Punball · systems design
Drive an original sports coupe around a reconstructed Mid-Ohio circuit on floating terrain. Race three rivals over two laps, or learn the course in Practice. The road has familiar grip and gravity. Two moons, distant UFOs and shooting stars fill the space around it.
§ 1
The pilot reconstructs Mid-Ohio's shorter, 13-turn configuration. The course keeps a recognizable real layout, while its nearby terrain floats in space. The car uses normal gravity. Space scenery does not change the route or supply power-ups.
§ 2
Brake before the corner, ease the steering as the road opens and add throttle on the exit. Steering response changes with speed. Braking, acceleration and cornering share the tires' available grip. Running wide costs speed, and contact with a barrier slows the car.
Driving assist starts on. Use Practice to learn the circuit before a sprint. Recover returns a stranded car to the course and adds five seconds. It does not award a checkpoint or lap.
§ 3
A sprint starts with a countdown and ends after two valid laps against three computer-controlled rivals. The HUD shows the lap, position, speed and race time. Results show the completed run and offer another race.
Ordered checkpoints validate each lap. Cutting across the circuit, crossing the line backward or recovering past a missing checkpoint cannot complete a lap. Sprint points start at one million, subtract one thousand per effective second and subtract twenty-five thousand per position behind first. Effective time includes five seconds for each recovery. The final score is rounded and bounded from one to one million. Higher points rank above lower points; this board is not a lowest-lap-time leaderboard.
Only an eligible completed sprint can offer the arcade initials prompt. Practice does not submit a public score. Gran Cosmos has its own top-eight board and starts at cabinet version 0.1.0. Its future major versions use the reserved pb16 score namespace. Client score checks are useful game rules, not server-authoritative race verification.
§ 4
| Input | Driving |
|---|---|
| Touch | Use the steering control together with throttle or brake. Each control keeps its own finger. |
| Keyboard | Arrows or WASD steer, accelerate and brake. Space also brakes. P or Escape pauses, R recovers and C switches camera. |
| Gamepad | The left stick steers, triggers accelerate and brake, Start pauses, and A is an accelerator fallback. |
| View and recovery | Use the visible camera, pause and recovery controls. Chase and bumper views follow the same car. |
Pause before leaving the game. Hidden pages and interrupted input stop the active drive controls. Sound and music default on, but audio starts only after a gesture. Saved choices persist. Pause, hidden pages and mute silence the sound. Choose sound and rendering settings in the game. Returning to the arcade must release the renderer, input handlers and sound.
§ 5
Rendering starts at 30 frames per second. The optional 60 fps setting changes the render target, not the driving rules: the simulation advances at a fixed 60 Hz. The game loads one circuit and one car design. Simple materials, limited lighting and a small opponent field keep the scene bounded.
The intended phone target is an iPhone 13. That target is not a measured performance claim. Desktop browser checks and touch emulation cannot prove sustained phone frame rate, battery use, heat or driving feel. Those require play on the actual device.
§ 6
Circuit geometry: OpenStreetMap contributors, Open Database License 1.0. The source uses six connected ways with 162 centerline points for the shorter 13-turn configuration. The source record is at /punball/gran-cosmos/data/provenance.json. Derived geometry is at /punball/gran-cosmos/data/mid-ohio-centerline.json and the license is at /punball/gran-cosmos/data/ODbL-1.0.txt. OpenStreetMap copyright and license: https://www.openstreetmap.org/copyright.
Terrain: 41 samples from the USGS NED 10-meter elevation dataset through OpenTopoData. Their interpolation gives the circuit its broad rise and fall. It does not establish the road surface between samples. The exact requests, acquisition date and reconstruction steps are recorded in the supplied source data.
Mid-Ohio's official facility information identifies the 2.258-mile, 13-turn configuration. Its maps serve as references; their artwork is not embedded. This independent game does not imply endorsement by the circuit or a vehicle manufacturer.