RecommendedSteam player
I would have reviewed this sooner, but that would mean leaving the factory, and the factory must growShow moreShow less
1,041.9 hours at review4,972 people found this helpful
Written during Early Access
Factorio
Factorio is a strong fit when you want to turn raw materials into complex production lines and coordinate plans with other players. Single-player, co-op, and multiplayer support different ways to organize a factory, while enemies keep infrastructure under pressure. The current price is ≈ $19.42 at 
GOG, at this site’s recorded low. For players who enjoy automation, logistics, and long-term problem solving, this is a timely way to enter an industrial sandbox whose appeal comes from gradual expansion rather than quick rewards. Confirmed interface languages include Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Hungarian, Dutch, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Portuguese-Brazil, Romanian, Finnish, Swedish, Czech, Russian, Ukrainian, Japanese, Korean, Turkish, Greek, Spanish-Latin America, Thai, and Vietnamese; the offer activates on DRM-Free as Standard.
All-time low ~ $19.99across Steam & third-party storesat the recorded all-time low
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Price History
Past 36 months · Updated dailyHistorical Low~ $35.002023-08Current Low Across Stores~ $35.00SteamAt its historical low now
Prices cover Steam and 39 authorized stores; only legitimate offers are counted. The chart shows weekly market-wide lows and Steam's official price across the past 36 months.
01About Factorio
Factorio is a 2D factory-building game where you mine resources, research technologies, and create increasingly complex production chains. Belts, machines, oil processing, and robots turn separate materials into automated industry. Enemies make defense part of your planning. The Steam PC version includes co-op, multiplayer, mods, scenarios, and a map editor. It released on August 14, 2020, with Steam players rating it 97% from 192,527 reviews.
Credits
Developer
Wube Software LTD.
Publisher
Wube Software LTD.
Lowest recorded in 36 months
$35.002023-08-12 · SteamBase game · same records as the chart above; USD history, not a regional Steam low.Language support
| Language | Interface | Subtitles | Audio |
|---|---|---|---|
| Simplified Chinese | Yes | — | — |
| Traditional Chinese | Yes | — | — |
| English | Yes | — | — |
Show 23 more languages
| Language | Interface | Subtitles | Audio |
|---|---|---|---|
| French | Yes | — | — |
| Italian | Yes | — | — |
| German | Yes | — | — |
| Spanish | Yes | — | — |
| Hungarian | Yes | — | — |
| Dutch | Yes | — | — |
| Norwegian | Yes | — | — |
| Polish | Yes | — | — |
| Portuguese | Yes | — | — |
| Portuguese-Brazil | Yes | — | — |
| Romanian | Yes | — | — |
| Finnish | Yes | — | — |
| Swedish | Yes | — | — |
| Czech | Yes | — | — |
| Russian | Yes | — | — |
| Ukrainian | Yes | — | — |
| Japanese | Yes | — | — |
| Korean | Yes | — | — |
| Turkish | Yes | — | — |
| Greek | Yes | — | — |
| Spanish-Latin America | Yes | — | — |
| Thai | Yes | — | — |
| Vietnamese | Yes | — | — |
Steam PC edition data · 2026-10-14
02Before you buy
Modes
The Steam PC version supports single-player, multiplayer, and co-op, along with Steam Cloud and cross-platform multiplayer.
Language and controls
Interface languages include English, German, Simplified Chinese, and Traditional Chinese among the listed options. Full controller support is listed.
Core play
Mine resources, research technologies, automate production, and defend your factory from enemies.
03Frequently asked questions
What is Factorio?
Factorio combines factory construction, resource management, research, and defense in a 2D world.
Can I play alone or with others?
Yes. The Steam PC version supports single-player, multiplayer, and co-op.
What do you do in the game?
You build infrastructure, research technologies, automate production, and protect your facilities from enemies.
Are there creation and customization tools?
The Steam PC version supports mods, scenarios, and an in-game map editor.
9.1
Overall Score
Graphics7.5
Audio8.6
Gameplay9.7
Story7
Content9.5
“A twelve-year industrial automation benchmark chaining conveyors and inserters into sprawling logistics networks, vastly expanded by a complete sequel-sized DLC.”
