Factorio
Factorio is a game in which you build and maintain factories. You will be mining resources, researching technologies, building infrastructure, automating production and fighting enemies. In the beginning you will find yourself chopping trees, mining ores and crafting mechanical arms and transport belts by hand, but in short time you can become an industrial powerhouse, with huge solar fields, oil refining and cracking, manufacture and deployment of construction and logistic robots, all for your resource needs. However this heavy exploitation of the planet's resources does not sit nicely with the locals, so you will have to be prepared to defend yourself and your machine empire. Join forces with other players in cooperative Multiplayer, create huge factories, collaborate and delegate tasks between you and your friends. Add mods to increase your enjoyment, from small tweak and helper mods to complete game overhauls, Factorio's ground-up Modding support has allowed content creators from around the world to design interesting and innovative features. While the core gameplay is in the form of the freeplay scenario, there are a range of interesting challenges in the form of Scenarios. If you don't find any maps or scenarios you enjoy, you can create your own with the in-game Map Editor, place down entities, enemies, and terrain in any way you like, and even add your own custom script to make for interesting gameplay.
Game Discussion
Steam User 601
I started Factorio as a mere man. A fool. A weak, pathetic human who thought "I'll just play for an hour." That was 4 days ago. My body is in ruins, my mind sharper than ever. I have eliminated all inefficient thoughts. My blood pressure fluctuates in perfect sync with my main bus throughput. The factory must grow.
"it’s just a game."
WRONG.
It is a way of life. Do you think a beaver calls dam-building a game? Do you think an ant optimizes for fun? No. It is war, it is survival. And every second wasted is a lost potential space science pack.
The police came after neighbors reported "mechanical whirring" from my apartment. I explained that my copper smelting arrays required better output. They called me "unstable." Fools. They are blind to the inefficiency all around them.
I tried to return to work. My boss asked for an urgent report. I set up an automated Excel system to generate real-time charts. He said he just needed a PDF. I informed him that the conversion was in a later stage of the production chain. My coworkers tried to make small talk at lunch. They asked about my family. I replied that family unit production was currently outside my scope. I have lost all capacity for normal human interaction.
I no longer dream of love, friends, or companionship. I dream of belts. I dream of robots. I dream of perfect, fluid efficiency.
If an Amazon logistics manager saw my factory, he would fall to his knees and weep — tears of admiration, terror, and unworthiness. His entire career, his vast warehouses, his so-called "efficiency" would seem like the crude fumblings of a caveman smashing rocks together.
Now I am an optimization algorithm wrapped in human skin. A transhumanist entity, devoid of inefficiency. My heartbeat syncs with production ticks, my thoughts run in parallel processing. Emotions? Redundant. Rest? A bottleneck. The only metric that matters is output.
The factory must grow.
Steam User 956
This game is dangerous. The expansion is coming out a week after I'm going back to Uni and I'm seriously debating which of the two things I should pour time into. 10/10, would get addicted to again.
Steam User 251
this game feels like having a full-time software engineering job. but the job contributes nothing to society and doesn't pay anything. and you are constantly doing hits of crack cocaine.
I highly recommend this game if you have at least a few mental disorders
Steam User 1208
I'm genuinely scared to play this game because while i am bad i have had actual relationships end over this game. I'm sorry Catherine but the factory must grow
Steam User 214
I figured it's about time that I reviewed this game.
Whether or not this game is for you, Factorio is undeniably one of the best polished games that has ever been made. Bugs, when found, are rarely more than minor quirks, and are promptly fixed when reported. I've seen cases where a bug has been reported on reddit (not even the right place to do so), and a patch was released within a few hours.
In terms of gameplay, Factorio scratches a certain itch that very few games provide. While it can seem intimidating at first, It actually does a very good job of leading the player step-by-step through what is needed. It does not, however, hold your hand. You are expected to figure some things out, and If you're the type of gamer who expects everything to unfold in a linear "this is the right thing to do" manner, you'll be disappointed.
I'd expect that my play time alone should indicate my thoughts on the game. In short, If you enjoy puzzle-solving, and find yourself getting "nerd-sniped" when confronted with an interesting conundrum, then you should pick this up and give it a go. Just, don't do so when you have a looming deadline. Factorio has a habit of causing unintentional time-travel, when you sit down to play it for a couple of hours after the evening meal, only to find that it's suddenly 4am.
Steam User 228
Pros: Addictive, well balanced gameplay loop that makes you lose hours playing
Cons: Addictive, well balanced gameplay loop that makes you lose hours playing
Steam User 239
crashland on a planet
start exploiting the natural resources
pollute the area
kill and extinct the wildlife
build a trainstation on their corpses
expand to pollute and kill on a global scale
do all this while having fun