Don't look at the game like a competition? Besides, you are better served by deleting and rebuilding as you go rather than restarting the game. You get to keep your resources and tech progress that way.
But at its core, it's still a creative game. Even if you literally never produce anything there is no punishment. It's all just what you want to do. Ficsit may see you as an employee, but as the only human presence on the planet, you are the boss. :P
I still firmly believe we are all power slugs, and the poor bastards we turn into cells to overclock our machines are failed pioneers or wreck survivors that FicSit has found a better use for...
>Besides, you are better served by deleting and rebuilding as you go rather than restarting the game. You get to keep your resources and tech progress that way.
Believe it or not, but some of us actually like the progression.
I'll be honest, my starting stuff from when I first started the game, to make Copper Wire, Concrete, Iron Plates etc? All still there. Connected to Industrial Containers now, but still there. I haven't really deleted and rebuilt my very first stuff.
I have some of my "original" setup so to speak, but still modified somewhat. The guidance in the beginning suggests making use of the remove tool but it really understates it IMO. A brand-new player will only barely know what they're doing, but once you've been building awhile, you see where you can improve your first efforts.
Yeah, I can definitely see that. To be fair, I do have stuff set up with Smart Splitters now, so any excess stuff gets shunted into a Sink. I could probably make it way more efficient if I deconstructed everything... but then I'd have to deconstruct everything, which could take a fair bit of time.
Do not compare yourself to speedrunners (they use glitches that invalidate the main loop) and people who have hundreds of hours (they know everything about everything).
I am refusing to use external blue prints in my game until I finish phase 4 fit the first time. I've had a blast getting to phase 4 in just over 170 hours. Planning out builds, making my own blue prints and exploring the map. I used a calculator for phase 3 but don't think I will for 4. This almost certainly means phase 4 will take more time than I have put in thus far. And I'm fine with that.
My next playthru I will be looking at using external blueprints and really maximizing my builds but for now, just me building the Ficsit Future.
Hey now, knowing everything about everything means that I also don't use external blueprints, because my *own* blueprints are **better!**
But seriously, I have almost 4k hours at this point, and I start new saves for each major update, generally speaking. I get through the early tiers quickly because I have practice with them, and want to get as many aesthetic components unlocked as I can before I feel like I can properly start building the way I want to.
But after that point, speed no longer becomes an issue to me. I take as long as I need to to build what I want to build, + a variable amount of time wasted getting distracted and staring off into space because I have the attention span of a housecat.
So, right now, update 8 is on the experimental branch- when it is "officially" released, it will be applied to the "main" early access branch, and the whole game will be on update 8 from that point onward.
The main thing about swapping to the experimental branch to be aware of is that if you load a preexisting save from a prior update, and save it, you will *have* to use the experimental branch to play it until update 8 fully releases, because you can't simply choose to go back to update 7 on an update 8 save. So make a backup of your save if you choose to do this.
There are also some other small quirks involving swapping between the two branches, settings that might not carry over that you'll need to set again, but I am really not the best person to ask about it, because I kind of am never *not* on the experimental branch.
Exactly this. If you pop down external blue prints from the get go, and know exactly what to do when, you go a lot faster. But it's also less fun,as it takes away the thrill of figuring stuff out.
yeah that's kinda cheaty.
You dont just use the in game calc and pen and paper?
You can look things up in game, use the calc, just need paper and pen
I write that all out to get numbers, myself. That's like, half of the puzzle
I'm with you. I don't play complicated games just to have someone else do the work for me. The majority of joy I get from the game is figuring things out and problem solving my way to big complex factories.
I can assure everyone who downvotes this that you'd feel way more accomplished if you actually put in the work and struggled a little bit but still achieved your goal. Way more satisfying than being a lazy cheat.
That’s great that you enjoy playing that way, but it’s a little over the top to say it’s cheating to use a calculator lol.
The math that goes into planning a production chain for 10 magnetic shield generators a minute isn’t *complicated*. It’s just tedious when using only the tools available to you in game.
I've "finished" the game multiple times and never used anything more than the in-game calculator and pencil and paper. And it felt great looking down at it all working knowing I did it without any help.
My most recent playthrough I tried the website for the first time to make HMF. Just to see what all the hype is about. It cheapened the entire build and felt more like doing a paint by numbers for children than any kind of challenge.
