Bug Survivors: the complete guide

01The 60-second version

You're a PostHog hedgehog ("hoggie") in an arena. Bugs pour in from every side. You only move. Your weapons fire on their own, and every weapon is a PostHog product. Squashed bugs drop XP gems. Each level offers 3 cards: a new weapon, a weapon upgrade, or a passive.

At 3:30 the boss arrives. Beat it and wave 1 is clear. Then you choose: CASH OUT (bank all your gold and end the run as a win) or CONTINUE up the wave ladder: harder waves, a new boss version every wave ("Legacy Monolith 2.0", "3.0"...), and a free Release pick after each one. The run ends when you die or cash out.

The big power spikes: - Evolution: a weapon at L5 + its partner passive + opening a chest = a much stronger evolved weapon. - Funding rounds: every boss you beat gives +15% damage (compounding) and +10 max HP. - Releases and tools: run-changing perks and 15 extra weapons, offered after each boss.

02Controls

Nothing is selected when the cards appear, so a stray tap can't pick one. On phones the game plays in landscape and asks you to turn sideways.

03How a run works

Wave 1 (the original run)

The first run is built to be a ~4 minute win, even for a newcomer on easy or normal.

On heat 1+ the ring and the stampede can swap places; the elite pack is always last. On heat 3+ lone elites come at 0:45, 1:25, 2:05 and 2:45 instead.

Spawning

Bugs spawn just off screen. The rate starts at 1.1 per second and grows by 0.034 per second for every second of the run (capped at 7 minutes), so about 8 per second by 3:30. It halves while a boss is fighting (until it gets angry). There can be at most 320 bugs at once. Past that, extra spawns are dropped and the later scaling turns into HP instead.

After the boss

The field clears and the remaining XP flies to you. Then the SHIPPED screen: - CONTINUE (the default): a funding round (+15% damage, +10 max HP), this wave's gold becomes safe, then SHIP A RELEASE (pick 1 of 3, free), then the next wave starts at full HP with the boss's big chest a few steps away. - CASH OUT: the run ends as a win. You bank all your gold plus a bonus (wave 2+).

04Your stats

Every hoggie starts from the same base. Passives, hoggie traits, merch, relics and releases change it.

Getting hit: after a hit you're invulnerable for 0.55 s. One hit can take at most 35% of your max HP (after armour), so nothing one-shots you from full. The Hogzilla drive-by is the only exception.

05Leveling up

The XP curve

You start needing 5 XP. After that, level L needs 3 + 2.2L + L^1.3 XP (and from level 40 it steepens sharply).

A level-up plays a short slow-motion beat, then the cards. Several levels in a row queue up.

The cards

Each level shows 3 cards, drawn by weight from: - New weapons: likely while you own fewer than 3, less likely after that (and rarer still past 8). - Upgrades to weapons you own: the most likely cards. Even more likely when you already hold that weapon's evolution partner. - Patches: a weapon already at L5 keeps coming back as a patch (v1.1, v1.2...). See patches. - Passives: new ones (only while you have a free slot) and upgrades. A passive that would evolve a weapon you own gets a big weight boost. Maxed passives also come back as half-level patches. - The five "handbook value" passives (You're the Driver, Make It Public, Do More Weird, Why Not Now?, Optimistic by Default) only show up from wave 2. - The 15 tools only show up after your first boss.

Cards say EVOLVES WITH X when they'd complete an evolution. When nothing is left to offer, you get filler cards: a snack (+30 HP) or +10 gold.

Reroll, Skip, Banish

You get one of each per run. Merch adds more. - Reroll (R): a fresh hand of 3. - Skip (X): take no card, get +3 gold. - Banish (B): select a card, then banish it. That weapon or passive never shows up again this run, and you get a fresh hand.

Slots

• Passives: 6 slots, 8 from wave 3 ("headcount approved").
• Weapons: no hard cap. New-weapon cards just get rarer the more you hold. (Small Teams rewards holding fewer than 6.)

06Weapons: the six products

Every weapon has levels 1-5, an evolved form, patches and a v2.0. Which products appear depends on the theme. Your starting weapon is the theme's starting product (Experiments by default) unless your hoggie brings its own.

Experiments

A/B test with real statistics. Fires straight shots forward and backward at once (the way you face, and behind you), in a small fan.

Tip: the base version only shoots along your facing line, so keep moving across the swarm, not straight away from it.

Error Tracking

Catch exceptions and see who they hit. Homing traces that seek the nearest bug.

Session Replay

Watch real users hit the bug. Orbs that circle you and knock bugs back.

Session Replay is one half of the secret Full Stack Nova.

Feature Flags

Ship safely, roll out to anyone. Plants flags at your feet. Each flag zaps the nearest bug in range.

