Your bike breaks down outside the little town of Millbrook, so you pitch a tent by a junk-filled pond and start fishing. Throw a magnet into every pond, river and well in the valley, haul up whatever's been lost down there, and get to know the people who lost it.
Magnet fishing in a town that has been dropping things in the water for a hundred years
Scrap Happy is a cozy pixel-art game about magnet fishing. You tie a strong magnet to a rope, throw it into the water and pull up whatever iron and steel is down there: nails, padlocks, bicycle wheels, now and then a safe.
You arrive by accident. You've been riding coast to coast and filming the trip for your channel, bikes aren't allowed on the expressway, and a pothole on old Route 12 folds your back wheel just outside town. So you pitch your tent beside a scruffy little pond and start pulling junk out of it.
You sell the scrap, buy a stronger magnet and a longer rope, and go back for the heavier things in deeper water. It's a slow, satisfying loop. The pond you're camped beside gets visibly cleaner the more you fish it, and the empty cottage across the road is for sale if you can save up for it.
The game is set in Millbrook, an old frontier town the Valley Expressway passed by in 1976. The people who stayed are mostly older now and they love telling stories, and a lot of what you pull out of the water ties back into those stories.
Cast, pull, haul, upgrade, and go back for the deeper stuff
Cast
Click the water to throw. Darker water is deeper, and the length of your rope decides how far down you can reach.
Pull
Hold to raise the tension and let go to ease off, keeping the marker inside the green zone. Pull too hard and the rope snaps. Ease off too long and the catch slips away.
Haul
When the bucket's full, sell it to the scrap merchant whose truck is parked by your pond, or at the scrapyard in town. Anything a neighbour is looking for goes in your quest satchel instead, and handing it over moves their story along.
Upgrade
Spend your credits on a stronger magnet, a longer rope and a bigger bucket, then head back out for the things you couldn't lift before.
Fish any water you can walk up to
You don't unlock fishing spots one by one. Every pond, river, lake, well and stretch of coast on the map can be fished from its bank (a few hidden pools have to be found first), and each of the 19 parts of the valley has its own 30 things to find.
The farm pond turns up hay hooks and cow bells. Heron Lake gives up tent stakes and old ice skates. The wells are a straight drop down, and they keep a few surprises of their own.
Clean up the pond you're camped beside
The Starter Pond begins murky and full of junk. Every catch cleans it a little, and you can watch the water clear, the rubbish disappear and the lily pads come back as you go.
Get it all the way to 100% and the town pays you a reward for the effort.
570 finds for the Collection Book, and every one of them has a story
Each find goes into your Collection Book with a line about where it came from. The book keeps a page for every part of the valley, so you can see at a glance what you're still missing and where to go looking.
Have a go yourself. These cards come straight out of the game's own list.
Old Lantern
Scrap value: 12 credits
Somebody's night fishing ended badly.
Starter Pond, Mid-depth
Click to cast. There are 570 finds in the Collection Book.
280 bottle caps in 20 collections
Mixed in with the scrap are bottle caps from sodas, root beers and odd local brews that only exist in the valley. They're sorted into collections like The Fizzwell Family, Root Beer Row and The Critter Club, and finishing one earns you a reward. Some are everywhere. A few turn up only in the deepest water.
Pick a cap to see what it is.
More than 60 neighbours, and most of them want to talk
Millbrook and the farms around it are full of people with long memories: the mayor, a retired sheriff, twin retired schoolteachers who still can't agree on pie, the family that runs the Srisook Rice Farm, a magician who says he's retired (he isn't). They pass gossip along, and 16 quests run through their stories all the way to the finale.
Say hello to someone.
All 48 buildings have an inside
You can walk into every building on the map. The diner, the arcade, the museum and the police station, the farmhouse and the lighthouse, a haunted manor, and a very pink princess castle with a fairy zoo hidden under the toy room.
The rooms are packed with detail, and the people who work there are usually behind the counter waiting to chat.
Hire some help
Grandpa Walt, Timmy and Rosa will fish for you, even while the game is closed. They work an hour at a time, so pop over and say hello to keep them going. The cleaning up is still mostly down to you.
Look the part
Pick your body, hair, hat, glasses and colours in the character creator, and change your look whenever you like.
Only magnetic things
It's a magnet, so everything you catch is iron or steel. Any gold, copper or brass down there stays on the bottom.
A look around
Every one of these is a straight capture from the current build.
What's in the game now, and what's coming
Scrap Happy is going into Early Access because the whole loop already works from a new game to the finale, and I'd rather build the rest of it with feedback from the people playing than guess on my own.
In the game today
- A broken bike, a tent by the pond and a cottage to save up for
- The whole valley to walk, with every bit of water fishable from the bank
- 570 finds across 19 areas, each with its own card in the Collection Book
- 280 bottle caps in 20 collections, with a reward for each one you finish
- More than 70 characters and 16 quests, playable through to the finale
- Interiors for all 48 buildings
- Magnet, rope and bucket upgrades, the pond clean-up and three helpers
- A character creator
Planned
- Clothes to find around your house, and a wardrobe to keep them in
- Getting your bike fixed, so you can ride around the valley
- Steam Cloud saves and achievements
- Testing on Steam Deck
- The world changing to show the quests you've finished
- A balance pass on the helpers and the economy
Why Early Access?
The core of the game is done and it's playable from start to finish, but whether a cozy game works comes down to how it feels after many hours of play. Players will find the slow spots, the confusing bits and the things they want more of much faster than I can alone.
How long will it be in Early Access, and what will it cost?
The price and the rough Early Access timeline will be set before the Steam page goes live, and they'll be posted here and on Steam at the same time.
Which platforms?
Windows PC on Steam. Steam Deck is on the list to test. Nothing else has been decided yet.
Is there combat, or anything scary?
There's no fighting at all. Blackwood Manor has a ghostly glow on its staircase and the campground has a man full of ghost stories (he'll tell you none of them are scary), but nothing in the game is meant to frighten anyone.
How can I give feedback?
Once Early Access opens, the Steam discussion boards are the best place. Until then, follow along on the links at the bottom of this page.
Hear when the Steam page opens
News about Scrap Happy goes out on social media first: the Steam page, the Early Access date and new things going into the game.
Questions, press or anything else: contact@scraphappygame.com