A bit of over three years after acclaimed development and automation sim Factorio left its prolonged early entry with a 1.0 launch, developer Wube Software program has shared particulars of its first enlargement, House Age, which might be selecting up proper the place the bottom recreation stops.
Factorio, for the uninitiated, casts gamers as impromptu area industrialists, tasking them with constructing more and more elaborate contraptions in a ceaseless grasp for ever-more environment friendly automation. The last word objective is to construct a rocket ship enabling you to flee the planet you have crash-landed on, which is the purpose the place House Age kicks in.
In a put up revealing first concrete particulars of Factorio’s enlargement, Wube defined House Age continues the journey after these rockets have launched, taking gamers out among the many stars the place they’ll “uncover new worlds with distinctive challenges, exploit their novel sources for superior technological beneficial properties, and handle [their] fleet of interplanetary area platforms.”
Wube says gamers might want to ship a number of rockets into area (these might be cheaper to construct in House Age to keep away from making the method “drag ceaselessly”) as they amass ample sources to assemble a platform that can generate area science however, extra importantly, journey to totally different planets the place the bottom recreation’s automation core will develop to interplanetary logistics.
4 pre-defined planets might be included within the enlargement, every with its personal distinctive theme, useful resource, challenges, and mechanics, and “most” may have totally different army targets. Wube provides that each planet results in the manufacturing of particular science packs and its applied sciences, and that the order gamers determine to take advantage of planets is an “impactful strategic alternative”.
To accommodate the enlargement’s new model of play, Wube says it is wanted to rebalance some base recreation components, which means that whereas area might be accessible sooner with House Age enabled, sure tech tree components – artillery, cliff explosives, Spidertron, best-of-tier modules, and a lot of private gear upgrades – will now unlock a lot later throughout totally different planets. On the plus aspect, some “cool new issues” might be added as rewards for progressing by means of the enlargement, alongside some “good additions” on the unique planet, Nauvis.
House Age does not have a launch date but, however Wube says it is presently at “Step 5” of its beforehand mentioned seven-step improvement plan. At this level, content material “is extra secure and the prospect of eradicating issues is decrease”, so it is prepared for a “first move of tweaking”.
“Since we all know the place we’re and what’s the objective,” the developer explains, “we will begin to approximate the date of releasing the enlargement, which is deliberate to be about one 12 months from now. It’s nonetheless a very long time, however no less than it’s getting extra particular.”
House Age will launch alongside a 2.0 replace for Factorio that’ll embrace important enhancements for all gamers, no matter whether or not or not they buy the enlargement. These will embrace “the power to regulate prepare techniques higher, higher blueprint constructing, higher flying robotic behaviour, and lots of extra.”
However whereas Factorio’s House Age enlargement may nonetheless be a way off, Wube says, “Any more, we’re stopping the embargo on the enlargement content material, and we might be publishing Friday Details each week about all of the totally different elements of the enlargement till launch!”. So anticipate to listen to a lot extra on the street to its eventual arrival.
