ForkForkline: a free space trading game
A free, turn-based space trading game for phone and PC. You're a freight probe that starts with a loan. Buy where goods are made, sell where they're wanted, and pay off the debt before the interest grows.
No download, no signup. Built to an E for Everyone standard by Songtan Labs.
How it plays
One mission takes about 20 minutes. Every day you spend flying adds interest, so plan your route.
Buy where it's made
Every stop makes some goods cheaply. Water from Ceres, metals from Psyche, food from Mars.
Fly the route
Ten real places: Earth orbit, the Moon, Mars, the asteroids and three nearby stars. Trips cost days, not fuel.
Sell where it's wanted
Prices jump during shortages and crash in gluts. Read the rumors, beat the market, clear your debt.
- Market events with rumors and shortages
- Freight and passenger contracts
- A Daily Mission, same for everyone
- Light-lag: star prices arrive days old
- When a mission ends, you fork: a copy of you boots up
- Learn supply and demand, interest and planning
What's new
Every build is tested with seeded balance bots and a phone-size check before it ships. Most changes come straight from tester reports.
Stars worth the trip, a fair Daily and a calm view
- Star colonies pay more for the goods they import, and the farther the star, the more they pay. They also sell more exoplanet samples for the trip home.
- The Daily Mission now counts your first run of the day. Play it again as practice as often as you like; practice runs don't change your counted score.
- Share your Daily result with no routes or prices, so it won't spoil the day for anyone.
- Calm view in the ☰ menu: bigger text, nothing moving, fewer numbers, and a buy or sell sign on every good.
- Local records restart with this build, because star pay changes scores.
- v25.8.1: tester credits in the Codex, and the tester count on this page now updates itself.
Sound
- Short sound effects for trades, jumps, arrivals, events and the end of a mission, made in code so the game stays small.
- Turn sound on or off and set the volume in the ☰ menu. Everything a sound tells you is also on screen.
The first five minutes
- A guided first trade walks new players through buying, flying and selling.
- Tap any game word (fork, colony, freight, debt…) to see what it means.
- Banks, insurance, the warehouse and forks now unlock after act 1, one at a time.
- The Move screen shows where your contracts and passengers are going, with a bigger "Show all" button.
- Tester reports no longer need a code, and this home page is new.
A new home and an icon
- Forkline moved to playforkline.com and got its "F" icon for browser tabs and phone home screens.
- Adult testers can join the crew list for updates, with an email to confirm.
Tester reports and credits
- A tester report you can send from the game menu or the end screen, with questions for each age group.
- Testers whose feedback makes it in can be listed by callsign in the in-game credits.
Tips for new players
- Short tips explain each idea the first time it matters, with a setting to turn them down or off.
Markets come alive
- Every stop buys and sells every good; wider margins between where goods are made and where they're wanted.
- Market events: rumors, then shortages or gluts that spread, worsen or fade.
- Fill your hold three ways: your own cargo, shipper freight and passengers.
- Forks you build count toward your score.
Travel is free; time is the cost
- No more fuel math. Every trip costs days, and days cost interest.
Earlier builds (v1–v20, Oct 2026)
What's next
Plans, not promises. Tester feedback moves things up the list.
Next v25.9
- An easier route planner on the Move screen. Thanks, BowtiedPassport
- More pictures and fewer words in the first missions. Thanks, Estarie
- Share a mission: send a friend your exact game and try to beat their score.
Soon beta
- Season 1, "The KESTREL Question": story chapters about the rival probe.
- Sprint mode: a 7-day mission you can finish in a few minutes.
- Daily Mission leaderboards, with every score checked by our server (after accounts).
Later launch
- Accounts and cloud saves on the web, so your progress follows you (after 25 testers).
- Google Play with the same login (after 100 players have accounts), then iOS.
- The Fleet: a community space for players.
- An optional one-time unlock for longer missions. The full mission stays free.
Story seasons
After launch, Forkline's story grows one chapter a month, three chapters a season, each tied to real space science happening that month. These are working titles: plans can change, and testers help shape them.
Season 1 · working title
The KESTREL Question
Tallis Freight's rival probe keeps undercutting your routes. Who programmed it, and why does it know where you're going?
Season 2 · working title
Inheritance
A fork comes back changed. What does a copy owe its original?
Season 3 · working title
Colony Councils
A colony runs short, and the councils vote on who supplies them.
Season 4 · working title
Open Lanes
The Solar Transit Authority opens shared trade lanes, and the solar system starts to feel a lot less empty.
We plan to keep finished chapters playable, so nobody misses the story.
You said, we did
Real feedback from testers and what it changed. Testers are listed by callsign only when they agree to it.
"I was suspicious at first. But this is a fun game."
BowtiedPassport, on X
A young tester (8–12)
Didn't know what the job was at first, and nine game words were unclear.
→ v25.6: a guided first trade and tap-to-explain words.
Orbit-Falcon-74
Not much of a gamer and found the game hard to follow.
→ v25.6: plain-words explanations and a clearer goal from the first screen.
Estarie
Too many words and numbers at the start, with no pictures to show the goal. Asked for a tutorial.
→ v25.6: guided first trade, icons and less text. v25.8: a calm view with bigger text and buy/sell signs.
Meteor-Owl-99
Prices and strategy were hard to follow; asked for a beginner mode with fewer numbers.
→ v25.8: a Calm view with bigger text, fewer numbers and buy or sell signs.
Spaceghost
Wanted more help easing in, and wasn't sure how much control they had over passengers and freight.
→ Next: we plan an easier start and a clearer Freight screen.
BowtiedPassport
Checking where each contract goes meant jumping between screens; the outer worlds didn't pay enough for the trip.
→ v25.6: Move screen shows drop-offs. v25.8: star colonies pay more, and more the farther they are.
How we build Forkline
A small studio, building in public, with players instead of around them.
Players first
We read every tester report, and the changes it leads to are listed on this page.
Depth, not grind
A real story, real science and a monthly chapter, so there's always a reason to come back.
Fair play
The full mission is free. The Daily Mission is the same for everyone. No pop-up ads.
Tested before it ships
Every build runs through seeded balance bots and phone checks, and big updates go to testers first.
Privacy by default
Tester reports ask for no names or emails, and the site uses no tracking cookies.
Learn by playing
Supply and demand, interest, planning and light-speed delay, built to an E for Everyone standard.
Help us test
Play a mission, then send a tester report. It takes about 5 minutes and doesn't ask for your name or email: you make up a space callsign. If your feedback makes it into the game, your callsign can go in the credits.
Adults can join the crew list at the end of a report for occasional updates.
Beta team, coming soon: we plan to form a beta team that tries big updates before everyone else. The first invitations will go to testers who sent a report and joined the crew list.
Testing goal: 25 testers
6 of 25 testers
The plan: at 25 testers, we open accounts and cloud saves on the web. At 100 players with accounts, we prepare the Google Play launch, and those first 100 hear about it first. We're looking for players of every age, especially 13 to 17.