Friday Facts #373 - Factorio: Space Age

[steinio]

Void items in space now.

[thuejk]

[...] Hard to see even for non colorblind people

I am not sure I agree. Can you point to a pair of flasks you think are hard to distinguish, for non-colorblind people?

[bluewilson]

Earendel, how about the new features in v2.0, are there mechanics there that you are looking forward to make use of in Space Exploration? Hope to see a bubbly H2SO4 lake, eventually, perhaps more entities with wire connections.

[jodokus31]

Finally some news on the expansion. Part of me is a bit disappointed, that it's "only" an extension to space. I had wished something like digging tunnels to an underworld, exploring the deep sea of nauvis or more regarding topography of the landscape like mountains, sea, different biomes, etc.

But of course, there is a lot more to exploring new kinds of planets with different type of challenges. I can only say, that the mod Space Exploration didn't catch my attention too much yet, because I'm very attached to Sea Block, which alone is able to fill my quota of time for factorio gaming. But I'm also glad, that I didn't spent too much time with Space Exploration yet, because the expansion will feel more fresh than to veterans of SE.

I think, a full engine support for launching rockets, building space stations and landing on different planets with different type of challenge can get really interesting, too. Esp. if the engine suddenly supports things, which are new and unexpected and with the typical vanilla quality.
I hope esp. that the planets are different enough, while the core gameplay stays interesting and factorio like. And I wonder, how convenient it will be to keep overview over the different planets, etc.

And, finally, I'm very excited for the reestablished FFF news. Nice

[Shuisman]

I had wished something ……… more regarding topography of the landscape like mountains, sea, different biomes, etc.

Each of the 4 planets could have different biomes right? From the images it seems likely this will be added… (to also make them easily distinguishable)

[Pales]

Really pleased in the direction this expansion is going. I just hope some improvements are made to exploration in the starter world.

[CaveGrinder]

so much modding potential in one gif, loving it already.
with those claw collectors we can make a "SpaceBlock" setting where all resources come in as asteroids. or a fish-pond.
i wonder how they handle resource filters, as they are seen collecting the same asteroid types yet the left chain extracts iron and the right ice.
the two engines burn with different colors, wondering what that is about. maybe the ratio of the two fuels matters? or just graphical variants?
it seems to me there are 3 liquids involved; red-stuff on the left chem plant, water(from ice) in the middle and blue-stuff on the right plant, with a loop between the engines.
and yeeting waste into space begs the question how they are they are deleted engine wise, maybe after the fade-out?
will a fish ejected into water despawn or swim happily ever after?
very curious where this is going.

[jodokus31]

I had wished something ……… more regarding topography of the landscape like mountains, sea, different biomes, etc.

Each of the 4 planets could have different biomes right? From the images it seems likely this will be added… (to also make them easily distinguishable)

Yeah, different biomes most likely. I just wonder, how interesting they get. Similar to Alien Biomes? Or is there more to it.

[PaszaVonPomiot]

This looks epic and it's exactly what I would like to see in the expansion.

[Earendel]

There are so many things that Space Exploration just can't do because it's a mod.

Hello Earendel,
big fan of your mod. Will we see some of the addon technology like the animated engines bleed over into your mod?

Greetings

Earendel, how about the new features in v2.0, are there mechanics there that you are looking forward to make use of in Space Exploration? Hope to see a bubbly H2SO4 lake, eventually, perhaps more entities with wire connections.

Anything that is part of the 2.0 engine and not tied to expansion content will be used by SE.

SA won't be a hard dependency, i.e. you won't NEED it to play SE.

SA will probably be an optional dependency, so extra features be used if they are unlocked. This will mean that SE will be a bit different based on if you have SA or not. I don't really like having 2 versions like this, at least not while I'm still changing so much in the mod, but it seems unavoidable unless the SE playerbase overwhelmingly already has the expansion, but I don't know what the acceptable % would be for it to be ok to make it required.

Either way, things are changing on both sides and I have a long time before I need to start making these decisions.

[yblondinca]

From the post, it looks like things are progressing nicely towards Step 6 - Beta testing. I do hope that an 'early access' version is made relatively soon with the caveat that it would need to be purchased (similar to how Factorio was released). I would be willing to pay full expansion price to be part of your early access beta testers. I imagine with FFFs coming every week now, I will need to remain patient and look forward to news on that in a future FFF.

I'm excited to try Space Age (I haven't played the Space Exploration or Extension mods).

Great work as always, Factorio continues to be my favorite game of all time!

[serhatozgel]

Excellent news!