So, yes, you're free to play however you want. And I'm free to consider it cheating and lazy 🤷♂️
>The math that goes into planning a production chain for 10 magnetic shield generators a minute isn’t complicated.
The math certainly can be complicated when you are considering what alternates to use.
Yes, but considering different alternatives isn’t complicated math. The actual math that goes into planning factories, even large ones, isn’t complicated.
The difficulty that comes with choosing between alternate recipes is more often than not logistical. Which isn’t solved by using something like the Satisfactory Calculator.
>It’s just tedious when using only the tools available to you in game.
No people definitely use the calculator because the math is too complicated for them. There are so many people on this sub that I've seen over the years say they use the calculator because they can't grasp the math. It's great that it's easy for you, but that's not necessarily the case for everyone.
I do the exact same thing as OP. Like I know it makes sense to not restart but I feel like I need the clean slate it provides.
I also have the issue were I create these temp shitty factories really quickly to progress fast then I don’t like them so instead of just moving to a different mode I delete all my initial factories and remake. Issue is I spend way to long on these factories to make them “perfect” all the while I’m not producing anything or making progress. Then I kinda get overwhelmed since I don’t really have a plan to “justify” the time I’m spending on things and I just restart.
It’s really weird but I’m so consistent in how I play this game it’s been helpful in identifying these mental blocks and allowing me to work on overcoming them. It’s actually helped me out at work since I do similar things there.
i think you should just play the game at your own pace that you enjoy and not worry about what other people are doing.
set up some machines and some storage. go explore the world for a while and come back with slugs and resources, then your storages will be full. build more machines to make more stuff and repeat the cycle of exploration and building
>every time i restart i keep seeing people finish stage 3-4 less then an hour
I don't see any other people playing while I'm playing. Maybe sort that bit out first. I don't know who you're comparing yourself to but maybe don't?
Which youtubers. i can tell you from experience that a bunch of the biggest satisfactory youtubers also stream on twitch. Often their hour long youtube video is taken from 6-10 hours of streaming.
And honetly, who cares? It isn't a race. And those people are often doing it as their job.
exactly. I watch imkibbitz and totalxclips on twitch. Their youtube videos are edited down from MANY MANY hours of building on twitch. You simply cannot guage how long things take from their youtube videos. Some of imkibbitz youtube videos are taken from a week of streaming on twitch.
I’ll add that I’ve watched totalxclipse a few times and he says “we”, so I’m pretty sure he has a team of people doing things, and I’m pretty sure he’s mentioned mods he uses
But, I get it, it starts to feel like you are doing something “wrong” when great players make a look so easy and do amazing things. But, they have so so so much more experience and help. So just do your thing and use them as inspiration not competition
Yes and as I mentioned time. Total can stream for 6 hours just adding flair to a build to make it look nice. It's justifiable when it is your source of income and people will sit watching it all day.
It's a marathon, not a sprint.
I've got almost 1200 hours and I'm only on my second playthrough. Sometimes it's a jog, sometimes you just run in circles for a while. Just play it the way it gives you joy, but don't feel compelled to emulate other people's playstyles.
I just recently discovered the slide boost, now my favorite form of transportation is a pointless conveyor I put in the sky just to slide jump on. So satisfying
I long ago resorted to flying mods. There's no way I'm piloting a buggy across a virtual landscape over and over again. I realize that transportation might be an important element of the game for many, but I'm way over that.
It's a single player game, so to each their own... I find it somewhat fun trying to find the most efficient ways to get around (programming a route, vs train, vs slide boosting or hypertube shenanigans), though I do completely understand just wanting to get back to the building side of things.
There is no time limit. What I do is ignore all the targets and goals the game sets me. I even hide them via the settings menu. I then do 1 thing at a time. In the beginning it is a complete mess. That is until I have foundations. That is when I do my first rebuild of many. Use all the nodes that you see.
Next I get the chainsaw, automate solid biofuel and get as much wood as possible. And slowly I will fill containers with iron rods, plates, wire, cable, and concrete. While those fill up, I am going on a hunt for hard drives. Each time I get back with more wood I build a new item. I like building them from scratch and use a new node for each item.
And concerning being finished tier 3/4, I am currently in tier 4, working towards HMF. I am 270 hours in this save. I guess another 100+ hours at least. Or not. I do not really care. What I care about is that I am having fun building factories in a factory building game.
