A downloadable game for Windows and Linux

Orbital Margins is a hard-SF character-driven small-business dicerolling RPG that puts you into the shoes of an independent spacecraft operator in cis-lunar space of a potential mid-future. Try to survive in the margins of a merciless orbital economy where your most dangerous enemies are propellant costs, docking fees and customs clerks that are having a bad day.

Ok, ok, I'm lying! I mean, this is the elevator pitch for what I hope the game to one day become. But it's going to be a long road from here to there.

The game has entered mid-alpha now, and has the core mechanics implemented, though is still lacking in flavour and variety. There is a few hours of fun and challenge to be had already, though, as you try to get your payloads from station to station or do dangerous EVAs to keep your line from dropping through the bottom, all the while extending your network of business contacts to keep the jobs coming, upgrading your spacecraft and advancing your character to make things a bit easier in the future.

If you try the game and have fun with it (or not - also good to know), please leave some feedback in the comments section.

The game currently uses the following 3rd-party placeholder assets:


More information

Download

Download
orbital-margins-linux-alpha.zip 350 MB
Version 0.16.1 15 days ago
Download
orbital-margins-windows-alpha.zip 345 MB
Version 0.16.1 15 days ago

Install instructions

Unzip to a folder of your choice, and run the orbital_margins executable (extension depending on platform, but it's neither the json nor the jar!)

Development log

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Comments

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AdaRynin62 days ago(+1)

Hi! Every now and then, I return to try this game again. It's good you made a tutorial. While going through it, I thought, could you break the tutorial into several scenarios? It would be the same content as the tutorial has now, just broken up and showing only 1 topic each. It would randomly generate start conditions on that screen, so I can focus on practicing one topic over and over. (Optimally, it would also record scores so I see whether I am improving, but maybe that's asking too much.) Then I would not have to click through the whole tutorial to repeat only the middle. I saw that idea in the game Beyond All Reason. 

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RandomActsOfConstruction60 days ago

Breaking the tutorial up into individually skippable sections is definitely planned, yes. Just not sure when I’ll get around to it. Practice scenarios on the other hand, not so much. Consider the entire game a practice scenario. Dying, nervous breakdowns (of the character, hopefully not the player…) or going bankrupt are all quite normal until you start getting the hang of things.

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EweMuttonheadStudios2 years ago

I just played Orbital Margins 0.7.1 for a while, and as a fellow game developer leaning toward hobbyist generalists, I must say, I admire what you've achieved here in your game's early phase. Overall, the game's flow and loop are enjoyable, although I must admit I wish I were better at it!

Here are some feedback and suggestions that I believe could enhance the overall gaming experience:

Technical Issues:

  • The game crashed a couple of times, particularly when the in-game currency was in the negatives. Would you like me to send you the save data when this happens?
  • The slide and checkboxes at the top of the screen seem like they should be read-only. Currently, I can interact with them, but they just reset when time passes.

Suggestions:

  • Have you considered adding a loan system and/or a retirement story/end game scenario?
  • Consider allowing players to continue the tutorial by hitting the specific button referenced in the tutorial window and/or using the "continue" button.
  • Instead of just telling the player they cannot use the game UI if the tutorial window is active, gray out everything but the tutorial window.
  • Add elements to the HUD as they are explained in the tutorial. I like that the tutorial windows went where the context was.
  • Bold important words in the tutorial and consider creating a glossary with hyperlinks to key terms such as "cislunar" or "v-delta" to improve player understanding, especially for when players are not in the tutorial.
  • When (de)buffs are applied after a task roll, have them visually show for a second, in case the player didn't read the mouse-overs on the faces. Perhaps consider adding a logbook to the HUD that shows all buffs and status changes as they happen, allowing players to go back and see what just occurred.
  • When dragging dice from the pool and there is already an active die, it would be nice if dropping the dice swapped them.
  • The find job menu covers your current location.
  • If you hit the roll button on a task before time allows flash/highlight the time button.

Overall, I enjoy this game. It gives me nostalgia for older games of my youth like Taipan! and Sid Meier's Pirates!. I anticipate further updates.

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RandomActsOfConstruction2 years ago

Thanks a lot for your feedback, and your kind words. Both are highly appreciated!

Regarding the technical issues that you mention:

The game crashed a couple of times, particularly when the in-game currency was in the negatives. Would you like me to send you the save data when this happens?

Just the last log entries would probably be enough (log is in the same folder as savegames, though it depends on the platform where that is exactly…).

The slide and checkboxes at the top of the screen seem like they should be read-only. Currently, I can interact with them, but they just reset when time passes.

Whoops. Makes perfect sense that that would happen, little oversight on my part. Thanks for pointing it out!

As to your suggestions, most of them are in fact somewhere in the backlog. UI-animations like change highlights etc. are planned in the complete UI overhaul that I hope to get done somewhen until July. Loans are an absolute must-have feature in my opinion, as they are the thing that ultimately makes time a limited resource. But before I add that I first need more precise planning, which means I need to stop faking orbital mechanics and actually doing them, which will take some time.

And as for actual midgame/lategame scenarios, obviously I have thoughts about that, but it’s entirely too early for that yet. Working on actual goals and progression is planned for the second half of this year, so some of that will start showing up. I’m always happy to hear ideas though.

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