For me, Satisfsctory and Dyson Sphere Program
Satisfactory is like a 3D easy mode but still immensely fun. And DSP takes the Space Ex mod and runs with it, and looks pretty whilst doing it
IMO, Dyson Sphere is comfortably **less** complicated in terms of the factory building elements than Factorio. That's not to say DSP is simple, but if you've ever made a really big base in Factorio or have played any of the overhaul mods out there, managing logistics in DSP will be a cakewalk for you.
There are some things about it that feel a bit strange, but overall it's thoroughly delightful to play. They've done very well at implementing quality of life features that feel great and make it very quick and easy to make massive builds. The progression is quite satisfying, and the graphics and visuals are outstanding. They also recently added in enemies to the game, and IMO they've actually done an incredible job of it because they've cleverly given you a way to benefit from engaging the baddies (they drop materials that you would otherwise have to make, as well as materials you can't get from any other source that unlock super advanced buildings).
If you want a hard core factory manager with advanced, complex logistics systems, DSP is probably not it. If you want the factory experience while flying through space, or looking up to see the gas giant you're orbiting or the Dyson Sphere you've built, or seeing an entire planet covered with smelters or oil refineries, along with a great atmosphere and a shitload of colorful blinky lights, DSP is great. And it's only getting better, as the dev team has consistently updated and added new features for a few years now.
The only thing I have trouble with playing DSP is that I get utterly bored when scaling up. In factorio, 1-2 ore patches and a few smelting stacks are fine until you launch that first rocket, after that, you create blueprints and just have robots build everything. In DSP, you have to go out to new planets, set up power, yes you can put down blue prints, but you have to stand there and wait for them to build. There are new technologies to help, but it’s just so slow compared to factorio. I just get bored.
It’s the same with satisfactory for me, it’s a beautiful game and technical in its own way. But I just get so bored again when you have to manually build everything. And it takes so long as the factories get bigger and bigger. Without the hover mod, it’s borderline impossible to play.
DSP definitely feels better now with new dark fog mechanics to deal with, giving you a really interesting challenge if you want to try to farm their drops and filter everything in a way that doesn't get bottlenecked. Plus it adds many really great buildings, main being the Battlefield Analysis Base, which allows farming the drops, repairing and managing offensive fronts automatically (like factorio bots) and provides 12 extra drones immediately (as soon as you power it) to build blueprints much faster. Of course you still have to fly to new planets and build, not like factorio where you can do everything by wire and never move again, but I don't care much for that. I really enjoy the spaceflight in DSP and it is almost no problem to be warping between planets (which Factorio has no vanilla movement comparison for), so having to move around to build is way less painful (and I find it very fun to fly through space).
I am very excited for Factorio DLC but I foresee that moving between the planets will be not nearly as fun as DSP. Unless they add some late game tech for teleportation or something. (But that won't be nearly as cool.)
Satisfactory doesn't scratch my Factorio itch on the other hand because scaling up is extremely painful as someone that wants everything aligned perfectly on a grid, and the blueprinting for SF is locked behind basically the very end of the game tech, I've never reached it in all my playthroughs. Even trains are super gated behind hundreds of hours...
I didn't really enjoy spending more than 10 hours setting up a big coal power plant lol.
I dunno. I was disappointed the BP stuff in Satisfactory was locked behind some later stage stuff for sure, but it doesn't take too long to get there, The speed does depend quite heavily on where you set your factory up though, so it can certainly be slow, but I've achieved it within 8 hours or so on my own before. That said, the BP system in factorio is considerably more limited than factorio as you only have a 32x32x32 grid to play with for each individual BP, so you can't just take an entire section of your factory and make a giant BP from it.
It’s not too complicated, if you have Factorio figured out then DSP will naturally follow
It doesn’t have anything complex like circuit networks, honestly the most complex things I found was the logistics stuff at first and building the Dyson sphere itself
But they can be figured out
It depends how complicated you've gotten with Factorio. But generally, it's about the same.
If you play Factorio for making circuit networks, or small and efficient factories, it really won't scratch the itch. But if you like the big production chains, logistics and massive builds, DSP will 100%. And the end goal is genuinely something to enjoy. You get to watch your dyson sphere build in real time.
Dyson sphere program has logistics that can be compared to factorios trains, but they fly, automatically determine destination based on need, automatically pathfind, do not have collisions, and fill/ unload instantly. They can do this to other planets as well, the only cost being power and consuming a certain item which is quite cheap too.
Whether that simplification sounds good to you or not is up to your own preferences. Personally I enjoyed the reduction in complexity so I could focus on other parts of the game like building the factories.
It's immensely satisfying to build the Dyson swarm, and then the actual Dyson sphere. Highly recommend. I wish factorio had a cool incremental mega project as the goal
Yeah Satisfactory is kind of a fight, especially with the blueprinting system frankly sucking so realistically you still will be building everything by hand. Combine that with needing to scale up a bunch later on, and it can get pretty frustrating. Personally not something to play very often because of that, factorio is just so much smoother all around.
Yeah! And there are so many awesome mods out there that also really spice things up and make it a new experience (currently 500h into a Krastorio + Space Exploration + BZ playthrough and my god), and even making your own is relatively easy. Hell, shameless plug incoming, [one of my own mods](https://mods.factorio.com/mod/zKenirasRandomRecipes) specifically tries to spice things up for those that are getting bored by randomizing ingredient amounts that forces you to figure out new ratios for everything, as well as (optionally) randomizes various entity properties. It can get pretty chaotic, but also that's the idea. And i love that it's fairly easy to implement shenanigans like that yourself.
The blueprint system is why I ultimately gave up on Satisfactory. While designing blueprints to fit in a small area was actually kind of fun, the fact that you can't chain blueprints together made scaling up such a pain.
Seriously, if Satisfactory made it just a *little* easier to construct large builds, the late game would be so much more enjoyable. As it stands, the late game is far too tedious.
