01 · What this artefact is

scrap is a TypeScript monorepo containing a browser-delivered game client, a separate HTTP backend service, an image-asset pipeline, and a documentation set. Observed

The client is a Vite 6 + React 19 single-page application, styled with Tailwind 4 and plain CSS, using lucide-react for icons and motion for animation. Type-checking is tsc --noEmit; tests run under Vitest. The client source is 12,235 lines of .ts/.tsx plus 1,174 lines of CSS. Its largest area is src/game/: 14 non-test modules totalling 5,543 lines, accompanied by 12 test files totalling 2,906 lines. Game content lives in src/data/gameContent.ts (904 lines) with a separate referential-integrity checker in src/data/contentValidation.ts (139 lines). src/types.ts (645 lines) holds the shared type surface and a literal initial-state object. Observed

The backend (api/) is an independent Node 20 + Fastify 5 service using better-sqlite3, Zod, Argon2id, JWT, Nodemailer, and Pino: 7,327 lines of TypeScript across routes/, services/, db/, middleware/, and config.ts, plus 6 SQL migrations (637 lines) and 5 transactional email templates (each in html/plain/subject form). Its own package.json describes it as "Self-hosted cloud saves & accounts backend for Scrapline". Observed

The art pipeline is 7 Node scripts (scripts/*.mjs, 669 lines) driven by artwork/art-direction.json (a style/palette/negative-prompt/role/dimension spec) and a runtime manifest src/assets/assetRegistry.ts. Deployment is Docker: an nginx container serving the static build, and a second additive Compose file for the API. docs/ holds 13 markdown files (3,478 lines); a further 307-line art checklist sits at the repo root. Git history is a single squashed commit (chore: initialize repository (scrapline3 v2.0.0)), so change history is not available. Observed

02 · Subject matter and fiction

The setting is a post-industrial freight network of ten named urban districts — Rustport, East Grid, Glassmarket, Lowtown, Iron Mile, North Foundry, South Reef, Ashgate, Relay Nine, Morrow Yard — each carrying a type label (Salvage Dock, Industrial Market, Tech Bazaar, Residential Sprawl, Freight Corridor, Reactor Yard, Flood Quarter, Contraband Crossing, Signal Station, Salvage Depot), a prose description, a stability number, and a population number. Observed

The tradeable goods (25) are industrial and survival materials: scrap metal, copper wire, battery cells, water filters, circuit boards, fuel canisters, salvage parts, medical supplies, iron plating, fiber cable, solar cells, coolant packs, ration packs, protein supplements, stim packs, trauma kits, signal arrays, void crystals, collector artifacts, modified parts, coolant rods, rope & cable, sensor modules, hazmat kits, grain alcohol — sorted into seven categories (scrap, electronics, utility, power, medical, food, luxury). Observed

Four factions are defined: Ironclad Logistics Corp. (described in data as the licensing and debt-ledger authority), Rustport Dockhands, Glassmarket Brokers, Lowtown Civic Ring. Observed

Sixteen named speaker characters exist, each with a role, an archetype (contractor, lender, collector, official, neutral), an optional district affiliation and specialty, and three lines of dialogue (48 lines total). Roles include Community Organizer, Credit Broker, Debt Recovery Agent, Contract Dispatcher, Market Analyst, Dockmaster, Grid Foreman, Bazaar Runner, Clinic Quartermaster, Convoy Marshal, Reactor Steward, Canal Pilot, Checkpoint Broker, Signal Keeper, Yard Archivist, Field Mechanic. Observed

Three vehicles (Damaged Cart, Flatbed Hauler, Shielded Rig), six rank titles (Unlicensed Runner → Scrapline Magnate), and three license tiers (Provisional, Standard Salvage, Guild Certified) supply the remaining named fiction. Environmental fiction includes five disaster types (storm front, flood surge, grid blackout, industrial fire, dust squall). Observed

The art direction document states the visual register as "cinematic industrial salvage realism … near-black and slate-steel … oxidized metal, wet concrete, teal instrument light, sodium-amber practicals", and explicitly excludes "clean utopia, glossy showroom sci-fi, neon-cyberpunk excess, fantasy magic". Observed — artwork/art-direction.json

docs/STEAM_STORE_COPY.md (a draft, per its own heading) describes the product as "a focused single-player strategy game about making difficult decisions with limited time and imperfect information"; docs/RELEASE_READINESS.md records the product position as "single-player freight-trading strategy game". These are the project's own characterisations, reported here as such and not adopted. Observed

03 · Core activity, abstracted

Categories of thing the player does, named at the highest level. No procedure, no steps.

• The player acquires quantities of goods and disposes of them at other locations. Observed
• The player relocates between nodes in a fixed connected network. Observed
• The player takes on time-bounded obligations and discharges or fails them. Observed
• The player accumulates a currency and carries a persistent liability against it. Observed
• The player makes discrete branching choices whose recorded consequences carry forward within the same run. Observed
• The player accrues a standing quantity that gates access to further locations and obligation tiers. Observed
• The player maintains a depletable physical asset and expends currency to restore it. Observed
• The player places goods into storage at locations other than the one currently occupied. Observed
• The player purchases permanent capability increments within a bounded run. Observed
• The player's run terminates in one of a fixed set of recorded outcomes, and aggregate results persist across runs. Observed

04 · Systems present

Each entry names existence and, at most, inputs and outputs. No internals.