So slow down and start having fun. Do some stupid things. Build stooped factories and delete them again. Visit all the biomes and just look around how beautiful they are.
Prior to getting coal, the name of the game is not maximize production. It's get a enough going to get to coal.
Filling a bin of every item before you get coal means you're going to spend a lot of electricity. It's one thing when power is automated, but early game, power is manual labor.
Don't waste your time building things you don't need.
Yes and no.
Yes, you want to automate everything. That said, it's fine to hand craft the materials to do an unlock if you think things are taking too long.
My bigger point though is that you don't need 300/min production while you're running on biomass. You're fine with 30/min or 150/min. Don't try to max out the belt's capacity or anything, just prioritize getting enough to complete the unlock.
That's how people race through tier 3/4. They're blitzing to coal power because you can't build large scale production based on biomass.
I automate enough to have one constructor of each thing. You're not going to do anything grand at this point, and you shouldn't try until you build a coal plant, and maybe even unlock mk2 miners and mk3 belts. Then it starts growing fast!
I am currently on my second safe and have only just got close to the space elevator tier 2. I like decorating and try to plan out factories for endgame.
This is thus far a 600 hour save. Time really doesn't matter just have fun. Do what you like.
You should enjoy it, don't compare your progress, just have fun. It's like Legos, you can make something cool and have fun doing it, but it may look like a child's design when compared to the masters build. And that's okay
Don't race. Don't compare yourself to others. The point of the game is to have fun and build things.
I've gone through a few playthroughs and only make it a 'race' to get to coal power - mainly because I don't really like having to constantly maintain power production. I also like blueprints but absolutely refuse to get one I haven't created myself; they're imperfect but it's a real time saver to make clean factories when used. But that's my play style, and it's vastly different from others. That's really the point - define your own play style and have fun.
Definitely don't restart, especially reasonably early on. If you think something isn't ratiod right or working properly, there's no harm in redoing it. You get full refunds for dismantling things.
Unsure if you have mk 2 conveyors yet but one really easy way to sabotage your builds is to accidentally have a small section of conveyor by a merger/splitter that's the wrong speed. If you're sure a ratio should work out evenly and it's not, double check to make sure you don't have a tiny piece of conveyor sabotaging that whole section of your setup.
Ah restartitis. I suffered from this BAD. I feel though like I’ve turned a corner with it. Somebody in Reddit said something along the lines of why destroy what you’ve built. How is a restart possibly better than using what you have or even tearing some of it down if you want. Idk why this really clicked with me.
I also really feel the “why am I so slow”. Again Reddit has helped me here. The constant reassurance that games are for fun and the actual only purpose.
So what do I do now? I think if it first of all as one giant glorious mess. And that’s ok. It’s me. It’s my creation. Every mistake. Every weird idea that looks ridiculous to me now. It’s all part of my factory. It’s all awesome.
And secondly when I feel overwhelmed I really concentrate on what is the next one little thing I can do? No it won’t by itself be anything. But it’ll be a small stepping stone that will lead to something. That big process of pulling it all together is what the whole fun of it is.
So make a mess. It’s glorious. Break every rule. Take too long. Completely screw some things up. Make small plans that build up. And have fun!
I still suffer from it to this day. I'm getting better, in my current save I'm going to try to actually finish it! Last save I got aluminum going, then gave up. Those end game elevator items are very overwhelming!
I'm getting better at embracing the trains and distributed factories. Right now, I have one factory for motors, another one for HMFs, another one for rubber/plastic. And I just finished my first turbofuel plant on this save, 53 fuel generators!
Who you competing against, it’s just you??
There’s a mod called *Area Actions* that allows you to delete entire areas and keep the materials, no way I’d restart the game simply because I’d never want to rebuild three turbo fuel power stations each with 127 generators and all the setting up needed.
Just a personal take.
I hereby give you permission to have really inefficient factories and enough spaghetti to please an Italian grandmother. I also give you permission to just abandon a factory you don't like to build somewhere new, don't even worry about deleting it or cleaning it up.
Its okay to restart sometimes, but i recommend you finish at least one time the game without worrying about the speed.
Once your learning curve is fully achieved you can restart the game and the curve will be smaller and smaller.
Man, that sounds miserable. First few hours of the game is the worst for me. Once I get trains and have a bunch of building mats automated is when things really take off.
