills everything in the room (Aliens and Humans alike).

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📡 THE COMMS SYSTEM (SIGNALS)

You cannot directly control humans, but you can influence them using the ship's PA system. Press [E] to enter Signal Mode, cycle with [Q], and left-click a room to broadcast.

• 🏃 MOVE (Cyan): Points the direction where the NPCs will move. They will head toward the signaled room.
• ⚡ RUN (Yellow): Injects a burst of adrenaline! Increases human movement speed by 50% for 2 seconds. Note: This does not alter their current pathfinding direction.
• 🛑 WAIT (Grey): Commands humans to hold their ground and stop moving. Useful to prevent them from running blindly into an alien-infested sector.
• 🥩 LURE (Purple): Emits a frequency that attracts Aliens. Use this to pull the threat away from your high-value VIPs and into a room you are about to depressurize.

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📈 SHAREHOLDER VALUE (SHV)

The corporation will grade your performance based on who survives.

• High Value: The Captain, Lead Engineer, and Nepotism Hires. Save them to boost your score.
• Low Value: Interns, Janitors, and the guy who stole the CPU cooling fan. Expendable assets.
• Negative Value: Influencers are prone to publish content that reduces stock value. Thieves have wrongly appropiated company assets. Social media manager are social media managers. Getting rid of them actually increases score.

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