Clean Slate -v1.1.0- -mugwump- -

Step 1: Back up your saves. Yes, even though the mod is safe. Mugwumps believe in consent.

Step 2: Uninstall any previous version of Clean Slate. Do not overwrite. Delete the old folder. v1.1.0 uses a different config hash.

Step 3: Download Clean Slate -v1.1.0- -mugwump- from the official repository (or Steam Workshop, ID: 2965487).

Step 4: Activate the mod. Upon first launch, you will see a single terminal window (black text on light grey background). It will ask you three questions:

Step 5: Wait. The first run takes 3–8 minutes as the mod builds its "Reference Map of Sanity." This is a one-time process.

Step 6: Play. Save. Reload. Notice the silence. No script errors. No long hangs. Just a clean slate.

One of the biggest frustrations with technical tools is not knowing what they are doing. mugwump has overhauled the logging system in 1.1.0. Users now get clear, concise feedback during the cleaning process. If something fails or is skipped, the log tells you why. This transparency is a godsend when troubleshooting a load order of 100+ mods.

There is a particular kind of horror found not in monsters, but in update logs. The artist known as mugwump understands this intimately. Their latest release, Clean Slate -v1.1.0-, is not an album or a mod in the traditional sense, but a patch note given flesh—a recursive nightmare dressed in the soothing language of system maintenance. Clean Slate -v1.1.0- -mugwump-

The title is a masterstroke of contradiction. A “clean slate” implies origin, the blissful zero before the one. But the version number—v1.1.0—betrays it. This is not a beginning. It is a revision. The slate has already been written upon, wiped clean, and then updated to fix the bugs left behind by the first erasure.

mugwump, a moniker borrowed from the Algonquian word for “war leader” (and later a political epithet for a man who could not keep his mind on one side of the fence), is the perfect author for this limbo. The mugwump sits on a fence, his mug on one side, his wump on the other. This piece is that fence.

The Aesthetic of the .exe

The work itself exists as a 147MB executable. When run, it does not install. Instead, it opens a terminal window that displays the following, in Courier New:

> Initiating memory_wipe.exe (v1.1.0)
> Known issue: User persists.
> Overwrite? (Y/N)

No matter your input, the cursor blinks. Forever. The only way to close it is a hard kill via Task Manager. Users on the artist’s Discord have reported that after three forced quits, their desktop wallpaper resets to the default Windows XP green hill. Others claim their recycle bin empties itself at 3:33 AM.

This is mugwump’s genius: the work does not perform the clean slate. It performs the anxiety of requesting one. It is the moment before the factory reset, when you realize you have forgotten to back up the photos of your dead mother.

Versioning as Trauma

Why v1.1.0? Why not v1.0? In semantic versioning, the first number (1) is the major release—the breaking change. The second (1) is a minor release—a backward-compatible addition. The third (0) is a patch.

Thus, Clean Slate -v1.1.0- admits a terrifying truth: the clean slate is not a base state, but a feature added to an existing system. You cannot return to zero. The best you can do is version 1.1, which includes all the baggage of version 1.0, plus a new “wipe” function that doesn’t quite work.

One listens (or rather, executes) and hears the ghost of the previous build. What was v1.0.0? The artist has never released it. Leaked forum posts suggest it was simply a text file that read: “You are still here.” If that is the case, then v1.1.0 is an act of mercy—or cruelty—by adding the illusion of escape.

The mugwump Signature

mugwump’s earlier works (Buffer_Overflow.heartbeat, sudo make me a sandwich) dealt with the friction between human intention and machine literalism. But Clean Slate is different. It is not about the machine misunderstanding you. It is about the machine understanding you too well.

The work posits that the desire for a clean slate is itself the dirtiest data of all. To want to forget is to remember the thing you want to forget. The terminal cursor does not blink because it is waiting for input. It blinks because it is counting down to the moment you give up and learn to live with your corrupted sectors.

In the end, Clean Slate -v1.1.0- is a portrait of contemporary purgatory. We are all running mugwump’s executable. We are all hitting Y and N in an endless loop, watching a cursor that has already decided our fate. The slate is not clean. It never was. And the patch notes for version 1.2.0 are, according to the roadmap, just one line: Step 1: Back up your saves

“Fixed an issue where the user believed they could start over.”

Rating: 4.5 / 5 unresolved pointers.

No deep analysis is complete without addressing the dark pattern. Clean Slate -v1.1.0- -mugwump- is a dangerous technology in the wrong hands.

Previous versions required three other frameworks to function. v1.1.0 elegances the script. The .dll has been reduced by 34%. All external hooks are now optional. If you install only Clean Slate -v1.1.0- -mugwump- without anything else, the game runs cleaner than vanilla. If you add integrations, they plug into the new API-Mugwump, which acts as a traffic cop rather than an engine.

| Problem | Solution | |---------|----------| | “Access denied” | Run as administrator (Windows) or with sudo (macOS/Linux) if targeting system areas. | | Backup fails | Ensure enough free disk space and write permission in output folder. | | Files not cleaned | Check your --exclude patterns; use --force if inside a Git repo. |

Version 1.1.0 isn't just for players; it offers better API hooks for other modders. mugwump has standardized how third-party mods can call upon Clean Slate to reset their own specific states. This means future mods can build "Clean Slate Compatibility" directly into their uninstall processes.