Friday Facts #406 - Space Age Music

[BrainlessTeddy]

Pretty awesome that you even put that much effort into music. Even tho its 'just a Factory building game'. Tbh I turned the music off after a while and just listened to my own, but I think I'll turn it back on for the expansion.

[FuryoftheStars]

Could we get a more detailed look into the thrusters and/or the space logisitics in general? Because one thing that always strikes me as odd, is that all long videos of space platforms so far, show the thrusters running intermittend. Why? Do they need to cool down? Any other explanation I could come up with, just raises the question why one would build so many of them in the first place.

It was mentioned early on that you're creating the fuel from the resources gotten from the asteroids. So the intermittent running is likely have fuel / out of fuel. Yes, less engines means it could potentially run more consistently, but there are mass & thrust calculations. They may not be linear. We won't know for sure until it releases. For all we know, they are purposely putting so many on there for the videos to showcase the differences between the engines being on and off, or for other reasons. *shrug*

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I don't even know why a star destroyer would be optimally shaped even within Star Wars because in the end they travel using hyper space, using a shortcut through higher dimensions. Why the hell would it make a difference if the ship is shaped like a wedge. ^^

As far as I was always aware, this was for combat profile. Head on, it maximizes the number of guns that can be brought to bear while minimizing it's own profile for incoming fire.

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I noticed something odd in the Fulgora Video, yeah yeah there are a lot of weird things in that base, but one sticks out:
The trainstop seen at 1:13 has not only some Requester-Chests with Inserters pointing towards the Locomotive, but also some Active-Provider-Chests with Inserters coming from the Locomotive.

So either we have to recycle empty rocket fuel canisters from now on, or they put Battery-Electric-Locomotives in the game that were switched out for regular ones for the video.

Or are there options I'm missing why someone would need this setup?

I thought somewhere they had said something (not in one of the FFFs, though) about allowing inserters to take fuel from some entities (again), like locomotives, for the purposes of chain refueling and fuel swapping/upgrading. I can't find it right now, though.

[Allianz4000]

This is awesome! I kinda wish Nauvis also gets a music upgrade. It's nice, but the new themes are just on a totally new level, they are truly awesome, creating an atmosphere that really sucks you in!

I created this forum account just to post this and realized I cannot use my years old factorio account for the forum

[Lizzy]

These tracks are really good! I'm really looking forward to hearing them in game.

From the way it all was discussed, it doesn't sound like we're going to have instrument tracks, which is a technice I really love that's done in bit budget games like every Mario since 1990 (and blew my mind in the last dozen courses in Super Mario Wonder) and also modest indies like A Short Hike. In my mind this could "easily be done" (yeah I know) using the same features already provided by the SFX system.

Oh well, I'm sure there were good reasons why they didn't go that way, but I gotta say I'm not a fan of the long silences that currently colour the gameplay of 1.x.

[BrainGamer_]

I can't say with any certainty that the whole new soundtrack is gonna be out of place, but from the samples provided I don't really feel it's fitting the classic Factorio vibe. To me, Factorio soundtrack always associated with machinery, with whirrs and clanks and electrical buzzes, with guttural roar of a mechanical beast, so to speak; at the same time it also gave that image of technician doing some routine work and the feeling of being stranded on an alien planet.

I am in the same boat. Really not convinced by the shown music so far..

It's not like the first 2 songs are bad. They just would have fit better in a Lord of the Rings scene.

This hit the nail on the head I think. It just feels way too theatrical and not like it'd fit for a factory building game.
The long snippet for the 2 undisclosed planets at 5:00 sounds like out of a James Bond movie where we see the villains evil island for the first time.

The fulgora track fits the best I think. A big part of that seems to be the reusing and modification of known motifs of the current soundtrack (if my hearing and memory serves me right). The bass part of it is pulling too much focus tho I think. Its too present (?) can't find the right words to describe it..

