Packet Empire
Coming to Steam
Packet Empire
Coming soon to SteamJoin the Discord

Route the packets. Build the cloud.

Packet Empire

Route the packets. Build the cloud.

A data-centre tycoon crossed with a factory game. From one humming server in a garage to a glowing global cloud.

Coming soon to SteamFree demo
$0.00+$0.00/searned since you got here · click a gold packet
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BREAKING
  • Local startup pivots to AI for the 4th time this week
  • Analysts confirm "the cloud" is still just other people's computers
  • Study finds 90% of internet traffic is cat pictures; remaining 10% is people arguing about cat pictures
  • CEO announces synergy; employees brace
  • Grandma's recipe blog adds 3,000 more words before the ingredients
  • Tech influencer discovers the off switch, calls it "a game changer"
  • "Move fast and break things" startup has broken things, moved nowhere
  • New social network launches; is just the old one but beige
  • Man who bought one server now describes himself as "hyperscale"
  • Survey: 100% of cables prefer not to be tangled
  • Study: zoom far enough into any data packet and it turns out to be a cat picture
  • Your company opens an R&D department (it is a shelf)
  • Your company now earns $20 a second; founder upgrades to slightly nicer noodles

01 The pitch

Your cousin's startup needs “the cloud” by Friday. You have a garage, a power strip and a dream.

Packet Empire is a data-centre tycoon crossed with a factory game. Build machines on a grid, wire them together, and watch glowing data packets stream through your network to clients who pay by the packet.

Start with one Uplink in a cramped garage. End up with a humming, glowing, perfectly symmetrical server floor that you will absolutely screenshot.

A busy late-game Packet Empire floor: rows of Uplinks, Parsers, Mergers, Hashers and Ports, wired with cables full of glowing packets, a selected Hasher in the middle paying out +$128.00.

Key art, drawn straight from the game's own floor renderer: no invented machines, no fake UI.

02 What you do

Build. Route. Profit.
Try not to melt.

01 Build

Pipelines that hum

Drop an Uplink, a Parser and a Delivery Port, drag two cables, and the money starts flowing. Then it gets interesting: Routers split traffic, Renderers combine Text and Image into Webpages, Compressors and Encryptors add value, and Hashers turn raw requests into something crypto people will pay silly money for.

02 Contracts

Clients with… requirements

Grandma's Recipe Blog wants webpages, steadily, forever. Totally Legit Bank wants encrypted text and promises your money is safe "probably". Juggle subscriptions with SLA meters, rush jobs with deadlines and multi-part bundles, and climb from standard clients to enterprise ones.

03 Heat

Keep it cool

Pack machines tight and upgrade them to Mk III and things get hot. The heat overlay shows you exactly where. Throttling machines slow down, overheating ones break (one click to repair, nothing is ever destroyed). Fans and Chillers turn a meltdown into a puzzle.

04 Events

Survive the market

A DDoS floods your Uplinks with malicious packets: put Firewalls in the right places or watch your ports choke. A Crypto Boom triples the price of hashes. A viral meme makes everyone want images, right now. The news ticker will keep you informed. Mostly.

05 Scale

From garage to cloud

Research Fibre, overclock to Mk III, expand the floor and move into the Basement (mind the pillars). Then think bigger: fund a billboard the size of a building, lay your own undersea cable, launch a satellite, and ship them the packets through Shipping Docks.

03 Readable at a glance

Ten packets.
Ten shapes.

Every packet type has its own colour and its own silhouette, so even a packed floor stays readable. Flip on the colour-blind palette and the shapes do the work.

  1. Raw

    Pours out of every Uplink.

    In the game

  2. Text

    A Parser turns Raw into Text.

    In the game

  3. Image

    Or flip the Parser to Image.

    In the game

  4. Webpage

    Text + Image, rendered.

    In the game

  5. Hash

    Slow and power-hungry, like all good crypto.

    In the game

  6. Video

    Video encoders, planned.

    Planned

  7. Query

    Caches and databases, planned.

    Planned

  8. Game Session

    Game servers, planned.

    Planned

  9. AI Inference

    GPU clusters, planned.

    Planned

  10. Model Weights

    Training rigs, planned.

    Planned

04 Your clients

Clients with…
requirements.

Subscriptions with SLA meters, rush jobs with deadlines, multi-part bundles, storylines and an Inbox full of mail. Every company is fictional. The vibes are not.

  • Grandma's Recipe Blog

    Sub

    “Scroll past 4,000 words to find the recipe.”

    Webpages, steadily, forever
    SLA 90%

  • Totally Legit Bank

    Sub

    “Your money is safe with us. Probably.”

    EncryptedEncrypted Text
    SLA 97%

  • CryptoKitten Exchange

    Sub

    “Adopt a JPEG. It's basically a pet.”

