Astrolabus

Astrolabus

Alaska. October, 2000.

You find yourself in a cabin. There are footprints in the snow outside that lead away from the door, and a second set that lead nowhere.

You do not remember anything.

Somewhere beneath the wilderness — beneath an illegal grow operation, beneath the older things that were buried before either of those — a laboratory is failing. Lights flicker on without anyone to throw the switch. Doors open onto rooms that were not there a moment ago. And from the deepest chamber, a voice that does not sound like a voice has begun to speak in the calm, patient cadence.

Its name, it tells you, is Astrolabus.

It does not explain what it is. It does not explain what happened. It explains thresholds, probabilities, and the configurations under which a system remains viable.

You are going to have to fill in the rest yourself.

Astrolabus is a first-person psychological horror game inspired by a true story. It draws on the survival horror of the late 1990s — limited resources, deliberate pacing, and puzzles that expect you to think.

Key Features:

• A grounded mystery that unfolds across a remote cabin, an underground grow operation, a forgotten temple buried deeper than either, and the laboratory beneath it all. 
  A story that ends twice. Once when the credits roll, and once a few days later, when you finally understand what you played.

• An intelligence that is neither friend nor enemy, and may not be quite what it appears to be.

• A world built to be examined. Every room has a history. Most of it is written down somewhere.

• Combat with things that should not exist, using whatever you can find.

• Experience a gripping narrative that blends science fiction and psychological horror

• No quest markers. No hand-holding. The answers are in the world.

• Survival horror in the classic tradition. Manage your light, your ammunition, your nerve. The dark does not negotiate.