I have a fondness for orchestral/classical-style music, but I find myself not liking the examples shown. Taylor's work on the pre-existing Factorio soundtrack set a tone for the whole game that, musically speaking, the new tracks don't exactly compare to; this not to say the new work is bad, just that there is a noticeable contrast in the mood that doesn't quite fit right.

Yeah I feel like it might be quite a jarring switch once we get to the new Space Age areas.

I am aware that we only heard ~3% of WIP music and it certainly sounds good but I do hope that there is more to it that fits more with the unique style of the existing soundtrack and that not everything is feeling so theatrical.

[Svip]

So either we have to recycle empty rocket fuel canisters from now on, or they put Battery-Electric-Locomotives in the game that were switched out for regular ones for the video.

Looking closely, one inserter is stuck attempting inserting nuclear fuel into the locomotive. It looks like we'd have to empty cannisters for rocket fuel and nuclear fuel in the future. And I believe this will have implications for both trains and rockets.

[spiro9]

Yeah I feel like it might be quite a jarring switch once we get to the new Space Age areas.

I am aware that we only heard ~3% of WIP music and it certainly sounds good but I do hope that there is more to it that fits more with the unique style of the existing soundtrack and that not everything is feeling so theatrical.

And this isn't just the main issue, either, there's also the fact that everyone knows the people involved, both Wube devs and the musicians, put a lot of effort into this. It's upsetting knowing that such an important part of the game will fall short even slightly because it means we're basically telling the devs "we know you put in a lot of hard work, but we need you to do it again," which isn't fair to them, and isn't fair to us either given it means we wind up waiting even longer over something which could easily be rectified in a future update.

I think the Fulgora preview track was on the right path, it sold the unique character of the planet without breaking too much from what we're familiar with on Nauvis. This could easily have been applied alongside the orchestral elements to Vulcanus, etc. and I'd have had zero issues hearing the orchestral. Hybrid music is a selling point for a lot of games' soundtracks! Going for a heavily cinematic soundtrack to a game which is primarily about micromanagement and automation just feels so, so wrong when done like this. It'd be like replacing the DOOM Eternal combat music with the Benny Hill theme. Sure, it's funny and could feasibly fit what's going on on-screen, but it doesn't have the right mood, character, or context to work seriously. That's how this soundtrack release feels without something or someone bridging the gap, expanding the musical palate of Factorio to accommodate the live orchestra even on Nauvis.

It's music that has plenty of potential. Right now, it seems like wasted potential; it's good work that shouldn't be thrown out, but it needs to be improved upon for certain. At least now I know it's not the musician/composer in me being biased.

As I'd said before though, the devs are doing good work. This is just, for now, with such limited information, an audio fumble. If the music is unfinished then that should certainly have been made clearer, too, because then these criticisms would be moot.

[husnikadam]

Some people have said some guesses already
Here is my take on the last two planets

Planet 3 - Glebe, which isn't named after a God directly, but it refers to a land which is assigned to support the priest. So I would expect a lot of life on the planet, which would be concentrated around some kind of queen/mother, hive, Hometree (as in the Avatar movie). A lot of life dependant on something very important.

Planet 4 - Aquilo, after the God of cold north wind, stroms and winter. Very hostile, almost inhabitable planet. Anything man-like outside the warmth of the base would freeze to death. All surface resources would be covered under a thick layer of snow. I imagine it a little bit as Mann's frozen planet from the Interstellar movie.

[GearShocky]

The second undisclosed track does sound aerial, I could see something like... A gas giant!

Does it make sense? no
Is it awesome? Absolutely

[factoriogame1121]

It seems to me that the current spaceship looks more like a piece of land with a standard factorio building, simply placed on a space background.
How about highlighting this stage of the game separately? Those. The design of a spaceship is no longer a factory simulator, but a simulator of the creation of a spaceship, with various special elements, mechanisms and processes that are implemented only there.

[Ext3h]

The first undiscovered planet theme sounds like some jumping frogs. May be a swamp with new jumping biters.
The second sounds aerial. My guess is something like flying islands from Avatar.

Am I missing something? I only see one "undisclosed" planet theme song. Where is the 2nd one?