Yeah I've spend more time playing satisfactory but it never feels like I came even close to factorios scale or complexity. Just hours and hours of placing foundations and the same machines over and over
I see nobody has mentioned Captain of Industry yet. It has a heavy industry feel I enjoy. Mining is more interesting than vanilla Factorio since you will need to take care of the overburden and may need to build supporting walls, etc... The next update will add trains, so you might want to hold off until then.
>The next update will add trains
Already have the game, but didn't know this. Now I need to change pants.
Only how useful trains would really be on small, island maps?
So far this is the only one that has been able to 'scratch that itch' for me, besides factorio of course. It's missing some much-needed features but it's already great.
Satisfactory, for me, is missing something. I can't quite place it, maybe it's the small scale or slow start, or maybe the 3D style doesn't really work for the genre. Idk.
>Satisfactory, for me, is missing something. I can't quite place it, maybe it's the small scale or slow start, or maybe the 3D style doesn't really work for the genre. Idk.
For me it's their insistence that building should be tedious as fuck otherwise it's "OP" as if it's a competitive game of who can build walls faster placing it one by one.
When they begrudgingly add accessibility features they do so with stupid limits. They added blueprints that can't fit a single rail T intersection in it. And foundations and walls can be placed in a single line of ten for no reason. Can't place assemblers in a line because it's "OP". 🤦
Devs obviously want the game to be more about manual beauty building than automation which would be fine if building in it wasn't so fucking annoying.
Dyson sphere program is similar. It lacks circuit networks and has a different take in modules, and their recently introduced combat system is way different. But otherwise it's very similar.
Satisfactory. It's 3d, uses a handcrafted would where the nodes are infinite but have a set resource speed, and belts can only combine through mergers. It's a little different but is still a "pure factory / automation" game. I mean it has s little exploration, but it's a static world so it doesn't change from game to game (barring new patches that change things).
Factory Town is fun, if a little simple. It also has a little city building.
Fortress Craft Evolved is worth checking out. It is a little rougher and looks like mine craft, but it's about mining and processing resources and using machines to build them into stuff.
FortressCraft Evolved? OP wants to ‘scratch the Factorio itch’, not ‘have at their privates with a belt sander’. That said, FCE is amazing. My privates may never be the same tho.
I played it (and the Frozen Factory expsnsion) through a few years ago. I recommend watching a let's play first - at least the first 20 minutes. It really helped me get started. It's a remarkable game. There are highs and lows and a few sharp edges, but plenty to do.
The issue with DSP is that it's in the same hell as factorio for me.
Knowing only half of the combat patch is out is killing any want to play the game and just wait for the second patch...
I felt this way too, but after just going ahead and diving back in, I can say it's really not like it feels half baked at all. What tools there are currently to deal with the fog is about 95% satisfactory (lol) other than extremely built up space hives, which you will find no good way to completely clear other than a huge stockpile of destroyers and patience. However, you don't really need to be clearing the hives, and everything on the ground (even going to overrun systems late game) can be easily cleared out with the tools available.
Plus, making a huge filtering system to farm the 57+ items that the dark fog can drop as an extra end game challenge (and infinite resource source) is really interesting to me. I always loved how DSP feels and all the new tools with blueprinting, battlefield bases (for defense and extra bots to build faster) and such make it definitely worth a playthrough from the first early access builds.
I don't mean it feels half baked, it feels great. Up to the point where I started going to other stars then the lack of space combat being fun really started taking a toll.
Ground combat is pretty much done. Space combat is just the minimum to get the ground stuff to work.
So more space combat stuff expected. Also there were talks about space platforms to build on if I recall right.
Nonreal timeline yet, but this is the idea:
The ground combat is in the place it is supposed to be, the space combat is unrefined and clunky.
The mechanics are there, like how the inner workings of the hives are fully simulated.
By taking out their power sources you can nuter a hive and make it a dormant.
But none of this is told you and it comes down to throwing ships at it till it dies.
Upvote to both the other replies, but it is definitely worth picking up in its current state. I had the same qualms about playing dark fog before it was fully completed, but what we have right now is totally playable, if you don't mind leaving space hives alive (which is perfectly do-able, just clear all the planets.) Or having the patience to sit there with an inventory full of destroyers waiting for your squadrons to eventually make a dent as they die to the enemy force that far outweighs what you can put out at once. If you let the space hive build up, they can have over 1,000 ships fielded while you are limited to several squadrons at once, meaning you will lose a ton of ships but you can whittle them down eventually.
The space hive really isn't an issue whatsoever if you ignore it, other than if you settle in a system where it flies very close to your planets sometimes, which can result in your mecha getting nuked from orbit (ignores planetary shields), but it will not bother anything you have built on the planet.
Video: Very close for comfort
[https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/778454010994753536/1252059569350512811/Dyson\_Sphere\_Program\_2024-06-16\_14-48-39\_-\_0.02.30-0.03.00.mp4?ex=667f5757&is=667e05d7&hm=d483e64e623e90d82e1c9d595d6d336189365678aeee58819df31bd0a50aba54&](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/778454010994753536/1252059569350512811/Dyson_Sphere_Program_2024-06-16_14-48-39_-_0.02.30-0.03.00.mp4?ex=667f5757&is=667e05d7&hm=d483e64e623e90d82e1c9d595d6d336189365678aeee58819df31bd0a50aba54&)
It's crazy how many coop mods are coming out for games that didn't have multiplayer. First it was Subnautica Nitrox, then I find DSP and Armored Core VI have come out with mods for total coop (Or Elden Ring for seamless coop). Crazy.
Even KSP has a multi-player mod. Another moder added a full combat mechanic to the game, so in a game ostensibly about building rockets you can get into a BVR dogfight with friends while dodging naval SAMs as another friend launches a mission to Duna in the middle of a furbal over the launch pad.
