Friday Facts #437 - Cargo Pod Deep Dive

[FasterJump]

The flight animation looks amazing. Sometimes I wish I could press T so that the camera follows the cargo pod to the station. Joke for kerbonauts: I noticed that the SAS are as overpowered in Factorio as it is in KSP!

Regarding the pod spam (sending 1 item every quarter of second), I found it to be distracting, and wrong. However,it's fixable via circuits. But I don't think that forcing the player to use circuits is a good game design. The pod spam was annoying so I spent time making a circuit, but how many players wouldn't, and get a permanent rain of 1-3 science packs?

[BraveCaperCat]

The flight animation looks amazing. Sometimes I wish I could press T so that the camera follows the cargo pod to the station. Joke for kerbonauts: I noticed that the SAS are as overpowered in Factorio as it is in KSP!

Regarding the pod spam (sending 1 item every quarter of second), I found it to be distracting, and wrong. However,it's fixable via circuits. But I don't think that forcing the player to use circuits is a good game design. The pod spam was annoying so I spent time making a circuit, but how many players wouldn't, and get a permanent rain of 1-3 science packs?

This entire disucssion is talking about a non-existant problem. - when launched, rockets over-fill with items, they don't under-fill.

[Rebmes]

lol I'm glad we didn't have to talk about the cargo pods' functionality. I'm so tired of hearing about it, while being so happy with it myself.

[fur_and_whiskers]

I'm not sure what the team's plans are going forward, but if another big expansion is in the works...

Space Age is the last Factorio expansion from Wube for the foreseeable future.
Relevant point of an interview here:
https://youtu.be/N189R1vU2Vg?si=C_8IiOiU7KhpPipN&t=634

[BraveCaperCat]

I'm not sure what the team's plans are going forward, but if another big expansion is in the works...

Space Age is the last Factorio expansion from Wube for the foreseeable future.
Relevant point of an interview here:
https://youtu.be/N189R1vU2Vg?si=C_8IiOiU7KhpPipN&t=634

Note that you said Factorio expansion. This leads to the conclusion that there might be other games by Wube in the foreseeable future. Considering that Factorio was and continues to be a very popular game, this new game could be the sequel to the Factorio game that we've all been waiting for. Note that the above conclusion is based only on the assumption that this statement is true:

Space Age is the last Factorio expansion from Wube for the foreseeable future.

And considering that you provided a source, we can be reasonably sure that the statement is true.

[FireStormOOO]

Good job making this so extensible. I look forward to somebody modding in orbit to orbit deliveries and/or orbital rendezvous.

[herrkocur]

Good job making this so extensible. I look forward to somebody modding in orbit to orbit deliveries and/or orbital rendezvous.

Yes! That should be an option. It would probably make some tasks slightly easier (Promethium? you could have a shuttle of meteorites and then process actual science packs on your research platform). But then there's a point to make that the end game with quality is 10x as complex as 1.1 was and then making it make sense isn't as bad of a thing.

[JOndra91]

It wasn't until this FFF, that I realized that the cargo pod uses gravity to dock to the space platform. Which is in a micro gravity environment.

So the landing animation in space is physically inaccurate. Same goes for the launch of cargo pod from space platform. It's launched upward but immediately starts falling downwards with no controlled thrust.

[BraveCaperCat]

It wasn't until this FFF, that I realized that the cargo pod uses gravity to dock to the space platform. Which is in a micro gravity environment.

So the landing animation in space is physically inaccurate. Same goes for the launch of cargo pod from space platform. It's launched upward but immediately starts falling downwards with no controlled thrust.

Same goes for the moving of Space platforms from one planet to another! Gravity and Orbital Mechanics don't work that way, we shouldn't get pulled back to the planet at km/s^2 no matter how far away we are. If I leave a space platform mid-way between two planets, I expect the platform to stay there. And that's at 0km/s speed, when at speed (say 60km/s) I slow down if I'm too close to a planet. As previously said, this is not how gravity works. If gravity applied properly, I'd expect to need to put in alot of force to start escaping the planet, but I wouldn't slow down while doing that.

