Friday Facts #21 - Happy St. Valentines day

[slpwnd]

It took more than two minutes, but at last: http://www.factorio.com/blog/post/fff-21

[FrozenOne]

Coming in two minutes.

Or slightly more

[Gammro]

Who needs women when you have factorio 0.9!

[ssilk]

Gammro: Takes seriously I would say you have no plan!

[3LollipopZ]

My factories are more efficient at putting out than my wife.

Thank God she isn't on the forums.... Happy V-Day sweetie!

[henrydxb]

I do reckon we need some navel game play. the ability to build on water would be awesome as well as boats.

[Malkasphia]

Well, here are my thoughts on the experimental release! ---====Absolutely brilliant Factorio Staff! ===----

This video shows my thoughts and experience on a 4 hour factory rebuilding from the 0.9.0 recipes, new oil stuff : http://youtu.be/jlYN7C7iBmQ

[tbarros]

Well, here are my thoughts on the experimental release! ---====Absolutely brilliant Factorio Staff! ===----

This video shows my thoughts and experience on a 4 hour factory rebuilding from the 0.9.0 recipes, new oil stuff : http://youtu.be/jlYN7C7iBmQ

Oh your the guy that made me buy factorio i recall going around youtube after coming across so many german tutorials and finally i saw your channel.
insta subscribed and bought 2nd tier factorio.

Devs, we need more expore like this!

[ssilk]

I created a page for the new stuff (anything is better, than nothing):

https://forums.factorio.com/wiki/inde ... Version0.9

Be free to add new stuff there, or give me a hint; keep in mind, that some things might change with the upcoming bugfixes, so please don't put too much afford into new content.

[Sedado77]

Well, here are my thoughts on the experimental release! ---====Absolutely brilliant Factorio Staff! ===----

This video shows my thoughts and experience on a 4 hour factory rebuilding from the 0.9.0 recipes, new oil stuff : http://youtu.be/jlYN7C7iBmQ

=D Malph, love your series and this "mini tutorial" was cool.
Keep it up and finish your old run so you can do one in 0.9!!!!!!

[Sven]

slpwnd,

I read your numbers about your sales [update: it was in the "Release Buzz" blog post, not the Valentines day one-sorry], and was surprised at the low conversion rate. I've been watching YouTube videos, and getting ready to make a purchase. I had a few thoughts you might find useful. But first, a bit about me. I'm 56, a software engineer (an old school game programmer from the 80s), and a fairly bright guy.

Your demo, at least the third game, is too hard. Is 13% the actual number of demo downloaders who go on to guy the full game? I wouldn't be surprised. I really didn't want to buy the game any more! I probably still will, but I was really frustrated and overwhelmed by the third game.

The problem was I couldn't keep up. The help was telling me to make a submachine gun and I had no idea how to find out how to make it, and what resources I needed to do so. And once I figured it out, there was *no* clue I could find how to make the ammo for it. I looked and looked, and nada. The hints were also telling me to do really advanced stuff I couldn't possibly come close to doing, and it *felt* like the demo was not working right or something (though I'm sure it was). In the end, even though I knew how to use raw fish, I kept getting killed by swarms of biters. I think also it would help if I could go back and see the hints, since I accidentally TABbed past them a few times.

The first two games could have benefitted from overarching goals. I just built the required machines and set them up on the various resources. I didn't really know what I was doing or why. If I had an end point, like building a special machine from the resources I was mining, that might have helped me understand how all the pieces fit together. Even watching the YouTube videos, I'm still confused by what all the displays mean. And toning down the biters for the demo would be a great help, I think!

That's just my experience, of course, but since your marketing approach is to encourage potential buyers to play the demo, I wonder if others are getting confused and overwhelmed too, and giving up on what looks like an amazing game.

Thanks for listening.

[FrozenOne]

Sven, the cluelessness of your post makes me feel like i am taking Algebra 2 classes again.

[ssilk]

I mean like so: there should be the tutorial, which explains in very fast, very easy steps (prebuilted stuff) how everything fits together. All in all I come currently to over 20 lessons!
And then the campaign, which introduces the biters and has those small, but convincing puzzles/riddles. I would like to have this all on one big map.

[aussiegaylord]

you could have it as a challenge map. first you must set up the collection of resources and while you are doing so it explains why. then you go onto the more challenging stuff like needing to get through a biter base to reach the next set of resources and so on and so forth. basically making you conserve your resources for the more challenging bits while giving you basics on how to set up functioning factories

[ssilk]

Yeah and I mean, that besides the challenge there should be maps, where you can train. For example with the biters: so many say, they are hard to kill, but not, when you know how. The problem for "normal" players is the time it takes to find it out, because you need to built everything yourself.

[slpwnd]

@Sven Thank you for a very detailed description of your experience with the demo. Yes the third level is kind of a standalone work from the player with hints here and there. Maybe it is too much and it definitely could be more user friendly. I think improving (or completely redoing) the demo is something we will work on in one of the future updates.