Tip: flags stay where you plant them. Walk in a loop around an area and you build a minefield.

Product Analytics

Funnels, trends and retention for every event. A shockwave ring that expands out from you. Only the ring's edge hurts, and it shoves bugs back.

Surveys

Ask users what they think, in-app. An aura around you that slows and damages every bug inside.

Tip: the slow is the real value. Surveys makes chargers and swarms manageable for every other weapon.

07Weapons: the 15 PostHog tools

Tools are fixed in every game (never themed). They're offered from the first Release screen onward (after the wave 1 boss), then in normal level-up cards too. Through wave 5, every Release screen offers at least one new tool.

Web Analytics: Traffic Beam

Rotating beams of pageviews sweep around you.

Heatmaps: Heat Trail

Everywhere you walk gets hot. Bugs standing on hot tiles burn.

Tip: a kiting weapon. Lead the swarm in circles and they walk through your trail.

PostHog AI: Max AI

A drone that floats by you and bolts the bug with the most HP in range (the boss, if it's close).

Data Warehouse: Warehouse Vault

Heavy data drums orbit you at a wide radius and slam bugs away.

Workflows: Automation

A zap that hops from bug to bug.

Data Pipelines: Pipeline

A once-a-minute screen event, and the rarest tool to be offered (30% of a normal tool's chance).

• The first run is 6 s after you pick it up, then every 60 s. Cooldown boosts don't change this.
• Suck (1.4 s): a cone in front of you (the way you face) vacuums in every small bug on screen, faster and faster. They die at the mouth. The cone's half-width is 0.6 + 0.12L radians (about 41° at L1, 69° at L5).
• Blow (0.9 s): the eaten bugs fire out the back as shots (up to 24, 40 damage each, pierce everything), and a blast ring sweeps the screen: small bugs die, elites lose half their HP, bosses take 8%.
• You can't be hurt for the whole run.
• v2.0: it sucks in elites too.
• Evolution: Hog Transformations (partner: Optimistic by Default): it sucks from every side, not only the cone.

Batch Exports

Every hit from any weapon "tags" the bug with that damage. Every batch, the export deals a share of each bug's tagged damage again, all at once.

The pop-up shows how many "rows" (bugs) were exported. One export hitting 100 bugs earns the Batch Exports crest.

Scouts: Scout Troop

Little drones wander around you and flag bugs. Flagged bugs take +40% damage from everything for 4 s.

Tip: Scouts makes every other weapon better. It's a multiplier, not a damage dealer.

HogQL: DELETE FROM bugs

Every few seconds a query runs over every bug on screen and deletes the weak ones.

Tip: HogQL finishes off tanks and elites that other weapons have worn down, and it's great with Default to Transparency.

Logs: tail -f

Every so often Hogzilla tears across the screen through the thickest part of the swarm, running bugs over and dropping log bombs along the road.

These Hogzillas are yours: they never hurt you (unlike the drive-by event).

Replay Vision: Vision Scanner

Scanner eyes drop where you stand, sweep a cone, and zap what they see. They also reveal Heisenbugs.

AI Observability: Trace

A hit on the nearest bug spreads along a span tree to the bugs around it.

Revenue Analytics: MRR Cannon

Gold cannonballs at the nearest bug. They hit harder the more gold you've grabbed this run.

"Gold grabbed" counts every coin you touch, even with Burning Money. So MRR Cannon and Burning Money work together.

Endpoints: Endpoint Turret

Drops a turret at your feet that shoots the nearest bug.

PostHog Desktop: Command Center

A ring of agent orbs around you. They take turns firing homing bolts.

Running 9 agents earns the PostHog Desktop crest.

08Evolutions, patches, v2.0 and fusion

How to evolve

Three things: 1. The weapon at level 5. 2. Its partner passive at any level. 3. Open a chest (elites, the boss's big chest, Legacy Nests, Generous Free Tier...).

When 1 and 2 are true you get an EVOLUTION READY! banner: go find a chest. If several weapons are ready, one chest evolves one of them, picked at random.

Some passives are partners for several weapons: Autocapture, Hot Reload, Big Monitor, Docs Day, Rubber Duck and Pair Programming each evolve two. Those are good picks.

Versions

Each weapon shows a version number on its card, in the HUD and in the pause menu: - v0.1 - v0.5: levels 1-5. - v0.5.1, v0.5.2...: an L5 weapon still waiting on its evolution, patched. - v1.0: evolved. v1.1, v1.2...: evolved and patched. - v2.0, v2.1...: a major release, then patched.

Patches (v1.1, v1.2...)