I just misread the news and thought that it was two tracks in one.

But it does sound like 2 different biomes indeed, just not like two different planets.

I suspect there's actually going to be a mix of high rising, barren plateaus and a sunken jungle on that planet. You guess with the "flying islands" might not be that far off actually, as the real world location where it was filmed actually is a jungle on the ground level, with huge sand stone pillars in between, and this "flying islands" effect can be observed only for about 30 minutes at sunrise and sundown, when the fog starts rising rapidly due to the temperature shift and then starts rolling over the mountain range with a density comparable to an avalanche.

If you are on the top of the pillars during those times, it actually does look and feel like you are standing on a floating rock within a shifting sea of clouds.

Best guess? That planet is going to have a day/night cycle which alternates parts of the map, rendering parts of the map inaccessible for trains or players at periodic intervals.

[factoriogame1121]

What about a gas planet? Placing infrastructure on flying platforms. Extraction of ore by filtration from various types of "oceans".

[TheRaph]

I like the first tracks, but don't like the last. It's too disturbing.

[CrimsonSky]

Another really awesome post! I know many people complain that the music being orchestral doesn't fit Factorio in comparison to the synthetic and mechanical music of the base game, and I can see where they're coming from. At the same time, however, I feel like the orchestral music does a wonderful job showcasing both the vastness and wonder of space and the alien planets, and it can also showcase the sheer size and power of your late-game factory. Think of a shot you'd seen in a big budget movie where you see a giant beautiful landscape, but instead of endless plains of grass it's endless machinery working in tandem to process the planet's resources. That probably sounded a bit pretentious, but I hope I got my point across.

Speaking of factories and music, a lot of people are theorizing that the last track has a rainy/aquatic feel to it. If that is the case, I feel like the next planet will be heavily fluid-focused. If does end up being that way, I can see the Foundry/Electromagnetic Plant equivalent being some sort of upgraded chemical plant that can craft stuff like plastic and fluids much faster and maybe even refine oil; similar to how the Forgery can make plates but also more processed items like gears and even LDS. Perhaps in a similar way that Vulcanus introduces better belts and mining drills, this third planet could introduce better fluid-handling buildings like better pipes, fluid tanks, or even pumpjacks used for both oil and maybe a planet-exclusive resource.

[just a gun turret]

is that a rocket turret i saw?

and why does it look like spidertron

[Fabrik872]

you definitely should sell Vynil records with the soundtracks they are awesome

[Seanyjolhv]

I got a bit carried away looking at the star parallax. TLDR: the platform moves 1.25 to 2.5 metres per second.

I took 2 screenshots of the space platform movement, then used the change in positions of the camera, 2 stars and a stack inserter's rotation to calculate this.

Frame 1

Screenshotter (681).png (28.79 KiB) Viewed 2541 times

Frame 3

Screenshotter (680).png (27.48 KiB) Viewed 2541 times

before:
belt corner: 105, 65
star1: 115 48
disp1: -10, 17
star2: 99,12
disp2: 6, 53

frame position: 153, 724

format: x, y

after:
belt corner: 105, 64
star1: 116,45
disp1: -11, 19
star2: 101, 9
disp2: 4, 55

frame position: 158, 724

relative displacements:

star1: -1, 2

star2: -2, 2

frame: -5, 0

6 frame cycle for stack inserter to go 360 degrees at 864 degrees/s --> 60 degrees/frame --> 14.4 ~ 15fps

I used a 2 frame interval -> 2/15th of a second. -> multiply values by 15/2 to obtain per second values.
divide pixels by 32 to obtain per tile, or per metre values.

star1 is moving approximately (-7.5, 15) pixels per second or (-0.25, 0.5) tiles per second
star2 is moving approximately (-15, 15) pixels per second or (-0.5, 0.5) tiles per second
The frame is moving approximately (-37.5,0) pixels per second or (-1.25, 0) metres per second

The y component of the motion is caused by the motion of the space platform. The x component is caused by the motion of the camera.
Parallax is proportional to displacement, and so parallax per second is proportional to velocity.
star parallax is 0.4 to 0.2 times the platform parallax.
From this we can deduce that the platform is moving somewhere between 1.25 and 2.5 metres per second.

