Neo Vegas
A discharged fleet pilot who scouts uncharted space for money, and writes songs for a life, is told by his future self to take the one job he refused, with the two people he refused it to protect.
The record is yours to keep. The game is free to download. Buy the record
Meet the crew
Three roles, filled from chapter 5. The band, in their other life.
The season
Fourteen chapters, fourteen tracks, in order. The title track streams free. The rest come with the album.
| Chapter | Track | Stage | Beat |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Broken Hearted | Ordinary World | The last job paid; the bar; the bassist and Dev on stage without him. |
| 2 | Automated | Call to Adventure | The contracting intelligence’s job: an escort past the lanes, a crew of three. |
| 3 | Ain't Even Tryin | Refusal | He works alone because of what happened to the last crew; the clamp; still no. |
| 4 | Time Traveler | Meeting the Mentor | The old man is Jim; the artifact; take the job, take the bassist and Dev. |
| 5 | Where the Cold Wind Blows | Crossing the Threshold | The bassist’s terms, Dev packs; the cartographer boards; the crossing. |
| 6 | Wasting Time | Tests, Allies | The long haul; the old argument; the derelict; the snake. |
| 7 | Don't Reckon with Snakes | Enemies | The settlement past the lanes and its boss; made in an hour; the price of leaving. |
| 8 | Deja Vu | Approach to the Inmost Cave | The clearance order; the discharge told; the artifact under the moon. |
| 9 | Money Back | Major Crisis | The advance demanded; bounties on all three; the boss’s gun. |
| 10 | Troubles are Behind You | Reward | The station taken; the file, the transmitter, the artifact; one quiet night. |
| 11 | Catch ya on the way down | The Road Back | The run; the older Jim’s ship takes the fire and goes down. |
| 12 | Ain't No Stopping | Resurrection | The broadcast from the mast; the crew’s old commander’s choice, in public. |
| 13 | Hold Your Head Up High | Return with the Elixir | Broke; the settlement on the charts; the three at the bar; the empty stool. |
| 14 | Without Rain | Coda | The next call; three seats; the first mission, not the last. |
The cast
Ten more, in the order you meet them.
The bar’s bartender; keeper of the hub. · 4 chapters
The mentor. Jim thirty years on, back through the artifact once. · 3 chapters
A recurring alien client. · 2 chapters
The informant; a fixer in the bar’s back room. · 1 chapter
The mining concern’s automated contracting intelligence. · 3 chapters
The concern’s cartographer; the asset the crew escorts. · 5 chapters
Runs the settlement past the lanes. · 2 chapters
Space Fleet; the crew’s old commanding officer. · 2 chapters
The settlement’s crew. · 3 chapters
The patrons of chapter 1, present in chapter 13. · 2 chapters
The places
| Id | Place | What | Chapters |
|---|---|---|---|
| W-00 | The ship, open space | The cockpit; the ship unnamed until the last frame. | 1, 14 |
| W-01 | Neo Vegas | A dome city floating in barren space: neon, holograms, flashing lights; run by automated systems, lived in by people. | 1, 2, 12 |
| W-02 | The bar | A western bar in Neo Vegas, seedy and run-down, holographic accents over wood; a stage in the corner where the band plays. | 1, 3, 4, 13 |
| W-03 | The lanes’ last station | The last charted stop before a person has to fly. | 5 |
| W-04 | The dust region past the lanes | A dust region past the lanes that blinds long-range sensors and chills a hull. | 5, 6, 11 |
| W-05 | The settlement past the lanes | A settlement on a moon past the dust: written-off miners, deserters, people who left on purpose. | 7, 9, 10 |
| W-06 | The survey station and the artifact | The thing under the moon that makes time travel possible; one object, used once. | 8, 10 |
Goes with this
The same story, in other hands.
What’s here
Six formats, each marked clearly. What’s here is here. What’s next is next.
| Format | Unit | State | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Song | the track | Here | Fourteen masters cut; on sale, digital and hi-res. |
| Level | the chapter | Partly here | Thirteen levels built on the earlier map; the re-map to fourteen, the hub and the crew roles are next. |
| Comic | a chapter per issue | Next | Restarts on this spine; the first edition is archived. |
| Character art | a sheet per character | Due 2026-11-01 | None pictured yet. |
| Merch | per world and per character | Held | Held until the art exists. |
| Sound | a Studio preset or pedal per world | Next | The Studio’s export carries no world tags yet. |
The drops
One chapter at a time, in story order: the track streams, the level ships, the comic chapter drops, the merch goes up.
No drop yet. The first is chapter 1, the bar, when the next build ships.
The record
| Bible | v5 · 2026-10-19 |
| Theme | The only way he can afford the thing he loves is the thing that is killing it. |
| Tone | A space western with a crew. Noir in the dome, frontier past the lanes. Funny where the future gets the West wrong, serious where the people are. |
| Sound | Garage rock: fuzzy blues rock, loud and loose. |
| Register | 13 characters · 7 places |
| Names | working names withheld until ruled |
People and places with working names are described, not named, until their names are set.