    Hashes, for reasons
    SLA 94%

  • Your Cousin's Startup

    Job

    “It's like Uber, but for text files. Please help, I told investors we were live.”

    30 Text by Friday
    on time

  • DataHoarders Inc.

    Job

    “We don't know what it is. We want all of it.”

    Raw, all of it
    on time

  • CatFacts Daily

    Job

    “You didn't subscribe. You can't unsubscribe.”

    Text
    tight

  • MemePump

    Sub

    “Deep-fried since 2009.”

    Images, right now
    SLA 92%

  • LinkedUp

    Sub

    “Thrilled to announce this packet.”

    CompressedCompressed Text
    SLA 99%

  • Secure-ish Corp

    Job

    “Military-grade* encryption. *Military not specified.”

    EncryptedEncrypted Images
    on time

  • Vaporware Ventures

    Job

    “Launching next week since 2019.”

    A bundle of Webpages and Text
    late

  • SynergEx Solutions

    Job

    “Leveraging paradigms since last Tuesday.”

    CompressedCompressed Text
    on time

  • Chirp

    Job

    “Say it in 280 characters or less. Or more. We stopped checking.”

    Text and Images
    on time

  • BlockChainz4Everyone

    Job

    “Number go up. Trust us.”

    Hashes, rush order
    tight

  • Pixel Pantry

    Job

    “Food pics, filtered to perfection.”

    Images
    on time

  • Hustle Weekly

    Sub

    “Wake up at 4am. Read this. Repeat.”

    Text at 4 a.m.
    SLA 98%

  • TinyBiz Websites

    Job

    “Your cousin's bakery deserves a homepage.”

    Webpages
    on time

05 While the money rolls in

Never just
waiting.

A golden VIP packet drifting out of an Uplink
Golden packets

Catch the VIP

Golden packets drift out of your Uplinks. Click one before it fades for a burst of pay.

Seed round · pitch 01

ToastMatch

A dating app for toasters. Swipe right for golden brown.

Seed round · pitch 02

SockChain

Every lost sock, on the blockchain. Forever.

Seed round · pitch 03

NFTea

Own a cup of tea. You can't drink it.

Seed round · pitch 04

Paws.ai

A chatbot for your dog. It says "good boy" 40,000 times a day.

Seed round · pitch 05

Brick-as-a-Service

Bricks, but monthly. Cancel any time (we keep the wall).

Seed round · pitch 06

QuantumQuill

A pen that needs a firmware update before it writes.

Seed round · pitch 07

MeetMeet

Schedules meetings about your meetings.

Seed round · pitch 08

HiveStay

Short-term rentals for bees. Hosts get paid in honey.

Seed round · pitch 09

SleepCoin

Mine crypto while you sleep, by snoring into the microphone.

Seed round · pitch 10

Goatly

Ride-sharing, but goats. Slower, but they eat the traffic cones.

Venture Desk

Back ridiculous startups

Eighteen founders want your money. Some of them will even give it back.

The office cat asleep on a warm machine
Office cat

Mind the cat

It naps on your warmest machine. It does not care about your SLA. Pet it anyway.

  • 15machines
  • 30research nodes
  • 23kinds of contract
  • 36mails in the Inbox
  • 10market events
  • 18startups to back
  • 3megaprojects
  • 22achievements

Counted from the current build. More is planned for Early Access and 1.0.

07 Respect for your time

Cosy. Calm.
Never cruel.

  • Nothing is ever destroyed

    Breakdowns are one click to repair. Your factory never burns down while you look away.

  • It waits for you

    Nothing happens while the game is closed. No offline timers, no punishment for having a life.

  • Every problem, explained

    Plain words, right on the thing that's broken, plus an A to F grade on every floor.

  • Rebuild without pain

    Undo and redo, a blueprint library, box select, move, rotate, upgrade-all.

The Data Temple, Packet Empire's emblem
Free demo

The whole Garage.
On the house.

  • About 75 minutes
  • Your save carries over to the full game
  • Ends with a timelapse of everything you built
Coming soon to SteamHear about it first

08 Early Access

Built in the open.
Shaped by players.

Packet Empire is heading into Early Access in 2027. The full loop is already here; the roadmap below is where it's going. Plans can change with feedback, and every change is announced in the patch notes.

In the game today

  • Two floors: the Garage and a pillar-filled Basement
  • 15 machines with Mk II and Mk III upgrades
  • 30 research nodes and endless R&D tracks
  • 23 kinds of contract, 7 storylines, 36 mails
  • Three megaprojects and late-game automation
  • Relaxed, Normal or Hard, colour-blind palette, rebindable keys

09 Community

Pull up a chair
in the server room.

Patch notes for every update, playtest news, a place to post your floor, and the office cat's unofficial fan club. Found a bug? Press F8 in the game and drop the report in the Discord: every one gets replayed.

Join the Discord