PLATE 01
Driftborn
Ships that channel the universe. A 2D space shooter with planar gameplay and angled 3D presentation.
- STACK
- TypeScript · Babylon.js · Vite
- LINK
- In progress
BRIEF
Driftborn is a playable prototype of a single-player space shooter. Movement, contact and combat resolve on a 2D plane; an angled 3D view gives ships and effects their form. In the current Hearth Reach outing, you can leave the station, fight two Ash Skiffs, earn experience, return to refit, and try another build. Its larger world and item rewards are still ahead.
Magic takes the shape of hardware
Ships channel cosmic magic through fitted devices. That premise becomes a rule: a defensive Aegis Projector grants Ward, while a Shield Reclaimer grants Mend Shields and a Comet Crucible grants Comet.
The fiction does not add a mana meter. What you can do comes from the current ship build, so changing equipment changes the available inputs as well as the ship’s strengths.
Driftborn: from cosmic magic to a combat action
An explanation of the build rules, not a live simulation or a mana-resource system. Cosmic magic is the fiction; fitting an Aegis Projector is the implemented choice that grants Ward and gives it a visible combat cue.
Read the full sequence
Source
In the fiction, ships channel cosmic magic. This is a story premise, not a simulated resource or meter.
Fit
Fit an Aegis Projector in a defensive slot. Equipment is the concrete way this ship channels that premise.
Build
The pure shipBuild rule reads fitted items and derives the active ship’s stats and available actions.
Act
The Aegis Projector grants Ward. The HUD shows it, and combat accepts the input only when the build grants it.
See
Activating Ward produces a forward defensive arc. Simulation state and events become a readable visual cue around the ship.
A different fit is a different move set
At the Hearth, Loadout previews a compatible item before you equip it. The selected Arc Projector would replace the Needle’s Starfire Emitter; the resulting build preview shows its weapon and action bindings before the choice is committed.
Equipment copies move between inventory and owned ships. Each ship keeps its own fitted loadout, and shipBuild derives weapon, granted actions, defenses and movement from that fit plus learned technologies. The immediate tradeoff is legible: a swap can add an action, change a weapon or leave another ship without its only weapon.
A technology tree with a narrow promise
Twelve implemented technologies sit in General, Interceptor and Gunship branches. Prerequisites gate later nodes, and a learned class-specific effect applies only to its matching hull class. The station previews the resulting stats and lets the captain reset the allocation.
The capture shows an earlier prototype with four stand-in points. In the current build, a new captain starts with zero: Ash Skiff defeats grant experience, and each captain level awards one technology point. Loot and the broader world remain outside this starter outing.
The HUD reflects the ship you built
The flight rail shows the fitted weapon, the hull ability and only the actions this build grants. Its seal shows integrity and shields; an experience arc now shows progress toward the next captain level. Action tiles show bindings, readiness, cooldown and active Ward state.
Combat can be busy without making the controls a memory test. A refit changes the rail as well as the rules, so the available choices stay visible during flight.
Rules first, visible effects second
stepCombat advances positions, abilities, projectiles and hits as pure simulation data. It returns state and events; the presentation layer turns those outcomes into shots, impact cues and Ward’s forward arc in the angled scene.
That boundary keeps the 2D combat rules independent of the 3D camera. The tradeoff is a deliberate translation step: every important event needs a cue that can be read while ships move through the scene.
CONSTRAINT
The playable world is still one starter outing: the Hearth, two owned ships, and a two-skiff encounter.
CONSEQUENCE
Docking and refitting make that small space useful for testing how hardware changes play. Ash Skiff experience now feeds captain levels and technology points; loot and further sectors still need their own systems before the wider premise can be experienced.
DELIBERATE BOUNDARIES
Prototype scope
The current outing is playable and technology points are earned through captain levels, but its owned ships and item catalog are supplied at the start rather than found.
Visual language
The opening ship image is a concept illustration. The combat and station panels below are captures from the running game.
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