White Out

Snowed in. The power's failing. The fire's nearly out. Get off the mountain.

You wake in a remote log cabin in the middle of a blizzard. It's -22 °C outside, the phone is dead and the radio says the storm won't break for days. The stove is down to its last embers, the battery bank is draining, the pipe under the kitchen sink has split and is spraying across the floor, and the only way out, an old snowmobile in the shop, won't start.

Nobody tells you what to do. There are no arrows, no glowing outlines, no inventory. Just your hands, a few handwritten notes, and a cabin full of things that work the way real things do.

Keep the fire alive

The cabin cools to freezing in minutes without a fire, and much faster if you leave the front door open. Swing the stove door open, drop a log in and watch it catch. Each log burns for ten minutes, charring black and shrinking as it goes, and the stove holds about four. The woodpile by the stove is real physics: stack it neatly or knock it over.

Keep the lights on

The house runs off a 1200 Wh battery bank, and every bulb draws its own watts. Flip the wall switches off in rooms you're not using, and work the breaker panel by the batteries. The meter shows exactly what's going in and out: watts, amps, solar and generator.

• Solar panels on the rack outside make power in daylight, but only if you sweep the snow off them, and the storm keeps burying them. The sun sets about ten minutes in.
• The generator under the lean-to has an empty tank and a cracked fuel line. Haul the gas can over, swap the hose, pull the choke and yank the cord. Its fuel is counted in watt-hours, and you can hear it labor harder the more you're drawing.

Stop the flood

The split pipe sprays water across the kitchen floor. Shut off the main valve before you pull the pipe, or it gushes and floods the cabin. Leave it too long and the water reaches the wiring. With a bang and a shower of sparks, the cabin's breaker trips and the lights go out.

Stay warm

Step outside without your parka and boots and you'll last about 40 seconds. Dressed for it, a few minutes. As the cold takes hold, frost creeps in from the edges of your vision, and you hear your heartbeat and your breathing get heavier. Only the warm cabin brings you back. Fill the kettle at the tap, boil it on the stove, drop a tea bag in a mug and pour. A hot cup of tea helps you hold out against the cold.

Fix the sled and ride out

The snowmobile is electric-start only, and it's in rough shape. You'll need to:

• charge its flat battery on the bench charger, which runs off the house bank, so plan your power
• swap the seized starter for the right one (only one of the three on the shelf fits)
• pull the spark plugs, scrub them clean with a wire brush and screw them back in
• shut the hood, climb on and turn the key

Then squeeze the throttle and ride out of the shop and down the winding mountain road through the trees and the storm. Don't think you can just walk out: the road is long and the cold gets worse the farther you go from the cabin.

Race your best time

Your escape is timed and scored, and your best time is saved. Once you know what you're doing, how fast can you get out?

Features

• Fully hands-on VR: grab, turn, pull, pour, wipe, scrub, flip switches with a fingertip
• Doors with real swing: slam the front door and it latches
• A working off-grid power system: battery bank, solar, generator, breakers, wattage on every light
• Physics firewood, a rocking chair you can sit in, and wind that's loud outside and muffled indoors
• Day turns to night, and the moon breaks through the clouds now and then
• A storm that rises and falls, and trees that sway in the gusts
• Pause menu, restart, and a results screen with your time and score

Controls

Grip	Grab / let go
Trigger	Throttle on the sled (right hand) · open the kettle lid
A	Full throttle
Left stick	Walk
Right stick	Snap turn
Left menu button	Pause menu

Requirements

• Windows 10 or 11 PC that can run PC VR (about a GTX 1070 / RTX 2060 or better)
• Meta Quest with Quest Link or Air Link, or an Oculus Rift. Other PC VR headsets haven't been tested yet; tell me if yours works!
• About 15–40 minutes for a first escape

How to install

• Download and unzip the whole folder.
• Put on your headset and turn on Quest Link or Air Link.
• Run WhiteoutVR.exe. If Windows SmartScreen pops up, click More info → Run anyway.

This is an early test version, and I'd really like your feedback. What was fun? Where did you get stuck? Did anything feel awkward in your hands, or make you feel sick? 

Art: models and textures from Poly Haven (polyhaven.com, CC0). Everything else made for this game.

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