First impressions

Hi! Hello.

I’m a huge fan of FACTORIO. I was watching videos on youtube and this came up as a related video (Bentham plays Production Line, IIRC). What the heck, $11 is affordable.

I don’t know the names for in-game things yet. Sorry if I get them wrong.

In no particular order, some things I noticed:

• If I start a game, lose, and start a new game it crashes a few minutes into game 2.
• I keep right clicking for more information and instead destroy the factory component. Shift does nothing. A short delay on ripping things up would give me a chance to cancel, please.
• How do i rip up supply lines built atop other zones? Can I get a heat map of where to build cheap supply lines, or no-go zones?
• I didn’t realize that the money counter was showing debt as well as current cash holdings. Being able to take out loans, issue stock, buy back, etc would add another level of play. Union disputes? Days without accident?
• R to rotate makes sense. shift-R to rotate the other way would make sense. I haven’t checked if this is possible.
• Producing cars is the very first thing that gets done, which is a bit like starting Factorio with a rocket already available. So… this game is mostly about min/maxing? I find I’m sitting doing nothing, watching the money trickle in until I have enough to buy the next component or the research finishes.
• I didn’t realize that robot upgrades have to be applied individually. I only saw it in Bentham’s videos, later. I thought it was Factorio style (immediately applied across the board). I see how aesthetically this makes sense here, but I didn’t see the buy button at all. Maybe an indicator “this zone can be upgraded!”
• Some dialogs have X in the corner, others do not. Consistency, please.
• I didn’t realize that stockpiles have to be told what to stockpile. In Factorio I’d just plop down a storage chest and it would handle things for me.
• I didn’t realize at first that time-to-complete is not the same as the progress bars. optimized completely wrong.
• Is there a creative mode where I can play with unlimited money and just see what works? Might make for a good way to automate game feature testing.
• The urge to turn the factory to see it from another angle…
• work cells are inconvenient shapes. I wish there was a minigame to change their form factor.

On the whole I find it’s a strong start and I look forward to whatever comes next. Thank you!

Thanks for the feedback, its very helpful. Actually loans are already in the game, they are a tab in the finance screen.
I know we have a lot of GUI improvement to do, such as notifying you of potential new upgrades on slots and so on…

I hope I don’t sound harsh. I’ve been playing the game every free minute I have. Just top of my head impressions as I go. I found the loans by accident later.

found a couple of render bugs: imgur.com/a/wysfg

I’d love to have a toggle for per-second, per-minute, per-hour stats. When I spend money to change the factory my stats all crash into the red the wait while they update is nerve wracking.

I find I only run the game either paused (while building) or maximum speed. I can’t see a reason to run anything in between.

I never ever close the slots. it might as well be welded on. Makes flying left by dragging the mouse to the edge of the screen impossible because the expanded slot menu takes up the entire left side.

unselecting the current construction is right click, which is also bulldoze. mild panic every time as i have to be careful not to unselect while hovering over something else. I’m not sure it will bulldoze the item under my cursor and I don’t intend to find out. several times I’ve reflexively tried to right click things to get information, deleted them, cursed aloud, and rebuilt the item. Do I get money back for every item in the slot’s buffer as well as the slot value?

My factory is making money, so… I just wait while it researches everything. Soon enough I’ll have all the tech unlocked and then I can get on with building the fastest possible factory. The only upgrades I felt had to be made while waiting are power (so expensive) and car seats (early unlock, high cost to buy).

Windowed mode would be nice. I could write this while watching the factory in a corner.

I’d like to see science moved over next to money and electricity. They’re the three things I care about: progress to next unlock %, power consumption %, cash flow %.

Stats are nice. Consumption tells me units/h and /unit, but not /h. That would give me a better idea of which area needs optimization first.

I have no way to REFUSE to import items I’m manufacturing locally. So the factory imports anyways. Gah!

I can’t make the output area of a manufacturing slot overlap with the import buffer of the related factory. Waste of room…

I can’t drag conveyor through multiple slots. As soon as I pass the first slot it tries to path the conveyor backwards through a one-way slot. Wut?

Will there be an electric car factory version with electric motors and battery production?

I’m very grateful that a slot in hand shows me the conveyor input and output. I wish I could also see the location of the stockpiles. I just placed a sheet metal fab and my guess was completely wrong. Then I placed it a second time backwards because I couldn’t tell from the silhouette that I’d lost count of turns.

I researched “manufacture wheels”, but the slot tree won’t expand to show anything more than Fit Wheels. Fit Tires and Fit Brakes are also not-expandable. I then closed and re-opened slots and hey! they’re expandable.

I can adjust “prefer local” for final assemblies, but what does that mean when I do it for component manufacturing? They’ll buy leather from the local tannery?

Is there a way to implement Kanban or JIT manufacturing so there’s less inventory sitting on the shop floor, tying up cash? inventory that doesn’t move is a liability.

Hmmm, maybe you want to take a look into the ‘Conveyorbelt income arrow’ suggestion and leave a comment there …

That’s what I also experienced but never think about. Maybe it should become a bug report - even it is just annoying and not breaking the game …

For component manufacturing it could be useful if you have a stockpile that you use to store the raw materials on.
Useful to have a stockpile close if the import slot is far away, making it more efficient as the station doesn’t have to wait for resources much.

i don’t know why i edited the previous message instead of making new ones. probably to reduce your inbox spam.

could researchers have an area effect, increasing efficiency in nearby slots?

could corners slow down the line, making players plan straighter lines where possible?

I don’t get what the white arrow coming out of component factories does. I mean i have a guess, but it seems I still have to connect factory output to slot input.

I have researched everything, the factory is still in the small size without expanding. I’m producing two types of cars with no obvious bottlenecks. Not sure what to do now. The small factory mission didn’t have a goal.

Could there be an upgrade to spend cash and move doors on the factory? I could optimize much better if I could put all the outputs next to each other.

Cars reach the export point, then vanish. The door is right there! I’d like to see them roll out the door and the stock of unsold cars sit in the parking lot.

What about break rooms / medical for human workers? local robot maintenance facilities?

Is there a sweet spot where the timing ratios are perfect?

The late game will be developing over time. We just patched the game today and introduced a bunch of new components that are required for stuff like car alarms, seat heaters and satnav. We also added a new research center, and a new high-output power plant.
Lots more will be coming, as well as scenario objectives and targets.