Dead Reckoning v0.3.0 — Corridors & Bloodlines (experimental)

Three systems land on the experimental branch: the departure board, genetic decline as a force that can end the voyage, and the science team's long projects. This build ships to the experimental beta branch (opt-in) only — the stable branch stays on 0.2.125.

The departure board

• The ship commits its departure corridor at the launch board. Year 1 offers three corridors on file — the nearest reachable system, the most promising world in the far window, and the densest cluster of onward stars — each a named, real star with its class, distance, and contact year. The choice sets your first system and the shape of the early voyage.

• The pre-launch founding log lists the same board. The corridor you commit at Year 1 is the one the launch record promised.

• The Sol system holds still when you commit. The drive keeps the maiden heading through the solar transit — the planets stay where they loaded, the flybys happen — and the committed corridor's course change executes at the heliopause exit, shown as a bend in the plotted route.

• The Sol-transit briefings run on every corridor, not just the default heading.

Genetic decline

• Genetic diversity can now end the voyage. Decline drains the pool across generations; a depleted pool kills colonists and suppresses births.

• Founding bloodlines are load-bearing. When a founding line's last living carrier dies childless, that diversity is gone for good.

• Two new endings record where the genome goes: GENETIC EXTINCTION, and ONE LINEAGE — a colony that survives as a single genome.

The long projects

• The science team works decade-scale studies. Three standing projects begin at launch — a drive harmonics study, closed-loop agronomy, and a hull fatigue atlas. The pace follows the living science staff and slows under knowledge regression and class stratification; field data found during the voyage joins the same queue.

• Found technologies are on the record. Everything acquired mid-voyage lists under SHIP LOADOUT with its year and source; live projects show progress and an estimated completion year.

Steam Deck

• Lists scroll by trackpad drag, with a wider scrollbar to grab.

• The Mission Archive closes when you click outside it, and its BACK button stays pinned in reach.

Ending text

• A ship that loses power gets its ship-loss ending rather than a survival coda.

• The abandoned-lifeboat line appears only on runs that landed.

• A collapse epilogue no longer repeats its "eleven years" line.

Polish

• The intro sequence keeps its aspect ratio on 16:10 screens instead of stretching to fill.

• Deep ideological drift now calls the ship the ark; identity announcements are clearer and sound less like bad copy (yeah that's me; some of these were late night writing sprints, and I need to clean them up — but they're a start).

Languages

• AddedNoteA number of new lines temporarily read in English in German, French, Italian, and Spanish while their translations are refreshed.

Opt in under Properties > Betas > experimental, and let me know your thoughts.