#LETHAL COMPANY

[yupmabel]

they're friends

[doyoulikethis-videogame-song]

Song: Delivery Music Artist: Kerosene From: Lethal Company

Listen on Youtube:

[vgbugs]

Maneater - Lethal Company

A grubby little baby bug that wanders around a facility, looking for a player. It's just a lonely baby that wants to be held, and care must be taken to make sure it doesn't get too scared or sad by gently rocking it and avoiding loud noises. To make things more difficult, it won't like being held by every player, but will imprint on the first one it meets.

If it does get upset it will rapidly transform into its dangerous and aggressive adult form. Should've taken better care of that baby.

Lorewise it belongs to a group of cockroaches, but concept art shows that its adult form was based on a subterranean springtail. Cockroaches have nymphs instead of larvae, which do not metamorphose and resemble small, wingless adults. Although in the lore the baby Maneater is referred to as a larva. Literally unplayable.

[lgbtransgirl]

"Friendslop" is the dumbest term for gaming ever and I refuse to listen to anyone who uses it unironically.

Oh "the game is built for clip farming and seeing people do stupid shit?" Here's a question: are they having fun? Further, If you played it with your friends, would they have fun? Sure the clips are funny, but if you're laughing and hearing a dozen people laugh at the same stupid stuff in their game, wouldn't you if you played it?

Repo, Lethal Company, and Content Warning are less than $30 and easily were the most fun experiences I've had with my friends in YEARS, I would absolutely buy another cheap PvE multiplayer game because it's FUN. Watching my friends do stupid stuff and hear/see them eat shit in 4k is fucking hilarious, have you ever heard someone scream right before they got killed by a creature in front of you in Lethal Company and laugh like a hyena just to realize "oh shit I'm next rUN!"

"Friendslop" games are amazing and I want more. Give me the slop I will eat it out of the pot with the ladle itself.

[tealover89]

Warmup drawing 💪💪 everyone’s fav planet REND!!!!

[grammarpedant]

#WATCH AS MY EYES LIGHT UP RED#VERSO WHERE DO I SIGN UP #what if when repo happens the SecUnit player loses control of their character #and has to watch as their POV subdues and captures the other players #OOHHHHHHHHHHH. DUDE. #you dont understand. im. im freaking out #video games are a medium built on agency. they work because the player can choose their actions #pairing that with the psychological horror of the governor module/combat override modules/etc #the detail of breaking the gov mod being possible but the secunit has a piece of the information needed to do it…………… #how you need to keep all the players alive otherwise you lose #but you also cant let them succeed otherwise you lose #and the players need the secunit otherwise theyll probably die #but the secunit is also actively working against them #im actually. i need to lie down. #what if asymmetrical gameplay was 4d chess #what if you needed each other but also couldnt rely on each other #im unwell #the murderbot diaries #lethal company (via @broken-risk-assessment-module )

Oh yes absolutely <33 you get it bram!! The question of how to incentivize nuclear amounts of tension between the two types of players is my favorite thing to think about here and if I ever made this game real, it would be SUCH a fun and tricky thing to balance.

(Fun tidbit: in my vision of the video game, Surveyor players' scan function shows them the location and value of items much the same as it does in Lethal Company. However, SecUnit players literally do not see the value of items when they scan- a subtle way to incentivize the mindset we see from MB of "why the fuck are you squishy humans risking your lives and safety for stupid material STUFF? stop making my job harder.")

Because if the players already know that the way to win the game is to pull a PresAux, then the game is too easy, isn't it? You may as well just reread All Systems Red if you want to know how it goes. And it would trivialize something that makes the themes of the books genuinely radical- that it's hard to react with clear-sighted trust and compassion in the face of danger. So you have to give the players real reasons to behave in ways that would interfere with each other and generate resentment and distrust. But at the same time, the point IS still that pulling a PresAux is the only way to get out of the prisoner's dilemma.

