Gloopy Edible Nubbins

What are you waiting for? Get to work!
...Oh that's right, you don't know what you need to do yet.
This here ->  <- is a Nubbin. Look at it bounce, isn't it just adorable? I could watch them for hours.
(cough)
Sorry about that,  are great for us in the Gloopy Power Tower because we have one of these bad boys:
 
This fine gentleman (genderless) can convert our adorable little Nubbins into pure energy! It's an absolute marvel of bio-engineering.

Now I know what you're about to say, "isn't that murder?" "but they're so cute! How could you do this?" "you've been talking for a while, where's the bathroom?" but the answer to all of those questions is don't worry about it! Both Nubbins and our Creature (don't look at me, you can't trust biologists to name anything) are absolutely unequivocally not intelligent or even sentient.
I hear those in other Power Towers use the shorthand of "Creatures eat Nubbins" to produce energy, but this is a false equivalence. It may not look like it to you, but Creatures don't even have mouths! That's a purely aesthetic mark.
We've gone off track
The point is that while Creatures are able to convert Nubbins into energy, they're not great at it.
This is where you come in!  We've hypothesised that with the right processing methods, we can vastly improve the conversion efficiency. Our greatest minds have developed specialised toasters, which have already been shown to easily double or even triple the produced energy!

This is the second part of your job
You'll use the energy you produce to improve your stations, but you can (and should) divert this energy to your own research potential as well! I'm sure you can come up with more ideas of how these Nubbins could be even tastier ("how do you even talk in strikethrough text?") converted more efficiently, or tinker with the station designs and see what you come up with! You have total creative freedom!

I am still your manager at the end of the day, so I'll be checking in on you from time to time. I don't get out much though, so I may talk your ear off a little. (You may have already noticed...) 

I need to get going now, but you have everything you need, right?
[Yes]
Great! See you soon!
 ...I hope? 
Gameplay
Manage your workers, who will collect, process, and deliver Nubbins to the Creature on your behalf.

Upgrade stations, explore your research options, find the best way to increase your energy output.

Engage (calm down) with your manager in intermittent visual novel sections.

Features
9 unique station types, each with a unique unlockable extra feature. (6 in the taster)

A research tree with 40+ upgrades. (20 in the taster)

'Streamer mode' with reduced particle effects and language sanitisation. Daisy can be a bit of a pottymouth! 

Your first playthrough should be a completable in a single evening.

Multiple endings! (Entirely based on your choices in the visual novel sections)

After your first ending, you unlock the "visual novel only" and "game only" modes. The first is great for completionists wanting every ending, the other is great for speedrunning (or just playing the game again in a different way)!

Steam achievements when I get around to figuring that stuff out.