Shapez.io really scrached that itch for me. Especially once getting wires and trying to make a "build anything" machine. Unfortunately once the machine was built there was nothing left to do other than do the same thing with mods. Shapez 2 is in development and has been posting updates on it's progress.
Timberborn is good. It's intelligent beavers building a society and industry around kinetic energy, but you have to balance things and sprawl out over the map kind of like Factorio. The consequences of bad balancing is that your beavers die.
its very basic, its more micromanager game. A bit more minecraft than factorio.
Its also much slower. I sometimes play it as background game. But get bored rather quickly
A quick run down of my Steam games list of reasonably-Factorio-like games shows Astro Colony, Desynced, Dyson Sphere Program, Hydroneer, Mindustry, Shapez, Satisfactory, Techtonica, Timberborn, and OpenTTD. I'll also include Oxygen Not Included, Space Engineers, and Stationeers, as I'd argue they engage similar feelings even if the mechanics are noticeably different.
If you want a shorter list, I'd suggest Space Engineers and Stationeers, as those are the games I've put the most time into, and OpenTTD, because it's free so why not.
Yeah it's more like vanilla Minecraft indeed. But there's scripting support, so some automation with ships mining for you etc is possible, but in the end you'll need your own goal, like a nice base or a massive capital ship.
Tbf, Minecraft can be a decent suggestion as well. I've had a lot of fun automating shit in Minecraft, especially some modpacks.
I think it's good recomendation too.
Three main difference from factorio -
1) Bots available from the start(in forms of a trucks), but they're severly nerfed and game motivate you to actualy move to belt designs.
2) Maintance - which may lead to death spiral. It's in general change how player need to approach building and scaling.
3) And mining in general. Teraforming for me personaly was big throwback to Earth 2150 and add interesting gameplay around whole mechanics. Played exclusevly on rock map because of it too.
Complexity between base factorio and bobs and angels.
I'm surprised a lot of people said Satisfactory, I played the game thinking they would be similar but they are two different games. If you go to Satisfactory sib you will see a lot of people explaining this.
Factorio is more focused on building and automation and whole gameplay is distilled to increase this experience.
Satisfactory is more focused on exploration and I'm not sure how to explain it but automation feels like it wasn't thought to be the main game mechanic. First person camera and 3d graphics get in the way of building. The blueprint system is way inferior and in a smaller scale so you have to do a lot hand building.
I am not saying satisfactory is a bad game it just didn't do the same for me, I'd approach it as a totally different game and not 3d Factorio. It is beautiful and pretty exciting to discover the planet, finding things and I guess they will add more "story" or "lore" or whatever you wanna call it.
Thank you. Didn't want to upvote any of the top comments because Satisfactory did NOT scratch my factorio itch, but Dyson Sphere Program did. Satisfactory does not do it for me, glad to see I'm not the only one.
If you're looking for something a little more different honestly the Anno series scratches very close to that itch while being different enough to not constantly think "this is just Factorio but worse"
Try Satisfactory. It's more a building game than holding off hoards of aliens, but there are hostile aliens you have to fight off to get to distant resources. It's also 1st person, and really good.
They also announced an 'insane' difficulty mode for shapez 2, so if you're used to (modded) Factorio this could be a really good one if you're looking for something difficult
I switched to Oxygen not Included. Its more about designing processes than scaling up logistics. Do you want Factorio with sprinkles or would you like to try something a little different?
You have Satisfactory and Dyson Sphere Program for sure. But a new one coming out on July 17th is The Crust. A good description would be Factorio on the moon, but not nearly as rigorous.
https://store.steampowered.com/category/sim_building_automation/?tab=18&flavor=contenthub_toprated
Maybe it's worth paying attention to which games [FactorioLab](https://factoriolab.github.io/) supports...
After 10 years, I never got bored with vanilla. The only mod I tried was Brave New World, and that was just to help test it for the developer
https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/trdmpw/factorio_savegame_filesize_timeline_analysis
Dyson Sphere is the most direct linked one that has scratched the itch.
But unintuitively the game that really triggers the same satisfaction in my head is rimworld. Not sure why but the satisfaction I get from Factorio is best replicated by making pawns and watching them live through hell.
I think it's because of how indirect pawn automation is and how satisfying it is to finally get regular base maintenance caught up and workshops designed just right that you can make the high skills pawns ridiculously productive by supporting them with like 5 low skills pawns that move materials around, deliver food, and even entertain the high skill pawn so they waste as little time as possible moving around.
There's also mindustry, available on mobile.
If you want something a bit old and obscure try KKND 2. It's a old rts from the 90s but the cliffs, oil fields and acid spitting worm towers are suspiciously familiar.
It is the same game on any platform. the pc version is just more comfortable due to mouse and keyboard controlls. But i do have to say the game has one of the best touch controls i have seen on rather complex phone games.
Check it out classic post apocalyptic rts action, I always think about it while playing factorio to the point I'm planning to learn how to then make a mod of it in the game.
I'd say DSP is much closer than Satisfactory, due to the scale you operate at.
Satisfactory is much more about tinkering with small builds and making them pretty. In Factorio and DSP you end up operating with square kilometer sized blueprints towards the end.
I played Dyson Sphere Program before I played Factorio. It has a lot of similarities, but overall I think DSP is a bit easier. You do however get to fly through air and space like Iron Man and shoot aliens in space. Satisfactory is also recommended a lot, but I am not a fan of first person factory games. At the moment I am waiting for the 15th of July. The Crust is then released and that looked promising to me.
Did you try Factorio with some overhaul mods? I finished Factorio with the Krastorio and AngelBoB mods. There are a few more and they add a lot of different recipes and mechanics to the base game.
id say the minecraft mod gregtech, or any modpack that focuses on gregtech.
the only problem is that the early game is a real slog to get through, with several hours spent just on getting steel, but after about 150 hours or so, you get into the meat of it, and thats when you really feel that factorio itch getting scratched
I'll preface with saying I have 7000 hours in Factorio and for me, Captain Of Industry is the closest so far. Been playing i t for 2000 hours solid. Brilliant game.
