A war seen from behind the counter
Margin of War is a sci-fi game concept centered on a shop and repair workshop. You buy and sell equipment, recover parts from damaged goods, repair items and assemble new ones. Your business decisions can influence the conflict beyond the shop.
The player stays inside the shop, but it is a walkable 3D space. The counter, repair bench, dismantling machine, assembly station, storage and sales area are places you physically use. News, customers, shortages and changes around the shop bring the outside world to you.
Keep the workshop moving
The crafting direction is deliberately simple: supply the required components, start a task and let the machine work for a set time. Dismantling, repairs and assembly become parallel activities, so you can serve a customer while another job finishes.
A damaged item might yield useful parts that go into a later repair or a new order. Choosing which materials to keep, which task to start and which customer to prioritize connects the workshop to the shop's economy. Screens provide information about orders, the market and the war alongside the physical workstations.
Every sale has a destination
The planned economy responds to the war. A lost supply source can make parts scarce, shift prices or create demand for different equipment. Selling weapons to a faction or repairing a civilian generator can affect more than the day's profit.
Government forces, rebels and independent civilians are the proposed starting groups. Your relationships with them could influence access to supplies, orders and recipes. Embargoes, inspections or sabotage are possible consequences being explored; their exact rules still need to be designed.
The war returns through your customers
Recurring customers would make the conflict personal. A soldier might return with the same damaged weapon, a displaced engineer could bring a blueprint, or a familiar face could stop visiting after a faction loses territory.
Reports and daily events would connect these encounters to shortages, faction strength and civilian stability. The goal is to make your choices visible through the business and the people around it. The proposed first version tests this with a small faction model, a limited item selection and a focused set of events.
A used workshop with a changing view
The visual direction is worn industrial sci-fi: repaired cables, scratched metal, labeled boxes, recognizable equipment and machines that visibly work on a task. The supplied artwork explores warm workshop lighting, cool displays and a busy spaceport beyond the opening.
As the conflict develops, empty shelves, military crates, disrupted lighting, arriving refugees or changed faction symbols could transform the same location. The exact camera perspective remains open, while moving between stations inside the shop is an agreed design direction.
The initial scope focuses on a PC shop experience with timed workshop tasks, economic choices and visible consequences. The images are visual plans, and the economy, events and outcomes still need to be worked out.