• Asset registryMaps 95 declared art entries (id, kind, aspect ratio, alt text, status) to optimized public files or to null.src/assets/assetRegistry.ts
• BroadcastsProduces time-limited advisory items tied to districts or routes, with a pending/confirmed/missed/partial status field.src/game/broadcasts.ts
• Character momentsSelects a speaker and one of their lines from run state and a context tag.src/game/characters.ts
• Cloud syncClient for account signup/login/refresh/logout and per-slot save upload/download against api/.src/game/cloudSync.ts
• Content validationChecks the content bundle for duplicate ids and dangling cross-references, returning a list of issues.src/data/contentValidation.ts
• ContractsGenerates, refreshes, and resolves obligations from 9 templates across 4 tiers; emits currency, standing, liability, and record deltas.src/game/contracts.ts
• DisastersSpawns typed, district-scoped, duration-bearing events affecting good categories.src/game/disasters.ts
• Economy / marketHolds per-district, per-good price state with history, trend, condition, pressure, and stock, and advances it.src/game/market.ts
• Failure statesSix terminal reasons recorded on the run.src/types.ts · src/game/selectors.ts
• Journeys and pathingResolves multi-leg paths through the route graph and reports reachability.src/game/travel.ts
• LicensingTier, status, strike count, and periodic review with pass/warning/revoked outcomes.src/game/progression.ts
• Loans and debt ledgerThree rank-gated loan tiers; a recurring liability charge.src/data/gameContent.ts · src/game/uiPolish.ts
• Persistence (local)Three save slots, versioned snapshots with a migration path, settings, and a cross-run career record.src/game/persistence.ts
• ProgressionReputation-driven rank changes that unlock districts and contract tiers.src/game/progression.ts
• Records and scoringPer-run statistics, a computed completion score and grade.src/game/selectors.ts
• Route events9 typed events, each offering a fixed set of labelled choices with declared deltas.src/game/travel.ts
• Server profile / leaderboard clientA second client module targeting profile, save-slot, completed-run, records, and leaderboard endpoints.src/game/serverProfile.ts
• StorageDistrict vaults, time-charged safety deposits, and inter-district postal shipments with arrival days.src/game/vault.ts
• TransactionsAn append-only ledger of typed, categorised currency movements.src/types.ts · src/game/actions.ts
• TravelResolves movement across an 18-edge route graph of 4 route types, returning arrival day and deltas.src/game/travel.ts
• Upgrades11 multi-level, rank-gated purchases mapped to 6 effect categories.src/data/gameContent.ts · src/game/progression.ts
• Vehicle conditionA bounded quantity that degrades and is restorable.src/types.ts · src/game/actions.ts

Server-side systems: email/password and magic-link authentication, email verification, password reset, session listing and revocation, save slots with server-allocated revisions and conflict responses, save snapshots, idempotency keys, share links with public/unlisted/private visibility and abuse reporting, data export, scheduled account deletion, and an audit event log. Observed

05 · Content inventory

Game content (src/data/gameContent.ts, 904 lines, 242 top-level data objects): 25 goods · 10 districts · 118 baseline market price rows · 1 hand-authored contract instance · 2 scripted day-advance fixtures · 3 vehicles · 11 upgrade definitions · 4 route types · 9 route-event types · 9 contract templates · 4 factions · 16 speakers (48 dialogue lines) · 3 loan tiers · 6 rank tiers · 3 license tiers · 18 route definitions. Observed

Additional typed content sets: 5 disaster types · 5 broadcast kinds · 7 market conditions · 6 failure reasons · 19 route-event choice definitions in src/game/travel.ts. Observed

Art: 95 registry entries, all approved with a non-null source. 95 source PNGs in artwork/source/, 95 optimized .webp files in public/artwork/approved/, 9 review renders. By kind: 25 good, 16 portrait, 11 upgrade, 10 district, 9 contract, 9 route-event, 6 rank, 3 foundation, 3 outcome, 3 vehicle. Also present: 7 favicon files and 8 marketing assets including one .mp4. No audio files of any format exist in the repository. Observed

Tests: 14 test files in src/ containing 169 it/test declarations, one of which is an it.each over 9 route-event ids. docs/RELEASE_READINESS.md records a pass at "178/178"; the reviewer did not execute the suite. api/ has 2 hand-run test scripts (202 lines) rather than a test-runner suite. Observed

Backend: 44 registered HTTP routes (20 auth, 9 shares, 6 saves, 4 account-deletion, 1 data-export, 1 test-mail, 3 service-health/version), 15 SQL tables across 6 migrations. Observed

Docs: DEV-CHECKLIST.md 673 · NEXT-ACTIONS.md 743 · DECISIONS.md 458 (numbered, dated, signed decision entries) · RUNLOG.md 372 · SECURITY-THREAT-MODEL.md 259 · SAVE-VERSIONING.md 237 · PRIVACY-POLICY.md 183 · CONFIG.md 168 · SECRETS.md 121 · TERMS.md 112 · TRAILER_VIDEO_PROMPTS.md 64 · RELEASE_READINESS.md 61 · STEAM_STORE_COPY.md 27 lines. Observed

06 · Structural facts relevant to format

Strictly bounded to what constrains what formats are possible — stated without describing the current experience.