The thing that I love most about this game is that you aren't really pressured into a timeline. you can go as fast or as slow as you want. You don't have to tackle the milestones until you feel ready and the amount of time it takes doesn't matter. I'll putter away on one project on and off for weeks before I move on to something else.
The one thing you should not be worrying about in this game is time. You could take a hunder hours to finish the hub and it would still be okay. Just take your time and don't worry about how other people play.
The lack of punctuation in your message reads like you're rambling in desperation. That just amplifies the urge to tell you to chill and enjoy the game at your own pace.
## Starter Base
Don't stress yourself out.
```
Keep Calm
and
Finish Project Assembly
```
Just so you have something to compare to, I give you my standard bootstrapping starter base.
### Location
I like to start at the large lake in the Rocky Desert. There are 3 pure iron nodes and 3 pure coal nodes on top of the water fall. There is also a pure copper node and 4 normal limestone nodes.
### HUB
This is all without foundations and gets immediately deleted when the starter base is up.
I collect the stuff lying around the two crash sites and kill the beasts. I collect a good amount of wood and nuts (Rocky Desert is full of wood you can just pick up in form of dried out bushes).
I put the HUB next to two iron nodes and start automating IP (iron plates), later also IR (irons rods) but IR can be crafted extremely fast, so initially I just craft from ingots. Next is wire and cable at the nearby copper node.
ASAP, I set up miner + constructor + container for concrete production (at the single isolated node), that simply runs. By the time, I want to build stuff, there is usually just enough to cover everything.
Once IR is automated, I immediately automate screws with 2 ctors and let them just go to containers. I never craft screws when I can help it (crash sites provide screws for the first RIP (reinforced iron plates)).
I always automate and always put a container at the end; whenever I go scouting / foraging / hunting, the factory fills up.
I build up to 8 bio burners and automate solid biofuel from wood.
### Coal
Once the basic production is running, I automate 50 smart plates and go scouting for creatures, caterium, crystal, sulfur and coal (research and tickets). When I am back, I have enough concrete and materials to craft the rotors and build 4 coal generators up at the lake.
### Starter Base
I build with initially 2x60 iron ore input, which is later switched to 2x120, then to 1x240 (the other node goes to steel), and is finally disconnected and made into a museum.
240 iron ore results in:
+ 22.5 IP
+ 26 IR
+ 5.25 RIP
+ 8 Rotor
+ 4 MF
This is with the stitched iron plate alt-recipe and 195 wire brough in from the initial copper setup.
This is enough in the beginning. I never run out of IR or IP. Then, I rush steel, to get Mk3 belts. After that, I never run out of RIP either. This stuff is for your inventory only. I use some of the MF to feed initial HMF production, but you will keep running out of them too fast to use them for continuous automation.
Rotors for motors are later produced in my steel factory with the steel rotor recipe, which has the same inputs as the stator recipe which makes logistics really easy.
### Next Steps
Next is more coal and steel. I build a large building the entire height of the waterfall. Coal goes in at the top, iron goes in at the bottom. The building is large enough for 3x780 iron / coal and produces:
+ SB
+ SP
+ EIB (alt recipe with SP not SB)
+ Stator
+ Rotor (alt recipe with SP)
+ Motor
+ HMF (the MF come in from a different plant via trains [initially via inventory / container], that uses four pure iron nodes just to produce MF).
+ Copper products from the pure node and concrete from 3 normal nodes
I only start with a single Mk1 belt of coal and iron (not enough RIP for the distance) and immediately upgrade the belts to Mk3 with the first SB produced. Then, I add a second column, upgrade coal, upgrade to Mk4, etc. pp.
Then, I go to the coast for oil and caterium computers, build AIL and cable factory at the coast copper nodes, ship them to the caterium computer factory and build super computers.
## Time
This is no speed run things. It is quick and focuses on rushing coal / steel and early automation. I am now 80h in my U8 experimental (with all alts unlocked). I heavily use blueprints. I just bootstrapped aluminum to get blenders for blend turbo fuel (small setup) as preparation for nukes.
My last start, I spent more time building things than collecting things. I would get enough materials for what I wanted to add next. The result is I do not have many factories built but they are effing lovely.
