factorio launcher / different game instances

[Qcor]

This hase been rewritten here: https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... =6&t=13133
-- ßilk


My forum search on this topic came out empty so here is a question/idea:

Is there a way to handle different instances of factorio in a civilized manner?

Lets say I want 1) my single player world 2) my testing-only creative-like world 3) mod-pack1 solo world and 4) mod-pack2 MP world to play with friends.
A reasonable wish I guess.. right?

The problem is that afaik the only way to switch between them is to replace mods folder each time I want to switch worlds.. am I right or maybe I'm missing something obvious here?
Ofc it's not hard to do but well.. lets call it 'less than ideal'

[prg]

You can set the path to use for save games/mods/etc. (write-data) in different config files (just copy the existing config.ini) and pass those to the executable with the -c command line option.

[Qcor]

Well that's a bit easier but still hardly a user-friendly solution.

I was thinking of something like in other games.. you know.. more GUI, less command line

[prg]

Put an application shortcut icon thing somewhere that you can click on which then runs factorio -c whatever.ini.

[daniel34]

You can download the zip-version and extract them to different directories.

All of the changes you make (saves/mods/config) will only be stored in the respective directory.
For easy access you can make shortcuts on the desktop/startmenu for every different zip-installation.

Once you've done that, you can work with each installation independent of the other installations.
You can add mods to only one of them or only update some of them.

Related - Multiple Factorio Installs: https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... 49&t=12819

[Qcor]

Yeeeess... TOTALLY a professional, user-friendly and easy solution... <facepalm>

Let me clarify something here, because you are clearly missing the point here.
I didn't ask HOW to do this.. I know how. My point is - THIS IS NOT HOW IT SHOULD BE DONE.

And since it is "Ideas and Suggestions" I suggest doing it in the different way. Not necessarily a launcher but sth of similar functionality.

Btw this is the exactly same situation as with Minecraft in its early days. Do you see any1 copy-pasting or using 10 shortcuts or any similar solution there? No.. because they have LAUNCHERS for that

From the development perspective it is rly easy to do. Ofc it's still beta so this is a low priority but definitely would be nice to have in release ver.

[daniel34]

I totally overlooked that you posted this in Ideas and Suggestions because to me this didn't look like an idea but rather a gameplay/technical question or general discussion.
The problem of your post was that there is no actual Idea in there, you phrased it like "does anybody have an idea?"
You were talking about "replacing mods folder", so I thought you didn't know about the zip versions or how to use them.

In my opinion the way of handling different instances is a personal preference. I'm very happy with Factorio's zip versions and for me this is a feature I'm missing in a lot of other games/applications. It keeps my instances separate and independent, portable, and I can use different versions of the base game.

Anyway, this is an Ideas and Suggestions thread, so here have some actual ideas:

Idea 1 (small change)
The mods dialog box in the game is extended so that you are able to make your own presets of mods, instead of having to change the mod-selection by hand if you want to change your instance.
You can click on new, enter a name and choose your mods, so that you can create different presets for vanilla, modded SP, modded MP, ...
You can easily change between by presets just by selecting a different one.
Also maybe adding the options or part of them (other options) to the preset, so that you can define different multiplayer usernames or have different autosave intervals.

Idea 2 (large change)
A profile manager/launcher for Factorio. Before launching the game a dialog appears and asks which profile you want to use.
You can give a name to each profile, which Factorio will use to make a directory that replaces what currently is in the config/mods/saves folders , so each profile has its own settings, mods and saves.
Only the base game (game version) is the same, all other settings can be individually defined.
Similar to the way the Firefox browser handles this (firefox.exe -p)

[ssilk]

Well, this isn't an easy to understand suggestion, because it is not clear, what is suggested. I must barely say: I don't understand it.

<facepalm>

I didn't ask HOW to do this.. I know how. My point is - THIS IS NOT HOW IT SHOULD BE DONE.

So, how should it be then? This is missing.

I recommend to write it again - clearly understandable in the first post - and closing this (when ready).

[prg]

Yeah, I must be missing something here. What would this GUI thing do that a bunch of icons on the desktop couldn't?

Current workflow:

• click one of the icons -> Factorio runs

Workflow then:

• click icon -> GUI runs
• click one of the buttons -> Factorio runs

Does not save work.

You'd still need to manually download mods and put them in the right place, unless you also want to write a full-blown mod browser/downloader/updater which has already been suggested elsewhere. Since you're already copying the mods around yourself anyway you can as well copy the config.ini while you're at it, no need for a GUI to do this for you then. Supporting multiple player profiles that can have different mods enabled directly in the game would make more sense, but i can't see how such a separate GUI would save any work.

[Qcor]

fair enough ssilk.
rewriten here: https://forums.factorio.com/forum/vie ... =6&t=13133

ready to close/dekete this one.