A maxed weapon's card doesn't disappear. Picking it again adds a patch: x1.12 damage, compounding (v1.5 = x1.76, v1.10 = x3.1). Evolved weapons get offered as patches more often than ones still waiting for a chest. Patching a weapon to v1.10 earns a crest.

v2.0 major releases

After a boss, the Release screen can offer a v2.0 for any evolved weapon. A v2.0 weapon gets: - x1.6 damage - +1 amount (one more projectile / orb / flag...) - 15% faster

Patches reset to 0 and start counting again (v2.1, v2.2...). On top of that, these tools get a real extra on v2.0: Data Pipelines (sucks in elites), Scouts (8 s flags), HogQL (runs twice), Logs (bigger bombs), Replay Vision (zaps twice as fast), AI Observability (wider tree), Revenue Analytics (exploding cannonballs), Endpoints (+1 turret) and PostHog Desktop (fires twice as fast). For the other weapons the v2.0 card's line is flavour, and the general boost above is what you get.

Full Stack Nova (the secret fusion)

Evolve both Session Replay (Rage Click Vortex) and Error Tracking (Stack Trace Storm), then open one more chest. Instead of a normal reward you get FUSION!: your replay orbs start firing homing stack traces too (one per orb every 1.1 s, 40 damage, pierce 2). It earns a hidden crest that unlocks Dr. Manhattan.

09Passives

You hold up to 6 passives (8 from wave 3). Most go to level 5. A maxed passive can keep coming back as a patch: each patch counts as half a level.

The last five (the PostHog handbook values) only show up from wave 2.

Rollback (revive)

When you'd die and have a revive, you come back at half HP (full HP for Angel), get 2 s of invulnerability, and a shockwave knocks back and hits everything within 90 px for 60. Revives stack from several sources (Rollback, Terminator, Angel, the max.hedgehog plushie).

Data Moat

A ring of water around you, radius 30 + 3 per level. - Small bugs that reach it are shoved back out and nicked (6 + 3 per level damage), at most once every 0.6 s per bug. - It also blocks enemy shots. - Each block costs water: 1 (2 for an elite). It holds 4 + 3 per level. - After 1 s without blocking it refills (0.8 + 0.4 per level per second). A dry moat (dashed ring) lets everything through until it refills. Leveling it up fills it to the brim. - Bosses, their forks and Nohog wade straight across.

10Chests

Chests drop from elites (always), Legacy Nests (35%), the boss (a big gold chest waiting for you at the start of the next wave), Generous Free Tier, and every 1,000 kills with Free Tier. When you open one:

1. If a weapon is ready to evolve, it evolves (EVOLUTION!).
2. Else, if Full Stack Nova is ready, it fuses (FUSION!).
3. Else it levels up (or patches) 1-3 things you own: 1 always, a 2nd with a 25% x luck chance, a 3rd with an 8% x luck chance (always for a big chest). If nothing can level, it heals you to full.

Every chest also gives gold: 10-22 (40 for a big chest) x luck x heat bonus x (1 + 30% per wave past the first).

11Bugs (enemies)

The theme gives three bug names, pains and sprites. Each one drives several behaviours. Variants are tinted and get a one-time NEW TRICK banner that tells you what to do. Bug stats below are wave 1, normal difficulty, heat 0.

Wave 3+ tricks

Each later wave introduces one new trick. After that it stays in the mix for good.

In waves 3+ the base six make up most spawns. Every trick met so far has a small share, and the current wave's own trick has a big share.

12Elites

Elites are big versions of splitters, tanks or chargers with a modifier. - 1.6x size, 9x HP, 1.4x damage, 5x XP. Barely knocked back. - A flashing gold pip over their head. - On death: a chest, 4 coins, a chance at a powerup (15% in wave 1, 50% later, x luck) and, from wave 3, a 3% x luck chance of a merch relic.

From wave 4 every elite has two modifiers (e.g. "Shielded + Swarming").

13Events

Each event opens with a banner.

Schedule - Wave 1: ring 1:00, stampede 2:00, elite pack 3:00. Elites at 1:30 and 2:30. - Wave 2: spike 0:20, stampede 1:00, incident 1:40, elite pack 2:30. Elites at 0:15, 0:50, 1:25, 2:05. - Wave 3+: spike ~0:17, stampede ~0:46, Hogzilla drive-by ~1:15, incident ~1:32, elite pack ~2:05. Elites at ~0:12, 0:37, 1:07, 1:32, 1:57. (Times are into the wave.)

14The boss

The theme's boss (default: Legacy Monolith, "I have been in production since 2009!").

