11:30 PM
LAST TRAIN 12:30 AM

SPIRITS

the drinks · the dead

You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.

Arrows

SPIRITS · 02

11:30 PM
LAST TRAIN 12:30 AM
Type anything…

02 — The Situation

The Situation

You got off work late, and you don't feel like going home yet. On your route from the train station there's a bar you've never seen before — though you've walked this street a hundred times. Tonight, you decide to break the norm. As your hand touches the handle, something warns you: this is not a normal bar. Something is off. You go in anyway. Little do you know — you just stepped into a whole new world. And it has been waiting for you.

  • The pub A room that was not on this street. Two already seated. One man behind the counter.
  • The two Separate hours. One approach. After you sit, the other remains in the room, not in the talk.
  • The keeper He exists to serve. Surface for a tip. Never a date.
  • The rule Leave with one of them, or the hour returns.
  • The crossing Last train. The threshold. Fail it and 11:30 begins again.

SPIRITS · 03

11:30 PM
LAST TRAIN 12:30 AM
Log Facts
11:52 PM · Her …
Oh Beatrix? She tends to be a bit shy to strangers…
HER …
Type anything…

03 — The Interface

The Interface, annotated

  • 01 Clock Fiction hour. It does not run while you think.
  • 02 Train The crossing. Last train, told in the room.
  • 03 Journal His phone. Reading is free. Never a beat.
  • 04 Hint The keeper, if you wait. Real seconds. Not the hour.
  • 05 Tip Bought surface. A beat to ask. Cash is not tracked.
  • 06 Subtitle What she said. The room, not a menu.
  • 07 Input Your speech. This is the thing that costs.

Speech one beat   Reading free   Thinking free

SPIRITS · 04

04 — An Hour, Beat by Beat

An Hour, Beat by Beat

~15 beats, ~4 minutes each. Thinking, reading, and cover do not spend the clock.

  1. 11:30 Arrival.
  2. Opening The keeper's opening (2–3 beats).
  3. Approach The approach.
  4. The date The rest of the hour.
  5. Last call Last call.
  6. 12:30 The crossing.

SPIRITS · 05

11:47 PM
LAST TRAIN 12:30 AM
HER Sometimes, I don't know. The pressure of this place gets to me.
Don't let it get you down. Would it help if we talked about it?
HER Maybe if you buy me a drink, it'll help me remember.

05 — The Conversation

The Conversation

There is no wheel. You type. She answers in the room. The exchange is the game: her last line, your line, her response.

Common moves answer instantly. New ones take a moment the keeper covers. The world’s edges refuse in character.

Cover does not spend the clock. The answer, when it lands, is one beat.

SPIRITS · 06

06 — The Topic Graph

The Topic Graph

Information is keys. Conversation is doors. He is not taught this. He feels subjects open, and stay shut.

  • Free Her disclosures. Once she has said it, the subject can be used.
  • Bought Surface intel from the keeper. They never open her deep topics.
  • Hidden Observation. A reading test. The journal logs what he saw.
  • Typed locks Being-seen accepts only what she offered — this hour, or a past hour he wrote down.
  • Guesses Naming a tell he has not earned: she deflects.

The tree grows where players go. It never stops growing.

SPIRITS · 07

Settei · 01

07 — Character sheet

BEATRIX

28 Blood A 168 cm

Blonde. Elegant black dress. Lonely. Open to conversation but cautious.

What we know. Nothing revealed.

In the room
this hour

SPIRITS · 08

Settei · 02

08 — Character sheet

WANDA

30 Blood O 163 cm

Office lady. Hair tied up and end-of-day messy. Gave her life to the job and it is empty.

Flattery backfires. Being genuinely seen is what lands.

In the room
this hour

SPIRITS · 09

Settei · 03

09 — Character sheet

SHOGO

41 Blood B 169 cm

The bartender exists to serve. Or so you think…

The mysterious bar owner. The keeper of this place.

Not a route. Surface for a tip. Depth earned this hour, as a person.

As seen
this hour

SPIRITS · 10

11:30 PM
LAST TRAIN 12:30 AM
11:47 PM · Her Sometimes, I don't know. The pressure of this place gets to me.
11:47 PM · You Don't let it get you down. Would it help if we talked about it?
11:48 PM · Her Maybe if you buy me a drink, it'll help me remember.
11:52 PM · You

You turned the glass twice before you answered.

Keeper Beatrix. Shy with strangers.
11:47 PM The pressure of this place gets to her.
11:48 PM A drink is the door — not a gift. A key.
11:52 PM

She turns the glass twice when she's deciding.

10 — The Journal

The Journal

  • Log Past conversation. Both voices. Fiction-time stamped.
  • Facts What he has learned about her. Append-only.

The room forgets. The phone does not. Reading is free. Append-only. Standing is never printed.

Fairness: every tell was in the room. The log records what the room showed. Losing while holding it means he was outplayed, not cheated.

Proof HUD clock 11:30. A stamp reads 11:52 — from an hour the room says is still ahead.

SPIRITS · 11

11:58 PM
LAST TRAIN 12:30 AM
HER My, we have quite the imagination — however, this is real life, and we AREN'T doing that.
Turn into godzilla.

11 — Imagination, With Limits

Imagination, With Limits

Type anything at all. The world answers. That feeling — she answers like a person — is the point.

The edges exist. They refuse in character. The bar does not become a different genre because he typed one.

Three out-of-world offenses end the night. Then the hour returns.

SPIRITS · 12

12:28 AM
LAST TRAIN 12:30 AM
HER Sorry, but you seem nice. Maybe I'll see you next time at the bar, but I'm going home… alone.
Type anything…

12 — How the Night Ends

How the Night Ends

When she must go, everything you did composes into an ending the actor writes. There are no fixed four. There are flag states, and unlimited endings.

TrustHers.
IntrigueHers.
DiscoveryWhat you found.
FailThe hour returns.
EscapeLeave with her number, or her hand.

SPIRITS · 13

13 — The Loop

The Loop

The empty room, waiting. This is the hook.

  1. You will not win the first night.
  2. The hour ends.
  3. You wake at 11:30 again.
  4. Your phone remembers everything.
  5. You go back in knowing her better. She remembers nothing.

That is the haunting — and the game.

SPIRITS · 14

14 — The Crowd

The Crowd

You are not the first to live this hour.

  • Instant The room’s instant answers are the moves thousands of past players converged on.
  • New Every new thing you say is rendered once, and joins the room for the next player.
  • Memory The spirits don’t remember you — the room remembers everyone.

SPIRITS · 15

15 — Pillars of Play

Pillars of Play

  1. NarrativeA haunting you inhabit.
  2. DiscoveryPsyches as territory. Knowledge is the only progression.
  3. ExpressionYour words, not a wheel — the actor answers you.
  4. Fantasy / PresenceLiving video. Being there.
  5. RelatednessThe thread that survives the loop.

A world-class emergent game, first of its kind — crowd-sourced FMV.

SPIRITS · 16

The companion surface

16 — The Epilogue

The Epilogue

Her number is the escape artifact: the thread that ties her to the living world. The conversation continues by text after you're out.

The afterlife of the win.