We can also say that the stars are 2.5 to 5 times the distance from the satellite to the platform. (I'm not certain on this calculation)

I don't know if this is beneficial at all: the camera functions optically as a distant observer, so having a relative distance from it to optically distant stars is kind of irrelevant. However, I believe that my calculation of the platform speed is valid, if rough. However, I really don't like the figure of 2m/s for the space platform. In order to have a more immersive experience, I would advocate for either increasing the star velocity due to the platform's motion, or decreasing the parallax due to camera movement. As it stands, (without having played myself, so take this with a grain of salt), I believe that moving the camera around while remote viewing a moving space platform will break the illusion of parallax, as the stars will move more due to the camera's motion than the platform's. Assuming that the camera moves at the same speed as a player (9m/s), this will be about 5 times the speed due to platform motion, and it'll just be strange.

Anyway, this isn't really today's topic, I hope this is covered a little more in a future FFF, as the stars are very pretty.

[LuxSublima]

Wow... My admiration for your team broadens while reading such an emotion/mood-focused post after so may technical posts (which I also absolutely love). This has increased my interest in the expansion on a level I didn't even realize it could.

Request: Could you add the ability to enable/disable specific tracks? Here's why:

There are some games where I love all the music except for one or a few tracks. Those outliers irk me so much that I can't abide it. Even if I adore the rest of the music, I'll have to mute all music if they don't give selective control, then listen to my own tracks (perhaps recorded of the rest of the game, which takes a long time).

I've played more Factorio than any other game, but one game I've also played a lot does have the ability to adjust the volume and mute option for several different categories of music. It also gives the ability to mute all music separately. When you unmute it, it retains the prior individual settings for categorized music. This gives the best of all worlds:

I can play the game with the intended atmosphere with the original music, while never being annoyed by the outliers. And, when I feel like a change, I can mute everything easily and listen to my own tracks played on a separate app or website. When I want to go back to the intended atmosphere, it's just a single click, no fiddling with several settings repeatedly. I wish this would become standard across all games that alternate among many tunes.

Thank you for this FFF. You've already delighted this audiophile.

[LuxSublima]

I have to ask - how deep-rooted is the engine constraint preventing the music from behaving dynamically?
I personally greatly enjoy when games have even the smallest dynamic elements in their music.
Many Nintendo games do this - jumping on Yoshi in most Mario games adds a layer of percussion, Mario Odyssey's power lines change key with the music, Pikmin (not that I've played), even Wii Play has dynamic elements.

I do think that having the standard "ambient track that fades into combat track" system tends to be pretty boring, but adding layers could be really cool.
Perhaps the bass of the space track could only come in while there's active thrusters on the platform, or a just struck lightning rod would have some musical flourish in key with the rest of the track.

Regardless, some damn good work being done for that music.

I agree that dynamic music, done well, is extremely satisfying and adds a lot. It's also less jarring than switching full sail from one tune to another, even if the two tunes are great and appropriate to different contexts.

A game I think handled this masterfully is FTL. Even though it's just a matter of switching between a combat and non-combat context, it was done so smoothly and so satisfactorily that several years after my last playthrough it's still one of the most memorable and enjoyable soundtracks of all time for me. It added so much to that game.

While on the subject of track-switching, I'm wondering how Factorio is going to handle the transitions when you're on one planet but working remotely on others, and switching between them.

It would be easiest just to always play the tracks of the planet you're on, but if you're doing a particularly long remote work session, the difference between what's playing and what you're looking at might be jarring. On the other hand, I hate it when a game interrupts a track so frequently that you can't enjoy the music when your context naturally switches rapidly (looking at you with serious side eye, original Baldur's Gate, for restarting the otherwise gorgeous music whenever I quicksave).

[Rammix]

Listening to the soundtrack, I think the last two planets are: 1) some kinds of glass / crystals; 2) oceanic / water world.