Wave 1 boss

• HP: 900 x difficulty x (1 + your level/25, capped at x2) x (1 + 12% per heat). So about 1,800 if you're level 25.
• Contact damage: 20. It walks at you slowly.
• Attacks (a new one every ~2.5 s, never the same twice in a row):
• Ring: 12 slow shots in a circle (18 when angry). Find a gap.
• Charge: it flashes red and draws a line, then dashes along it. Step aside.
• Spiral: two streams of shots spinning out for 1.6 s. Only at heat 2+, after your first boss kill, or when angry.
• Summon: 6 swarmers and splitters. Only when angry.
• Angry at 50% HP, or after 50 s. Angry = faster attacks, 1.5x walking speed, summons, and normal spawns resume.
• Crumbling: a long fight wears it down. From 50 s it takes +5% damage per second (up to x8) and walks faster and faster so you can't just kite it forever.
• Heat 5: at 25% HP it rages: even faster attacks.

Later bosses ("Legacy Monolith 2.0", "3.0"...)

• Its HP is sized from your build's real damage per second over the last 20 s, so the fight lasts about a minute on wave 2 and about 45 s after that, whatever your build. (There's a floor based on the wave.)
• From 2.0 it can also do Rollout: four lines blink out from it for 0.9 s, then go live for 0.45 s. Step off them.
• It crumbles from 40 s in, much faster (up to x16 damage taken).
• Each version learns a trick (its affix), and keeps every earlier attack.

Beating a boss in under 20 s earns a crest.

15The wave ladder

Wave lengths

• Wave 1: the boss at 3:30.
• Wave 2: 3:00 of traffic, then the boss.
• Wave 3+: 2:30, then the boss.

Scaling (how waves get harder)

• Wave 2: spawns x1.35, bug HP ramps from x1.3 to x2.6 across the wave, bug damage x1.3.
• Wave 3+: bug HP x2.35 per wave (x2.7 per wave from wave 9: the soft wall), growing smoothly through each wave. Bug damage x1.3 per wave. Bug speed +5% per wave (max x1.4). Spawns +10% per wave (the 320-bug cap turns the rest into HP).
• Difficulty and heat multiply on top. Easy's discounts fade out between waves 3 and 6.
• You scale too: +15% damage (compounding) and +10 max HP per boss (funding rounds), and each wave starts at full HP.

Wave modifiers

16Releases

After each boss (on CONTINUE) you SHIP A RELEASE: pick 1 of 3 cards, free. The cards mix releases, new tools (through wave 5 at least one is always offered) and v2.0 majors for your evolved weapons. Each release can be taken once, except Hedgehog Mode (up to 3).

Companions (pals, DeskHog, Dopamine agents, Self-Driving PRs) scale with the wave: +45% damage per wave past the first.

17Powerups

Powerups glow on the floor with a pulsing ring (at most 2 lie around at once). They come from crates, elites and, rarely, normal kills. Wave 1 sees few; they get common later. Durations get longer with Why Not Now?, the Copy/Pasta Hoodie and the Self-driving hoggie.

At the start of wave 2 a Self-Driving Mode powerup drops next to you, so you can try one.

18Pickups and the arena

Normal kill drops (x luck): food about 0.6% from small bugs and 2.5% from others (halved at heat 4+), a coin 1.5-3.5%, a vacuum ~0.3% (after 0:30, one at a time), a hotfix ~0.25% (after 0:45, one at a time), and a tiny powerup chance (after 1:00).

Crates: one every 22 s from 0:20, 110-180 px from you, max 3. Break one (10 HP) for: food (40%, halved at heat 4+), a vacuum (12%), a hotfix (6%), a powerup (4% in wave 1, 12% later), or else 3 coins. From wave 6 a crate has a 3% chance of a handbook page instead. Crates are your steady source of healing.

Tech-debt puddles: one every 30 s from 1:15 (max 4), placed 120-200 px from you. They grow to 34 px (+3 per heat) over 15 s, last 45 s, and slow you to 55% while you're in one. Superhero flies over them.

The arena is at least 1280 x 800 px with walls. The camera follows you.

19Gold, risk and cashing out

Gold buys merch and hoggie capsules between runs.

• Wave 1 gold is always kept, win or lose.
• From wave 2, gold is at risk. The HUD shows "N AT RISK": the gold picked up since your last CONTINUE.
• Die: you keep the safe gold plus half of the at-risk gold.
• CONTINUE: all your gold becomes safe.
• CASH OUT: you bank all of it plus a bonus of 15% x the wave number on the at-risk part (e.g. wave 4: +60%).
• Quitting from pause keeps what dying would keep. The run isn't recorded.
• Gold sources: coins, chests, +3 for a skip, +10 from a gold filler card. Burning Money and the Burning Money hoggie turn every coin into a fireball instead, and chests give no gold.

20Score

score = ( kills x 10
        + (level - 1) x 100
        + seconds survived x 5
        + 2,000 x (1 + 2 + ... + bosses beaten)     e.g. 3 bosses = 12,000
        + 3,000 x wave, if you cashed out )
        x (1 + 0.2 x heat)

Each boss is worth more than the last, and cashing out is worth a lot on a high wave. A 250,000 score earns a crest.

