Logbook front page: 'Lost at Sea, 1803, The Good Ship Obra Dinn'

About this game

Developer: Lucas Pope · Publisher: 3909 · Platform: PC (Steam) · Art style: Minimalist & vector · Screen type: Encyclopedia / Codex

More Return of the Obra Dinn screens in the Gallery

What to study

The whole investigation is framed as paperwork before it is a game: the first page of the insurance logbook is a lost-ship notice that reads like a poster, 'Lost at Sea, 1803', the good ship 'OBRA DINN' in display capitals under a small engraved ship, and everything the player needs to know is set as document facts rather than tutorial text. Built 1796, London, 800 tons, 18 ft draught; Captain R. Witterel; crew 51 men; last voyage to Orient, Cape rendezvous unmet. The footer turns the fiction back on the reader: 'Contact East India Cy. London Office for enquiries or testimony', you are the East India inspector this notice is addressed to, and the book you are holding is the claim file. There is no menu furniture at all, just one page centred on black, in the same 1-bit stipple as everything else in the game. Frame at about 1:20 in the Announcement video (Steam).

Patterns

How the screen is arranged.

diegetic-document document-card story-panel

Components

Parts on screen.

Illustration

Screen inventory

• 'Lost at Sea, 1803' headline in large italic serif
• 'THE GOOD SHIP' subhead above a small engraved ship illustration
• 'OBRA DINN' in large quoted display capitals
• spec line 'Built 1796, London - 800 tons, 18 ft draught'
• 'Captain R. WITTEREL - Crew 51 men'
• 'Last voyage to Orient - Cape rendezvous unmet'
• footer 'Contact East India Cy. London Office for enquiries or testimony.'
• the single page centred on black, with no other chrome or controls

Top 3 colors

#e4ffff 41%#2c2d18 41%#cde5e2 9%

Top three palette colors by share. The remaining colors make up the rest.

Source and credit

© Lucas Pope / 3909, Return of the Obra Dinn screenshot: Announcement (Steam), shown for design study and commentary. PlayCraft is an unofficial fan project, not affiliated with or endorsed by 3909.

Source tier 2 (publisher-released) · screenshot: Steam store page · Steam page

Source details

Fetched 2026-10-20. verified 2026-10-20: frame extracted from the official Announcement video (Steam) and inspected visually at full resolution; genuine logbook front page confirmed settled and fully legible (all spec and contact lines readable); no trailer text overlays the frame

no published policy found (checked 2026-10-20); fair-use study use, takedown honored within 48h, note: no Lucas Pope / 3909 video policy was located during this prep and a dedicated policy search was not run in this phase; flagged in review-notes.md for the ingest gate

Rights holders: see Copyright & takedown.