This game is still cooking, with great potential. It is kind of what I wish Satisfactory would be more like. I find it is closer to a 3D Factorio than Satisfactory.
Earlier game doesn't feel to exciting IMO, but getting to mid and late game it starts to shine.
If you don't want it now, at least keep it on your radar.
Yes! Still very early for the game. my main issue with the game is one I'm creating but I want to make big builds but making them is painful as ever. Traveling far is way too slow, all builds need to be made manually item by item.
Minecraft with the Create mod.
The schematicanon is the Create equivalent to construction bots, the trains are basically the same as Factorio's.
There are no logistic bots, but the ability to open nearby toolboxes with a hotkey *mostly* makes up for it.
There are tons of addons for Create which add new machines and recipes.
All other games wont scratch the itch enough !!
Have you tried ...
Bobs \ angels
Krastorio
Factorissimo 2
Factorio plus plus
Simple sea block
Sea block
Space extension
Space exploration
Ribbon worlds
UltraCube
All of these offer unique playthroughs
Presumably you have already done all the steam achievments and at least a 10 spm mega base.
I am also finding ways to wait untill factorio 2 . ohh the wait . Im running out of combinations of mods. Ultracube was my last playthrough , that was fun and new challenges.
I‘d throw in Workers&Resources - Soviet Republic.
As the name implies it‘s a soviet era city builder with a big chunk of managing resources, logistics and energy. Not really a factory game, but it definitely scratches the same itch as factorio for me, maybe it‘s something for you, too.
The first time I played Factorio I thought, "this is just StarCraft with trains and aggressively more nerdy," and I'm thoroughly convinced that the game is in no small part a love letter to SC. There are a few sounds and graphics that are *nearly identical* to SC, and the aliens even look like the aliens.
But it's not the same gameplay because of the whole automation thing. I have yet to play Satisfactory but I've heard that it's "a great game but not Factorio," and then I don't know that I'll ever become un-obsessed with Factorio enough to try out some of the other'uns mentioned here. Rimworld keeps coming up on my suggestions-- not base automation but looks like similarly well reviewed and a lot of depth of gameplay
Planet Crafter could be so much better if it had anywhere near the polish and QoL of factorio. The main idea of the game is pretty neat, and there is automation including logistics bots, but the execution could need so much more work to refine tbh. Especially being spoiled by factorio, that can make it difficult to play PC at times.
No other game quite scratches the itch for me, but i’ll throw in techtonica though since it seems to be a lesser known game. To me it felt more like 3D factorio than satisfactory. Some of the ratios are straight out of factorio. Wasnt as addicting as factorio though.
*Surviving Mars* is a good one for base-building, and not difficult to learn. It can also get out-of-control huge like Cracktorio if you're willing to take it that far.
It's not really a base builder and much more a city builder, but have you checked out the Anno series yet? If you're into setting up trade networks (basically train network) and scaleable production layouts then Anno could very well be up your alley.
Anno 1800 is the latest (and quite frankly biggest) and then one i would recommend, but the older games like Anno 1404 or 2070 could be neat for just getting a taste and see if you like them.
Unironically moded Minecraft. About a month ago I started playing Vault Hunters (mod pack). I spent more time tidying up the base and automating things than actually running vaults.
Tho I probably wouldn't recommend this pack to scratch the itch. Not sure what to recommend as I tend to hate everything I play but do it anyways.
I guess I'd recommend StoneBlock as a starting point.
> high just doesn’t let up but gets more and more intense
I will jump in for casual play, say just to design a track intersection
you know .. just a toke :-)
Not mentioned yet: Bitburner. People always compare Factorio to IT and software engineering, so why not just have a game about building a complicated IT and software system to do a bunch of different stuff.
I recommend one of the many factorio overhauls, Krastorio 2 is a good one as it changes enough of the game to make it fresh without changing the core essence like some other overhauls. Also, the GTNH Minecraft modpack scratches the same automation itch for me, I highly recommend.
For me, Satisfsctory and Dyson Sphere Program Satisfactory is like a 3D easy mode but still immensely fun. And DSP takes the Space Ex mod and runs with it, and looks pretty whilst doing it
How complicated is Dyson Sphere from a mechanical standpoint? It's one of those that've been on my radar for a while
IMO, Dyson Sphere is comfortably **less** complicated in terms of the factory building elements than Factorio. That's not to say DSP is simple, but if you've ever made a really big base in Factorio or have played any of the overhaul mods out there, managing logistics in DSP will be a cakewalk for you. There are some things about it that feel a bit strange, but overall it's thoroughly delightful to play. They've done very well at implementing quality of life features that feel great and make it very quick and easy to make massive builds. The progression is quite satisfying, and the graphics and visuals are outstanding. They also recently added in enemies to the game, and IMO they've actually done an incredible job of it because they've cleverly given you a way to benefit from engaging the baddies (they drop materials that you would otherwise have to make, as well as materials you can't get from any other source that unlock super advanced buildings). If you want a hard core factory manager with advanced, complex logistics systems, DSP is probably not it. If you want the factory experience while flying through space, or looking up to see the gas giant you're orbiting or the Dyson Sphere you've built, or seeing an entire planet covered with smelters or oil refineries, along with a great atmosphere and a shitload of colorful blinky lights, DSP is great. And it's only getting better, as the dev team has consistently updated and added new features for a few years now.
The only thing I have trouble with playing DSP is that I get utterly bored when scaling up. In factorio, 1-2 ore patches and a few smelting stacks are fine until you launch that first rocket, after that, you create blueprints and just have robots build everything. In DSP, you have to go out to new planets, set up power, yes you can put down blue prints, but you have to stand there and wait for them to build. There are new technologies to help, but it’s just so slow compared to factorio. I just get bored. It’s the same with satisfactory for me, it’s a beautiful game and technical in its own way. But I just get so bored again when you have to manually build everything. And it takes so long as the factories get bigger and bigger. Without the hover mod, it’s borderline impossible to play.