21Heat

Pick heat 0-5 on the title screen. Heat n unlocks by winning on heat n-1 (a win = clearing wave 1). Heat stacks: heat 3 has everything from heat 1, 2 and 3.

On top of that, each heat level adds pressure that ramps up over the first 2:30 (and a bit beyond): +15% bug HP and +10% spawns per heat level (up to 1.5x that by 3:45), and +8% bug damage per heat level. Puddles get bigger.

Rewards: gold x(1 + 0.1 x heat), chest gold the same, and score x(1 + 0.2 x heat). On heat 1+ the ring and the stampede can come in either order.

22Difficulty

Set by the theme (it's per prospect, not a menu option).

Easy's discounts fade to normal between waves 3 and 6, so an easy run still ends.

23YOLO mode

--dangerously-skip-permissions. On the title screen, unlocked by reaching wave 6.

• x3 spawns, x3 XP, x3 gold.
• x2 damage both ways: you deal double, and from wave 2 bugs hit twice as hard.
• 90 s waves: a boss every 1:30.
• No pauses: level-ups apply instantly. PostHog AI picks your cards (usually the best one, sometimes not), with commentary ("Max merged Surveys straight to main.").
• After each boss Max ships a release for you and the next wave starts right away. No SHIPPED screen, no cashing out: YOLO runs end when you die.
• A powerup rains down every 6 s.
• ALL HANDS at every boss.
• YOLO has its own leaderboard.

24Hoggies (characters)

All 171 PostHog hedgehogs are playable. About 40 are signature hoggies with a start weapon and a real trait. The rest are the cast: default stats plus one small perk that matches the art.

Signature hoggies

Hoggie	Starts with	Trait	How to unlock (besides capsules)
I'm The Driver	the theme's main product	None: the default	Start
Wizard 1-3	Product Analytics	+20% area (Wizard 3: +10% XP too)	Wizard 1 at start
Wizard 4-5	Feature Flags	+20% area
Self-driving	-	Self-driving for 5 s at the start of every wave. Powerups last 2x	Crest: ride out Self-Driving Mode
Driving Hogzilla	Heatmaps	Runs bugs over while moving (20 damage, scaled by wave). +30 max HP	Crest: get run over by Hogzilla
Terminator	Experiments ("minigun tests")	One free revive ("I'll be back")	Reach wave 5
Reaper	Error Tracking	1% of kills reap every bug on screen under 20% HP. -30% max HP	Reach wave 13
Burning Money	Revenue Analytics	Every coin becomes a fireball. No gold	Pick the Burning Money release
Dadd AI 1-2	PostHog AI	Max AI starts at level 3	Dadd AI 2: crest (1,000 AI kills)
Noir 1-5	Replay Vision	Sees Heisenbugs. +10% crit	Noir 1: crest (50 elites)
X-ray	Session Replay	Sees Heisenbugs	Crest: evolve Rage Click Vortex
Data Thief	Data Warehouse	Pickup range x2	Crest: hold Warehouse, Pipelines and Batch Exports
Desk Wizard	-	Brings a DeskHog turret	Crest: run 9 Command Center agents
Doc Brown / Back to the Future	Session Replay	A free Rewind powerup at the start of every wave from wave 2
Caveman	-	Evolves at waves 3 and 6: Business Evolution, then Final Evolution. Each form +25% damage and +25 max HP	Reach wave 3
Robot	-	+1 projectile, -15% speed
Superhero	-	Flies over tech debt and icy floors. +15% speed
Stamp Approved	Surveys	+20% armour
Stamp Denied	-	Thorns: bugs that touch you take 30 damage (scaled by wave)
996	-	+40% XP, but you slowly burn out (-0.5 HP/s)	Survive 9:36 in one run
Panic	-	Faster the lower your HP: up to +50% speed and 30% faster weapons near 0 HP
Asleep / Sleepy	-	-15% speed, but heals 2 HP/s
Dynamite	-	A hotfix bomb goes off every 60 s
Angel	-	Revives at full HP, once per wave	Kill Nohog (never in capsules)
Error	Error Tracking	+8% crit	Crest: evolve Stack Trace Storm
Experiment / Scientist	Experiments	+1 projectile	Experiment: crest (evolve Multivariate Barrage)
Survey	Surveys	+20% area	Crest: evolve NPS Blizzard
Chart	Product Analytics	+20% area	Crest: hold 3 analytics weapons
Workflows	Workflows	-	Crest: evolve Multi-Channel Blast

A signature start weapon that's a theme product is only used if the theme has that product. Tools always work.

