I Found 3D (1st Person) Factorio (seriously)

[Drizzt]

yes - it's this game (that some people may already know, and which was recommended to me by the YouTuber GliderCat when he has posted on here in the past):

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1013540/Evospace/

it's in Early Access and has all sorts of rough edges, since it is being made by one person

but it is 3D Factorio in so many ways - belts, inserters, mass production, increasingly complex research chains - but done in the Unreal Engine

i have just completed my first automated mining and smelting setup - and am just about to go and set up an automated coal mine and transport belt so that i can ensure it stays fuelled forever (is currently being fuelled by the load of biomass that i collected during the initial stages of the game - that when processed give a small amount of solid fuel and also some gas that i am currently storing, but can be used as fuel itself with the right tech)

i have only scratched the surface - but because it has the belt and inserter mechanic, i know i will be able to set up mass production very soon - and i haven't even set up my first component assemblers yet - but again because of the belts and inserters i know it's going be a proper automated set up

plus it has fluid and gas processing, heat transfer, kinetic energy and electricity, and a whole bunch of other interesting and relatively realistic processes and byproducts - with a massive tech tree that allows you to unlock a bunch of stuff with just electricity while you learn the basics - but which then requires tech appropriate components to be fed into the research machines

plus it has multi tiers of everything, with machines made from better materials performing better - as well as more advanced machines and processes becoming available

anyway - i need to get back to the game - but i did want to come by and recommend the game to my fellow Factorio fans - since it is the first game since Factorio to really give me that automation buzz - but with the immersive survival vibe in a deformable voxel environment - where you can build stuff and then just stand and admire it for a moment - same way we often zoom out (or in) and admire the Factorio factory for a moment

as well as that addictive twist, where you just have to set up that next line to automate that next level of production etc :-)

and like i say it is still pretty rough around the edges - the guy likely did all his own artwork and so kept it very simple for the tech screens and icons etc - but the main game world and 3D models look great

and it is currently on sale for a ridiculously low price considering what is there - and i worry that maybe the dev is in need of the income - so i would encourage everyone to go and buy the game - since what is there is already worth it i am sure - i expect i will get dozens of hours out of it just working my way up the tech tree - and then likely enjoying starting again from nothing but knowing what i am doing

and i certainly want this dev to be able to continue to develop this great game

obviously do ask around if you want - and i have only been playing for 3 hours - so maybe others will have more significant impressions from longer plays
(UPDATE: still addicted after 40+ hours - it's the real deal)
(UPDATE2: up to 80 now, give or take a few hours where the game has been left loaded - but still playing it constantly - started a new factory just because i wanted to start from the beginning and build it better - saving the final push through to the end of the tech tree for as long possible - savoring the experience)

and i know there are at least a few Factorio forum people who have played it - as i said it was recommended to me here by GliderCat

anyway - just figured i would pop by and do my bit for the dev - and for you all - since like i say the game is currently insanely cheap and has belts and inserters and smelters and assemblers and automated mining machines - but all in a 3D voxel world

surely that's gotta be worth 5 or 6 bucks?

i hope y'all agree and have some fun with it :-)

Peace :-)

(and i can currently answer questions about the early game - and every hour from now i shall know more :-))

[Blake]

Hello there Evospace dev....:)

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by The Nun:

Hello there Evospace dev....:)

lol - very funny ;-)

but no - massive Factorio fan (2000+ hours) - had Evospace on my wishlist for a while since it got recommended to me

and yesterday or today i noticed the price was incredibly cheap - and it just so happened i was feeling the need for a something that scratches 2 itches

see i have been playing some Planet Crafter of late - and i like the immersive 3D world and the progression

but if there is any factory or automation type stuff in it, it's not till the very late game (i believe there are drones)

so it's mainly building the various facilities that feed the terraforming progress and give you the new tech - with some toys to play with to make it easier to explore and manually collect the minerals to build the stuff to progress - rinse and repeat and try not to suffocate, starve or dehydrate (i always play on hardcore, hence why i haven't got to late game yet, plus i did a restart for a new version and deleted my game where i was pretty far in)

and not to take anything away from Planet Crafter - it is great - but while it scratches some immersive survival and progression itches - in a very pretty world - with some building

i still have my Factorio game on the go for some proper factory automation

and i still have Medieval Engineers Community Edition for some hardcore manual mining and modded mechanisms stuff

and i booted up Space Engineers for a bit - but that is also mainly focused on building ships and processing facilities - but still with manual mining and transporting

played a few minutes of Besiege - definitely some interesting stuff - but didn't grab me

and then i booted this one up today

and it is as i described

3D Factorio

manually mine a few bits and pieces to set up your first smelting rig - hand craft a few bits and pieces to do your first research - and then set up your first automated mining and smelting setup - then feed the smelted stuff into your assemblers - then feed those components into the next chain - and feed your research computers to get better tech

