Game

The loop of First Light: Luteway. It sits on mount_game and is the only writer of LW.state.phase, LW.state.run, LW.state.tide and LW.state.dawn.t.

title ──start──▶ opening ──(staging releases)──▶ play ──▶ won | lost
                                                  │ pause ▲ resume
                                                  ▼       │
                                                paused ───┘

A screen moves the loop with LW.emit("uiRequest", action) — start, pause, resume, restart, title — and this answers. The opening is held while the staging slice has LW.state.stagingBusy set, and released on its own after nine seconds so a missing or mid-edit crane can never leave the player without control.

The two clocks

The sea is defined by WHEN it takes the rookery rather than by how fast it rises, so a route of any height gets the same deadline and the same shape of pressure: slow at first, gathering, over the crest at RUN.drownSeconds. Standing on the beach doing nothing drowns in about fifteen seconds; a run that keeps moving has room, and one that dawdles does not.

The light runs on the clock too, but it can never fall behind the penguin: dawn.t is the greater of the clock's share and the climb's, and only ever increases. A fast climber arrives into a dawn that kept up with them; a slow one gets it anyway. The cliff slice turns that number into the sky, the sun and the light line coming down the rock.

Ends

Lose when the sea reaches the penguin's chest. Win when it is standing on the rookery ledge — dawn.t goes to 1 and firstLight fires with it.

Staying wired

Reloading luteway.game gives it a new event bus while this component keeps running, and every subscription made against the old one is gone: the loop would answer no button on any screen, and nothing would report an error. So it emits a probe on the bus once a second and subscribes again when its own handler does not answer.