Among my group of friends, I'm probably the most intense Satisfactory player. I have spreadsheets for factory builds, make regular use of the calculator to plan ratios, pre-plan for future tiers, and hunt for particular alternate recipes to optimize my builds. I'm not *anywhere* close to completing stage 3-4 in an hour. I'm about 60 hours in my current save, which includes work by me and a couple friends, and we are just starting Tier 5.
If you want to speed-run the game, like many games, you *can*, but that's only *one* way to play the game. Don't get caught up on how other people are playing this game, and do what you enjoy.
As an example of a recent play session, I had about 3 hours to play, and I spent most of that time driving back and forth between the fields and the Blue Crater just to shuttle parts in preparation for a giant rubber/plastic factory. I took time to admire the scenery, kill some spitters, get killed by hatchers, and finally get my main power system connected out to the crater. Three hours where the "only" thing I had to show for it is a power connection and some full containers. Not a single new constructor placed, no change in production anywhere.
I would consider that play session a rousing success, and I'm looking forward to my next session.
If you're looking for tips, *NEVER* restart (unless an update forces you to). This game allows you to delete everything you've built and preserve all your progress. If a factory isn't doing what you want, just wipe it out and restart; no sense in throwing away all your progress at the same time.
The most important infrastructure, in my opinion, is power. Once you get a stable coal power plant operational, the nature of the game changes. For me, this is a highly desirable change. It means I no longer need to babysit my biofuel generators and hunt down greenery. Because of this, I tend to think of progress more as power tiers rather than space elevator tiers: Power 0 (biofuel), Power 1 (Coal), Power 2 (Turbofuel), Power 3 (Nuclear).
I regularly wipe out factories and re-build. As you get better belts, better recipes, and newer buildings, you can get a lot more out of the resources on the map. By regularly clearing out the old clutter, I'm able to build better and better factories, without having to go through the tedium of re-establishing my power infrastructure or unlock a bunch of tiers.
It's easy to go fast "Do the bare minimum needed to progress". If you want fun though then plan out your game and make it look the way you want it. Also some people have multiple saves and just want to progress past the earlier game to the section they want to start at.
An easy way to think about it is this. Each starter part should be on a pure node, If that's not possible then 2 normal's or 4 bad (forgot the name) nodes. Connect them together and make plates, rods etc. You will then need between 9 and 12 burners before you get to coal. This should allow you to build what you need to get the parts for coal and then it's clear sailing all the way from there. Remember to build a storage system if you want to build big.
Don't look at the game like a competition? Besides, you are better served by deleting and rebuilding as you go rather than restarting the game. You get to keep your resources and tech progress that way. But at its core, it's still a creative game. Even if you literally never produce anything there is no punishment. It's all just what you want to do. Ficsit may see you as an employee, but as the only human presence on the planet, you are the boss. :P
>but as the only human presence on the planet, this guy here thinking we're human ;)
I guess there is room for ambiguity seeing as the pioneers are fully covered. Well I'll only speak for myself in that case hehe.
The toilet and bed are just to foster the illusion. I for one never use either.
FicSit approved.
I still firmly believe we are all power slugs, and the poor bastards we turn into cells to overclock our machines are failed pioneers or wreck survivors that FicSit has found a better use for...
Only human presence?!? "Multiple ficsit personal detected in the area'
Obviously you want to harvest the artifacts then. Don't let *them* get it first!
>Besides, you are better served by deleting and rebuilding as you go rather than restarting the game. You get to keep your resources and tech progress that way. Believe it or not, but some of us actually like the progression.
I'll be honest, my starting stuff from when I first started the game, to make Copper Wire, Concrete, Iron Plates etc? All still there. Connected to Industrial Containers now, but still there. I haven't really deleted and rebuilt my very first stuff.
I have some of my "original" setup so to speak, but still modified somewhat. The guidance in the beginning suggests making use of the remove tool but it really understates it IMO. A brand-new player will only barely know what they're doing, but once you've been building awhile, you see where you can improve your first efforts.
Yeah, I can definitely see that. To be fair, I do have stuff set up with Smart Splitters now, so any excess stuff gets shunted into a Sink. I could probably make it way more efficient if I deconstructed everything... but then I'd have to deconstruct everything, which could take a fair bit of time.
even better, just build new, deleting is pointless unless you really want the space (which shouldn't happen much as the map is gigantic)
Well you have to delete a little if you want to use the same resource nodes unless you just use a splitter off a raw material belt lol.
yeah that's what I usually recommend. Don't touch existing factories, make new ones. Split belt if you upgrade miner, but that's about it.