and then build huge (i assume - haven't got there yet - but it has all the equipment to do so - and the interface lets you drag out lines of machines and belts and stuff)

anyway - figured it was worth a recommendation - first game i have played that feels like Factorio with its automation - but also has that immersive survival vibe that you get from being in a 1st person 3D environment and being able to deform the terrain and build vertically etc

would be interested to here from any other Factorio fans who have already played it

but i am so far definitely not regretting my purchase and am confident i will be getting my money's worth - as well as confident in my categorizing it as 3D Factorio - albeit rough round the edges - since as mentioned it is the work of one guy

pretty amazing work - the dude has vision and talent

and interestingly enough - for those who remember the guys who made a tool to load a Factorio map into UE5 as a tech demo a little while back - well this game is in UE, and has actual functional components that could be mapped to equivalent components in Factorio - so it would be interesting to see something of that kind

anyway - i really do need to get back and play lol :-)

but hopefully some people will check the game out - from what i have played so far, the dev deserves the support - it is a proper 3D factory automation game - and it costs 5 or 6 bucks

and if it had a demo that took me to where i am now in 3 hours - i would have paid $20

although you do have to work a lot of stuff out for yourself - he has not spent time on a tutorial

either way - figured i would share the love :-)

[Chindraba]

Aside from the "survival" aspect it sounds interesting at least.
What is the aspect or mechanic which give it the survival aspect?
How is the survival aspect compared to Factorio biters in a default setting?

[Chindraba]

Welp, never mind. The information won't help me any. Might help others though.
Support for Win/Mac but not Linux. Ain't gonna go proprietary just for an EA game, or an game.
It looks rather like it'd be outside my mouse/kbd skills anyway. FP action don't do so well with me at the controls.

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

Aside from the "survival" aspect it sounds interesting at least.
What is the aspect or mechanic which give it the survival aspect?
How is the survival aspect compared to Factorio biters in a default setting?

so there are no enemies - and there is no hunger, thirst, sleep etc - your Engineer is even more immortal than in Factorio :-)

the survival aspect is in terms of the raw materials - so i use it in contrast to a creative sandbox

so you need to mine the raw materials to make the metal plates and other components to make your machines etc

so it is basically like Factorio with biters turned off

without trains

mixed with a bit of Minecraft

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

Welp, never mind. The information won't help me any. Might help others though.
Support for Win/Mac but not Linux. Ain't gonna go proprietary just for an EA game, or an game.
It looks rather like it'd be outside my mouse/kbd skills anyway. FP action don't do so well with me at the controls.

ah ok - didn't know you were a real PC user ;-)

i used to be one of those

but due to my video game addiction Windows was pretty much a prequisite

plus after Uni all my work was on Windows - and i gradually lost all real computer skills lol :-)

well if you ever join the darkside do remember this one :-)

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

It looks rather like it'd be outside my mouse/kbd skills anyway. FP action don't do so well with me at the controls.

shouldn't be too much of a problem since it's not an action game - can take your time

if it ever makes it to real PCs lol :-)

does Unreal Engine not support Linux?

or maybe it does but games need to do a bunch of work to support it, or to support both

also hard for a single dev

either way - i'm glad it sounded interesting :-)

just tapped some coal - now i need to make a buttload of copper plates to build some basic belts to get it to my copper smelters

then i need to set up some assemblers

then quit my job so i have time to play all day and all night :-)

[Thuar]

Unfortunately the dev isn't working on it anymore currently.

I read that he moved, and couldn't live of the money he gets from selling the game. He will pick it up later again ( we still have to see if that will happen ) as a hobby.

So, I wouldn't count on updates at the moment.

[Chindraba]

The darkside is unlikely to offer this dinosaur any enticements. I've already converted my office system to a PC within the first couple months. Now I've got the tech supervisor's system converted. Give me couple hours and I'd convert his laptop as well. He likes the way I've customized the desktop and menu for him. He don't yet realize that there's no EULA attached to it now.

I'm not actually looking for new games, but as a 3D Factorio that one sounded interesting, at a minimum. It might be worth trying on Proton, but I'm not _that_ interested. First person view is likely to destroy me anyway, so I'll just stick with scratching the itch while scratching the surface of Factorio's potential whilst awaiting the SA xpac.

Looks like it could be a good catch, for those with the platform and skills, though.

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by SVD:

Unfortunately the dev isn't working on it anymore currently.

I read that he moved, and couldn't live of the money he gets from selling the game. He will pick it up later again ( we still have to see if that will happen ) as a hobby.