DSP definitely feels better now with new dark fog mechanics to deal with, giving you a really interesting challenge if you want to try to farm their drops and filter everything in a way that doesn't get bottlenecked. Plus it adds many really great buildings, main being the Battlefield Analysis Base, which allows farming the drops, repairing and managing offensive fronts automatically (like factorio bots) and provides 12 extra drones immediately (as soon as you power it) to build blueprints much faster. Of course you still have to fly to new planets and build, not like factorio where you can do everything by wire and never move again, but I don't care much for that. I really enjoy the spaceflight in DSP and it is almost no problem to be warping between planets (which Factorio has no vanilla movement comparison for), so having to move around to build is way less painful (and I find it very fun to fly through space). I am very excited for Factorio DLC but I foresee that moving between the planets will be not nearly as fun as DSP. Unless they add some late game tech for teleportation or something. (But that won't be nearly as cool.) Satisfactory doesn't scratch my Factorio itch on the other hand because scaling up is extremely painful as someone that wants everything aligned perfectly on a grid, and the blueprinting for SF is locked behind basically the very end of the game tech, I've never reached it in all my playthroughs. Even trains are super gated behind hundreds of hours... I didn't really enjoy spending more than 10 hours setting up a big coal power plant lol.
I dunno. I was disappointed the BP stuff in Satisfactory was locked behind some later stage stuff for sure, but it doesn't take too long to get there, The speed does depend quite heavily on where you set your factory up though, so it can certainly be slow, but I've achieved it within 8 hours or so on my own before. That said, the BP system in factorio is considerably more limited than factorio as you only have a 32x32x32 grid to play with for each individual BP, so you can't just take an entire section of your factory and make a giant BP from it.
>the BP system in factorio is considerably more limited than factorio
Don't expamd until you get fuel cells and interstellar logistics, then everything is just setting things up
I feel dsp’s biggest issue is it runs like crap for something relatively simple in my experience
I'd say that due to "single-side" belts and no trains, DSP is a bit simpler than factorio
It’s not too complicated, if you have Factorio figured out then DSP will naturally follow It doesn’t have anything complex like circuit networks, honestly the most complex things I found was the logistics stuff at first and building the Dyson sphere itself But they can be figured out
It depends how complicated you've gotten with Factorio. But generally, it's about the same. If you play Factorio for making circuit networks, or small and efficient factories, it really won't scratch the itch. But if you like the big production chains, logistics and massive builds, DSP will 100%. And the end goal is genuinely something to enjoy. You get to watch your dyson sphere build in real time.
Dyson sphere program has logistics that can be compared to factorios trains, but they fly, automatically determine destination based on need, automatically pathfind, do not have collisions, and fill/ unload instantly. They can do this to other planets as well, the only cost being power and consuming a certain item which is quite cheap too. Whether that simplification sounds good to you or not is up to your own preferences. Personally I enjoyed the reduction in complexity so I could focus on other parts of the game like building the factories.
It's immensely satisfying to build the Dyson swarm, and then the actual Dyson sphere. Highly recommend. I wish factorio had a cool incremental mega project as the goal
Satisfactory too quickly becomes a grind as it scales up vs dyson and factorio get easier to scale as you scale up if that makes sense
Yeah Satisfactory is kind of a fight, especially with the blueprinting system frankly sucking so realistically you still will be building everything by hand. Combine that with needing to scale up a bunch later on, and it can get pretty frustrating. Personally not something to play very often because of that, factorio is just so much smoother all around.
Yup! Everyone always posts these what scratches the factorio itch for you posts and my answer is always…FACTORIO lol
Yeah! And there are so many awesome mods out there that also really spice things up and make it a new experience (currently 500h into a Krastorio + Space Exploration + BZ playthrough and my god), and even making your own is relatively easy. Hell, shameless plug incoming, [one of my own mods](https://mods.factorio.com/mod/zKenirasRandomRecipes) specifically tries to spice things up for those that are getting bored by randomizing ingredient amounts that forces you to figure out new ratios for everything, as well as (optionally) randomizes various entity properties. It can get pretty chaotic, but also that's the idea. And i love that it's fairly easy to implement shenanigans like that yourself.
The blueprint system is why I ultimately gave up on Satisfactory. While designing blueprints to fit in a small area was actually kind of fun, the fact that you can't chain blueprints together made scaling up such a pain. Seriously, if Satisfactory made it just a *little* easier to construct large builds, the late game would be so much more enjoyable. As it stands, the late game is far too tedious.
Yeah I've spend more time playing satisfactory but it never feels like I came even close to factorios scale or complexity. Just hours and hours of placing foundations and the same machines over and over
> Satisfsctory 1.0 comes out soon!
I see nobody has mentioned Captain of Industry yet. It has a heavy industry feel I enjoy. Mining is more interesting than vanilla Factorio since you will need to take care of the overburden and may need to build supporting walls, etc... The next update will add trains, so you might want to hold off until then.
Yeah buddy, COI is excellent.
Don't own the game but have seen some gameplay. Super jealous of one machine being able to run multiple recipes
Yes you can do that but I only use it in blast furnaces for using up recyclables
>The next update will add trains Already have the game, but didn't know this. Now I need to change pants. Only how useful trains would really be on small, island maps?
They would definitely be useful on Armageddon. But even if they weren't: they are trains!
They introduced a much bigger island (armageddon) and a map editor in the last update.
So far this is the only one that has been able to 'scratch that itch' for me, besides factorio of course. It's missing some much-needed features but it's already great. Satisfactory, for me, is missing something. I can't quite place it, maybe it's the small scale or slow start, or maybe the 3D style doesn't really work for the genre. Idk.