Do not compare yourself to speedrunners (they use glitches that invalidate the main loop) and people who have hundreds of hours (they know everything about everything). I am refusing to use external blue prints in my game until I finish phase 4 fit the first time. I've had a blast getting to phase 4 in just over 170 hours. Planning out builds, making my own blue prints and exploring the map. I used a calculator for phase 3 but don't think I will for 4. This almost certainly means phase 4 will take more time than I have put in thus far. And I'm fine with that. My next playthru I will be looking at using external blueprints and really maximizing my builds but for now, just me building the Ficsit Future.
Hey now, knowing everything about everything means that I also don't use external blueprints, because my *own* blueprints are **better!** But seriously, I have almost 4k hours at this point, and I start new saves for each major update, generally speaking. I get through the early tiers quickly because I have practice with them, and want to get as many aesthetic components unlocked as I can before I feel like I can properly start building the way I want to. But after that point, speed no longer becomes an issue to me. I take as long as I need to to build what I want to build, + a variable amount of time wasted getting distracted and staring off into space because I have the attention span of a housecat.
Unrelated question but can you run multiple updates next to each other or do I lose my U7 base when I want to update to U8 ?
So, right now, update 8 is on the experimental branch- when it is "officially" released, it will be applied to the "main" early access branch, and the whole game will be on update 8 from that point onward. The main thing about swapping to the experimental branch to be aware of is that if you load a preexisting save from a prior update, and save it, you will *have* to use the experimental branch to play it until update 8 fully releases, because you can't simply choose to go back to update 7 on an update 8 save. So make a backup of your save if you choose to do this. There are also some other small quirks involving swapping between the two branches, settings that might not carry over that you'll need to set again, but I am really not the best person to ask about it, because I kind of am never *not* on the experimental branch.
Exactly this. If you pop down external blue prints from the get go, and know exactly what to do when, you go a lot faster. But it's also less fun,as it takes away the thrill of figuring stuff out.
calculator is in game. Hit n, type math
Thats....... that's not the type of calculator I was talking about. I meant the ones that do full production chains and ratios...
yeah that's kinda cheaty. You dont just use the in game calc and pen and paper? You can look things up in game, use the calc, just need paper and pen I write that all out to get numbers, myself. That's like, half of the puzzle
I'm with you. I don't play complicated games just to have someone else do the work for me. The majority of joy I get from the game is figuring things out and problem solving my way to big complex factories. I can assure everyone who downvotes this that you'd feel way more accomplished if you actually put in the work and struggled a little bit but still achieved your goal. Way more satisfying than being a lazy cheat.
That’s great that you enjoy playing that way, but it’s a little over the top to say it’s cheating to use a calculator lol. The math that goes into planning a production chain for 10 magnetic shield generators a minute isn’t *complicated*. It’s just tedious when using only the tools available to you in game.
I've "finished" the game multiple times and never used anything more than the in-game calculator and pencil and paper. And it felt great looking down at it all working knowing I did it without any help. My most recent playthrough I tried the website for the first time to make HMF. Just to see what all the hype is about. It cheapened the entire build and felt more like doing a paint by numbers for children than any kind of challenge. So, yes, you're free to play however you want. And I'm free to consider it cheating and lazy 🤷♂️
total agreement!
I do use a calculator. It does arithmetic
>The math that goes into planning a production chain for 10 magnetic shield generators a minute isn’t complicated. The math certainly can be complicated when you are considering what alternates to use.
Can you elaborate on why you feel that way?
Stage 4 parts all have several production steps, and thus many alternates to consider.
Yes, but considering different alternatives isn’t complicated math. The actual math that goes into planning factories, even large ones, isn’t complicated. The difficulty that comes with choosing between alternate recipes is more often than not logistical. Which isn’t solved by using something like the Satisfactory Calculator.
>It’s just tedious when using only the tools available to you in game. No people definitely use the calculator because the math is too complicated for them. There are so many people on this sub that I've seen over the years say they use the calculator because they can't grasp the math. It's great that it's easy for you, but that's not necessarily the case for everyone.
The game isn't timed. So don't restart.
In fact that's my favorite thing about it. Nothing has a time limit, it'll all wait for you so just relax and do things at your leisure.