Cast perks

Every other hoggie gets one perk, matched to its art (a coffee or rocket hog is fast, a chef is tough...):

Unlocking hoggies

• Start: I'm The Driver, Wizard 1, and one random cast hoggie.
• Crests: every crest unlocks a hoggie (see Crests).
• Milestones: Caveman (wave 3), Terminator (wave 5), 996 (9:36 in one run), Reaper (wave 13), Burning Money (take that release), Angel (kill Nohog).
• Capsules: one free per wave cleared after the first (max 5 per run), each a random new hoggie. You can also buy them in the MERCH store: 110 + 15 gold per hoggie you own.
• Angel, Reaper, Business Evolution and Final Evolution never come from capsules.
• New hoggies get a reveal screen after the run.

25Crests (achievements)

All 55 PostHog team crests. Each one pops a badge in the game and unlocks a hoggie.

Crest	How to earn it	Unlocks
A Default Crest	Clear wave 1	Success
AI Gateway	Squash 1,000 bugs with AI tools (in total)	Dadd AI 2
AI Observability	Evolve Trace into Evaluations	Magnifying Glass
AI Research	Evolve Max AI into Deep Research	Research
Analytics Platform	Hold 3 analytics weapons at once (Product Analytics, Web Analytics, Heatmaps, Revenue)	Chart
APM	Beat a boss in under 20 s	Rocket
Batch Exports	One Batch Export hits 100 bugs	Mailbox
Billing	Earn 1,000 gold in total	Money
Blitzscale	Reach wave 5 before 14:00	Roller Coaster
Builder Relations	Play 10 runs	Hand Clasp
ClickHouse	Squash 100,000 bugs in total	Construction 1
Client Libraries	Clear wave 1 with 10 different hoggies	Coding Group
Cloud Foundations	Reach wave 8	Construction 2
Cloud Platform	Reach wave 10	Float
Conversations	Find 10 handbook pages	Phone Call
Customer Analytics	Squash 50 elites in total	Noir 1
Customer Success EU	Co-op only: not in this game	Croissant
Customer Success NA	Co-op only: not in this game	Burger
Data Modeling	Evolve Managed Warehouse	Doll House
Data Tools	Hold Warehouse, Pipelines and Batch Exports	Data Thief
Demand Gen	Pick up 25 powerups in one run	Megaphone
Dev Experience	Clear wave 1 without getting hit	Code Bubble
Editorial	Find every handbook page	Reading Is Magic
Error Tracking	Evolve Stack Trace Storm	Error
Experiments	Evolve Multivariate Barrage	Experiment
Feature Flags	Evolve Kill Switch Grid	Stop
Forward Deployed Engineering	Clear wave 3 on heat 3 or more	Explorer
Graphics	Unlock 25 hoggies	Art Thief
Growth	Reach level 100 in one run	Gardener 1
GTM Engineering	Cash out at wave 3+ with 500+ gold	Haha Bizzniss
Ingestion	Collect 5,000 gems in one run	Hot Popcorn
Managed Warehouse	Hold 5 evolved weapons	Organized
Marketing	Score 250,000 in one run	Town Crier
MCP Analytics	Hold 5 PostHog tools in one run	Cursor
New Business Sales	Cash out for the first time	Gatsby
Onboarding	Finish your first run	Lifeguard
People Ops	Unlock 50 hoggies	Namaste
Platform Features	Patch a weapon to v1.10	Transformer
Platform UX	Ship a v2.0 major release	iPad
PostHog Desktop	Run 9 Command Center agents	Desk Wizard
Product Analytics	Evolve Funnel Quake	Level Up
Product Lead Sales East	Clear wave 1 on heat 3	Football Coach
Product Led Sales West	Clear wave 3 on heat 5	Cowboy Lasso
Replay	Evolve Rage Click Vortex	X-ray
Security	Clear wave 6 without dropping under half HP	Mountie
Self-Driving	Ride out Self-Driving Mode	Self-driving
Support	Be revived 10 times in total	Doctor 1
Surveys	Evolve NPS Blizzard	Survey
Talent	Unlock every signature hoggie	Star
Warehouse Sources	Collect every merch relic	Safari
Web Analytics	Evolve Realtime Dashboard	Traffic Controller
Website (hidden)	Fuse Full Stack Nova	Dr. Manhattan
Wizard Docs	Clear wave 1 as a Wizard	Wizard 3
Workflows	Evolve Multi-Channel Blast	Workflows
YouTube	Get run over by Hogzilla	Driving Hogzilla

26The merch store

MERCH on the title screen. Three tabs (TAB or 1-3 to switch): MERCH (the store), HOGGIES (pick who to play) and CRESTS (the wall).

The store sells the Hoggie Capsule (a random new hoggie, 110 + 15 gold per hoggie you own) and all 57 items from PostHog's real merch store, each with a strange but useful effect. Owning it means wearing it: it works in every run. Items stack: each copy applies the effect again and costs 1.6x the last (rounded to 10).