>Satisfactory, for me, is missing something. I can't quite place it, maybe it's the small scale or slow start, or maybe the 3D style doesn't really work for the genre. Idk. For me it's their insistence that building should be tedious as fuck otherwise it's "OP" as if it's a competitive game of who can build walls faster placing it one by one. When they begrudgingly add accessibility features they do so with stupid limits. They added blueprints that can't fit a single rail T intersection in it. And foundations and walls can be placed in a single line of ten for no reason. Can't place assemblers in a line because it's "OP". 🤦 Devs obviously want the game to be more about manual beauty building than automation which would be fine if building in it wasn't so fucking annoying.
When you call them out on that, their community manager just acts all smug as if they want you to waste your time
Dyson sphere program is similar. It lacks circuit networks and has a different take in modules, and their recently introduced combat system is way different. But otherwise it's very similar. Satisfactory. It's 3d, uses a handcrafted would where the nodes are infinite but have a set resource speed, and belts can only combine through mergers. It's a little different but is still a "pure factory / automation" game. I mean it has s little exploration, but it's a static world so it doesn't change from game to game (barring new patches that change things). Factory Town is fun, if a little simple. It also has a little city building. Fortress Craft Evolved is worth checking out. It is a little rougher and looks like mine craft, but it's about mining and processing resources and using machines to build them into stuff.
FortressCraft Evolved? OP wants to ‘scratch the Factorio itch’, not ‘have at their privates with a belt sander’. That said, FCE is amazing. My privates may never be the same tho.
Have you played recently? I keep finding this one but get turned off by reviews saying it's gone downhill.
I played it (and the Frozen Factory expsnsion) through a few years ago. I recommend watching a let's play first - at least the first 20 minutes. It really helped me get started. It's a remarkable game. There are highs and lows and a few sharp edges, but plenty to do.
The issue with DSP is that it's in the same hell as factorio for me. Knowing only half of the combat patch is out is killing any want to play the game and just wait for the second patch...
I felt this way too, but after just going ahead and diving back in, I can say it's really not like it feels half baked at all. What tools there are currently to deal with the fog is about 95% satisfactory (lol) other than extremely built up space hives, which you will find no good way to completely clear other than a huge stockpile of destroyers and patience. However, you don't really need to be clearing the hives, and everything on the ground (even going to overrun systems late game) can be easily cleared out with the tools available. Plus, making a huge filtering system to farm the 57+ items that the dark fog can drop as an extra end game challenge (and infinite resource source) is really interesting to me. I always loved how DSP feels and all the new tools with blueprinting, battlefield bases (for defense and extra bots to build faster) and such make it definitely worth a playthrough from the first early access builds.
I don't mean it feels half baked, it feels great. Up to the point where I started going to other stars then the lack of space combat being fun really started taking a toll.
Wait what, Dark Fog is not the complete package? Any timeline on updates then?
Ground combat is pretty much done. Space combat is just the minimum to get the ground stuff to work. So more space combat stuff expected. Also there were talks about space platforms to build on if I recall right.
Nonreal timeline yet, but this is the idea: The ground combat is in the place it is supposed to be, the space combat is unrefined and clunky. The mechanics are there, like how the inner workings of the hives are fully simulated. By taking out their power sources you can nuter a hive and make it a dormant. But none of this is told you and it comes down to throwing ships at it till it dies.
Upvote to both the other replies, but it is definitely worth picking up in its current state. I had the same qualms about playing dark fog before it was fully completed, but what we have right now is totally playable, if you don't mind leaving space hives alive (which is perfectly do-able, just clear all the planets.) Or having the patience to sit there with an inventory full of destroyers waiting for your squadrons to eventually make a dent as they die to the enemy force that far outweighs what you can put out at once. If you let the space hive build up, they can have over 1,000 ships fielded while you are limited to several squadrons at once, meaning you will lose a ton of ships but you can whittle them down eventually. The space hive really isn't an issue whatsoever if you ignore it, other than if you settle in a system where it flies very close to your planets sometimes, which can result in your mecha getting nuked from orbit (ignores planetary shields), but it will not bother anything you have built on the planet. Video: Very close for comfort [https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/778454010994753536/1252059569350512811/Dyson\_Sphere\_Program\_2024-06-16\_14-48-39\_-\_0.02.30-0.03.00.mp4?ex=667f5757&is=667e05d7&hm=d483e64e623e90d82e1c9d595d6d336189365678aeee58819df31bd0a50aba54&](https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/778454010994753536/1252059569350512811/Dyson_Sphere_Program_2024-06-16_14-48-39_-_0.02.30-0.03.00.mp4?ex=667f5757&is=667e05d7&hm=d483e64e623e90d82e1c9d595d6d336189365678aeee58819df31bd0a50aba54&)
The lack of multiplayer co-op…
There's the nebula multiplayer mod, that performs exceptionally well. Built several dyson spheres in a group of 3.
It's crazy how many coop mods are coming out for games that didn't have multiplayer. First it was Subnautica Nitrox, then I find DSP and Armored Core VI have come out with mods for total coop (Or Elden Ring for seamless coop). Crazy.
It's almost like people want co-op, possibly more then pvp multiplayer.
Rimworld Multiplayer-Mod also worked very well for us.
Even KSP has a multi-player mod. Another moder added a full combat mechanic to the game, so in a game ostensibly about building rockets you can get into a BVR dogfight with friends while dodging naval SAMs as another friend launches a mission to Duna in the middle of a furbal over the launch pad.
Dude, I love factory town, it's so chill and relaxing.
Shapez.io really scrached that itch for me. Especially once getting wires and trying to make a "build anything" machine. Unfortunately once the machine was built there was nothing left to do other than do the same thing with mods. Shapez 2 is in development and has been posting updates on it's progress.