Our Verdict
# Verdict
Context: 12 years of polishing one game, the indie benchmark
When Wube Software launched the Indiegogo crowdfunding in January 2013, the entire indie industry was still in the early "indie game ships fast and monetizes fast" phase. Wube took the opposite path — 12 years polishing one game, from 1-2 to 31 employees, 4.5 years from EA to 1.0, then 4 more years from 1.0 to Space Age DLC. This "specialize-on-one-thing" operations philosophy is exceptionally rare in indie history.
Over 12 years, Factorio accumulated over 5 million sales, Metacritic 90 / Space Age 92, OpenCritic Strong verdict, Steam 187,000 reviews 96% positive, IndieGameReviewer 2020 Indie Game of the Year, BAFTA Best Debut Game nomination. This work's design philosophy has been widely referenced by successor works like Satisfactory, Dyson Sphere Program, Captain of Industry, and Shapez.io.
More dramatic is its impact on the engineering community. Cracktorio nickname, Yunfeng and other Chinese programmers spending 300 hours and writing summaries, Shopify co-founder allowing employees to expense purchases, US engineering schools recommending it to new students, Neobuthus factorio scorpion species named after the game — these details combined prove Factorio is not just a game, it is an "industrial simulation textbook plus engineering thinking training tool" industrial-grade phenomenon.
Who should buy it
Group one — engineers, programmers, and optimization-leaning players. If you have STEM background or your career involves engineering system optimization, Factorio is the most complete "systems thinking training tool" you can find on PC. Flexible logistics of conveyors plus inserters plus assemblers, circuit logic design, 7-color science pack supply chain planning, Space Age cross-planetary automation — every mechanic maps to real industrial concepts.
Group two — simulation management veterans. If you played Dwarf Fortress, Oxygen Not Included, RimWorld, or The Sims, Factorio is the 12-year ceiling of this lane. It made "automation" the game's core mechanic, distinguishing from peers where "automation is auxiliary."
Group three — players wanting to train systems thinking. If you want to train big-picture thinking, production line design, circuit logic, supply chain management, Factorio is a low-cost high-efficiency textbook. Many companies use Factorio as team-building activity — programmers build factories together, learning collaboration and system design from it.
Group four — Cracktorio addicts. If you previously sat down to a factory automation game and refused to stop for 5-10 hours, Factorio will make you "addicted enough to question life." The Cracktorio nickname is not a joke — many players continue opening new saves and play hundreds of hours after victory.
Who should not buy it
Group one — players hating complex interfaces. Factorio's UI follows "information density priority" — one screen displays dozens of different status indicators. If you played 50 hours of Call of Duty and felt "complex enough," Factorio will redefine "complex" for you.
Group two — players demanding narrative story. Factorio has no traditional main story; all narrative is player-generated. If your purchase motivation is "I want to hear a complete story," avoid it.
Group three — players demanding polished art. Factorio is minimalist 2D top-down with no 3D modeling or lighting effects. If The Witcher 3 or Cyberpunk 2077 spoiled you, Factorio will feel "too primitive."
Group four — players unwilling to invest 100+ hours in learning. Factorio's first 10 hours require heavy tutorial reading and trial-and-error. IGN's review describes it as "dauntingly complex." If you expect "10 hours to master," Factorio is not for you.
Group five — players who want PvP or social-driven gameplay. Factorio's multiplayer is strictly cooperative factory-building with no competitive ladder, no matchmaking, no seasonal events. If your purchase motivation is "play with friends in short sessions for bragging rights," Among Us or Helldivers 2 will scratch that itch far better; Factorio's coop is more like sharing a software-engineering project than playing a party game, and most online sessions run 4-12 hours per sitting.
Recommended versions and discount lines
First choice — Steam base plus Space Age DLC bundle. Base $130 plus Space Age $130, list total $260. Steam seasonal sales typically discount 25 to 50% to $130 to $195. New players should buy the bundle directly — Wube clearly recommends in their blog "play Space Age directly, do not play base first then add DLC later" because Space Age's pacing has been rebalanced.
Second choice — Switch 2 version. Native 1080p handheld / 4K docked at 60 fps, best for non-PC players. Controller operation thoroughly redesigned; handheld mode fits commute and lunch break scenarios. Downside: no mod support (PC exclusive).
