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Cold Water: the casino took the clocks off the wall, so the phone in your pocket interrupts on purpose.

A slot player wanted an app that does what the floor is designed to stop: snap a person out of the trance. Three taps on the way in, what you walked in with, how long you are staying and what you want to walk out with. Then the phone interrupts at gaps that are never the same twice, with a card that takes over the screen and one line on it, and it stays until you clear it.

Paid 12:02pm, live 2:26pm the same day About 35 interrupts in two hours, 2 to 8 minutes apart The first three lines are word for word from the application
Cold Water icon
Cold Water
David Hooven · built by The App You Want
Three tap setupUneven timerFull screen interruptsYour own linesLock screen buzzSession history
Real screens
Set the session: walking in with $200, staying for 2h, want to walk out up $100, each with chips for the common amounts
Set the sessionThree numbers, then the phone goes in the pocket. Walking in with, staying for, want to walk out up. Chips for the usual amounts, or type your own.
Live session: a glass draining as time runs down, 1:22:55 left, next interrupt in 3:55, 37 minutes played and 9 interrupts, walked in $200, going for $300, on you $240
The sessionA glass that drains as the time runs down, the next interrupt counting in, and where you stand against the number you set.
An interrupt: the whole screen goes blue, Interrupt 9 at 37 minutes in, the line reads Cash what is left and walk outside. Decide out there, not in here. Up, Even and Down buttons and a cash field
The interruptInterrupt 9, 37 minutes in. The screen is the card, the sound keeps asking, and it does not go away until you say where you stand.
Show me an interrupt now: a preview card reading Up is a number, not a feeling. Read the number.
Show me one nowA player can fire a preview from the setup screen and see exactly what is going to hit them on the floor.
My lines: the player's own lines, tagged Any time and When I am up, above the lines the app already says
The linesEvery line is the player's to write, edit and reorder. Lines are tagged by moment, so an up line only shows up when the cash says up.
Your sessions: three sessions, 5h 50m played, net $15, one goal hit, one ran over time, 42 of 45 interrupts answered, then each session with what went in and what came out
The historyCounted, never guessed. A session where the player never said what they walked out with is left out of the money. Sample sessions shown.
See it live

Cold Water is live

It installs from the browser on any phone, no app store, and runs with no signal on the floor. Sign in is an emailed six digit code, no password and no phone number. It is for players 21 and over, the age gate is the first screen, and the National Problem Gambling Helpline sits on the sign in page and in Help. It takes no bets and holds no money.

Open Cold Water →
The challenge
"What the app will do for the player, figuratively speaking, is splash some cold water in the face."

The application came in at 1:54am and it was a page of clear thinking: slot machines are designed to put players in a trance, rational thinking disappears, and that is the edge the casino keeps. The fix was not a budget tool or a lecture. It was a timer that sends messages at different intervals and will not let the player settle in. The owner had already written the messages.

So the spec was short. Three questions on the way in. Interrupts on an uneven clock, so they never fade into background noise the way a repeating alarm does. Every line editable by the owner. The offer went out the next evening. Paid at 12:02pm on the Saturday, the $100 arriving with a two word text. Live at 2:26pm, with the owner's own first three lines in it.

What we built
A timer that interrupts, from the setup screen to the lock screen.
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Three taps in

Bankroll, time and the number to walk out on. The app runs the clock. The setup screen tells the player how often it is going to interrupt, and a preview button shows exactly what one looks like before the session starts.

▲

The uneven clock

The gaps are decided once, off the session itself, and stored, so a reload, a second phone or a browser that slept all get the same rhythm back. A phone that comes out of a pocket forty minutes later gets one card, not five.

→

Lines by moment

Lines are tagged by moment: any time, when I am up, when I am down, when I hit my number, when the bankroll is nearly gone, when the session is nearly over, when I am past my time. The card picks off where the player actually stands, and the player's own lines sit in the rotation with the house lines.

$

Counted, never guessed

Each interrupt takes one tap, up, even or down, with cash on you optional. History adds up only what the player said. Six cards with no answer and it goes quiet and says so, one tap brings it back, and it stops half an hour after the time you set.

The signature feature
The card takes the whole screen, and it stays until you clear it.

An interrupt is not a notification a thumb swipes away. The screen goes blue, one line sits in the middle of it, the sound keeps asking, and the only way back to the machine is to say where you stand. On the floor the phone is in a pocket, so the buzz comes from the lock screen alert, switched on from the home screen icon. An iPhone will not vibrate for a web page, so we did not ship a switch that pretends it can.

Whole screenStays until clearedBuzz from the lock screenNever the same gap twice
How it moved
Applied at 1:54am, paid on a Saturday at noon, interrupting by 2:26pm.
24 Aug
1:54am, the application: the trance, the edge, and the cold water. The messages already written.
25 Aug
8:58pm, the offer in writing: three taps in, an uneven timer, every line the owner's to edit.
29 Aug
12:02pm, paid. 2:26pm, live: six minutes, then eleven, then twenty two, never the same gap twice, sound, a buzz and a card that takes over the screen until you clear it. 6:02pm, Alerts moved to the top of Help with a Test it now button, and the sound plays through silent. 8:49pm, the buzz explained in three steps that tick off as you do them.
30 Aug
11:07am: it stops half an hour after the time you set, and goes quiet after six cards with no tap. 12:39pm, the owner's call: drop the Easy and Standard paces, cut Sharp's gaps by a third. 2:31pm, done. 4, 3, 7, 5 became 3, 2, 5, 3; about 23 interrupts on two hours became about 35. 5:15pm: the app reads the phone's own alert setting before it asks, and Buzz my phone now ends with the phone buzzing in your hand.
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