Powerful Tools, Powerful Consequences

In Space and Lasers, every choice carries weight, especially when it comes to the powerful systems aboard your ship. Each of these systems offers game-changing abilities but comes with trade-offs that force players to think strategically and communicate effectively in co-op mode. Let me introduce you to three key systems that epitomize this philosophy: Fire Suppression, Security Lasers, and the CPU.

Fire Suppression System

Manually putting out fires is a risky and demanding task. You’ll need to constantly replenish fire suppression ammo from the armory and risk injury in the flames. On top of that, every moment spent firefighting is a moment lost tending to other vital ship systems.

The Fire Suppression Station offers a more powerful solution. Activating it extinguishes all fires instantly and ejects every enemy into space—a tempting option when the flames spread out of control.

The Trade-Off: This system doesn’t discriminate. All airlocks are opened, meaning any crew caught in its path will also be shot into the void. Losing a crewmate means waiting 10 seconds for their replacement to arrive—a costly delay in a high-stakes scenario. Use it wisely, or the price could be devastating.

Security Lasers

When the ship is crawling with boarders, the Security Lasers are your best defense. With a single activation, lasers fire across all decks, instantly eliminating even the largest alien threats.

The Trade-Off: The lasers freeze all crew movement while active. This forces careful planning and coordination, especially in multiplayer co-op. Activate the lasers at the wrong time, and you risk leaving critical systems unattended or neglecting smaller threats that could spiral out of control. Knowing when to act—and when to wait—is the key to survival.

CPU Reset

Enemy hacks are a constant threat, creating hazards like lasers, poison gas, and blackouts in critical rooms. The CPU Station offers a powerful solution: a full reset that wipes all hacks from the ship.

The Problem: Early playtesting revealed a flaw. Players would park someone at the CPU to spam resets, making hacks trivial. To address this, I introduced consequences. Initially, the CPU required a repair kit to be used again after each reset. This worked to some extent, but late-game players often had enough repair kits to negate the impact.

The new solution? Power Resets. When the CPU is activated, it clears all hacks but plunges the ship into a brief blackout. This blackout affects all crew members, leaving them vulnerable to attacks or environmental hazards. It’s a risky but necessary trade-off that mirrors the consequences of the other systems.

No Easy Choices

At its core, Space and Lasers is a game about making tough decisions. The most powerful tools on your ship can save the day, but they might create just as many problems as they solve. Lasers might zap your crewmate. Fire suppression might eject them into space while they’re mid-task. The CPU reset might leave them defenseless in a blackout.

The goal is simple: no easy choices. Every action has consequences, and every solution demands sacrifice. This philosophy keeps the tension high and the gameplay dynamic. I can’t wait to see the creative (and chaotic) ways players use these systems to navigate the challenges aboard their ships.