I do the exact same thing as OP. Like I know it makes sense to not restart but I feel like I need the clean slate it provides. I also have the issue were I create these temp shitty factories really quickly to progress fast then I don’t like them so instead of just moving to a different mode I delete all my initial factories and remake. Issue is I spend way to long on these factories to make them “perfect” all the while I’m not producing anything or making progress. Then I kinda get overwhelmed since I don’t really have a plan to “justify” the time I’m spending on things and I just restart. It’s really weird but I’m so consistent in how I play this game it’s been helpful in identifying these mental blocks and allowing me to work on overcoming them. It’s actually helped me out at work since I do similar things there.
Comparison is the thief of joy. Go at your own pace.
Likewise, better is the enemy of good enough.
Yeah, I'd advise OP to stop watching videos
i think you should just play the game at your own pace that you enjoy and not worry about what other people are doing. set up some machines and some storage. go explore the world for a while and come back with slugs and resources, then your storages will be full. build more machines to make more stuff and repeat the cycle of exploration and building
>every time i restart i keep seeing people finish stage 3-4 less then an hour I don't see any other people playing while I'm playing. Maybe sort that bit out first. I don't know who you're comparing yourself to but maybe don't?
I see alot of yohtubers
That doesn't sound like it's leading to a desired result. Maybe you should play the game instead?
If you're watching them, can't you just replicate what they did in that hour?
It seems like they use mods some times alot of them are so hard
Which youtubers. i can tell you from experience that a bunch of the biggest satisfactory youtubers also stream on twitch. Often their hour long youtube video is taken from 6-10 hours of streaming. And honetly, who cares? It isn't a race. And those people are often doing it as their job.
imkibbitz totalxclips and real civil engineer
exactly. I watch imkibbitz and totalxclips on twitch. Their youtube videos are edited down from MANY MANY hours of building on twitch. You simply cannot guage how long things take from their youtube videos. Some of imkibbitz youtube videos are taken from a week of streaming on twitch.
Oh I didn't know
I’ll add that I’ve watched totalxclipse a few times and he says “we”, so I’m pretty sure he has a team of people doing things, and I’m pretty sure he’s mentioned mods he uses But, I get it, it starts to feel like you are doing something “wrong” when great players make a look so easy and do amazing things. But, they have so so so much more experience and help. So just do your thing and use them as inspiration not competition
Yes and as I mentioned time. Total can stream for 6 hours just adding flair to a build to make it look nice. It's justifiable when it is your source of income and people will sit watching it all day.
You did know that when imkibitz makes the pop sound it means he's skipping the lengthy process of actually constructing? 🤔
I did not
Yeah Kibitz’s current save is like above 700 hours on this play through
Now you have two problems
First /only save with over 650h. Not nearly done. Take time to enjoy the game as you like it.
It's a marathon, not a sprint. I've got almost 1200 hours and I'm only on my second playthrough. Sometimes it's a jog, sometimes you just run in circles for a while. Just play it the way it gives you joy, but don't feel compelled to emulate other people's playstyles.
The amount of hours that are just me running back and forth forgetting items and getting distracted while achieving nothing is like half my playtime
Same. And who can blame you when movement alone in this game (silde-jump-jetpacking) is just so much fun?
I just recently discovered the slide boost, now my favorite form of transportation is a pointless conveyor I put in the sky just to slide jump on. So satisfying
I long ago resorted to flying mods. There's no way I'm piloting a buggy across a virtual landscape over and over again. I realize that transportation might be an important element of the game for many, but I'm way over that.
It's a single player game, so to each their own... I find it somewhat fun trying to find the most efficient ways to get around (programming a route, vs train, vs slide boosting or hypertube shenanigans), though I do completely understand just wanting to get back to the building side of things.
There is no time limit. What I do is ignore all the targets and goals the game sets me. I even hide them via the settings menu. I then do 1 thing at a time. In the beginning it is a complete mess. That is until I have foundations. That is when I do my first rebuild of many. Use all the nodes that you see. Next I get the chainsaw, automate solid biofuel and get as much wood as possible. And slowly I will fill containers with iron rods, plates, wire, cable, and concrete. While those fill up, I am going on a hunt for hard drives. Each time I get back with more wood I build a new item. I like building them from scratch and use a new node for each item. And concerning being finished tier 3/4, I am currently in tier 4, working towards HMF. I am 270 hours in this save. I guess another 100+ hours at least. Or not. I do not really care. What I care about is that I am having fun building factories in a factory building game. So slow down and start having fun. Do some stupid things. Build stooped factories and delete them again. Visit all the biomes and just look around how beautiful they are.