As my 2 cents, I do hope that Space Age addresses the biggest 2 things I do not like in Vanilla (do not get me wrong, Factorio is by far the best game I’ve played):

1. There’s no point in building a megabase other than achieving bigger numbers. I wish there was a small bit of content to unlock that’s only realistically achievable by building a megabase. Like a MK2 of something or similar. Something to make me say “I did it” other than seeing 1000 on a graph.
2. Once X per minute of each science pack is achieved, there’s no point in building more of a single colour science pack. Let’s say I built a 100rpm factory and now want to slowly build up to 1000. The way things are, I need to build a 1000 per minute red science pack factory but it will do nothing until I also build all other pack factories. I wish it was immediately meaningful to build some more red science, then some more green science, then some more blue and so on. Slowly growing a factory would become a much more fun and meaningful activity.

[Shuisman]

Excellent news!

……Something to make me say “I did it” other than seeing 1000 on a graph……

That would be a great new achievement, some sciencepacks/minute. Would make speedrunners rethink their strategy as well. New challenges.

[FunMaker]

I'm looking forward to fridays i missed FF so much!

[Chindraba]

I can hardly wait, and 52 +/- weeks is going to be killer. The FFF return will hold back the sanity. (Sanity isn't all it's reputed to be.)

I'm a bit worried about some of the balance adjustments, but I'm willing to hold judgement until I've tried them. The one part that did catch me attention was the "technical" possibility of playing Vanilla to rocket launch and then switching over to SA. Seems like the balance is trashed, heavily, allowing that. At the end of Vanilla I'll have level 3 modules, arty, and cliff explosives in quantity, even if the recipe changes and nullifies the existing factories. I love having options, yet I'm not sure "that" option belongs in the deck.

The better control over trains, even in Vanilla, is going to be something I ought to enjoy. I love my trains. All the enhancements to the engine in Vanilla 2.0 are gonna be fun to explore on their own.

As a lower-end computer owner I'm a bit worried what those space ore grappling arms will do to UPS. Looks expensive to me.

[sarge945]

I have a few questions about this expansion.

Just for context, I am a somewhat experienced player, but not an expert. I have finished the game ~2 times and hardly know much about megafactories etc. I have never played the Space Exploration mod.

So, question time:

1. With the new expansion, is the game still going to have a "win" state, or is the plan that it will now be an infinite sandbox. I know a lot of the attitudes in the community are currently about building a megafactory, rather than completing the objective. Space Exploration has the end goal of escaping the solar system, is that still true here?

2. Will the Space Exploration mod be remade when this new expansion comes out? Rather than adding new space content as it does now, would it make more sense for it to be essentially a "hardcore" mod for Space Age that essentially adds back the challenges and difficulty from the current Space Exploration version while leveraging the Space Age content, or is it going to stay it's own thing?

3. Will there be any randomness in the generated solar system, or is it always going to be the same planets every time with the same challenges?

[NicolaeHC]

How will the interaction in multiplayer behave?

Will all players require the DLC to be able to play in a multiplayer world?

OR will it be so that lan worlds are related to the DLC owned by the host while others joining(within a limit) can join even if they don't have it.
While dedicated servers require all players to have the DLC?

[Chindraba]

[...] Hard to see even for non colorblind people

I am not sure I agree. Can you point to a pair of flasks you think are hard to distinguish, for non-colorblind people?

As a someone without colorblindness, just ancient eyes, looking at the tech-tree sample I can barely tell the logistic science green from the new green and the utility science yellow from the new orange?, and even in the larger icon for the red it looks like automation science to me.

If the belts are in isolation from each other, I don't think I could tell if the green was old or new at all, while I might notice the difference between yellow and orange. The two reds are so close that I might tell them apart if they were side-by-side on a belt, maybe. A different shape to the flask wouldn't help much either. On a full belt at zoom-level 1, or further out, the shape's probably lost anyway, especially in map view at the first detail zoom level where even other similar things are the "same" based on shape and color. Concrete, bricks, and refined concrete as a "concrete" example. Of course, I happen to love the science beakers for science packs, just seems natural. I am not, however, any good with colors, so I have no suggestions for changes, merely the request for change.

[Chindraba]

How will the interaction in multiplayer behave?

Will all players require the DLC to be able to play in a multiplayer world?

OR will it be so that lan worlds are related to the DLC owned by the host while others joining(within a limit) can join even if they don't have it.
While dedicated servers require all players to have the DLC?

Just my speculations, yes, all players joining a server running SA will have to have SA. Logic: I expect it to behave as any other mod. Joining a server with "Honk" mod installed will require me to install, and enable "Honk" in my game. The only difference between the current mods and SA, is that to get the SA mod to work you also have to get the expansion.

My speculations only.

[mikehendi]

The weekly FFF was my favorite read of the week, I'm glad it's gonna be back! Can't wait to slowly discover all that you've been working on all this time! A year seems like a long time, but secretly I'm glad, because that means I'll be able to finish all my current and planned projects before the release of Space Age
Factorio is the game that keeps on giving, the dedication of the dev team is incredible (both to the expansion and the continued updates and fixes to the base game), thanks for all your hard work over the years!