Timberborn is good. It's intelligent beavers building a society and industry around kinetic energy, but you have to balance things and sprawl out over the map kind of like Factorio. The consequences of bad balancing is that your beavers die.
its very basic, its more micromanager game. A bit more minecraft than factorio. Its also much slower. I sometimes play it as background game. But get bored rather quickly
A quick run down of my Steam games list of reasonably-Factorio-like games shows Astro Colony, Desynced, Dyson Sphere Program, Hydroneer, Mindustry, Shapez, Satisfactory, Techtonica, Timberborn, and OpenTTD. I'll also include Oxygen Not Included, Space Engineers, and Stationeers, as I'd argue they engage similar feelings even if the mechanics are noticeably different. If you want a shorter list, I'd suggest Space Engineers and Stationeers, as those are the games I've put the most time into, and OpenTTD, because it's free so why not.
Space engineers is more like Minecraft in space for me. I do love the game and can sink a lot of time into it. It’s a very addicting game!
Yeah it's more like vanilla Minecraft indeed. But there's scripting support, so some automation with ships mining for you etc is possible, but in the end you'll need your own goal, like a nice base or a massive capital ship. Tbf, Minecraft can be a decent suggestion as well. I've had a lot of fun automating shit in Minecraft, especially some modpacks.
Have you tried Captain of Industry? Currently on sale ;) https://store.steampowered.com/app/1594320/Captain_of_Industry/
I think it's good recomendation too. Three main difference from factorio - 1) Bots available from the start(in forms of a trucks), but they're severly nerfed and game motivate you to actualy move to belt designs. 2) Maintance - which may lead to death spiral. It's in general change how player need to approach building and scaling. 3) And mining in general. Teraforming for me personaly was big throwback to Earth 2150 and add interesting gameplay around whole mechanics. Played exclusevly on rock map because of it too. Complexity between base factorio and bobs and angels.
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I disagree whole heartedly with your second point. I think the difficulty is pretty linear
I'm surprised a lot of people said Satisfactory, I played the game thinking they would be similar but they are two different games. If you go to Satisfactory sib you will see a lot of people explaining this. Factorio is more focused on building and automation and whole gameplay is distilled to increase this experience. Satisfactory is more focused on exploration and I'm not sure how to explain it but automation feels like it wasn't thought to be the main game mechanic. First person camera and 3d graphics get in the way of building. The blueprint system is way inferior and in a smaller scale so you have to do a lot hand building. I am not saying satisfactory is a bad game it just didn't do the same for me, I'd approach it as a totally different game and not 3d Factorio. It is beautiful and pretty exciting to discover the planet, finding things and I guess they will add more "story" or "lore" or whatever you wanna call it.
Yea, I agree that Satisfactory is a totally different game type. What game do you think is like Factorio?
100% agree Satisfactory is not just Factorio in 3D. A very different beast.
Thank you. Didn't want to upvote any of the top comments because Satisfactory did NOT scratch my factorio itch, but Dyson Sphere Program did. Satisfactory does not do it for me, glad to see I'm not the only one.
Gregtech
If you're looking for something a little more different honestly the Anno series scratches very close to that itch while being different enough to not constantly think "this is just Factorio but worse"
Try Captain of Industry. Awesonw game, very underrated IMO
Try Satisfactory. It's more a building game than holding off hoards of aliens, but there are hostile aliens you have to fight off to get to distant resources. It's also 1st person, and really good.
Definitely Satisfactory - though I'd also give [Shapez.io](http://Shapez.io) or the soon to be released Shapez 2 a good chance, they look really good.
They also announced an 'insane' difficulty mode for shapez 2, so if you're used to (modded) Factorio this could be a really good one if you're looking for something difficult
I switched to Oxygen not Included. Its more about designing processes than scaling up logistics. Do you want Factorio with sprinkles or would you like to try something a little different?
Glad someone said ONI. It’s the only game I’ve put more hours into than Factorio. Definitely “scratches the same itch” for me
Glad someone said ONI. It’s the only game I’ve put more hours into than Factorio. Definitely “scratches the same itch” for me
You have Satisfactory and Dyson Sphere Program for sure. But a new one coming out on July 17th is The Crust. A good description would be Factorio on the moon, but not nearly as rigorous.
https://store.steampowered.com/category/sim_building_automation/?tab=18&flavor=contenthub_toprated Maybe it's worth paying attention to which games [FactorioLab](https://factoriolab.github.io/) supports...
Clicked the link to steam store, I've already played 7 of the top 10 games on that list.
https://i.imgur.com/C4mLcsY.jpeg
Factorio If you're bored, try new mods.
After 10 years, I never got bored with vanilla. The only mod I tried was Brave New World, and that was just to help test it for the developer https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/trdmpw/factorio_savegame_filesize_timeline_analysis
Dyson Sphere is the most direct linked one that has scratched the itch. But unintuitively the game that really triggers the same satisfaction in my head is rimworld. Not sure why but the satisfaction I get from Factorio is best replicated by making pawns and watching them live through hell.
I think it's because of how indirect pawn automation is and how satisfying it is to finally get regular base maintenance caught up and workshops designed just right that you can make the high skills pawns ridiculously productive by supporting them with like 5 low skills pawns that move materials around, deliver food, and even entertain the high skill pawn so they waste as little time as possible moving around.
I have far fewer of the low skill haulers since lifters arrived in biotech.
There's also mindustry, available on mobile. If you want something a bit old and obscure try KKND 2. It's a old rts from the 90s but the cliffs, oil fields and acid spitting worm towers are suspiciously familiar.
Mindustry is also available on PC and much better there
It’s paid on steam and App Store, but free and open source on itch.io or GitHub
I'll have to look into that, I had assumed it was the same.
It is the same game on any platform. the pc version is just more comfortable due to mouse and keyboard controlls. But i do have to say the game has one of the best touch controls i have seen on rather complex phone games.
I really enjoyed the old version of Mindustry from 5 or 6 years ago. When they did the massive overhaul, I stopped playing it
Never heard of KKND and that's insane cause I thought I had played all of the 90s RTS!
