The people in your van

Up to four van-mates ride with you, each with a personality and a special ability. Here's the neat trick: a character's name, their personal storyline, and their ability are all connected to one small hidden label. Learn how that works and you've learned a pattern used all over software.

Concept: an "id" (identifier). An id is a short, unique label the program uses to refer to something — like a username, or a product's SKU. Each van-mate archetype has one: deb, randy, doses, and so on. The player sees a friendly name; the code works with the id.

One question the game keeps asking

Almost everything about a crew member runs through a single tiny check: is this character currently in the van and still with you?

1219  function crewHas(s, id) { var c = crewByArch(s, id); return !!(c && c.ok); }

Because everything asks that question, a member's perks simply stop working the moment they leave — no special "remove their bonus" code needed. That's elegant: the ability is only ever applied while the answer is "yes."

Four things hang off that one label

Using just the id and that check, the game wires up:

1. Their name in the story. Event text contains little placeholders like {deb}. The game swaps in the real (possibly player-renamed) name when it shows the text — so you never see a raw {deb} or a blank.
2. Their personal storyline. Some road events are marked "needs doses." Those events only ever appear when that character is aboard. Bench or lose them, and their stories never show up.
3. Their special ability. Deb gets you cheaper prices; Doses stretches the food; Rita improves your recordings. Each is applied only while that member is with you (thanks to the check above).
4. Bonus surprises. When morale is high, a crew member might chip in supplies as you roll into town.

Concept: "reuse." Notice we solved four different features with one idea (an id plus a yes/no check). Good code finds a small idea that many features can share. That's reuse, and it's a hallmark of a clean design.

Two names per character

Each archetype comes in two versions — for example Cosmic Deb and Cosmic Dean — and the game randomly picks one at the start of each trip. The personality and ability are the same either way; only the name differs. And you can rename any of them yourself.