Friday Facts #367 - Expansion news

[FuryoftheStars]

It’s concept art. I’d be willing to bet good money the original concept art on the biters and their bases was a lot more grotesque than what we actually got in game.

To me, it also furthers the dynamic of the game: on the one hand, they’re grotesque aliens, ew, kill em (you wouldn’t have that desire if they were beautiful, like the Na’vi, would you?), but on the other you are the invader and it’s your polluting of their planet that agitates them (technically, you as the player are the bad guy if you choose to pollute and attack them for their land).

[pointa2b]

I don't know if it has been mentioned before, but why is that preview of this jellyfish like creature so comparatively grotesque?

Looks like it has mammaries, too. Maybe that's just me, though, but, it does.
Why?

Why must it be so fleshy and gnarly and entrail like looking? Is it because the nests of the basegame aliens pulsate?
Well they're not as weird as this new creature.

Disgust is one of he lowest hanging fruits of inciting emotion, virtually anyone can do it with little effort.
Gangly hooked flesh tentacle boob alien woooooo look how fleshy it is, steam coming out of its boobs oooooohhh, isn't it shocking? Aren't you shocked to see such a creature?

No I'm not. I'd be more shocked if you managed to design something more refined, but, perhaps you can't, not anymore. Maybe the spark is gone.
(reverse psychology)

But seriously, kind of a nasty creature, I'm human, humans are beings that appreciate beauty. Sure, you can probably kill that thing, but, just because I can remove something doesn't mean I want it in the first place.
You can pick bunny droppings out of your cereal with a toothpick, but...do you want them in there in the first place?
Maybe... if you want THAT freakshow accosting the eyes of your players...

The game is centered around invading an alien world inhabited by bug/Zerg-like (from StarCraft) entities, IMO the more grotesque/scary looking the new enemies are, the better. We aren't fighting teletubbies or teddy bears. And even if we were, or some less scary/generic looking creature that you're implying, that removes a lot of the excitement in defending your base and attacking them. I want to fight something with pulsating tumors, green glow in the dark goo dropping off of it, and the feeling like I'm going to catch some fatal disease if this thing touches me

[Koub]

Looks like it has mammaries, too. Maybe that's just me, though, but, it does.

That's purely subjective. I personally don't see boobies everywhere I look (despite the fact I do like them). Also I like the "alienness " of the natives, including this stunning concept art.

[blazespinnaker]

I think it's appropriate and thematic with the rest of the imagery in the game, however it'd be very cool if there was a campaign / scenario built in where through advanced science we learn to communicate with the native inhabitants, purposely reducing our polluting ways and even come to defend them - perhaps against an invading robot force looking to colonize nauvis (and other planets!) for their minerals.

The basic premise I think btw is to evoke starship troopers. Great novel, suprisingly even better movie (love the absurdly sarcastic take)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtTgHuGgW-c

[lovewyrm]

Was my thread moved into this one as a post? Regarding the alien design? Or did I mess up and posted it here? I couldn't check the forum for a while.

Anyway. I don't think the new design is alien at all. It's just a jellyfish with blobby meat hooks and steam puff boobs.


It's boobs.
It's a protruding set of lumps with airy olae, there's air coming out of them.
It's boobs.

And this ting is dripping some wet slick fluid.
And it's got mutated chicken feet meat hook gangly bits.

Anyway, you can of course dismiss this.
But Total War Warhammer 3, for example, has tanked in player activity and regard because most of the factions on release were (and are) grotesque chaos demons.

Do you really want to fight a steam puffing boob jellyfish? In your factorio game?
Do you, like, really actually want that? The enemies are symbolic, they're just some enemy. Jellyfish aren't alien, we have them on earth.
Boobs aren't alien, we have them on earth too.
Mutated hooked chicken feet aren't alien, we have them on earth, too.

If anything on earth in a combination can be an alien, then why doesn't it have to be a boob jellyfish brain thing with steamnipples?
Again, I'm not a prude or anything, I just don't think this kind of degenerate schizo design is needed for factorio. You guys can do better.

Is it a psychic alien? Then make it a snail or something, that way it can still be slow.
If it's got to be a floating jellyfish then make it less detailed and more stylistic. Give it an aura of some sort of ungraspable presence that dominates.

This creature doesn't dominate, it's basically blushing with it's brain, glancing to the floor and away while its alien steam milk is evaporating. Lol. For real now guys come on this is not just me having a case of a parad...para... the thing where you see things in clouds.

This is a bashful, feminine jellyfish wearing a subdermal tiara that expels boob vapors out of the prominent tips atop its bulbous body protuberances.

It's not an alien it's an ara aralien, it looks like it wants to iron your body pillow with its steam.
It's glancing sideways going: It is my duty to relieve your tension, engineer, but please touch them gently. PSHHHHHHH

And despite my now jovial banter, I actually am serious about proposing not to go this way. It drags the 'athmosphere', the soul down.
Don't make a mockery out of your game. It's factorio, let the nerds and 'autists' have SOMETHING that isn't clownshoes.