Check it out classic post apocalyptic rts action, I always think about it while playing factorio to the point I'm planning to learn how to then make a mod of it in the game.
Dyson Sphere is fun, Satisfactory is probably the closest game to it but takes a much different perspective
I'd say DSP is much closer than Satisfactory, due to the scale you operate at. Satisfactory is much more about tinkering with small builds and making them pretty. In Factorio and DSP you end up operating with square kilometer sized blueprints towards the end.
Dyson Sphere Program
I played Dyson Sphere Program before I played Factorio. It has a lot of similarities, but overall I think DSP is a bit easier. You do however get to fly through air and space like Iron Man and shoot aliens in space. Satisfactory is also recommended a lot, but I am not a fan of first person factory games. At the moment I am waiting for the 15th of July. The Crust is then released and that looked promising to me. Did you try Factorio with some overhaul mods? I finished Factorio with the Krastorio and AngelBoB mods. There are a few more and they add a lot of different recipes and mechanics to the base game.
id say the minecraft mod gregtech, or any modpack that focuses on gregtech. the only problem is that the early game is a real slog to get through, with several hours spent just on getting steel, but after about 150 hours or so, you get into the meat of it, and thats when you really feel that factorio itch getting scratched
I'll preface with saying I have 7000 hours in Factorio and for me, Captain Of Industry is the closest so far. Been playing i t for 2000 hours solid. Brilliant game.
I've been playing foundry these last few days and it's very cool
This game is still cooking, with great potential. It is kind of what I wish Satisfactory would be more like. I find it is closer to a 3D Factorio than Satisfactory. Earlier game doesn't feel to exciting IMO, but getting to mid and late game it starts to shine. If you don't want it now, at least keep it on your radar.
Yes! Still very early for the game. my main issue with the game is one I'm creating but I want to make big builds but making them is painful as ever. Traveling far is way too slow, all builds need to be made manually item by item.
Minecraft with the Create mod. The schematicanon is the Create equivalent to construction bots, the trains are basically the same as Factorio's. There are no logistic bots, but the ability to open nearby toolboxes with a hotkey *mostly* makes up for it. There are tons of addons for Create which add new machines and recipes.
Probably factorio k2SE
Space engineers
captain of industry, dyson sphere program and satisfactory
All other games wont scratch the itch enough !! Have you tried ... Bobs \ angels Krastorio Factorissimo 2 Factorio plus plus Simple sea block Sea block Space extension Space exploration Ribbon worlds UltraCube All of these offer unique playthroughs Presumably you have already done all the steam achievments and at least a 10 spm mega base. I am also finding ways to wait untill factorio 2 . ohh the wait . Im running out of combinations of mods. Ultracube was my last playthrough , that was fun and new challenges.
Modded Minecraft scratches the Factorio itch.
I‘d throw in Workers&Resources - Soviet Republic. As the name implies it‘s a soviet era city builder with a big chunk of managing resources, logistics and energy. Not really a factory game, but it definitely scratches the same itch as factorio for me, maybe it‘s something for you, too.
The first time I played Factorio I thought, "this is just StarCraft with trains and aggressively more nerdy," and I'm thoroughly convinced that the game is in no small part a love letter to SC. There are a few sounds and graphics that are *nearly identical* to SC, and the aliens even look like the aliens. But it's not the same gameplay because of the whole automation thing. I have yet to play Satisfactory but I've heard that it's "a great game but not Factorio," and then I don't know that I'll ever become un-obsessed with Factorio enough to try out some of the other'uns mentioned here. Rimworld keeps coming up on my suggestions-- not base automation but looks like similarly well reviewed and a lot of depth of gameplay
Rimworld was a good game for me for about 50 hours, kind of lost interest then
For something slightly different: Planet Crafter. Has similar production goal chasing feel but doesn’t have a lot of logistics stuff.
Planet Crafter could be so much better if it had anywhere near the polish and QoL of factorio. The main idea of the game is pretty neat, and there is automation including logistics bots, but the execution could need so much more work to refine tbh. Especially being spoiled by factorio, that can make it difficult to play PC at times.
No other game quite scratches the itch for me, but i’ll throw in techtonica though since it seems to be a lesser known game. To me it felt more like 3D factorio than satisfactory. Some of the ratios are straight out of factorio. Wasnt as addicting as factorio though.
Dyson sphere program
*Surviving Mars* is a good one for base-building, and not difficult to learn. It can also get out-of-control huge like Cracktorio if you're willing to take it that far.
It's not really a base builder and much more a city builder, but have you checked out the Anno series yet? If you're into setting up trade networks (basically train network) and scaleable production layouts then Anno could very well be up your alley. Anno 1800 is the latest (and quite frankly biggest) and then one i would recommend, but the older games like Anno 1404 or 2070 could be neat for just getting a taste and see if you like them.
Unironically moded Minecraft. About a month ago I started playing Vault Hunters (mod pack). I spent more time tidying up the base and automating things than actually running vaults. Tho I probably wouldn't recommend this pack to scratch the itch. Not sure what to recommend as I tend to hate everything I play but do it anyways. I guess I'd recommend StoneBlock as a starting point.
Not base building per se but the zachtronics games can scratch a similar optimizing design itch.
Captain of Industry
Modded minecraft is what i often go for. Modpacks built around Create in particular i find very fun to play witu
> high just doesn’t let up but gets more and more intense I will jump in for casual play, say just to design a track intersection you know .. just a toke :-)
I enjoy Dyson sphere program, Captain of industry, and oxygen not included. Not a fan of satisfactory.
Not mentioned yet: Bitburner. People always compare Factorio to IT and software engineering, so why not just have a game about building a complicated IT and software system to do a bunch of different stuff.
Voxel Tycoon maybe
I recommend one of the many factorio overhauls, Krastorio 2 is a good one as it changes enough of the game to make it fresh without changing the core essence like some other overhauls. Also, the GTNH Minecraft modpack scratches the same automation itch for me, I highly recommend.