Third choice — Steam Deck. Verified rating allows long handheld sessions; headphones deliver full stereo. The best portable and cost-effective option for non-PC players.
The version not to avoid is none — any platform is complete experience. GOG / official website versions match Steam content, just without Steam Workshop integration (Factorio itself does not use Steam Workshop, using its own Mod Portal).
Overall, the 2026 optimal Factorio experience path is PC plus Steam plus Space Age DLC plus selective mods plus long weekend investment. If you accept the 10 hour learning cost, Factorio will become one of the most worthwhile titles to keep in your PC library. Many veterans still mine new gameplay at 1000+ hours. Sequel? Wube has clearly stated on Discord "no Factorio 2 in the short term"; they will continue extending the work via DLC.
Latest news about Factorio
Popular Steam reviews
Native-language selection · 10 reviewsSelected helpful reviews in this language show both recommendations and criticisms. This selection does not represent the overall positive rating; opinions reflect the version reviewed.
Not recommendedSteam player
Let me first say I love this game and I have been an alpha backer for a long time before Factorio hit steam. So don't get confused over the little playtime steam shows I have. I've put hundreds of hours into Factorio, some uninterrupted sessions being over a dozen hours long having the most awesome intellectual stimulating happy time ever gnawing my knuckles bloody while trying to optimize my oilrefinery. Factorio is a unique mashup of the survival/craft/minecraft genre with its own niche and right to exist, because it focusses mainly on designing production flows, which nearly no other game does especially in that depth. Anybody who liked Infinifactory will love Factorio, as it is basically its more sincere older brother in 2D. What bothers me though is, that while the dev team is great at staying in contact with the community and decent in polishing the game and the engine in particular the game still has no endgame content. Myself, as a player, desperately needs goals to work towards, and no, self created goals dont work for me, I need a carrot to work towards, and I consistently will grow more and more unhappy the longer I have no carrot to target. Call me uncreative, or achievementaddicted, that might be true, but I swear I'm not alone with that problem. The current hight of feelings in that regard is the spacerocket, which has turned out to be the last and only goal of Factorio for over one year now. The absurd spacerockets resourcerequirements is an obvious hint that the devs ran out of creativity at that point, and once reached trying to finish the spacerocket in lesser time is nothing I can destilate much enjoyment out of. There are similar red exclamationmarks in design of that game, for example the totally pointless existence of the native alien race that currently exist just to be an annoyance, since the diplomatic system has been announced for over a year now. Or let me give another example: the one dimensional evolution of energy production. The single and only source of energy - until lategame, when one has solar energy; is steamengines, which turn once one solved the logistics of them just into another annoyance. Restrictions grow creativity, yet every rerun of the game one only has the most efficient path to follow instead of having to choose between different technology trees or being restricted on some buildings (aquatic powergeneration comes to mind). Regarding lategame: Things like implementing a placeholder system that pushes out demands of goods to produce and deliver once one is in space or similar would be incredibly easy, yet it is completely overlooked, even while a part of the community craves these features. There even have been dozens of decent suggestions on reddit and the forums in which directions the game could develop from that point, even as hilarious as turning it into a x4ish space economy sim. As long as this state continues, and Factorio basically is a proof of concept and not a game I can't motivate myself to play it again. And month for month when scrolling through my steam library looking what to play I'll pause for a sad silent moment over Factorio, sighingly remembering the good times I had with it, when stuff was new and thinking about what this awesome game could be if it solved these easy problems hindering it from reaching awesomeness. Is Factorio worth your 20 $? - Definitely, you'll probably get way more hours for your buck out of it compared to AAA titles Am I happy with it in it's current state? - nope :( Thanks for reading my rant, I hope it has been helpful to you /edit 27/6/16: achievements \o/ /edit 23/11/2016: with the option of endless science now as placeholder endgame, I am looking forward to update .15 to maybe bring new content that would legitimately tackle some of my points, like more complex energy and fluid management for example. We'll see what the future holds. This review will never change to positive though, just because of its rank as negative review now. I feel it does an acceptable job at fairly informing possible purchasers about cons without discrediting the devs effortsShow moreShow less
69.3 hours at review1,825 people found this helpful
Written during Early Access
RecommendedSteam player
