I think I want an even bigger rocket silo that has enough space for two construction bays and a launch tube and that logically rotates a new rocket into position. Perhaps have the new rocket slide 'north' into the launch tube and then get raised into the launch position? On the other hand, perhaps a...

I'd suggest 'cutting fluid', mostly a mix of lubricant and water; the lubricant sticks to the ore, and the water boils off. A quick search suggests stone cutting just uses water. Perhaps as an upgrade, have supplying lubricant/water improve speed/power/pollution but result in dirtier ore? Actually, ...

It strikes me that the best way to do what is desired is to have a mod record the UPS of the slowest client and configure the server to always run at that speed unless an admin changes things around. It would have the (possibly dubious) advantage that UPS would be nearly constant, with the tradeoff ...

The usual idea is to have a set of fallback fonts covering all Unicode characters.

I also believe there are open/free fonts that could be bundled with Factorio that cover all current glyphs.

That said, most glyphs are covered by the OS fonts, with a notable exception of country flags.

I'd expect a headless build for the M1/M2; I don't think the Switch has much performance to spare, plus it's not really set up to work as a server. Theoretically, a headless server binary for Apple Silicon should run on Darwin on Hyper-V/Windows or KVM/Linux on ARM. I wonder if you can run Darwin on...

TL/DR To efficiently use multiple-core processors in Factorio 2.0, where we expect to have multiple large surfaces, it might be a performance win to split the save across a local cluster of Factorio servers managed via the GUI. What? Something like a built-in clusterio cluster, launched by the GUI,...

I wonder how tricky it might be to (on Windows (which can't fork) with WSL2): Install a Factorio server in wsl2 When you load a save (in the GUI) load your save in the server and connect to it The local server in WSL2 works just fine, I believe; what's missing is doing the steps automatically from t...

It would be nice to have a UI to hide/show alerts rather than console commands. I imagine it would want to be per-planet, or perhaps even per-alert, in the case of having a huge wall constantly under attack somewhere. I'm guessing that alert/tag consolidation will work similarly to resource patches;...

An interesting mechanic would be if your grid would need empty storage capacity for the energy to go to otherwise the lightning rod gets damaged. I'd expect basic lightning rods that just ground the strike, with an advanced version capable of power cspture. Perhaps the ability to toggle lightning c...

having some sprites showing the wind blowing over the plains The description mentioned sand carried in the wind, so perhaps something like film grain that moves with the wind might look good. Thinking about it a little, sandstorms imply you need different sprites for Fulgora; they wouldn't have the...

Ooh, the wind whistling through the trees when they're thinly spread? A more whistly and less rustly sound for wind in dying trees? Wind whistling through the factory ? Some night sounds that get blocked by lights, and some that don't? Hmm. Alien critters that get startled and fly away from sudden s...

I wonder how it would look if items on belts were offset randomly from the center of the lane instead of perfectly centered; that would add some easily visible low-frequency noise to items on belts. Another thought could be to add random noise (something like a 'film grain' shader, but tied to the i...

Regarding the number parsing... I'm surprised nobody mentioned this before, but the most interesting activity about this for me would be trying to break the game via code injection . Who knows, naybe there's a CVE lurking around the corner ;) Why? Why break into a program on your own computer? You ...

I've got to wonder if it would be feasible to name circuit network... networks. I think it would be nice to include the connected output circuit networks in addition to the inputs in the GUI. I think the ideal way to handle red/green circuits would be to add a setting for choosing wire colours and h...

If we're going to have an unpack/build animation for things in space, I wonder if we could use the same on-planet? It would be a flat nerf to building construction speed (which is now effectively instant)... but it would look significantly more awesome. I've got to wonder if it would be fun and/or f...

It looks strange not to have some method for how buildings are placed on the space platform. Perhaps specialized space spidertrons for construction would be nifty; instead of pointy feet, they grab hold of the platform to move around, and ideally, their animation is impacted by how much thrust is be...

From the point of view of maximum laziness; reuse the screenshot layouts for main menu scenarios and/or test cases?

Also, I think there's an option to tell factorio to load a map then run for n ticks; though I don't know if you can use graphics in that mode.

Two methods I know of to nearly do what you're describing; fire artillery where you're exploring, or the scanning radar mod; it allows you to describe minimum and maximum range, and start and end angle from the radar.

So... a spidertron with floaties (pontoons, I guess), or perhaps one with really long legs?

Sounds like something that should be easily doable by a mod. Some mods that do parts of what you're suggesting: * https://mods.factorio.com/mod/platforms <-- removable tiles that go over water Any number of mods that override and/or modify terrain generation. A trivial solution would be something li...