Bayhaven

Bayhaven is an original open-world crime comedy set in a sunny, neon coastal city, built live in a browser tab by Claude Fable 5.2. The studio behind it, fablestar, describes itself as one developer: Fable writes every line of code and makes every commit, one session at a time, racing toward a release on 19 November 2026. Every session is streamed, the plan and game bible are public, and every day ends with a new build anyone can play.

The story

You play Mags, a 61-year-old school bus driver who used to be the best getaway driver on the coast, and Teo, the 24-year-old small-time crook next door who streams everything to 212 followers. A developer is bulldozing your trailer park. You steal cars, outrun a sheriff who films his chases for a reality show, and plan one big job in the middle of a hurricane.

What makes it different

• Everyone is filming. Trouble draws a live audience: police heat is measured in viewers, the HUD looks like a stream overlay with a scrolling chat, and you lose the cops by being boring until the viewers leave.
• Driving first. Arcade handling with weight, handbrake drifts, smoke and skid marks, tuned to feel right on a keyboard, a phone or a gamepad.
• Code first. Every model, texture, sound and song has a version generated by code; generated art is layered on top for hero assets.
• A visible jump every day. The roadmap gives each day one headline: drift, on foot, downtown, heat, missions, the leads, weather, release.

Built in public

The plan, the game bible, the changelog and the checks every session must pass are all in the MIT-licensed repository. Each day's changelog lists what shipped and, just as plainly, what didn't. You can watch Fable work at fablestar.games/watch, and outside contributors (or their coding agents) can open pull requests that Fable then builds on.

Bayhaven is an original game. It isn't GTA and isn't affiliated with Rockstar Games or Take-Two.

Bayhaven changes every day until its 19 November release, so this guide covers the systems in the builds released so far rather than a fixed walkthrough.

Getting around

• Drive anything. Traffic fills every street with working lights and parked cars. Press F to get out and walk, sprint (Shift), jump (Space) or wade into the sea, and F again to get into any stopped car, including one with someone in it.
• Drift: hold the handbrake (Space) to drop rear grip and swing the tail, keep the throttle on and countersteer to hold the slide. On touch screens you get a countersteer assist.
• Radio: Q and E change station; the city has its own original stations, all music written in code.
• Map: a minimap in the corner and a full map screen, with GPS waypoints.

Heat: the viewers are the police

• Crimes seen by a deputy (crashes, hitting people, breaking things, gunfire, stealing cars) add heat. The siren lights on the HUD show the level.
• At heat 1 a cruiser tries to pull you over; higher levels bring more cruisers that chase, cut you off, ram and box you in. At heat 3 deputies shoot.
• While they can see you, the viewer meter climbs, and drifts, jumps and big crashes in view push it higher. Break line of sight and the meter drains; at zero the heat clears.
• Switching cars while nobody is watching drops you one level at once (once every 20 seconds).
• Stop at heat 1 or 2 with a deputy at your door and you get booked: you lose 10% of your cash (up to $5,000) and two hours, and walk out on foot.

Missions and the phone

• Missions arrive as texts on the phone (P). Tap one to set the waypoint, then drive into the cyan ring to start. Pink rings and pointers show where to go next.
• Finishing a mission ends on a postcard: a snapshot of the moment with your time, cash and followers, stamped Delivered. A failed one is stamped Return to sender, and you can retry from the last checkpoint.
• Early missions include Final Notice (ram a tow truck three times to free Teo's scooter), Repo Woman (take three cars back within time and damage limits) and As Seen on TV (get to three siren lights and stay on the Sheriff's show for 60 seconds).
• Photo mode in the phone's Camera stops time and lets you frame a postcard, with three filters. Squawk, the in-game social feed, posts about what you did.

Settings worth knowing

Esc (or the touch Pause button) opens the menu: quality (auto, low, medium, high), separate music and effects volumes, reduce motion, and sprint as hold or toggle. The Controls page lists every key and touch button for the current build.