Prices below are for the first copy.

"Minutes" here means time since the run started.

27Merch relics and handbook pages

Merch relics (in-run)

Relics drop from every boss from 2.0 on (one per boss) and, from wave 3, from about 3% of elites (x luck). You can hold one of each per run. Their buff lasts the run, and they're collected for good (all 9 earns a crest).

Handbook pages

22 pages of PostHog history and values. Page N drops the first time you beat boss version N (wave 1's boss gives page 1, Legacy Monolith 2.0 gives page 2...). From wave 6, crates have a 3% chance of dropping your next missing page. 10 pages and all 22 each earn a crest.

1. Idea number 6: the sixth idea, after five pivots in six months.
2. YC W20: Tim and James joined Y Combinator, winter 2020.
3. The MVP: built in four weeks, then launched on Hacker News.
4. 300 deployments: over 300 deployments in a couple of days.
5. ClickHouse: Oct 2020: moved to ClickHouse for billions of events.
6. PostHog 3000: going from 1 to 3000, not 0 to 1.
7. Max's rule: Max is never drawn in profile. Self-conscious.
8. The name: the hedgehog is still called Max.
9. You're the driver: no deadlines, very minimal coordination.
10. Make it public: we default to transparency with everything.
11. Do more weird: we aren't weird for the sake of it.
12. Why not now?: doing the thing is the answer by default here.
13. Optimistic by default: you cannot change the world without believing you can.
14. Culture: if given a choice, go live. Write everything down.
15. Free tier: your free allowance renews every month. Yes, all of it.
16. 97%: 97% of companies use PostHog for free.
17. Offsites: a 24-hour hackathon at every offsite.
18. DeskHog: a palm-sized console with three buttons. A friend.
19. Hedgehog mode: tiny hedgehogs on your website, sometimes in top hats.
20. Self-driving: a troop of more than 90 scouts watches PostHog.
21. Mission: equip every developer to build successful products.
22. Owners: zero intention of selling our business.

28The unhinged set pieces

The Hogzilla drive-by

An event from wave 3 (about 1:15 into each wave). A horn sounds and a 44 px yellow lane flashes across the screen through where you're standing, with chevrons showing which way it's coming. 1.8 s later, Driving Hogzilla barrels through at 560 px/s with a long screen shake. - Every bug in the lane dies. Bosses lose 4%. - If you're still in the lane it hits you for 25% of your max HP (armour doesn't help, and the 35% hit cap doesn't apply). It earns the YouTube crest, which unlocks Driving Hogzilla. Self-Driving Mode, the Hogzilla powerup and invulnerability save you.

ALL HANDS

Every hoggie you've unlocked stampedes across the screen (up to 24), flattening bugs on the way (60 damage, scaled by wave; bosses take 1%). It happens when you reach a new personal best wave (wave 3+) and at every YOLO boss.

Nohog (the Reaper)

Wave 13: DEPRECATION. 20 s into the wave, a hog-shaped hole in the world arrives: Nohog, a black void with a violet event horizon. - It never stops and never slows: it starts at 60 px/s and speeds up by 4 px/s every second, up to 210 (faster than you, unless you're fast). - Its touch deals 50% of your max HP (capped at 35% per hit like any other). - It takes only 20% damage, has at least 1,000,000 HP (or 240 s of your current DPS, whichever is more), and ignores knockback, slows, hotfixes, HogQL, pipelines, Hogzilla and ALL HANDS. - It comes back every wave from 13 on. - Kill it (a broken enough build can) and "NOHOG IS DOWN?!": 20 coins (5 of them big) and Angel unlocks. - Just reaching wave 13 unlocks Reaper.

29Leaderboards

SCORES on the title. A top 20 per game, with two boards: RUN (all normal runs, any heat, since heat already scales the score) and YOLO. Make the board and you enter 3-letter initials on the end screen. Each prospect game has its own boards. Leaderboards are on wherever the game is hosted and in the Android app, but off when it runs locally.

30How damage works

When a weapon hits a bug:

damage = base
       x might              (passives, merch, relics, releases, funding rounds: x1.15 per boss, YOLO x2)
       x patch bonus        (x1.12 per patch, x1.6 for a v2.0)
       x bug armour         (tanks 0.6, shielded elites 0.45, nests 0.8, Enterprise Deal 0.65...)
       x (1 + vulnerability)  (Make It Public, light_mode.shirt: ignores armour)
       x crit               (x2, or x3 with Source Maps)
       x 1.4 if flagged      (Scouts, the Scout Troop powerup)
       x 2 if sampled        (the Sampling powerup)
       x boss crumble        (up to x8 on wave 1, x16 later)
       x 0.35 behind Monolith plates
       x 0.2 against Nohog

• Exact-damage effects skip all of that: Batch Exports, HogQL deletes, hotfixes, pipelines, Self-Driving PRs, Kill Switch.
• Some hits can't crit: Surveys, Heatmaps, Scouts' flag hit, Logs (car and bombs), the moat, ramming (Driving Hogzilla, the Hogzilla powerup) and Party Mode's aura.
• Damage numbers are merged per bug every quarter second. In a big crowd only crits, big hits, elites and bosses show numbers. N toggles them.

