This is a sub-page of Proto:Lethal Company.

To do: There's A LOT that could be gone into in more detail here. Differences in the map tiles, everything about the old gameloop and the lift, disabled objects, and so on.

The oldest build that Zeekerss made available to his patrons. It is incredibly barebones and has no scrap to collect, no anomalies to patch and no enemies to encounter, so acts more as a proof of the concept or prototype of the game's overall structure and systems.

Even if the actual gameplay is non-existent, it is clear just from this prototype that the game was a very different beast at this stage in development.

This version of the game is running on Unity 2021.2.19f1, with the latest version at the time of writing, being V64 running on 2022.3.9f1.

Gameplay

The gameplay, or what exists of it, is radically different from the final game. This build was created at a time when the main game loop was still significantly different from what the game would become.

The main change is the completely different primary game loop. At this stage of development the game's roguelike inspirations are a lot more blatant. Upon starting the game you head into Experimentation's main building and power an elevator which charges up. You can then descend into the randomly generated facility. Similar to the final game, the random part of the level is intended to be filled with scrap though none spawns in this build.

Similar to Zeekerss' previous game The Upturned, progression requires the players to find an item (in this case, a "Lung Apparatus") to power the elevator on each floor while collecting scrap and dealing with anomalies. Once found and inserted, the elevator will take some time to power up and once powered players can choose whether they wish to continue deeper or return to the surface.

While inside the facility players would need to deal with "instability" which would grow when anomalies spawn. Left unpatched this would lead to enemies spawning, too. To make matters worse, pulling the apparatus would also have an effect on the stability. It seems like it was intended for this to result in a sort of "holdout" when the apparatus was brought to the elevator, as the elevator takes a very long time to charge and become usable afterwards and it's clearly expected that players would be doing something in this time.

Only the general outline of this gameplay is actually implemented in this build. No scrap spawns, no anomalies spawn and the instability never changes (only even being displayed for a moment at the end of the round.) Automatic enemy spawning similar to that of the final game is intended to exist but due to what appears to be a bug they don't spawn either.

Compared to the final game, the player moves very slightly faster.

Ship#

The ship is extremely barebones compared to later versions. There's no map, no monitors and no terminal (which also means no shop.) There's no real reason to ever return to the ship after landing in this build because you can't even take off afterwards.

Presumably for debugging purposes, the ship's doors are also entirely absent. Prior to "landing" (which just loads the level scene in this version without a landing animation) there's a test room in the space outside the ship which includes a simple maze and a touchable trigger that'll spawn a bracken inside said maze. This test room is technically still there after landing too but ends up mostly embedded in the ground.

Also attached to the ship are a red and purple trigger box which will damage you or instantly kill you respectively.

With no shop implemented, you instead spawn with some supplied in the ship. Some batteries, 4 patcher tools, 4 flashlights, a mapper, the clipboard and 2 plastic fish are provided.

Upon starting the ship you'll be given a few pieces of dialogue from "PILOT COMPUTER" (similar to the ship leaving warning in later versions) that explain some basics of the premise:

Welcome to 41 Experimentation. 

This moon appears to have been abandoned. You are likely to find no signs of life, so it will be an easy job.

Your mission: to collect scrap worth monetary value.

As specified on your contract, you will recieve 20% of the earnings accrued by H.E. Global. As also specified, we are not responsible for injuries taken while on the job.

It should be noted that the last word of the final message is cut off due to the way the UI elements are set up.

Items#

Items work quite differently in this version. In 4.2 and onwards items were updated to use fake physics whereas here they're actual physics objects.

All charged items use a different system in this prototype. There's no charging coil in the ship and instead all items use batteries which can come individually or in packs. You can replace an item's batteries at any time by pressing R though this is unfortunately the same key used for the freecam.

Flashlights work pretty much as they do in later versions though for some reason use footstep sounds.

The "patcher tool" would become known as the zap gun later on. Here, it's still built to serve its original purpose of fixing anomalies but given that they don't spawn in this prototype it ends up being completely useless. If an anomaly is hacked into the game though it functions almost the same way as it does in the final game.

The mapper is a pretty useful tool that shows a 3D map of the area around you. It's not continuous and it must be used to update the displayed position, which will drain a chunk of its batteries.

