#automationgame

So... after a long absence, motivated by lack of “stuff“ to post (such as art or stories I’d want to post), I made a decision to get back here, and start posting some other things too - for example, musings on game design, or on writing, or on proper infrastructure. I was never much of a blog person, but perhaps I can change this and actually use Tumblr for its intended purpose.

And, on the note of game design, as well as writing, and infrastructure, let me kick things off by mentioning a particular aspect of factory-building games. Starting from Factorio, which pretty much started the genre as we know it, factory games and automation games like to finger-point at the player for the pollution and resource depletion that comes from their factory/base development. Some games, like Factorio itself, are subtle about it and only imply the bad environmental effects through attacks by local creatures, forests dying near polluting industries, and lakes showing water pollution; it’s enough of a background thing, but still notable enough, that the game ends up without really having a message one way or another. Satisfactory, which put the genre in 3D, simply goes full-on Spec Ops: The Line and bludgeons the player with “You’re a bad guy! Stop playing!“, and hey, it got what it wanted from me at least. The Riftbreaker is another bizarre take - the main protagonist seems to be interested in reducing environmental harm and peacefully studying the planet in question, but the gameplay goes completely against that. Other automation games downplay the pollution problems, or put the player on barren planets with no environment to harm, or they might be using medieval-fantasy-level technology like the good old Settlers games, meaning the environmental impact is notably lower. But. Looking over the genre, it honestly feels like none of those games (at least, none I’ve played or seen) let the players actually clean up after themselves. And that feels like one hell of an omission.