Space Age, Quality (and a little bit of elevated Rails) FAQ

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GrumpyJoe
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Space Age, Quality (and a little bit of elevated Rails) FAQ

Post by GrumpyJoe »

So, after a recent post about what can be expected from the expansion package, I was again browsing through "old" FFFs and their forum threads, when I noticed something odd?*

It could have been answered in the Quality thread, but that alone has 41 pages already.

So, here is what made me go "/whoosh?"

So far, the 3 additions to the game mentioned in this post's title have been said to be separate mods. Since mods can be disabled, I figured one can play with any of these combinations enabled. This was stated in at least the Train or Quality FFFs?
In the Quality FFF it says that uncommon and rare are unlocked by the first research, quite early, just as the other tier one modules.
Epic and legendary are then unlocked at one of the first 3 planets, and the last one respectively.

Which makes me wonder. Can Quality even be enabled without space age, or is the latter mandatory for at least Quality?

Or is it as simple a shuffling the research tree around when Space Age isn't enabled?
To me that's the answer, cos I can imagine how you set up dependencies, having done some minor modding and reading here for 6 years now. But I guess it's not as easy for everyone.


Is this an oversight in planning or an oversight in communication (cos when it says where the latter tiers unlock, it doesnt say anything about my question?)

Like I said in that other little thread, I'd love a combined list of what's known so far, possible with some FAQs of the related entries. (/spoiler'd for easy readability?)

List of "mods" that get enabled when you buy the expansion.
List of free stuff.
List of QoL stuff.

Imho it would make things easier to find and could be a selling point for some.
I know FFFs since 2017, and they have always be awesome read, even when talking about technical stuff thats way above my head, but with an expansion on the horizon, I think there should be a more centralised point of information, this is a totally different beast.

Get the hype up! :lol:

*Elevated rails are a quite simple answer I guess, I just mentioned it in the title because I was cross reading said FFFs and forums on my phone which is a pain with tabs.
Last edited by GrumpyJoe on Thu May 09, 2024 8:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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MeduSalem
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Re: Space Age, Quality (and a little bit of elevated Rails)

Post by MeduSalem »

I may be wrong, but I would imagine that for the Quality "module" you need to have the Space Age "module" enabled as well.

Exactly for the reason that otherwise they would have to make different research trees and possibly change/balance recipes for all the combinations.

I would think that it would be really annoying to maintain the game in such a way where it would be 4 different games then:
  1. Base game without Space Age and without Quality (the game as it is now)
  2. Base game without Space Age but with Quality
  3. Base game with Space Age but without Quality
  4. Base game with Space Age and with Quality
Sounds like hell for bug fixing. ^^


So I would say the only thing you can probably turn off independently from Space Age (and Quality) will be the Elevated Rails "module". I can imagine that the latter can work with or without Space Age.

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Re: Space Age, Quality (and a little bit of elevated Rails)

Post by Tertius »

I try to not think too much about how 2.0 will work out in the end. I might be disappointed if I thought some thing would be this way but it turns out to be that way. The fff show the feature in general, but some implementation detail might change between fff and release due to testing feedback. Or the fff was incomplete. So I just take what new features will be in general, but how they will be actually presented to me in my gameplay is a thing I will wait for until release. I don't like to waste my thoughts into things that turn out differently than I imagined.

In the past I made a fool of myself with other games where I thought the presentations said certain features would work just so and pretended that was a fact, but in the end these features worked out quite differently. I don't want to waste my time and other people's time again.

There will be features that will be in 2.0 vanilla for free.
There will be features that will come in a paid module.
It also seems there will be features that can be activated or not activated like a mod.

But how this will be sorted and organized is something that has to wait for an official announcement or just until the release where we see what suddenly has just been added to the base game, and what module or modules are additionally offered in the shop. I don't really care, because I will just buy the complete expansion with all modules as soon as it is available no matter what it actually contains.

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Re: Space Age, Quality (and a little bit of elevated Rails)

Post by FuryoftheStars »

Tertius wrote:
Thu May 09, 2024 6:59 pm
[...] what module or modules are additionally offered in the shop. I don't really care, because I will just buy the complete expansion with all modules as soon as it is available no matter what it actually contains.
To my understanding, this is how it's being sold anyway: 1 expansion pack with parts that can be turned off and on separately.
My Mods: Classic Factorio Basic Oil Processing | Sulfur Production from Oils | Wood to Oil Processing | Infinite Resources - Normal Yield | Tree Saplings (Redux) | Alien Biomes Tweaked | Restrictions on Artificial Tiles | New Gear Girl & HR Graphics

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Re: Space Age, Quality (and a little bit of elevated Rails)

Post by GrumpyJoe »

Tertius wrote:
Thu May 09, 2024 6:59 pm

I try to not think too much about how 2.0 will work out in the end.

...
Interesting way of thinking about it, which I can even relate to.

However, I'm pretty sure Wube is "only" polishing right now. The time it took for the new-new rails, even before elevation, according to that FFF, speaks volumes how hard devs have to work for a "simple" rework.
If I'm right about that, some things will already be set in stone.

