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 582
I'll leave this positive review here in tribute to Katherine of Sky.
8 years ago, I downloaded a pirated copy of Factorio in a computer cafe, and installed and played this game (v0.16) with my Intel Celeron laptop. I literally can't buy the game because I didn't have a bank account. I even sent an email to the developers if they'd agree if I can mail them cash or pay via Gcash (Now, steam accepts our local payment processor.)
Back then, I was utterly lost on what to do right after the old tutorial. I then went to YouTube to find guides and that's where I discovered Katherine's Channel. I downloaded all her videos (Entry Level to Megabase) using a dodgy site called YouTube CC Converter.
I watched all 93 videos, and I played alongside her walkthrough.
I learned about Malls, Balancers, Different Builds, the basic logic of automation, things I could possibly do, everything. Everything I knew about Factorio started from her. 120 hours later, I had a decent sized semi-spaghetti factory that's launching 1 rocket per minute.
Now, every time I play this game, her builds are always integrated into my Factories, no matter how many times I restart, and no matter what mods I use.
She made me love Factorio so much, that I stopped pirating games, and started to buy the games that I really love. With Factorio being the very first game I bought when I got my very first paycheck.
She may be gone from this world, but she will be forever remembered as we build our Factories.
Fly high Katherine of Sky.
Steam User 277
I’m actually afraid to click "Play" anymore.
You tell yourself you'll just fix one conveyor belt, then you blink, and suddenly the sun is up, the birds are chirping, and you have to drive the kids to school in 20 minutes.
This game didn't just hook me, it consumed my soul. The factory must grow, but my sleep schedule is ruined. 10/10.
Steam User 363
I'm a retired IT guy who used to do a lot of gaming. Back then the gaming platforms with some of the best games were Nintendo 64 and Windows PCs. That's all changed for the most part and I've gone many years without playing FPS or racing games so now my hand-eye coordination is pitiful. So, with the help of my 33-year-old son, I've found that my favorite kind of game(s) are simulations, almost all of which are played with a mouse. I've played a huge number of hours in Factorio and loved every minute of it. Admittedly, I quickly found that playing in "peaceful" mode was a necessity. Factorio requires quite a bit of thought particularly early on and having to constantly battle the bugs was simply too stressful and kept me from enjoying it to its fullest. I have to give big kudos to the developers for realizing that not every potential gamer has to be constantly threatened with enemies to kill in order to enjoy a game. I now have more than a thousand hours invested in it and it's never failed to keep me entertained every time I start it up. That adds up to a whole lot of fun for very, very little cost. I can easily see myself playing for a few more thousand hours. There's always something new to learn and a new factory to be built bigger and better than the last one. I have to run now. I'm building a new train system to get my materials to a new area to start the next one. I love it!
Steam User 358
Don't buy this game... No really I mean it don't buy it. drugs might seriously be an easier addiction to break. Your life is enough. You enjoy showering and friends and touching grass... ... ... Th... The... The Factory Must Expand... ... ... The Factory Must Expand... The Factory Must Expand. The Factory Must Expand. The Factory Must Expand.
Steam User 286
This game is the definition of a game made by the developers for the developers. Every tiny little issue is fixed quickly and perfectly. I am absolutely blown away by the attention to detail and quality of the game. Also, it's the absolute pinnacle of the genre, best game that I have ever devoted 11,000+ hours to. :)
Steam User 382
They should load this game on chromebooks in school and fix the youth for a brighter future
Steam User 281
A Friendly Warning for Your Social Life.
If you are looking for a game to casually "dip your toes into" for twenty minutes before bed, Factorio is the worst financial and physiological decision you will ever make. It is, quite literally, a digital narcotic disguised as a logistics simulator.
Commonly referred to by its victims—I mean, players—as "Cracktorio," this is a game that is highly recommendable to people who don't want to spend much time on a game, simply because the game will make that choice for you. You don’t choose to spend 400 hours on a belt-fed ammunition supply chain; you simply realize it’s 4:00 AM, your coffee is ice cold, and you’ve forgotten the names of your immediate family members.
The story is simple: You are an engineer who has crashed on an alien planet called Nauvis. You have a pickaxe, a flashlight, and a level of industrial ambition that would make a Gilded Age robber baron weep with envy. Your goal is to launch a rocket.
To do this, you need to mine iron. But hand-mining is for peasants. So you build a burner drill. But the drill needs coal. So you build another drill for coal. But now you need to move the coal to the iron drill, so you build a conveyor belt. Congratulations: you have just sparked the industrial revolution, and you are officially "The Problem."
The "Factorio Loop" of Eternal Suffering is built on a gameplay loop so tight it should come with a cardiovascular warning. It follows a relentless logic:
1. The Bottleneck: "I don't have enough Iron Plates."
2. The Expansion: "I will build more Smelters."
3. The New Bottleneck: "Now I don't have enough Iron Ore to feed the Smelters."
4. The Escalation: "I will build a massive mining outpost three miles away."
5. The Crisis: "Why did my power go out? Oh, because I’m using more electricity than a small European nation."
6. Repeat.
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This is not a game; it is a second job that you pay to go to. But unlike your actual job, Factorio provides a level of satisfaction that is borderline erotic. There is a specific chemical release in the human brain when you finally solve a "spaghetti" belt problem and see a thousand green science packs flowing perfectly into a line of labs. It’s the visual equivalent of a deep-tissue massage.
The evolution of the every Factorio player goes through four distinct stages of psychological descent:
Stage 1: The Optimist - "I'll just hand-craft these gears. It's faster." (It is never faster).
Stage 2: The Chef - Your base is a mess of "Spaghetti Belts." You have no idea where the copper is going, but it’s getting there eventually.
Stage 3: The Mathematician -You start using a calculator to figure out the ratio of copper wire to electronic circuits. You start using terms like "Bus Design" and "Throughput."
Stage 4: The Ascended -You no longer see pixels. You see a grand machine. You haven't slept in three days. You mutter "The Factory Must Grow" in your sleep.
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Combat: Pollution vs. The Neighbors
Of course, you aren't alone. The planet is inhabited by Biters—charming, multi-legged creatures who have one minor character flaw: they are allergic to smog. Since your factory produces enough pollution to melt a hole through time itself, the Biters will periodically visit your base to express their disapproval by eating your face.
This adds a layer of RTS (Real-Time Strategy) survival. You’ll spend half your time building the most efficient production line in history, and the other half building a Great Wall of China made of laser turrets and landmines. There is nothing quite like the peace of mind that comes from knowing your automated artillery is turning a local ecosystem into a crater while you focus on your "Advanced Oil Processing."
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Should You Buy It? Yes. Absolutely.
Factorio is one of the highest-rated games on Steam for a reason. It is incredibly solid game, and the modding community is so talented they've basically turned the game into a platform for everything from computer architecture to complex chemistry. Pro-tip: Before you install, set a loud alarm in another room. Or better yet, give a friend a key to your house and tell them to physically drag you away from the computer if they haven't seen you in 48 hours.
Rating: 10/10.
**Note: This review was written while my iron production was dipping. I need to go. The factory must grow!