paradrew101 streamer · video games
Isometric shooter · browser game

Highway 101 — an isometric zombie shooter, play free online

Riverbend, California, September 1998. Casey Roark worked the night shift at the laundromat, and by morning the town had stopped answering. Her mother is two hours up the 101 in Santa Rosa — all Casey has to do is cross fifteen districts, and on four of them the road is held by somebody she knew by name. You steer her with a finger and you do the shooting: she carries one gun, and every shot is yours. The light here is cast for real — her flashlight, the street lamps and the burning cars throw true shadows off the buildings, and around a corner you see nobody at all.

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1
1 / 15
Health 0 / 0 0¢ Rounds 0 Wave — Exit —

Turn your phone sideways — this one is played in landscape

Save room
Save room Nothing touches you here. Buying and changing clothes only work in this room; head out with the button on the panel or through the door in the corner.

RIVERBEND, CA

Controls: drag anywhere on the board — Casey walks where your finger goes. On a computer you walk with WASD or the arrows, space to dash, E for a medkit. Only the left mouse button fires: click it or hold it, and it fires wherever the cursor is. Casey never shoots on her own — until you press, the gun stays quiet. On a phone it is the same: a short tap on the board, or the fire button under your thumb, which aims at the nearest one for you. She carries one gun; swap it in a safe room. Music and effect volume live under the ♪ in the corner of the board.

Leaderboard

Shared by everyone. Scores are saved once you sign in with Telegram, and the board lists members of the paradrew101 community.

5.0 ratings: 1

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# Player Districts cleared
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How to play

  1. Only the left mouse button fires. It hits where the cursor is and keeps firing while you hold it, and a burst re-aims at the cursor as it goes. Casey never shoots on her own: until you press, the gun stays quiet, and a miss costs exactly what a hit costs. On a phone a short tap on the board does the same, or the fire button under your thumb — there is no cursor there, so it aims at the nearest one for you.
  2. One slot: she carries exactly one gun, and it is everything you have until the next safe room. So the pick at the workbench is the decision of the run: the uzi holds a crowd, the sawed-off takes them apart up close, the launcher answers a tight pack but a miss with it costs a whole cooldown. The other guns are not lost — they wait in the safe room, and you can swap any time. A crate with somebody else’s gun turns up in two districts out of three, and what she finds goes straight into her hands.
  3. The dash is a short burst with a moment of invulnerability. It is how you get out of a biker’s charge and out from under a popping clown. A second and a half of cooldown, bottom right.
  4. A district is a stand: two waves at the start, four by the finale, each one bigger than the last, with the wave counter in the status line. Where the exit is stays unknown until the last wave: it sits on a random crossroads and gives nothing away, and the status line shows a question mark instead of a distance. The moment the street holds, the exit lights up green, a sign rises over it, and an arrow on the edge of the board points the way. It is a walk: a district runs a hundred and twenty tiles across, and some of its streets are blocked by wrecks, so the straight line is not always open.
  5. The light is real: Casey’s flashlight, the street lamps and the burning cars are cast as rays, and buildings throw shadows. Around a corner nobody is visible — neither to you nor to them.
  6. Money drops off the residents and lies around the streets: quarters, singles, fives and twenty-dollar rolls. The bigger the note, the brighter the spot on the asphalt — one is worth the detour, another is not. It is only spent in a save room: guns, gear and medkits. Rounds never drop from bodies: you find them on the streets and buy them at the counter, and that is half the reason to walk the district at all.
  7. Every district has a safe house — a building with a lit door, and that same door is where Casey steps out onto the street. Walk in whenever you like, even mid-fight, and walk back out to the same spot: the street waits exactly as you left it. Inside there is the workbench, the outfits, a summary of the district and the room itself: other people’s notes on the tables and corners worth searching. The payphone is there too, but you pick it up yourself — the call waits and holds nobody.
  8. The safe house is the save, and what it writes down is the state you walked out with. Closing the tab returns you to that door rather than to the street; the district itself is rebuilt.
  9. Death ends the run: quarters, gear and bought guns are gone. What stays is what you found — next time that gun is on sale from the start. That is the roguelite part.
  10. Bosses arrive with the final wave of districts five, nine, twelve and fifteen, and while one is on his feet there is no way out of that district. Each has his own trick — calling for help, firing volleys, going berserk on his last third — and the bestiary says so in advance.
  11. Reach the highway and Casey keeps a new outfit and a perk for good. Perks stack and work from minute one of the next run: change in her pocket, a second medkit, an ammo pouch, more damage, a sawed-off under the counter. The fifth run starts as a different game.
  12. Tapes lie in the streets — there are five, and each is found once. A tape does not turn up at once — only after the street beats its first wave — in a random spot, under a violet glow and with an arrow on the edge of the board. Pick it up and the street plays it instead of the usual music, and the tape stays in the collection for good. You carry one; the backpack from the shop adds a second and a third slot, and raises the ceiling on rounds and medkits too. Found tapes can be played in the safe room, which has its own tab for it.

Where she is going

Fifteen districts back to back: the motel lot, the strip, the mall, the blocks across the river, the high school, St. Mary’s hospital, the yards, the trailer park, the River Road treatment plant, the drive-in, the bridge, the bus depot, the church and its yard, the Guard checkpoint and finally the on-ramp to the 101. Before each one there is a safe room: quiet music, a workbench, a rack of outfits and a working payphone. The payphone is where the story is told: a radio still looping yesterday’s advisory, an answering machine with her mother’s voice, a recorded 911 call about the plant discharge, and a Guard channel silent for three days. In districts five, nine, twelve and fifteen the road is held by a boss — Coach Dale, the River Road foreman, the night driver of the 42 and Trooper Barnes — and while he stands, there is no way through. Every district is a stand: the waves come on their own, and until the street holds them there is no way out. One run is enough to finish it: half an hour, if it goes well.