Incoming damage: contact damage x (1 - armour), armour capped at 70% (so you always take at least 30%), then capped at 35% of max HP per hit. Then 0.55 s of invulnerability.

31Tips and builds

The first run

• Keep moving. Your weapons aim themselves. Your only job is to not be where the bugs are.
• Grab gems early: levels compound. Autocapture makes this much easier.
• Break crates: they're your main food source.
• Aim for one evolution by the boss. Get a weapon to L5, take its partner passive, and kill an elite. The 3:00 elite pack drops three chests.
• Exploders: kill them at range or step away from the fuse. Chargers: sidestep the red line. Spitters: close the distance.
• The boss: circle it, dodge the charge line, and find the gap in the ring. It crumbles after 50 s even if your build is weak.

On the ladder

• Continue or cash out? Each CONTINUE makes your gold safe and gives a funding round. Dying from wave 2 on costs half the gold picked up since. Cash out when the next wave looks like a wall, especially on a high wave where the bonus is big (15% x wave).
• Take tools. They're strong, and through wave 5 the Release screen always offers one.
• Multipliers beat raw damage. Scouts (+40% to flagged bugs), Make It Public (ignores armour, and wave 6's armoured bugs make it shine), Source Maps (x3 crits), Rollout 100% (+1 amount on everything).
• Double-duty passives: Autocapture, Hot Reload, Big Monitor, Docs Day, Rubber Duck and Pair Programming each evolve two weapons.
• Survival: Data Moat, Self-Healing, Code Review and Snack Break. Kill Switch Protocol is a free panic button.
• Wave 7 (Outage): stay close to your weapons' reach; Replay Vision and Noir hoggies see the Heisenbugs.
• Wave 8 (Code Freeze): start turning early. Superhero ignores the ice.
• The Hogzilla drive-by: the lane is drawn through where you are when it starts. Step out sideways, not along it.

Build ideas

• Crit storm: Error Tracking + Rubber Duck, AI Observability (Evaluations auto-crit), Source Maps, posthog_caps.key.
• The minefield: Feature Flags + Hot Reload, Endpoints (Edge Cache) + You're the Driver, Heatmaps. Walk loops.
• Money printer: Revenue Analytics + Lucky Commit, 97% Pay $0, the meme sticker pack. Or go Burning Money: coins become fireballs and still power the MRR Cannon (but bank nothing).
• Screen wiper: Data Pipelines + Optimistic by Default, HogQL (Materialized View), Default to Transparency, Logs.
• Multiplier stack: Scouts (Troop of 90), Make It Public, Batch Exports (Backfill) on top of anything that hits a lot.
• Full Stack Nova: Session Replay + Autocapture and Error Tracking + Rubber Duck, then one more chest.

32Quick reference

Numbers worth remembering - Boss at 3:30. Later waves: 3:00 (wave 2), then 2:30. - Evolution = L5 + partner passive + chest. - Patch = x1.12 damage. v2.0 = x1.6, +1 amount, 15% faster. - Funding round = +15% damage (compounding), +10 max HP per boss. - One hit takes at most 35% of max HP. Armour caps at 70%. - Passive slots: 6, then 8 from wave 3. - Rerolls, skips, banishes: 1 each per run (+ merch). - Gold at risk from wave 2: die = keep half, cash out = +15% x wave bonus. - YOLO unlocks at wave 6. Heat n unlocks by winning heat n-1. - Nohog arrives at wave 13, 20 s in.

What the colours mean | Colour | Meaning | |---|---| | Yellow bug | Exploder (fuse) | | Red bug | Charger (dash) | | Green bug | Spitter (shots) | | Lilac bug | Regression (comes back) | | Brown, big | Legacy Nest (factory) | | Cyan, flickering | Flaky (blinks) | | Orange, growing | Scope Creep | | Faint white | Heisenbug | | Pink pair | Race Condition | | Gold pip overhead | Elite (chest) | | Blue ring around a bug | Shielded elite | | Blue flag over a bug | Flagged by a scout (+40% damage) | | Red halo shot | Enemy shot | | Yellow lane | Hogzilla drive-by incoming | | Glowing ring on the floor | Powerup | | Green sludge | Tech debt (slows you) |