[BlueTemplar]

Dissapointed Space Age doesn't do Space correctly

[Usul]

I think I may speak for a lot a people who's first reaction was also similar to: "WTF is that ugly rocket!?"

No, I don't think people were saying that. If you're going to be immature and rude about it, I don't think the developers will nod in agreement about something that's very easily modable. If it makes you feel better there is a pretty good chance someone will make a mod, probably even a DLC port for it too using the tools literally mentioned in the post.

I apologize.

[Lokley]

Registered just to say that I love dev.blogs and all the attention expansion gets.
It's really cool to see that developers not only focus on final product as a game, but also remember about modders and making it easier for them.

[Amarula]

Regarding the pod spam

This entire disucssion is talking about a non-existant problem. - when launched, rockets over-fill with items, they don't under-fill.

Pod spam is the reverse of rockets launching items to the platform, it is the platform delivering requested items to the landing pad. For example, I ask for 200 space science to be kept on hand. My science train arrives at the landing pad and starts loading 200 space science; as soon as one science pack is removed from the landing pad, the landing pad requests one pack, and the platform delivers one pack. Eventually the pad will have asked for all 200, but it doesn't ask for all 200 at once. The cargo pods do not fully load on the space platform and deliver all 200 in one go, regardless of how the requests are made.

This becomes a throughput issue when you have several space platforms attempting to deliver diverse products. Only one pod can land every few seconds, so it makes a huge difference if the pod is carrying 5 items instead of 200. This is why there is so much interest in convincing the landing hub to ask for all 200 rather than sending dozens of requests for much smaller amounts, and why it would be so convenient if the space platform over-filled the request exactly the same way the rocket silo does.

[icksa]

I was wondering if it would be possible to modify the background in space to show whatever planet you are visiting. For example when a platform is at Vulcanus, you would see the planet in the background instead of just the menu item on the right. It would be cool to see the planet below you when you get dropped off in a space platform

[Flauschraupe]

Could someone explain to me what that weird sound is when the pod is entering the atmosphere, when the flames start? It feels kinda out of place, even jarring, but I'm not a rocket surgeon, so this may be something that's grounded in reality?

[mmmPI]

Waow, this interest me a lot, the question of loading screen had went thru my mind at some point before playing the space age, i was expecting a stylized version more than the seemless transition which i wondered a lot why it wasn't published in the FFF as a teaser because it looks great and shiny in my mind , the flashy things you want to show off in the press to catch a few seconds in the ever-reducing attention-span we got when bombarded by messages. It's only now i realized it was like a surprised to avoid spoilers or something, and hum also, maybe it couldn't be shown because it wasn't done yet at the time x).

I can recognize the face of the mech armor in the concept pod, i think it's funny.

I think you went into a lot of effort to explain things with pictures and images but it still look daunting to try and use. ( the modding part , i can use the pods just fine ). I found the image with the time line and the different layers the one that stick the most in mind to understand and "locate" the other things mentionned. It helps for a first approach knowing what exist and what to search for in documentation. I would close my eyes and try to picture this to understand, but i guess it could help to keep them open in this situation.

Happy to read yet another FFF

[malecord]

When I first sent the engineer to space that animation was pure magic. And the planetfall as well, it is an emotion for every new planet.

I really love this expansion. It makes me wish there were more and more worlds to explore and exploit.

[Justderpingalong]

I saw this sequence in the trailer, and assumed it was "doctored" for the trailer. So I was extremely pleased to see it in the actual game, it's an amazing sequence. Really well done!

Not gonna lie I am not sure why I didn't expect the transition to be in game. But I didn't. And then, when you launch to space for the first time. It catches you COMPLETELY off guard. And it was completely amazing.

One thing I am a bit sad about is the inability to launch shit from platform to platform. It'd be real nice to have a 'repair dock' in space that stores supplies my ships need in order to travel, and then have said ships import their supplies from this repair dock.

[BlueTemplar]

It might be for balancing reasons.

[liron_aramas]

Guys, are you planning to update the sprites of the assembly machines and electric furnaces? All the buildings look great except for these two. In Friday facts you promised to update the graphics.