What a safe house is for

Every district has one — a building with a lit door, and you can walk in whenever you like, even mid-fight. Nothing touches you inside: a workbench of guns, a shelf of gear, a rack of outfits and the payphone that carries the story. There are fifty of these rooms in town and the run decides which ones you get: the laundromat, an auto shop, a video store, a radio station’s control room, a sawmill watchman’s shack, the fallout shelter under the school. Every one of them has other people’s paper lying about — a shopping list, a shift sheet, a note for the next guy — and two or three corners worth searching: mostly dust, sometimes change or rounds, rarely an attachment for a gun and very rarely somebody’s named piece. On the wall there is a summary of the district: how many residents are still outside, how much loose change is lying around, whether the district had a weapon crate and whether it has been taken, and how far the exit is once it has opened. A gun you do not need is sold there for half price. And the important part: the run is written down in the safe house — in the state you walked out with.

Fifteen districts

# District Boss Side, tiles Who lives there
1 Crescent Motel lot On foot to the first gas station. We will see after that. — 70 Shambler, Runner, Mailman, Bouncer
2 The strip The windows are intact. Nobody ran, then — they just walked out. — 70 Shambler, Runner, Mailman, Crawler, Biker, Bouncer, Matron
3 Riverbend Mall The gallery is shorter. And darker. — 90 Shambler, Runner, Schoolkid, Mall guard, Patrol cop, Crawler, Biker, Butcher
4 Blocks across the river I grew up here. Do not look in the windows. — 90 Shambler, Runner, Schoolkid, Dog, Screamer, Spitter, Biker, Matron
5 Roosevelt High The gym is open. Coach Dale always locked it at nine. Coach Dale 90 Senior, Schoolkid, Janitor, Shambler, Runner, Crawler
6 St. Mary’s Hospital Mom was on the third floor. I know the way out. — 90 Shambler, Crawler, Nurse, Orderly, Spitter, Birthday clown, Janitor, Schoolkid
7 Riverside yards Two turns from here to the treatment plant. That is where it started. — 120 Shambler, Runner, Dog, Firefighter, Bloater, Mechanic, Screamer, Patrol cop, Butcher
8 Pines trailer park Tight, dark, and every door standing open. — 120 Shambler, Dog, Trucker, Biker, Bloater, Screamer, Schoolkid, Matron
9 River Road treatment plant The discharge itself. The crew van is still at the gate. The River Road foreman 120 Hazmat worker, Bloater, Spitter, Shambler, Firefighter, Crawler
10 Star drive-in The screen is burning white over the whole field. Light, and nobody. — 120 Shambler, Runner, Dog, Senior, Birthday clown, Biker, Trucker, Bouncer
11 The Riverbend bridge Narrow, with nowhere to step aside. The Guard held it to the last. — 120 Guardsman, Patrol cop, Shambler, Runner, Mall guard, Trucker, Bouncer
12 The bus depot The 42 is up on the pit. Its driver is not. The night driver 120 Mechanic, Trucker, Shambler, Dog, Janitor, Bloater, Butcher
13 The church and its yard Light in the windows. Singing inside — which is worse than silence. — 120 Preacher, Shambler, Crawler, Screamer, Nurse, Orderly, Schoolkid, Matron
14 The Guard checkpoint The order was to let nobody through, either direction. It stands. — 120 Guardsman, Patrol cop, Mall guard, Firefighter, Hazmat worker, Trucker, Dog
15 The 101 on-ramp Two hundred metres of asphalt. And him. Trooper Barnes 120 Guardsman, Patrol cop, Shambler, Runner, Dog, Firefighter, Trucker

Twelve guns

She carries exactly one — whatever is in her hands. Two are yours from the start; the rest sit in crates around town, and a crate turns up in two districts out of three. A gun found on the street goes straight into her hands, and the old one waits for you in a safe room. Once found, a gun is in the shop for good — even if that run ended badly.

Gear

Four bosses

They stand in districts five, nine, twelve and fifteen, and nothing gets past while they do. Each is somebody Casey knew: the school coach, the foreman from the treatment plant, the driver of the 42 bus and the trooper on the ramp. Their tricks differ, and they are named here in advance — the fight should be about reacting, not about guessing.

What a clear leaves you

Fifteen districts is half an hour, and few people replay half an hour for nothing. So every trip to the highway leaves two things for good: an outfit (visible immediately, changes nothing) and a perk (changes the next run from minute one). Perks stack — the fifth run starts as a different game.

Clears Outfit Perk
1 Trooper’s jacket Taken off Barnes along with the badge. Heavy and too big. Change in her pocket Casey does not leave the laundromat empty-handed any more.
2 Hospital scrubs From the St. Mary’s store room. Clean — the only clean thing in town. Trunk first-aid kit A second medkit on every run.
3 Turnout gear Too long, but it has the stripes. In the dark she is the first thing you see. Doug’s ammo pouch Fifty rounds over the usual load on every run.
4 Prom dress Hung in the closet since May. Casey decided there was nothing left to wait for. Her own handloads A tenth more damage from everything she holds. Permanently.
5 Night driver’s jacket Leather, route 42 on the patch. Smells of diesel. The spare sawed-off Under the counter from the start — right where the pistol was.

Who is out there

Twenty-six kinds of resident and four bosses. The figures are not drawn one by one: the game assembles each from a silhouette, a detail and a palette — which is why the nurse and the orderly not only look different but behave differently. Below are exactly the figures that walk the streets.

Progress lives in your browser: found guns, the story and your record sit in this device’s localStorage. Clear the site data and Casey walks out of the laundromat with the pistol and the nailer again.

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