Finding myself not playing because of dreary atmosphere

[PhasmaNL]

Preface: I've been playing Factorio since the original Steam release. Done a couple playthroughs, logged 193 hours total so far. Love the game.

So, on to my minor (in the grand scheme of things) complaint:

I was planning on another playthrough when the game leaves Early Access. But lately, when starting the game a few times over the last couple weeks (devblogs), to preview the spiffy new graphics and other improvements, I find myself quitting the game fairly soon. The reason, I think, is the dreary/depressing atmosphere the game has. Yes, you're stuck all alone, on a planet full of aliens. So I guess up to a point you can say: well done for conveying that feeling.

But maybe the game is conveying that a bit too well? I don't think the idea is to discourage you from playing...

Anyways, just curious if I was the only one noticing this.

[mrudat]

Do you still get that feeling when you're surrounded by your factory?

I certainly feel more comfortable when I either see a screen full of factory, or a nice thick wall between me and the rest of the planet.

[FuryoftheStars]

I use the Alien Biomes mod and I feel like in many ways this helps. Just my opinion, though.

[PhasmaNL]

Do you still get that feeling when you're surrounded by your factory?

I certainly feel more comfortable when I either see a screen full of factory, or a nice thick wall between me and the rest of the planet.

Doesn't really make a difference for me. What probably does make a difference is just ignoring it and getting back into the game, and once you're really busy designing and building a new factory you kind of forget about it.

I use the Alien Biomes mod and I feel like in many ways this helps. Just my opinion, though.

Thanks, that looks pretty nice! Gonna try that out.

[dood]

Yeah the game is pretty low on contrast in general.

[Xeorm]

It is pretty dreary but I find as soon as I get my factory up and running it feels really good. Like, it's amazingly good to have a factory with a healthy wall and some sort of pavement on the ground. I love the difference in remaking the dreary world into something different.

But yea. The first bit when I'm still building the basics feels off.

[mrudat]

How about the various shiny graphics mods, or mods with shiny graphics?

Dectorio is pretty much purely shiny stuff, as is Nice Fill.

Beautiful Bridge Railway, as the name implies looks shiny too.

Inbuilt Lighting is quite literally shiny (it gives every power pole a lamp, optionally one that uses power and requires research to enable).

Angel's Bob's and Pyanodan's mods all have pretty spiffy graphics.

YoukiTani does a lot of shiny graphics, both for their own mods and for others as well.

[Eketek]

I also noticed this, though I tend to be a bit more bothered by graphical inconsistency between things from the base game and things added by mods. I think that it would be nice to have a mod which completely replaces the base game graphics with something simple/minimalist which emphasizes colors and patterns over realism (possibly also designed with the intent that people who don't use a complete 3D art toolchain [or even non-artists] can more easily collaborate and extend it).

[Qon]

I also noticed this, though I tend to be a bit more bothered by graphical inconsistency between things from the base game and things added by mods. I think that it would be nice to have a mod which completely replaces the base game graphics with something simple/minimalist which emphasizes colors and patterns over realism (possibly also designed with the intent that people who don't use a complete 3D art toolchain [or even non-artists] can more easily collaborate and extend it).

An art style that is easy to make new art for with little experience in art while simultaneously be pleasant to look at would require an artist of the calibre of the ones in Wube to develop though. So while I think it is possible, we need an awesome artist to create this style before we can begin to contribute art in this style to the project. It's kind of a chicken and egg problem. Most of us are bad artists. If we had a simpler and more abstract style then we could contribute in this style and keep it looking consistent and good looking. But we can't start because we are not equipped to decide how this style should be built up.

I've seen a mod that does attempt something like this with a pixelated art style for the base game. But I didn't really like the look of it.