DOCUMENTED SETTING · FICTIONAL PLAYABLE WELLS
One platform.
Separate targets.
The two campaigns use real fixed concrete platform settings. Eight playable wells per campaign, conductor positions, azimuths, surveys, casing points, facies maps, incidents, operational readings and economics are game designs. They do not reconstruct named historical development wells, mapped seismic bodies, actual operating limits or field reserves. The section starts at a simplified sea-level datum; the drill-floor offset is omitted. It includes the water column, seabed and manually drilled surface-to-target programme.
Hibernia — 1997–2007 development era
The Newfoundland and Labrador government's February 2008 report describes Hibernia's fixed gravity-based structure in about 80 m of water, first oil in November 1997, two rigs on the platform, Hibernia reservoir sands around 3,800 m and Ben Nevis/Avalon around 2,400 m. Its account of the 2004 B-16 36 well records 7,232 m horizontal displacement at 3,960 m depth. Those facts establish the setting and scale; the game does not copy that well's survey or assign its identity to a fictional slot.
Government of Newfoundland and Labrador — Oil and Gas Report, February 2008, Hibernia section
Hurley and colleagues describe the Hibernia reservoir as channel-rich, fluvial-dominated deltaic sandstone, with favourable continuity along a southwest–northeast trend. The shallower Ben Nevis/Avalon system includes transgressive shoreface and shallow-marine sandstone with thin bedding and uncertain continuity. The game's disconnected lenses and muddy barriers are deliberately selected exercises; they are not a claim that every Hibernia channel is isolated. Real faults subdivide the structure, but the elliptical exercise map is not its mapped fault architecture.
Hurley, Kreisa, Taylor & Yates — Reservoir Geology and Geophysics of Hibernia, AAPG 1990
Statfjord C — 1990s to early 2000s
The Norwegian Offshore Directorate documents the three concrete Statfjord facilities, with Statfjord C starting production in 1985. Brent and Statfjord groups and the Cook Formation provide Jurassic sandstone reservoirs at roughly 2,500–3,000 m within a major tilted fault block and smaller eastern blocks. Injection supported earlier production; late-life depressurisation began in 2007. The campaign's producers and injectors belong to the earlier development setting. A Cook exercise target is not a claim about a specific historical Statfjord C slot.
Norwegian Offshore Directorate / Ministry — Statfjord field · Directorate — Brent Group lithostratigraphy · Kostol (1993) — Extended reach and horizontal wells experienced on Statfjord
One geological model for the visible bodies and the bit
The ocean window spans 24 × 24 km, or about 14.9 × 14.9 miles. Separate finite sand lenses occur at different depths, with shale between them. Each well leaves its own conductor and has a fixed planned azimuth. The player controls inclination and pace; azimuth is assigned by the well plan. S-curves return toward vertical, deviated wells hold an angle, extended-reach wells travel several kilometres, and horizontal wells require the complete 1,200 m lateral.
The same lens footprints, depth surfaces and muddy interruptions drive the cross-section, instantaneous facies, retained survey logs and completion contact checks. No decorative reservoir sheet bridges isolated bodies. Numerical GR/gas/ROP, torque/drag, the 40 mMD return lag and completion thresholds are synthetic. The sampled distance to previously completed bores is a 3D game distance, without a survey uncertainty ellipsoid, and is not an engineering anticollision clearance.
Gas-cut returns, kicks and other drilling problems
Gas-cut returns change unpressurised bulk density; elevated gas alone does not confirm a kick. Kick exercises add persistent pumps-off flow and an unexplained rising volume balance. Loss exercises show return deficits and falling pit volume. Breathing exercises show declining flowback that reconciles with earlier losses and a multi-indicator crew review. Packoff exercises combine pressure/torque increases, impaired movement and poor returns. No single observation is treated as sufficient to distinguish every real case.
Every encounter stops drilling. Select the evidence-supported diagnosis, then fund and verify the crew response. Incorrect diagnoses retain the hold and carry a financial/barrier penalty. A correct answer alone does not resume drilling. These are simplified management decisions, not a well-control procedure or kill programme.
SLB — Gas-cut mud · SLB — Kick · SPE-178835 — Differentiating thermal expansion, ballooning and influx
Saved campaign and completion
Actual paths, fixed sampled logs, completed slots, spending, diagnoses and abandoned sidetrack surveys save in this browser. Reload resumes paused. The campaign ledger is separate from the existing main-game oilfield and leaderboard. Reaching TD pauses drilling; it is not a lost level. The completion panel above the plot shows endpoint distance (maximum 70 m), final inclination difference (maximum 8°) and assessed target interval in sand (minimum 25%, or 60% for horizontal wells). Passing those checks enables the production or injection liner test that finishes the slot and unlocks the next well. A held completion names every failed check and offers a paid sidetrack or a restart of only the unfinished slot; completed slots and prior spending remain saved. Paid events and completed wells cannot be booked twice.