The lung apparatuses are the only 2-handed item and carrying them is an incredibly brutal experience compared to later versions. They slow you down immensely and prevent you from sprinting or jumping. Carrying the apparatus to the elevator is almost certainly intended to be a difficult task requiring some level of teamwork.

Enemies#

The only enemy that can be encountered in this build is a bracken which can be spawned in the test room maze. It has no logic for attacking or hurting the player and will usually just wander around and run away when looked at. A test enemy can be found in the game as well but nothing spawns it.

Bugs#

Being in such a significantly unfinished state the game is incredibly buggy.

No enemy spawns#

The lack of enemy spawns is not just an artifact of the game not having it set up - it's the result of a bug in the execution order of the level loading logic. In this version of the game the round manager will store all the enemy spawn vents on the current level and then calculate spawn times from there, similar to the final game. However, it attempts to populate its array of enemy vents before it actually spawns them, meaning no enemies will ever spawn unless the logic is patched.

Elevator softlock#

Picking up any batteries in a level will doom the game to a softlock upon attempting to proceed to the next level due to an oversight. The round manager keeps track of all the networked entities it has spawned, including batteries. When unloading the current level it iterates this list and attempts to despawn the objects. Unfortunately the logic for picking up batteries does not remove the battery's entry in the round manager's list.

As a result, when the round manager attempts to despawn all of the entities in the previous level, some entries in the list will be null and the function will fail, softlocking the game.

Changed Audio

Some of the game's audio differs from later versions.

Changed Graphics

Icon#

V4	V4.2 and onwards

The game uses this green scavenger head, named faceicon.png in the files, as its main icon. From Version 4.2 and onwards this icon is replaced with a redrawn version coloured red and orange to be more in-line with the theming of the game's interface.

Manual#

The company-provided service manual you're given at the start of the game is significantly different in V4, in no small part because V4's manual references the game's original gameplay concept and had to be changed.

This is reflected in the textures' filenames - with the exception of page 1 which is still called manual1.png in both versions, the later version of the manual's textures have "v2" appeneded.

Page 1

V4	V64

The first page is identical, except for the fact that the text in the "specifications" table remains uncensored and readable in V4's version.

Page 2

V4	V64

The second page details the concept of "instability" in V4. While not functional as a mechanic in this version, it would have likely formed the basis of the "anomalies" the player would need to patch with the patcher tool while exploring. It's likely that enemies would start spawning (or possibly increase in spawn rate) as instability rose. The game does briefly show an instability level when descending in the elevator, but no anomalies spawn in this build so it's always 0%

The page has been replaced in the final game with a page explaining the mechanics of the scanner, which didn't exist in V4.

It's worth nothing that despite being called manual2.png, this page is actually the third page in V4, with the page and section numbers reflecting this accurately. It is, however, used as the second page in the updated manual.

Page 3

V4	V64

In V4, this page gives a quick explanation of the "lung" apparatuses found in both V4 and the final game. It acknowledges the names of these devices as "lungs" (in the current version of the game, referred to only as either "Apparatus" or "Apparatice") and also states their total weight as 20lb (they weigh 32lb in the current version). It also, likely as a joke, tells the player not to remove them despite this being the only way to progress. It also hints that originally removing them may have caused the instability level to rise.

In the final game this page was replaced with an explanation of the terminal, store and bestiary which are once again mechanics that are non-existent in this particular version of the game. Interestingly, the replacement page in the current version of the game seems to have once again used manual2.png as a base rather than manual3.png

This page is the second page in the manual in V4 despite being called manual2.png though similar to above has page and section numbers that match. Meanwhile, since the replacement texture uses manual2.png as a base, the final game's service manual ends up having two section 19s and two page 139s.

Page 4

V4	V64

V4's version of this page serves to teach the player about both the patcher tool used to patch anomalies as well as the "intruders" that would spawn as a result of failing to do this. It's not clear if intruders were intended as some sort of unique enemy or if this is simply an earlier concept, as the way V4 is set up seems to suggest that at this stage the game is already moving to the concept of enemies spawning from vents instead.

The final game keeps the page layout the same as well as the section and page numbers and changes the information on the patcher tool and intruders to information on selling scrap and miscellaneous advice, respectively.