Clanker Calamity

Programming a shift

Clanker Calamity is a PC game about robots still working in Plant 7, a factory decommissioned in 2049. You program a bot’s movements with instruction cards, trying to reach numbered punch clocks in order and earn a shift completion bonus. The payroll system still offers the bonus, though it hasn’t been redeemable since the company dissolved.

Each shift, you’re dealt a hand of cards and commit five instructions in order, face down. Then every bot runs its first instruction at the same time, followed by its second, and so on. Between each instruction, the plant takes its turn: belts move bots, turntables spin them, and hazards fire on schedule. Bots can collide and shove each other aside, so a route that looked sensible when you planned it can go wrong quickly. You watch the result, then plan again next shift.