Eight Crowns

You are not dead until the numbers stop.

Every unit carries two numbers: where its health is headed, and where it currently reads. Damage doesn't subtract — it starts a countdown.

You are alive while the counter reads above zero. So the blow that should have killed you isn't a death, it's a few seconds. Heal during the fall and you win the race. Miss it and you don't.

That one rule changes everything downstream. A revive climbs from zero instead of snapping to its value. Healing races a falling number. And a lethal hit opens a window with an alarm on it that does not stop until it resolves, one way or the other.

Eight bosses. Each one breaks a different rule.

One reflects whichever school of magic you just used. One is armoured until you strip the plates. One winds up visibly, then acts twice. One is a knowledge check you will fail the first time — and that is intended.

The battle system never special-cases them. Each boss is a set of rules the fight reads, which is why they compose instead of contradicting each other.

Two modes

• Boss Rush — all eight in order. Wounds carry between them, you recover only partly, and you draft a boon after each crown. One defeat ends the run.
• Free Select — any crown you have unlocked, at full strength, to learn a mechanic before it costs you a run.

Four difficulties, including one that stops the counters while you choose — the race, without the reaction test.

A run takes about fifteen minutes. No install, no account, no loading screen.

Accessibility

Built in, not bolted on:

• Flashing effects are off by default. You turn them on, not off.
• Background motion can be disabled separately.
• “Slower counters” widens the rescue window without removing it.
• KIND difficulty stops the odometer while you pick a command.
• Full keyboard play, visible focus, and a real screen-reader contract — the health counter is polled rather than announced, and only four events ever interrupt.

⚠️ Photosensitivity warning: this game uses moving, colour-cycling backgrounds. Flashing effects are off by default and the game tells you so before you start. If you have photosensitive epilepsy, please leave those settings off.

Notes

Progress saves in your browser only. Inside the itch embed that is third-party storage, which browsers can clear on their own — if you want it to stick, use the fullscreen button and stay in the same browser.

One HTML file, 143 KB gzipped. Zero dependencies and zero external requests: the music and every sound effect are synthesised at runtime, so there is nothing to download and nothing to go stale.

Boss art was generated with FLUX and post-processed to a fixed 43-colour palette. Everything else — code, music, sound, interface, and the hand-drawn fallback sprite set — is made by hand. All mechanics, names, art and text are original; nothing is taken from any commercial RPG.