So, I wouldn't count on updates at the moment.

ah ok - i hadn't heard that - i saw there hadn't been an update for a few months - but that was the same gap as the previous updates (March then June)

apparently he is also still active on the dev Discord (according to a recent post in the game's forum - i am not on Discord)

if he has stopped work that is unfortunate - and i hope he is able to pick it up again soon

and even more reason for people to pick it up now - since what is here is excellent so far as i have seen - and the price is ridiculously low - so if he gets a few thousand sales then maybe he will be able to afford to keep going

but again - it is not clear if he has actually stopped working on it

do you have a source for your info? like i say i am just going off a comment i saw on the game's forum from this month which said he is active in the discord - but maybe he is active but has said he is not working on it at the moment?

either way - it looks like you don't currently have the game at the moment - might be worth picking up at this very low price - regardless of whether it ever gets any more content - since it may well not need any to make it worth the money to you

i will let people know if i am still playing it after the weekend

since if i get 10+ hours out of it, it will have been an ok deal - and way better value than many other things i could get for that price - and there is nothing at this price with this kind of gameplay of which i am aware

but if i get 20+ hours then it is really good value

and so on up the hours

i will keep people posted

as well as if i find out any news on the dev

but i bought it with full knowledge of the Early Access pledge - as well as having seen that things seemed very quiet since June

i went on previous recommendations and the price

and i was not disappointed - in fact the total opposite

like i said - pretty much everything i could have hoped for

just a little rough around the edges

[Chindraba]

In the Discord channel the dev is still semi-active. Seems they're not highly active there at all (general channel anyway). I suppose that as a solo dev, probably with a 'day job' as well, Discord is a low-priority activity with development taking a higher amount of time. They did mention some problems with their Win PC, and sounds like they also have a Mac, but the Win system is their development system as Win is the primary target platform.

Without scrolling to far into the history I didn't see anything about other personal problems, and some examples of still doing active development.

Nice touch, imho, is that even at this point they are working on keeping mod support in the game. That's probably the second biggest plus for Factorio, so I don't think it's going to do them any harm having it there either.

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

The darkside is unlikely to offer this dinosaur any enticements. I've already converted my office system to a PC within the first couple months. Now I've got the tech supervisor's system converted. Give me couple hours and I'd convert his laptop as well. He likes the way I've customized the desktop and menu for him. He don't yet realize that there's no EULA attached to it now.

I'm not actually looking for new games, but as a 3D Factorio that one sounded interesting, at a minimum. It might be worth trying on Proton, but I'm not _that_ interested. First person view is likely to destroy me anyway, so I'll just stick with scratching the itch while scratching the surface of Factorio's potential whilst awaiting the SA xpac.

Looks like it could be a good catch, for those with the platform and skills, though.

ah ok - maybe worth trying with Proton - but people may be having issues with it (not entirely sure - i would need to put some cyrillic into google translate)

as for the 1st person, it doesn't have the stressful urgency of Factorio with biters - which may put some people off - but does also mean that there is no rush

obviously it will not have the ease of control of Factorio - since how could it? - but so far i am finding it ok to use

plus i can dig big holes in the landscape :-)

and they fill with water below sea level - and i will be able to out pumps down there and use the water in processes - so i am looking forward to that

anyway - i shall report back on the longevity

and if i am still gushing praise for it after the weekend, then it may be worth investigating if it is known to play nice with Proton

it looks like the bug report i saw was with Ubuntu - so it may be a distro specific thing

either way - i shall report back on how it is

and yeah - i still have a couple of Factorio games on the go - one default vanilla, one rail world, one SE - and then a dozen big mods on the list

so plenty to go till SA

as well as lots of FFFs for people to get all frothed up about lol :-)

[Chindraba]

Originally posted by Drizzt:

...
so it is basically like Factorio with biters turned off

without trains

Biters I can live without.... BUT, no trains? is the dev inhumane or what? /s

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

In the Discord channel the dev is still semi-active. Seems they're not highly active there at all (general channel anyway). I suppose that as a solo dev, probably with a 'day job' as well, Discord is a low-priority activity with development taking a higher amount of time. They did mention some problems with their Win PC, and sounds like they also have a Mac, but the Win system is their development system as Win is the primary target platform.

Without scrolling to far into the history I didn't see anything about other personal problems, and some examples of still doing active development.

Nice touch, imho, is that even at this point they are working on keeping mod support in the game. That's probably the second biggest plus for Factorio, so I don't think it's going to do them any harm having it there either.

good to know that he is still active - i guess the other poster was misinformed

we will see if there is another release in the next few months - was one in March and then the last in June

i don't actually know what the mod support is - the Workshop is currently empty

although i did see something in the changelog about a lua library

either way - i take the Early Access pledge seriously

so without a demo the price has to be pretty low and i need to have got some decent recommendations

and if i gamble and it isn't great - then so be it - obviously if it's within the refund period then maybe i will do that - but that would probably only be if it was horrifically buggy or no fun at all

but this one i am currently pretty pleased with what is here - and happily played it past the 2 hour window

and by Sunday it may well be one of my favorites

we shall see :-)

[Drizzt]

Originally posted by Chindraba:

Originally posted by Drizzt:

...
so it is basically like Factorio with biters turned off

without trains

Biters I can live without.... BUT, no trains? is the dev inhumane or what? /s

lol - yeah - [s] what was he thinking? [/s] :-)