I started a co-op factory with a close friend. After a day of work, I stepped back, looked at what we built, and came to some realizations. 1) I have no ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ idea whats going on in this factory 2) Half the components that directly interact with each other aren't even near one another, one of the machines producing copper cable for another machine to assemble into circuit boards is halfway across the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ refinery 3) 90% of the conveyor belts are underground, and the rest are going so many directions this thing looks like a ball of yarn 4) There is coal ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ EVERYWHERE 5) I maintain enough sanity to count to 5 6) Staring at this thing makes my eyes itch 7) Looking away makes my brain itch The scariest part is that it keeps getting bigger, and every time it gets bigger it somehow becomes MORE labrynthine. One of those ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ conveyor belts goes all the way around the entire factory to deliver steel plates to a single assembler thats making bloody gears, and its right next to the refinery itself! Sometimes the factory breaks. We don't usually notice because of how much of a mess this thing is, and the breaks we do spot are often half an hour old and are a recurring problem. Rather than fix it, we simply unjam the machine and ignore it until it breaks again. The biggest problem to fixing it comes from our production lines. Normal production lines look like a grid. Ours looks like you threw a bunch of squares into a bowl of spaghetti noodles and gave the bowl to a five year old for a period of one to five minutes. This proccess results in either an empty bowl and a full five year old, a floor covered in noodles, or spaghetti all over the walls and ceiling with the squares nowhere to be found. Knowing the trend in increasing chaos and complexity the factory exhibits, probably all three. The factory is an empodiment of madness incomprehensible even to the men who built it, laid every unholy circuit of conveyor belt, a thousand arms madly spinning every second, countless plates of copper and iron in a complex dance the likes of which is unseen in the realm of mere mortals. There are sections that I have no idea how they work, and I BUILT THEM. The factory grows more complex with each passing second and more convoluted every milisecond. Perhaps the reason is in part due to each segment being constructed with no plans for future additions, then the future additions were constructed by forcibly adapting the existing segments, usually by shoving more tubes into it rather than actually redesigning it, and these futrue additions are also not planned for expansion. The end result is a cluster-♥♥♥♥ so large in magnitude, the last time a cluster-♥♥♥♥ rivaled it in size, God smote the town and turned its inhabitants into salt. Unfortunately no god can save us from this... thing. Having expanded it further its almost as if the factory has a mind of its own, an ever hungry consciousness burning with dark malevolence and the need to grow. It infects all who stand in its presence, compelling them to add to it. A hundred furnaces belch smoke and the black blood of the earth is torn from its cradle to fuel the fires of industry. The ecosystem is demolished and the skin of the planet is rent and shattered for its glittering treasures, tossed into the inferno of a thousand stone and metal prisons to be transformed, used to expand the malignant blight upon the world that we brought. Ten thousand steel cogs turn and steam fills the air as the never ending fires boil the oceans away to power the sprawling spiderweb of mechanised mayhem, ordered chaos at its purest, a hundred thousand plates of steel and copper cycle and swirl in patterns barely knowable by the very people that created them. Each day, the red and green fluids are pumped into glowing crystalline globes, each sparking and burning, discovering new knowledge and new machines. The factory grows. Each advance in technology only complicates matters. The factory grows. The new advances create a need for new resources. The factory grows. The new resources require new means of transportation. The factory grows. The new transportation feeds new machines that burn the new resources to produce blue fluids to discover new technology. The factory grows. The blue fluids feed the globes to reveal new truths, beginning the vicious cycle anew, a neverending circle of destruction and growth that will only end when every corner of the planet is scoured clean. The factory grows. The planet will never be scoured clean. The factory grows. The planet is infinite in size. The factory grows. The game will never be over. The factory grows. Epilogue: //: Date: 6/21/[ERROR_NULL_VALUE] Resources have dried up again. The factory consumes all within its reach, insatiable in its hunger. Though it had experienced full production stoppages in the past, the factory could never be eliminated from the planet by the natives, for the sun itself powered the beams of destruction that maintained its borders. Within the creaking, ancient cogs and permanent haze of foul and polluted smoke, a single humanoid shape slowly rises to its feet. Aged, failing flesh and bone long ago replaced with steel and chrome, once polished and clean, now weathered by uncountable years of exposure to acid rain and blackened by