Space Couch Command started as a small prototype with one goal: a game I could play with my kids and our friends, all together, on the couch.

The idea was simple. Turn our living room into the bridge of a spaceship with the main screen on the TV and turn every phone, tablet, and computer in the room into a station on the bridge. One person flies. One shoots. One keeps the reactor from melting down. Nobody can see the whole picture, so everyone has to talk.

The first version was rough. But we kept having more fun than I expected, game nights kept running late, and every session ended with a new pile of "what if we could…" ideas. So I kept building.

That little experiment has grown into:

• Five bridge stations (Helm, Tactical, Engineering, Science and Comms), plus simple cannoneer seats so the youngest crew members can press FIRE and do real damage.
• Ships for crews of 1 to 9, so it works whether it's two of us or the whole gang.
• Pirates who hail you and demand tribute (you can bluff), and beaten enemies who beg to surrender. Sometimes they're lying.
• Probe missions: Science steers a probe through a dark, collapsing wreck while Comms watches the scope for whatever is hunting it.
• THE VOID, a story campaign about a patch of pure nothing heading for home.
• Permadeath runs where salvage and upgrades carry forward, so every crew gets a little further.
• Online co-op through Steam for friends who can't make it over (they'll need their own copy).

Getting started is easy. The game runs on the computer hooked up to your TV, everyone else scans a QR code, and their phone, tablet or laptop becomes their station. The crew installs nothing.

TELL ME HOW TO MAKE IT BETTER

Almost every feature in this game started with someone on the couch saying "what if…". Now I'd love to hear yours. Drop a comment below:

• Which station would you want to play, and what would make it more fun?
• What should crews run into out there next: enemies, anomalies, missions?
• Who would you play with (little kids, teens, a big group, friends online), and what would make it work better for them?
• Any wild idea at all. The weirder the better.

I'll be reading every comment. Thanks for following along, and keep talking on that bridge!