Some things have been revealed, some thing were hinted at, by more or less obvious hints.
Some hints might have been dropped deliberately even, to make us curious, which I don't mind, a little bit of hype can be a good thing, and they deserve every bit of attention in the time of self proclaimed AAAA games that are insulting us at best.

What im asking for is a summary of what's already know.
Don't reveal stuff that you wanna conceal, that are not quite ready, that look like they might need to be changed, or even only need some polishing wax.
If there is stuff that's like 80% revealed but the last 20% can't be, and that's preventing them from releasing info on something else, I'm fine with that.
I'm not impatient, I never preorder and I'm not camping in a tent to get the next xfone asap.

What I was pointing at in my op is that FFF were, are and will continue to be an awesome tool. That combined with this good old fashioned forum which I love, is a BIG part of what makes this game outstanding to me, its a one in a million game.
But maybe thats only 80% of what's needed for such a big expansion.
Original Factorio was in alpha and beta for quite some time, driven by passion, openness about development and bugs, community feedback, implementing of asked for APIs etc over like 7 years before 1.0.

Now it's information dropping without releasing those revealed parts. We can't test them one by one. When it's released, we need (if we chose to play it) to get used to those new things all at once.

I'm with you that I don't wanna get hyped up for some feature that might not come at all.
All im asking for is some summary of what's already known, with some FAQs people had.

It's not even that "I"!!! need it, I'm not even sure if I'll like Space Age. I'd buy it even if I didn't like Quality and Erails, cos I ran out of friends to gift the game to and Wube still deserves more my own 5c/h played.

But maybe I just have too much time right now, that I'm starting to think for others, like that question in that other little thread I mentioned.

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Re: Space Age, Quality (and a little bit of elevated Rails)

Post by Tertius »

GrumpyJoe wrote:
Thu May 09, 2024 8:00 pm
What I was pointing at in my op is that FFF were, are and will continue to be an awesome tool.
I agree, however they are just blog posts other games also use as marketing tool. They tell gamers there is something new upcoming and how it will look like. Invite players. Raise interest in new players, keep current players interested.
It's not even that "I"!!! need it, I'm not even sure if I'll like Space Age. I'd buy it even if I didn't like Quality and Erails, cos I ran out of friends to gift the game to and Wube still deserves more my own 5c/h played.
No game or game expansion beyond a given scope will please all players with all its features. There will always be something you like and I don't, and vice versa. I don't like biters, pvp, combat, deathworld scenarios. For others that's their primary game content. The game supports us all, and I don't feel that I'm missing part of Factorio if I don't play what I don't like. That's different from game to game. Some other games make you feel missing out something, or force you to play some mode you don't like for some mandatory progress you cannot get by alternative means.

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Re: Space Age, Quality (and a little bit of elevated Rails)

Post by MeduSalem »

GrumpyJoe wrote:
Thu May 09, 2024 8:00 pm
What im asking for is a summary of what's already know.
Well a complete summary is difficult because so much has been shown already. But I made a quick rundown:

Space Age content:
  • 4 new themed planets, 2 of which still have to be revealed
    1. Vulcanus: a hot lava-themed Planet
    2. Fulgora: A cold & dry planet with lightning storms; seems to have had long gone ancient civilization
    3. Redacted
    4. Redacted
  • Space Platforms & new mechanics for travel between planets
  • Elevated Rails
  • Quality modules & tiers for items/machines
  • Item Recycling (not sure if SA only)
  • New resources/recipes as a result of the planets having different themes
  • New machinery to deal with the 4 themed planets; currently known are bigger Mining Drills & the Foundry, Electromagnetic plant
  • Even faster Belt tier; Stacking items on Belts (also not sure if SA only)
Free Quality of Life content as part of the 2.0 patch:
  • Rework of Nauvis terrain generation
  • Major rework of the research tree; some things use trigger technologies to unlock; more infinite researches
  • Major rework of train schedules; including "interrupts" to conditionally force a train to deviate from regular schedule
  • Major rework of rail geometry with more smooth curves and directions possible
  • Improvements to Circuit Network & Combinators, Wireless Circuit Networks, new combinators, controlling recipes for machines
  • Improvements to Logistic Network & Bot behavior, also Logistic Groups
  • Improvements to Ghost building & deconstruction
  • Improvements to Blueprints; allowing more generalized blueprints using parameters
  • Mirroring Machines with pipe inputs where reasonable
  • Improvements on Remote view & control
  • Tons of improvements on various UIs in general

Some I may have overlooked, so pardon me. But I think I got all the bigger stuff.

Some may or may not have changed in the mean time.
But to be honest I doubt that anything will be "cut" from the list, because all the work that went into it just to remove it last second is... urgh. I am sure the stuff they show in FFs will make it into the game one way or another and if they aren't sure about something they don't even go so far to reveal it in an FF to avoid the hypetrain crash if they then decide not to include it. ^^

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