thick, choking smog, form its excuse for a body. It could have left while it was still human, before it was consumed in body by the foundry it created to escape. It never had a chance to leave, mind and soul devoured in the pursuit of freedom. With slow, clanking steps and the steady drip of oil from its joints, like a bleeding mechanical nightmare brought to hideous life, it stands and rasps as it moves for the exit. Behind it, a thousand drones rise like a plague of locusts, ready to continue the endless harvest. As the abomination that was once a man steps towards the gates of the factory, a mighty space faring vessel lies decrepit in its dry dock deep within the core of the facility. It was supposed to be a way off the planet, the whole reason for the factory's construction. But soon, the building of the factory became the means and the end, no thought other than the constant urge to grow in its mind. The only machine resembling the human form in the entire world stepped out into the barren wasteland of the ruined world. A keening, howling wind tears across the surface, forests destroyed by the ruined atmosphere no longer keeping it in check. It is the cry of a dead world, echoing forever on a planet overtaken by the machine.Show moreShow less
94.3 hours at review3,016 people found this helpful
Written during Early Access
Not recommendedSteam player
Good game but raising the price on an already released game is a practice I will never support and hopefully never catches onShow moreShow less
111.4 hours at review997 people found this helpful
RecommendedSteam player
It says I have played 7,279 hours of this game, and it is asking me if I would recommend it??? Yaa dude I would recommend it LOLShow moreShow less
7,297 hours at review2,320 people found this helpful
Not recommendedSteam player
I know im on the minority here, but i want to express an important point no one really likes to talk about. At first, i play this game for years now, long before it went on Steam and have many playhours that i enjoyed. The problem i have with this game, and that isnt visible until you invest more time playing it, is that it doesnt go anywhere due to a lack of depth in some mechanics/areas. I dont mean, making sense in playing a videogame. I mean theres no real freedom as the core design goes in circles of pointless crafting for no "reason". Let me explain that. You start in automating the process of harvesting resources and producing items/goods/products. Call the endresult how you feel fit. But the only purpose is, to be able to automate the production of sciencepacks, to then research new ways to enhance that process, only to be more effective into producing sciencepacks. You see, this goes in circles and goes nowhere. When you play Factorio, you are only there to do what you do, for no reason other to be more effective in this pointless process. Yes, there is combat in Factorio. Its the weakest mechanic in the whole game and despite the focus of the game, isnt automated. What i liked about Factorio is the idea of getting rid of handcrafting everything and automating this with using machines, robotarms and belts. And it achieved that in 3 of 4 main aspects of the game. If i was more precise i would say 2.5 of 4. Factorio is about these aspects: - Building and Producing - Exploring the map for resources and enemies - fighting enemies and defend your structures - Research new ways of doing all of that The Research aspect and the building/producing aspect received numerous additions in updates to be fully automated and deliver enough ways to get it working. The exploration aspect, only consists of either moving out by yourself, with a car or by foot, or using radar scaners, which are limited in range. So that process could maybe be considered automated, but with restrictions (A scout unit could make the trick here). What is lacking and missing, is the combat. Its weak, often plain out boring and underdeveloped (barely any updates for combat). Not only does the tower defense aspect not really deliver, but doing attacks on alien nests yourself is tedious busywork that needs something fresh and new to be interesting. Which gets me back to the initial point. The game has no main purpose of why im doing all of that, beside being more effective at doing really nothing. Which led me to the question, why not "simply" make combat automated and add Combat Robotics? Producing items in Factorio would finally serve a purpose and have an end of a chain. Whenever i played factorio, i built an effective and well made factory producing thousands of items a minute, only to... Yeah what exactly? These products serve no purpose. Why would i massproduce copperplates exactly? I can pump out enough science packs easily without having to massproduce anything. All the weapons and combat related researches, are a waste and only give the player items he/she might craft ONE time, and then never again. Why would i massproduce armor or a gun? I can only carry one, so having more than two would be pointless. Not if i had combat robotics to have my factory autobuild droids that i can send out to fight the aliens. It would add a complex mechanic, give this whole prodouction a second goal/approach (waging war at aliens) and basically making it one of the best RTS Games you could imagine. And dont get me wrong, there are attempts of that. A mod introduced Combat Robotics, doing exactly what i hope