Crisis countdown

Owns a countdown to a scheduled crisis (in days, turns, or progress percent), the crisis's nature, and sometimes its expected severity. Each tick the counter falls; at zero the crisis applies a large state change such as extreme cold, an attack, a flood, or a scenario loss, which the player's preparation mitigates. The timer may be fixed, randomized within a known window, or driven by a rival process the player can slow. Frostpunk's main scenario builds toward the Great Storm, and its Last Autumn scenario races to finish an outpost before a storm; Plague Inc. runs a cure-research percentage that ends the game when it completes; Don't Starve's winter arrives on a fixed schedule; The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask frames play around a three-day falling moon. Inputs are elapsed time and actions that shift the clock; outputs are the crisis and its severity.

Dread and focus. Knowing what is coming and when, the player turns the remaining days into a plan: stockpile coal, insulate homes, finish the walls. The final days narrow choices to triage, and surviving feels earned because the preparation was the player's own.

• warning lead time and whether the exact date is known
• crisis severity and whether it is shown in advance
• whether player actions can delay, accelerate, or weaken the crisis
• single climactic crisis versus recurring crises of rising strength
• failure handling: scenario loss, heavy damage, or partial survival

• A crisis with a fixed required preparation becomes a build order that players replay rather than a plan.
• Too much lead time removes tension; too little makes the crisis an unavoidable random event.
• A single climactic crisis gives a scenario a hard end and little reason to replay.

• Players shift from expansion to stockpiling as the counter runs down, creating distinct phases within a run.
• Countdowns reward forecasting tools that project resource runways to the deadline.
• Recurring crises such as winters or droughts escalate into a cycle of preparation and recovery.

• Can a director model choose crises that target the player's actual weak points while keeping the warning fair?