Factorio Forums

After uncounted playthroughs with a variety of difficulties I came to the fact that factorio could transport a subliminal (eco) message beside the glamorous story that's officially been told (short résumé on the official story: guy crashes on foreign planet, has tons of knowlegde in engineering, tries everything to get back home)

First main question: "Is factorio mirroring the real life society with some of it's main problems?"

There are several hints in factorio that would let me answear this question with yes. I don't want to anticipate too much so I just want to describe my experience and my thoughts about the ingame pollution. The first occurance of pollution starts with the first mining drill. From that moment it increases almost steadily till the very first bases (homes?) of aliens (native inhabitants?) are reached. Due to the fact that they don't like polluted air and the player is afraid that they will come for a visit where they ask for more than just a cup of sugar, they are preventively or urgently pleased by the player to leave their homes. If the arguments aren't strong enough, the player looks for stronger one's to finally convince them. What a wonderful world .
One more thing facing the pollution that trees (= the enviroment) are getting irreversibly damaged over the time. Dead trees cannot filter the air as good a alive one's increasing the contact/wipeout with/of the biter's even more.

There are several more idea's I could come up with.
- exhausting the ressources of a planet for reaching the goal of leaving a (now) f****d up planet = selfish?
- having finally reached the selfset goal = boring?
- the false thought of infinite sweet water all around?
- ...

Would it in some way of thinking be more beneficial for all ingame-parties if the player buys and installs the game and just hangs out and has a good time? I mean .... you can go fishing.... walk around in the forrest ... relax while you don't work ("building a factory")

And the second main question, is it intended or not?! [exaggerating] Are the dev's even eco-activits that just started coding to rc-educate the people without their knowing?[/exaggerating]

Have fun discussing!

I think your thinking way too much into this xD
anyway AFAIK the subliminal message of Factorio is "Fuck nature! I'm building something awesome!"
but TBH I do see where you're going with this, however I do not agree, just because I shot billions of trees and polluted and destroyed this planet I inhabited in, such as IRL now, doesn't mean I like it, and I doubt that people in society likes it either, the problem is, we are yet to develop technology and mass produce such technology for society to go into a clean energy efficient society, we are currently in the process, hybrid cars are starting to become a thing, while electric pure cars are still a bit away, we are working our way there, same goes for Factorio have you noticed that you start with steam engines rather then solar panels, even though you came from a spaceship that more then likely had solar panels? its giving us the feel of progression that what our society is currently experiencing, we are in the transition for clean energy, not to mention a few research are starting to pop up about clean nuclear energy, where waste can decay rather then thousands of years to a decade, and that's great, nuclear energy has been a great clean way to generate massive amounts of power, it only needs more research, money, and stricter protocols for it to be viable, so yeah.

TL;DR we are in the transition to clean energy, we just need time to do so due to time and study restrictions.

your kinda right about it displaying 1 or 2 of our current problems in society, but however I do doubt we don't care at all, hell if Factorio allowed me to put trees around my factory I would, If I an just move trees, instead of destroying them with a boom stick, I would, but the game won't let me, so I'm stuck with this pollution all over my base.

as for your second question...
Here's a secret I found while undercover strolling around near and inside their offices, they are part of the lizard squad, they are plotting to destroy humanity as we know it, via making everyone addicted to Factorio, therefor reducing human productivity (no productivity module would fix this crap), stay away from this game, run now while you have a chance, posting this may have revealed my intentions but its worth it, alert everyone, I gotta hide before they GeeetlkaladadstaALLASDlka"PFa.dLHKAWALDflKJ....

I like thinking of factorio in more of a Nick Land http://www.xenosystems.net/right-on-the-money-2/ direction . Focus on capital development for the sake of developing more capital faster, increasing automation, increasing the intelligence of the automated system, if only it's intelligence could be boosted until it's explosive growth takes it on escape trajectory independent of the human that catalyzed it into existence (which would make the best win condition since the Omar end in Dues Ex Invisible War). Though contra to Land you have a hero on who's actions hinge the fate of catallaxy, which alines closer to my beliefs anyway. I love this game so I'm going to project my ideas all over it.

"First main question: "Is factorio mirroring the real life society with some of its main problems?"

And the second main question, is it intended or not?! Are the dev's even eco-activists that just started coding to rc-educate the people without their knowing?

It's called observational and confirmational bias what you got there. Yes, one of the first thoughts that came to me when I started to play was - yeah, replace the aliens with indigenous tribes and you got the capitalism history of USA all over again; to a degree. However, you are focusing too strong on your thoughts, and in this case, it leads nowhere. Save your focus and energy.

The issue what you pointed out is a meta problem, and a valid claim about a subliminal message, but was it made with purpose? I don't think so. It is just a simulation of a story's background.

My P.O.V. - I focus on what good can I get from this game, the mechanics. This game thought me to get my thoughts in order when I want to execute a plan from start to finish in a priority order. To some it may seem obvious, but with my background this was an ''AHA!" moment in mid game. From spaghetti structure to clean order and effectiveness.

P.S. English language is not my main language. Sorry if I expressed my thoughts somewhat unclear.