play.atomictick.com · Reserved · Not open
The browser client is not open yet
There is no server running behind this address. There is no account to make, nothing to download, and no date. Atomic Tick exists as a large body of written design, and as code that runs in development on one developer's machine.
There is no waiting list on this page, no newsletter box and no notify-me field. There is nothing behind this address that could receive one, and a form that goes nowhere would be a lie with an input in it.
Between here and a game
What has to happen before this page becomes something you can play
Five things, in rough order. One of them is done, one is being worked on, and three have not been started. None of them has a date attached to it.
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Built in code
The rules engine
One action per eligible character per Tick, UTC-aligned boundaries, the one-minute lock, deterministic resolution, movement, combat and the written report. Implemented in the private codebase and covered by tests. It runs in development. It is not deployed.
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Being built
The browser client
The part you would actually look at: sign-in, Shard and character selection, the map, the queue and the Tick reports. This is the current focus and it is incomplete. A visual reference exists; the game screens do not.
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Not stood up
A deployed API and database
The API boundary and the database invariants exist as code and pass their tests in development. Nothing is hosted. No server has been provisioned, paid for or pointed at this domain.
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Not running
A Shard on a schedule
A Shard is one persistent world resolving on a fixed cadence. None is running. There is no world anywhere with a Tick number in it, and the first public Shard's name, premise and map are still open questions in the design.
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None exist
Accounts
Sign-in is designed as a six-digit code sent by email, with no password stored anywhere and an email address as the only personal data collected. That is a design, written down. No account exists and nothing can create one.
None of this is deployed. Everything marked as built runs on one developer's machine, under a test suite, and nowhere else. There is no host, no public API, and no address you can reach it at — including this one. When that changes it will be said here plainly, and not before.
Demonstration
The rhythm a Shard will run on
Atomic Tick resolves on a clock rather than on your reflexes. Boundaries are aligned to UTC, so they never drift, and orders stop being editable one minute before each one. Below is that cadence, counting on your own device, so you can check it against a wall clock while you read.
- Next boundary in
- —:—
- Orders would lock in
- —:—
- Editing window would be
- open
- Cadence
- every 30 minutes
- Boundaries
- aligned to UTC
What this clock is Arithmetic, running on your device, against UTC-aligned boundaries. It reaches no server and it is not counting down to anything that will happen. Thirty minutes and one hour are the two worked profiles in the design; cadence is a per-Shard rule and any interval that divides the day evenly is legal.
Later, at this address
What lands here
When the browser client is finished, this is what it will do. None of it is reachable today.
- Sign in with an emailed code A six-digit code will arrive by email and be exchanged for a session. There will be no password to invent, forget or have stolen, because none will be stored.
- Pick a Shard Each Shard will be one persistent world with its own cadence, genre, economy and roster. Characters, items, currency and mastery will not transfer between them; that isolation is what keeps separately balanced worlds fair.
- Create a character Six attributes, a Race, a Class, a starting square on the map. There will be no character level: a character will be the sum of their Skills, capped at one hundred ranks each and eight hundred in total, so choosing what not to learn is the decision.
- Write and reorder your queue You will write a run of future orders — one atomic action each — and edit, reorder or cancel any of them until the Shard locks the Tick, one minute before the boundary. Only the head of the queue locks. Everything behind it stays yours to change.
- Read the Tick report After every Tick you will get a report naming the intent that was locked, the action that became effective, where you came in the acting order, the random draw that was used, what it cost you, and the plain-language reason the result happened.
Five empty boxes. They stay empty until the thing next to them genuinely works for somebody who is not the developer.
The address This URL will not change. When the client ships it replaces this page in place, at play.atomictick.com. A link, a bookmark or a store listing pointing here stays correct, and there is no later announcement of a different address to wait for.
Plainly
What is and is not behind this page
Not here
- A game to play, a demo to try, or a build to download.
- A deployed server or a public API. Nothing is hosted anywhere.
- Accounts, sign-in, or anything that stores a detail about you.
- A waiting list, a newsletter, or a notify-me box.
- A release date, a launch window, a beta or an early-access programme.
- Anything for sale. There is no store, and core access is a locked design commitment to stay free.
Here, and true
- A design written down in enough detail to build from, set out in full at atomictick.com.
- A private codebase where Tick resolution, queues, maps, movement, combat and the content catalogues run in development, under tests.
- A clock on this page counting genuine UTC boundaries, which you can check against your own.
- A Discord where the work gets discussed as it happens, and a studio address that a person reads.
- Another game by the same studio that is playable in alpha today.
In the meantime
Somewhere to go instead
Playable now, in alpha
Astral Sovereignty
The studio's other scheduled game, and the one you can actually play. An empire across a galaxy rather than a person standing on one square, many orders per tick rather than one, and the same ideas underneath: orders as editable intent, reports you can read, and no advantage for being awake at the right moment. Alpha, with everything that implies.
The concept in full
atomictick.com
What Atomic Tick is: at most one player-directed action per character per Tick, the order vocabulary, the laws the design is bound by, the Shards and the Atomic Bang behind them — and an honest account of what is built in code and what is still only written down.
Progress
Discord
Where the work gets talked about while it is happening, rather than announced once it is safe to. The same person writes the code and answers the messages, so the answers are slow and specific.
The studio
Space Junk Industries
A one-person studio, building both of these games. The studio site has the longer write-up of Atomic Tick, including what has been implemented, what has been designed and not implemented, and what has deliberately been left open.
No form · No list · No date
When there is something to play, this page becomes it
Until then, the honest thing is to say so and leave the page alone. Nothing here collects your details, because there is nothing behind it that could, and because a game about explaining exactly what happened should not start by overstating where it is.
Read what the game is