How to play

Getting started

Camera On, Brain Off is a game about attending a video call with your camera on while quietly slacking off just out of frame. The meeting lasts one minute. If you make it to the end without your manager Greg catching you, you clear the round, and everything you slacked off on in the meantime becomes your score. Think Red Light, Green Light: you can only move while you hold the button, and you have to freeze when you're being watched.

Controls

• Hold to slack off: You slack off only while you hold the big button at the bottom of the screen. On a computer, holding the Space bar does the same thing
• Let go to look attentive: Release the button (or the Space bar) and you on camera snap back to a straight face. Switching browser tabs also counts as letting go
• Choose how to slack: Pick Snack, Scroll or Nap above the button. You can't switch while you're holding the button
• Sound: The speaker button at the top right of the call window turns sound effects on and off

Reading the screen

• Top of the call window: The meeting name, "Weekly Team Sync", and the time left
• Greg's tile: The big tile is your manager, Greg. Most of the time he's looking down at his notes. When he clears his throat, his tile glows yellow, and when he looks at you, it glows red
• Your camera: This is "Alex (You)". While you're slacking, your eyes drift down, and during a nap they close. If you're slacking while Greg is watching, the edge of your video flashes red
• Off-camera: The part of your desk the camera can't see. It shows the emoji for how you're slacking, a progress bar, and your current score multiplier (×1.0 to ×3.0)
• Suspicion and score: The Suspicion bar turns red above 70, and at 100 you're removed from the meeting. The number on the right is your current score

How Greg behaves

Greg repeats a cycle: reading his notes → clearing his throat ("*ahem*") → looking at you. The throat-clearing is the warning before he looks, so let go as soon as you hear it.

• For the first 3 seconds of the meeting, Greg is reading his notes
• The gap between the "*ahem*" and the look is about 1.3 seconds at the start of the meeting, and it shrinks as the meeting goes on, down to about 0.55 seconds at the very end
• Sometimes he clears his throat and doesn't look (a fake-out). The chance starts at 20% and rises to 45% toward the end
• He looks at you for 1.1 to 2.2 seconds. The time until his next "*ahem*" also gets shorter in the second half of the meeting

The three ways to slack off

The more points a way of slacking earns, the faster your Suspicion rises when you're caught, and the longer it takes to get back to a straight face.

"Back to a straight face" is how long it takes after you let go until you look attentive on camera. Waking up from a nap takes 0.5 seconds, so if Greg looks during that time, your Suspicion goes up.

Scoring

Streak multiplier

Keep holding, and your multiplier goes up by 0.5 every 2 seconds, to a maximum of ×3.0 (×1.5 at 2 seconds, ×2.0 at 4, ×2.5 at 6, ×3.0 at 8). It goes back to ×1.0 when you let go.

Example: hold Snack for 4 seconds. The first 2 seconds earn 60 × 1.0 × 2 = 120 points and the next 2 seconds earn 60 × 1.5 × 2 = 180 points, for 300 in total. Since Snack finishes at exactly 4 seconds, you also get the 200-point finish bonus.

Finish bonus

The off-camera bar only fills while you're holding. If you let go, the bar stays where it is and picks up from there the next time you hold. When it's full, you get the finish bonus and the bar empties. Switching to a different way of slacking resets the bar.

Close call

If Greg looks at you within 0.6 seconds after you got back to a straight face, it's a "Close call!" worth a 250-point bonus. Instead of letting go the moment you hear "*ahem*", hang on until just before he looks to rack up points.

Suspicion

• If you're slacking (or haven't finished getting back to a straight face) while Greg is looking at you, your Suspicion rises by the amount in the table above
• The rest of the time, your Suspicion drops by 5 per second
• If your Suspicion hits 100, you're removed from the meeting on the spot and the game is over
• You keep earning points while you're being watched, as long as you're holding. If you have Suspicion to spare, you can push your luck

Getting called on

Once per meeting, sometime between 20 and 40 seconds in, Greg calls on you with something like "Alex, what are your thoughts on that?" (it never happens while he's looking at you). The game pauses while you're on the spot, and you have 5 seconds to pick an answer. The order of the answers changes every time.

If you were slacking (or hadn't finished getting back to a straight face) the moment you were called on, you get "Was I asleep…?" and another 15 Suspicion. After your answer, Greg goes back to his notes for a little while.

End of the meeting and titles

After one minute the meeting ends, and you get a title based on your score plus a chat message from Greg. You'll also see how many slacks you finished, how many close calls you pulled off, and your best score.

Tap "Share result" to send your title and score as a text message through your phone's share menu. In browsers without a share menu, the text is copied to your clipboard instead.

What gets saved

Your best score and your sound setting are saved only in your browser. A meeting in progress isn't saved, so if you close or reload the page, it's as if that meeting never happened. See the privacy policy for details.

Tips for slacking off

• Start with snacks: Snacking lets you snap back instantly, so it's a good way to get a feel for the timing of Greg's "*ahem*"
• Let go of naps early: Waking up takes 0.5 seconds, so let go as soon as you hear him clear his throat. Late in the meeting, there's only 0.55 seconds between the "*ahem*" and the look, which makes naps especially dangerous
• Don't panic at fake-outs: Sometimes Greg clears his throat and doesn't look. If his tile doesn't turn red, you're safe to hold again
• Keep some Suspicion in reserve: Answering "Wait, what are we talking about?" when you're called on adds 35 at once. Keep your Suspicion low between 20 and 40 seconds to be safe
• Go for finish bonuses: The bar stays put when you let go, so short, frequent holds can still get you the Nap's 1,000-point bonus