Redline
At a glance: playable prototype / high-speed courier platformer (Sonic-like) · outrun the Choir — hold the redline or the swarm catches up (speed beats omniscience) · current build focuses on a Pyre courier; full target includes Pyre / Warden runner identities · the courier front of the War for the Lanes, turning the CANON §6 win condition into a verb (Resistance-era).
Outrun the Choir. When the Scourge cuts the lanes and chokes the comms between holdouts, the message still has to get through — so a lone runner carries it on foot, faster than the horde can close. Speed is survival. Stop moving and the swarm catches up; the Choir is always listening for the one thing still moving on the dead roads.
Canon role
The courier front of the war. Deadlane holds the lanes, Scourge-Survivors descends into the breaches, Starblight burns the orbit — Redline keeps the holdouts talking when the breaches sever the wired relays and the Scourge floods the corridors between them. A severed holdout is a dead holdout; the runner is the human repeater the Choir can’t jam. Both factions field couriers under the Pact — a Pyre runner carries a burn order, a Warden runner carries a hold order, and on the road they run the same gauntlet.
Warline operation — Logistics Run: A courier carries the message between holdouts on foot when the Scourge cuts the comms — outrun the Choir and the front stays connected.
The hook — speed beats omniscience
The Scourge is near-omniscient while it’s massed and connected (CANON §5), but its coordination has a tempo, and a runner at full redline is faster than the Choir can re-route the horde to cut them off. The fantasy is the CANON §6 win condition turned into a verb: you don’t fight the signal, you outpace it. Lose your momentum and the swarm’s omniscience snaps shut around you.
Core Loop
Flow-state, readable high-speed platforming layered on the shared Survivors-Loop: launch a run → chain ramps, rail-grinds, and breach-debris boost pads to hold the redline → bank salvage/XP at speed → draft movement/loadout upgrades → reach the next holdout before the gate closes (or get caught and overrun). Levels are lanes-as-racecourses: collapsing chokepoints, breach-flooded streets, and Choir-repeater jammers you blow past or smash through.
Enemy shape
The Scourge here is the road itself turning against you: chitin growing over the asphalt, spore-walls that bloom across the lane, Render-class horrors that try to cut you off at junctions, and repeater-pylons whose jamming radius slows the redline — clip them and the local horde goes feral and stops predicting you.
First Sprite Roster
- Human courier identities: Pyre-Courier, Warden-Courier.
- Shared Scourge pressure: Swarm-Ripper, Render, Rot-Engine.
Status
Playable prototype — current build proves the Pyre courier speed verb first. The full design target still includes both Pyre and Warden courier identities once the movement, lane hazards, and Choir-pressure loop earn the extra faction work. Shares horde, rules, Timeline, and the rust-and-hellfire look.