they will include into the vanilla game later. But its of lesser quality, robots arent animated and it doesnt feel as well made as if it was done by the developer. Sadly, this game might be great in many aspects, but lacks in the most important thing i could think of, giving me freedom. And after i played enough to experiment with factory designs, theres nothing to it you can do otherwise. Which means, that PvP also isnt really interesting to begin with, as missing "attack" options for a player, wont get you playing PvP. Both players building a factory, which takes hours for most people, only to place some turrets and attacking your enemy, meaning you had to go there personally to deal with his/her turrets, is boring and not really interesting. But producing units and sending them out to fight, as in an RTS, would deliver that though. To show off how ridiculously obvious it is, that the lacking combat and point of producing is kicking the game down, is that you really dont need to massproduce efficiently to get to the "goal". You can build a small factory, research your stuff and get your rocket off, well done. No need to really massproduce and expand your base by much. You dont even have to leave your first base and still be able to hit the endgame. If they release their game without proper combat mechanics and production chains related to that, i feel that the game lacks a real lategame alltogether. It has an endgame but no lategame. You can reach a goal of shooting a rocket up and "escape". It doesnt encourage playing lategame though, as keeping on producing has no other point than that (like continue war). An example, to underline this point: I played with a friend and when we started (he was new to the game) i explained him how it works. He then just asked "And why are we doing all of this? Why would we spent hours of work to get a good factory running?". I couldnt give him an answer, because there is none. I thought to myself, i would have liked to tell him "to be able to produce robots of different kinds, which we then can send out to raid alien nests, because those get large in numbers and grow stronger each hour we play, turning it into a Coop Real Time Strategy Game where we build bases and train units, like in the old C&C and Dune Days when we played CompStomp Matches." The next time i loaded the Combat Robotics Mod with him, it was a much better session. We had much more fun producing things and trying to build new bases. We felt great massproducing weapons, armor and ammo for "soldiers", so we could send them out to die in a big war. Which was great. If the developers took that mod (or a bunch, because there are really good ones), polished it and included it into the vanilla game, I would easily say that this game is finally a step up from the RTS Genre to a new era of strategy gaming, but also being a must-buy overall. A genious game for a low price for what it delivers. But in the state it is, lacking in such a big aspect, i can say that this is only true for those who just want to mess around with factory designs and occasional fights. If its just experimenting with production designs while occasionally building some towers and walls to stop aliens annoying you while you do that, feel free to buy it. As you will get an awesome game. If you however want a game where producing has a point and research not only makes you more efficient but also gives you proper stuff to use your resources for, if you want to fight aliens and spend time to create a deadly factory. Dont buy it as that part is a shallow placeholder. The whole main idea of the game is to automate processes so the player only has to deal with macro tasks, commanding, managing, taking care of the strategy. But currently this only applies to the production of new resources, and nothing else. Which is a break with the whole idea to begin with. If they manage to find a way to tackle that issue or just include the already given idea of combat robotics that many players want, use and deemed a great idea, i will change this review to a completely positive one, as i cant think of any flaw apart of the described one. They now need to bring combat/exploration on the same depth-level as building and researching. Otherwise half of its features stay underdeveloped.Show moreShow less
67.4 hours at review917 people found this helpful
RecommendedSteam player
Help for new players. Rule #1. When you think you have enough iron, you don't. Trust me. Rule #2. When you have backups in your system, don't worry, you'll have shortages later. Get more iron. Rule #3. Leave enough room to expand without having to do crazy stuff with your belts. Spaghetti is fun, until it isn't because you can't send enough material down the entire belt, and there's no room to supplement it down the line. Rule #4. When you have backups, start storing extras in chests. You'll need it later. Rule #5. Crap, I'm out of copper. Get more copper. Rule #6. Create dedicated factory towns for iron plates and copper plates, and build gear wheels and copper cables on site. It's much more efficient than trying to transport them. Rule #6. Wait, there is automation for automation? Flying robots? Check. Rule #7. Aliens love radars. Don't put radars near things that matter (like your steam engines) unless you support them with enough turrets. Rule #7-a. Flamethrowers are your friend for killing aliens. Unless you're in the middle