Edit: Check out this classic.
https://d30xqvs6b65d10.cloudfront.net/w ... lert-2.jpg

Just a guy with striking eyes, a beard, some mark on his forehead and some plastic accessory on his head.
But he is Yuri, brain dominator bar none.

"Ohh look he has a plastic mcguffin on his head, and the narrative is that he's psychic, I believe that"
vs
"bok bok bok booob, pshhhhhhhhh ara ara engineer-kun, my steamies are ready, jellies steamies for you araaaa araaaa"

[Koub]

[...]

First, this is a "concept art of new stuff". Not the actual graphics. Compare this image of concept art with the actuel final tank :

images

Second, a lot of the details will be gone when scaling down from a 3k x 3k image to a couple hundred x couple hundred pixels sprite.

Third, "alienness" is subjective. Things that are different from what we're used to seeing appear alien to us. Most microfauna looks way more alien that the aliens we see in movies (#tardigrad).

Fourth, that's an awful long tentative of convincing us we shouldn't like this design. One can't convince another that something is ugly or beautiful. We have a saying in French which can be translated into "Taste and colours can't be discussed". I personnally like the less "insecty" and more "slimy" "squishy" "bloby" feel with brains and tentacles. There's no way you'll convince me I'm wrong, the same way I won't ever try to convince you you're wrong.

[Tertius]

I see in this art a self moving floating brain. May be the brain of a new breed of biters, spitters and worms that might act a bit more intelligent and not so zerg-like. Or it's simply the boss of the zerg. I'll call it "The Boss" from now on.

Its main body is a brain, the small tentacles have small eyes to let it see, it has some kind of air drive, and it has claws for attacking and the longest tentacles are for grabbing or spitting venom. However, the drops look like ordinary water, may be its air drive is actually driven with steam.

It's an air creature, not a water creature.

It's eye tentacles and general appearance remind me a bit of the D&D beholder: https://forgottenrealms.fandom.com/wiki/Beholder

[aka13]

I chuckled heartily about the ara-ara one, let's hope rule 34 is inapplicable to factorio

[FuryoftheStars]

Somebody still doesn’t understand what “concept” art is. And the idea that “it’s not alien” because each part kind of sort of remotely resembles something we already have on earth is laughable.

That said, yeah, I completely want to fight that or something like it in my game.

Thanks, devs!

[webkilla]

Is there any update on the status of the expansion?

[Qon]

Is there any update on the status of the expansion?

Yes. You are commenting on it right now.

[ptx0]

Twitch has about 30,000 active Factorio streams at any given moment, and those have 800 viewers each, on average

that means wube makes 3.2 million dollars PER DAY from Factorio

the world's population has a mere 8 billion souls, it costs 3 bucks per day to feed one.

Kovarex could feed everyone for 312 years and no one would even miss a car payment

and yet the expansion is still not done

(in case it's not obvious, i'm being silly)

[lovewyrm]

[...]

First, this is a "concept art of new stuff". Not the actual graphics. Compare this image of concept art with the actuel final tank :

images

Second, a lot of the details will be gone when scaling down from a 3k x 3k image to a couple hundred x couple hundred pixels sprite.

Third, "alienness" is subjective. Things that are different from what we're used to seeing appear alien to us. Most microfauna looks way more alien that the aliens we see in movies (#tardigrad).

Fourth, that's an awful long tentative of convincing us we shouldn't like this design. One can't convince another that something is ugly or beautiful. We have a saying in French which can be translated into "Taste and colours can't be discussed". I personnally like the less "insecty" and more "slimy" "squishy" "bloby" feel with brains and tentacles. There's no way you'll convince me I'm wrong, the same way I won't ever try to convince you you're wrong.

Okay.
But if I get any NSFW reports on my avatar, then I have to get off the hook for them.

[aka13]

11/10

[cpy]

MUTALISKS INCOMING! Zerg rush kekeke.

There is aweful lot of silence about new dlc. Anyway I've still got hoard of mods to try so no rush.

[jarda34101]

Hi brosis! I look quite every day for NEW FF. But... We need something like a progress bar to hypnotize it.

[pointa2b]

This is cruel and unusual punishment on the lack of FFF's

[Splitframe]

Since Wube people are working on Space Exploration I wonder if it's a precursor to the new addon and they will be one once it releases.

[aka13]

Since Wube people are working on Space Exploration I wonder if it's a precursor to the new addon and they will be one once it releases.

It's the other way aroung, Space Exploration people are working for Wube now
But yeah, had the same thought myself.

[johnatucci]

Since Wube people are working on Space Exploration I wonder if it's a precursor to the new addon and they will be one once it releases.

It's the other way aroung, Space Exploration people are working for Wube now
But yeah, had the same thought myself.

I really hope a good amount of what Space Exploration is incorporated into the official expansion, but I also really hope its only a small part of an even larger library of new content. I can't wait