• Single-player simulation core. All run state lives in one GameState object mutated by pure functions in src/game/; no module in the gameplay path references another player, another session, or a server. Observed
• Backend implies accounts and multi-user storage, not shared gameplay. The API has a users table, sessions, per-user save slots with revisions, and share links (public/unlisted/private) that carry a copied snapshot payload. There is no WebSocket, real-time channel, or shared-world endpoint anywhere in api/. Observed
• Two distinct client-server integrations exist. cloudSync.ts targets endpoints that are implemented in api/src/routes/ (/auth/*, /saves/*). serverProfile.ts targets /api/profiles, /api/profile, /api/save-slots, /api/import/local-save, /api/completed-runs, /api/records, and /api/leaderboard — none of which are registered in api/src/routes/. The leaderboard path is therefore a client-side capability without a backend in this repository. Inferred — modest
• Persistence exists at two layers. Local: browser storage with 3 save slots, SAVE_SCHEMA_VERSION = 2, an explicit migration function, export/import of portable backups, plus a cross-run career record and a settings object. Remote: optional, server-authoritative integer revisions with declared parent-revision and conflict responses. docs/RELEASE_READINESS.md states local-first behaviour with cloud as opt-in. Observed
• Content is data-driven, not hardcoded. All 16 content collections are exported arrays in one file, aggregated into a GAME_CONTENT bundle and checked by a separate validator. Gameplay modules import these arrays rather than embedding entities. Content is TypeScript literals compiled into the bundle, not external JSON or a database. Observed
• Structuring is discrete and turn-like, not real-time. State advances through an explicit integer day counter with a bounded maxDays (30 in the initial state) and a runStatus of active/completed/failed. The only timers in the client are one animation delay and one 5-second clock refresh; there is no simulation tick, frame loop, or physics. Observed
• Outcomes are deterministic and seed-driven. Math.random appears nowhere in src/. Variation comes from an FNV-style hash over a per-run runSeed combined with day, district, and context strings, so a given seed reproduces the same events. Observed
• Platform targets. The shipping target is a browser: a Vite static build served by nginx behind a Cloudflare Tunnel. docs/RELEASE_READINESS.md names a premium desktop/Steam build as the commercial target with the web build retained as a demo, and lists console, mobile, multiplayer, and leaderboards as out of scope for the first release. No desktop wrapper (Electron, Tauri, or similar) exists in the repository. Observed
• No audio layer. No audio files, no Audio/howler/Web Audio references in any source file. Observed

07 · Explicit non-scope

Per the brief governing this document, the reviewer deliberately omitted all description of navigation, interface structure, layout, input, and interaction flow, and all mechanics internals — formulas, balance constants, per-action procedures, state-machine descriptions, and cost or timing tables. Where a system's internal procedure would have been the only way to convey a fact, the system was named and the description stopped. For the same reason the reviewer excluded client files whose content is onboarding or interface material rather than game data or simulation logic, and did not describe the composition of the marketing page component. This omission is deliberate so that the reader is not primed toward the current shape of the experience; it is not a statement that those parts are absent, small, or unimportant.

08 · Unknowns and unverifiable items

• Whether the test suite passes now. The reviewer did not execute it; the 178/178 figure is a claim in docs/RELEASE_READINESS.md, not a measurement it made. (Hermes independently verified this afterwards — 178/178 pass.)
• Whether the deployed live instances described in the docs are currently running or match this source tree. Unknown — not determinable from the code.
• Why serverProfile.ts targets endpoints absent from api/: whether they were removed, never built, or live in a different repository. Unknown — not determinable from the code.
• Whether the game is played end-to-end as one bounded run or as a longer sequence of them. A cross-run career record and a bounded per-run day counter both exist; their intended relationship is not stated in code or docs read.
• Design rationale for the gameplay itself. docs/DECISIONS.md is explicitly scoped to the cloud-saves subsystem and states that "top-level game decisions for Scrapline live in the parent project's docs" — those docs are not in this repository.
• Pre-v2.0.0 development history. Unknown — the repository has a single squashed commit.
• Localisation state: all content strings are English literals; no i18n layer was found. Whether one is planned is not determinable from the code.
• Player-count, audience, and commercial claims. Only docs/STEAM_STORE_COPY.md and docs/RELEASE_READINESS.md speak to these, and both are internal drafts.

09 · Evidence appendix