of your town, in which case they are not. Rule #7-b. Same goes with atomic weapons. When you're not actively fighting outside your base, remove atomic bombs from your hotbar unless you want a very expensive mistake (read: hole) in your factory. Rule #8. Take enough ammo with you when you go to fight aliens. It's lots of fun to run out of ammo in the middle of a battle, and it goes quickly. Rule #8-b. Personal laser turrets are a gigantic step forward in biter-fighting - just ensure you have enough power to keep them going. Rule #9. Don't stand on train tracks when trains are automated. Rule #10. Use the little overlay in map view to see where your power poles are. Create redundancies so an entire section of your base is not dependent on a single pole somewhere (you will accidentally destroy or remove it at some point, guaranteed - ahem, cars). Rule #11. Blueprints are amazing, and the community is fantastic at sharing their different creations. Try them out, and then see if you have a better or more creative way to make something work (if you want). Rule #12. Deconstruction planning forests is amazing. Clear out wood quickly, or filter to only pick up certain types of items (e.g. items laying on the ground, or just small power poles). Rule #13. Logistics robots change your world. Rule #13-a. You always need more power. Rule #14. The modding community is active and makes lots of ways to keep the game fresh. Rule #15. Oh, there's a better way to build that. Let me start over. Again. Rule #16. Wait, is that the sun coming up already? Rule #17. Remember your family fondly. Rule #18 Get more iron. Cracktorio is more accurate. 10/10Show moreShow less
886.6 hours at review1,728 people found this helpful
Not recommendedSteam player
While this is a great game, I always felt like the $30 price tag was fairly high, especially when you consider that it will never go on sale. Now they're raising the price to $35, years after the release and after the game has already made them a LOT of money. There's also no new content to justify this. It's pure greed and seems like a cheap attempt to get people who had been holding off to buy it right now due to "fear of missing out". I also think it's ridiculous that Steam will flag these reviews as "off-topic". The game's price and the developers' actions directly related to the game are very relevant for people who are trying to decide whether they should buy it. It's bad enough that newer games are increasing in price, don't let this become standard practice. Edit: In my local currency the price actually increased by the equivalent of over $10 and the game now costs over $43 here.Show moreShow less
41.3 hours at review723 people found this helpful
RecommendedSteam player
This game is extremely addictive for one simple reason: it's a sandbox survival game with zero grind, because everything can be automated. In a normal survival game, to craft 100 items, you need to first harvest 100 of some resource. In this game, you set up a power plant, a coal mine to fuel the it, an iron mine, a few assembly plants, a few conveyor belts and a chest and then wait for it to fill up with 100 grenades while you go work on another part of the factory. Meanwhile, the increasing pollution makes the bugs native to the planet increasingly agitated. Automation is extended into every single part of the gameplay - you can mass produce buildings, then use robots to place them according to blueprints, transport items with automatic trains, and create complex control networks to let production adapt to demand. There is always something to do with very little repetition - a sudden bug attack, a bottleneck in your iron production, a depleted ore patch that forces you to explore for a new one. People spend absurd amounts of time on this game because it doesn't waste any of it.Show moreShow less
105.7 hours at review1,440 people found this helpful
Written during Early Access
Not recommendedSteam player
kovarex . 1yr ago Developer "Thanks, this is appriciated. Big part of it is, that our (or at least mine) approach to money is, that once you have enough to live comfortably, and enough to financially support the ongoing (and future) projects you want to do, you don't really need more. There is no reason to squeeze the extra $ just to get yacht bigger then the next millionare, or to buy the overprised expensive stuff when you buy it just to show off. And this has some deep implications, because once you feel that you have enough, you can safely ignore all these people trying to buy % of your company for big cash. I actually reply to these kind of offers with the sentence "Thanks, but I have no use for the extra money". This feels very different to the culture I sense to be prevelant, where big amount of startups is created with the goal of "big exit" in mind. So the implication of my approach is that we have no investors and shareholders pressuring us into the "service for investors to exploit", which would be very understandable demand once they invested big. So in the end, we can feel smug about it, and you can't put a pricetag on that :)" Says the guy who offers no sales and then raises the price Due to inflation I and many others can no longer recommend this gameShow moreShow less
36.2 hours at review702 people found this helpful
Source: original Steam user reviews. Helpful votes are an archived snapshot, not live data. Last collected: 08/14/2026.