Support
Founder Mode is a startup simulator set on a real map of San Francisco. If something is broken, or the game did something you did not expect, write to us.
Describe what happened and what you expected instead. If the game crashed or looked wrong, include your iPhone model and iOS version — it is usually the difference between a fix this week and a fix next month.
Frequently asked
The game is landscape only.
Rotate the phone. It is a driving and walking game; portrait would waste half the screen.
My company's numbers stopped moving.
Open the phone, then the CALENDAR tab, and check that the day is advancing. If the date is stuck, start a new save from Settings — a save written by a much older version can decode into a company that never started.
I ran out of money on day nine.
That is the game. Twenty days is the maximum if you do nothing at all, and everything you buy shortens it. Eat cheaply, walk instead of taking cars, and get to a hacker house so you are not paying for a bed every night.
How do I pay myself?
Incorporate, open a business account, then use the salary control on the phone's MONEY tab. Nothing reaches your personal account until you do — that gap is deliberate and it is most of the game.
What is aura, and why does it keep falling?
It is how many people know who you are, and it decays every night because a network is maintained or it is not a network. Later-stage partners will not take a cold meeting without it. You build it by turning up to things — events, conferences, dinners.
What does community do?
It multiplies the users arriving on their own and lowers the number leaving. You build it by hosting things — a Discord, a meetup, a hackathon, and eventually your own conference — and it decays if you stop. Everything you can run is listed on the phone's GROWTH tab, along with where to go to run it.
My Series A happened without me doing anything.
That is intended. A priced round comes with a plan and a date: the numbers your investors expect and the day they check them. On that day the round prices itself at whatever those numbers earned — a step-up, a flat round, or a down round. The plan and the countdown are on the MONEY and GROWTH tabs from the day the previous round closes.
The board voted to replace me.
Then the run is over, and it was arithmetic you could have watched coming. Founders hold the votes until roughly Series B. After that the board's confidence in you — built by how you answer their questions in meetings — is what stands between you and that motion.
Where is my data?
On your phone. The game has no accounts, no servers, and makes no network requests. The optional diagnostic log in Settings is written to your device and is only shared if you tap Share yourself. See the privacy policy.
How do I delete everything?
Settings inside the game has Reset progress and
Delete all logs. Deleting the app removes everything else.
Is any of this real financial advice?
No. It is a game. The tax dates, cap table mechanics and liquidation preferences are modelled on how these things work in life because that makes a better game, not because they are advice. Talk to an actual lawyer and an actual accountant before you sign anything.