I think currently the SecUnit player not getting to fucking communicate with anyone At All is maybe too brutal tho, tbh. It seems like it might be too isolating- it might just be me, but there's something about the way that you can laugh things off with your friends, or even just use basic tabletop safety tools when you can communicate clearly with them, that turns scary and frustrating moments into funny or at least tolerable ones, and the opposite isolation kind of scarring oops. In a tabletop rpg, I guess it would be mitigated by giving the SecUnit player GM powers, or making the human players the GMs who can communicate freely with the SecUnit out of character.

Thinking about the Murderbot Diaries x Lethal Company x Among Us crossover game idea. posting for today's whumptober. some stream-of-consciousness notes:

the goal of the Surveyors is to rack up enough Credit that they can pay off the Company and leave the planet. they get Credit by completing certain tasks, making certain discoveries, collecting evidence thereof, etc

the goal of the SecUnit is to stop them from doing this by reporting infractions that incur fines, because it loses if the Surveyors win. (the game implies that the SecUnit will be killed at the end of this contract, maybe because of bad performance stats? or it's at the end of its warranty? idk)

Surveyor lose conditions: if everyone dies/is in cryostasis. SecUnit lose condition: if it dies, or if the Surveyors win while the governor module is still active.

the Surveyors are normal-ass humans in a horror game, i.e. they are distressingly susceptible to death by alien fauna and small injuries can be fatal. the SecUnit is OP by comparison, with a tankier health bar, built-in weapons, and increased speed, jump height, dmg resistance, and the ability to insta-heal when returning to the base's Cubicle station.

However, there is only one SecUnit. It can't be everywhere.

Additionally, the SecUnit cannot meaningfully communicate to the other players. It cannot speak in voice chat or emote. It can only trigger buffer phrases to play, and the game AI picks which one seems appropriate: "Please use caution," "Danger," "Get clear," "It's safe," "I don't advise that course of action," random excerpts of Company protocol, etc.

"That is a violation of contract" buffer phrase automatically triggers when the SecUnit reports an infraction that fines the Surveyors. The Surveyors' HUD will show how much farther back that set them from escape and winning the game.

The SecUnit's HUD shows tags for the location of all players and their distance from it. It tracks a distance limit: remain outside this limit for too long, and the governor module will start shocking you to death.

The SecUnit will die if all Surveyor players are dead.

Surveyors will not automatically die without the SecUnit, but death is likely. There are no places in the game where death is impossible- monsters can spawn almost anywhere, environmental hazards require clear and precise communication to navigate, and even in home base it is possible to fuck up somehow and die.

Daily quota: It's not a quota per se, it's the daily cost of living- of paying the Company for food, water, power, breathable air on an alien planet. Equipment can be bought, debt can be incurred, and the Company repo's you if you lose too much. Meanwhile, you are trying to build up enough to buy escape.

Oh god what if when repo happens the SecUnit player loses control of their character and has to watch as their pov uses unique voice lines and pathing AI to subdue and capture the other players.

Alternately, players must complete a certain number of objectives from a list in order to win the game by the end of contract cycle. If they don't, they are stuck on the planet until next contract cycle is up, or until they die. Surveyors may have secret objectives that the SecUnit will be mandated to prevent or punish.

The best ending is possible if the SecUnit's governor module is broken before the full quota is met. The govmod break conditions are different every game, and one of the crucial pieces is known only to the SecUnit- who again cannot easily communicate with the other players.

The game has hurt/comfort mode (Surveyor players do not die, but rather their suits enter cryostasis and they can be retrieved and revived later) and whump mode (Surveyor deaths are permanent).

I wonder if this would be better as a video game or a ttrpg

[sadlyjustal]

Maneater lethal company my pickupped

[dat-is-i]

what if they were friends :)

[ninten-draw]

[ersatz-colubridae-888]

our work has just begun. and there is no way out but further in.

[yuledimes]

leaning on each other

[sillyman-justgoofy]

[theknightsstars]

Uhhh Did we always have 5 people..?

[joetastic2739]

All Pony Express Employees are now required to start their day with this morning routine dance.

[ci-real]

love employees