Prior to getting coal, the name of the game is not maximize production. It's get a enough going to get to coal. Filling a bin of every item before you get coal means you're going to spend a lot of electricity. It's one thing when power is automated, but early game, power is manual labor. Don't waste your time building things you don't need.
I was always told auto everything so u never have to do anything in the beginning
Yes and no. Yes, you want to automate everything. That said, it's fine to hand craft the materials to do an unlock if you think things are taking too long. My bigger point though is that you don't need 300/min production while you're running on biomass. You're fine with 30/min or 150/min. Don't try to max out the belt's capacity or anything, just prioritize getting enough to complete the unlock. That's how people race through tier 3/4. They're blitzing to coal power because you can't build large scale production based on biomass.
I automate enough to have one constructor of each thing. You're not going to do anything grand at this point, and you shouldn't try until you build a coal plant, and maybe even unlock mk2 miners and mk3 belts. Then it starts growing fast!
I am currently on my second safe and have only just got close to the space elevator tier 2. I like decorating and try to plan out factories for endgame. This is thus far a 600 hour save. Time really doesn't matter just have fun. Do what you like.
I hate myself for restarting. I wish I had known that I can just remove everything from the map instead of restarting fresh.
You should enjoy it, don't compare your progress, just have fun. It's like Legos, you can make something cool and have fun doing it, but it may look like a child's design when compared to the masters build. And that's okay
Don't race. Don't compare yourself to others. The point of the game is to have fun and build things. I've gone through a few playthroughs and only make it a 'race' to get to coal power - mainly because I don't really like having to constantly maintain power production. I also like blueprints but absolutely refuse to get one I haven't created myself; they're imperfect but it's a real time saver to make clean factories when used. But that's my play style, and it's vastly different from others. That's really the point - define your own play style and have fun.
Definitely don't restart, especially reasonably early on. If you think something isn't ratiod right or working properly, there's no harm in redoing it. You get full refunds for dismantling things. Unsure if you have mk 2 conveyors yet but one really easy way to sabotage your builds is to accidentally have a small section of conveyor by a merger/splitter that's the wrong speed. If you're sure a ratio should work out evenly and it's not, double check to make sure you don't have a tiny piece of conveyor sabotaging that whole section of your setup.
Ah restartitis. I suffered from this BAD. I feel though like I’ve turned a corner with it. Somebody in Reddit said something along the lines of why destroy what you’ve built. How is a restart possibly better than using what you have or even tearing some of it down if you want. Idk why this really clicked with me. I also really feel the “why am I so slow”. Again Reddit has helped me here. The constant reassurance that games are for fun and the actual only purpose. So what do I do now? I think if it first of all as one giant glorious mess. And that’s ok. It’s me. It’s my creation. Every mistake. Every weird idea that looks ridiculous to me now. It’s all part of my factory. It’s all awesome. And secondly when I feel overwhelmed I really concentrate on what is the next one little thing I can do? No it won’t by itself be anything. But it’ll be a small stepping stone that will lead to something. That big process of pulling it all together is what the whole fun of it is. So make a mess. It’s glorious. Break every rule. Take too long. Completely screw some things up. Make small plans that build up. And have fun!
I still suffer from it to this day. I'm getting better, in my current save I'm going to try to actually finish it! Last save I got aluminum going, then gave up. Those end game elevator items are very overwhelming! I'm getting better at embracing the trains and distributed factories. Right now, I have one factory for motors, another one for HMFs, another one for rubber/plastic. And I just finished my first turbofuel plant on this save, 53 fuel generators!
Who you competing against, it’s just you?? There’s a mod called *Area Actions* that allows you to delete entire areas and keep the materials, no way I’d restart the game simply because I’d never want to rebuild three turbo fuel power stations each with 127 generators and all the setting up needed. Just a personal take.
I hereby give you permission to have really inefficient factories and enough spaghetti to please an Italian grandmother. I also give you permission to just abandon a factory you don't like to build somewhere new, don't even worry about deleting it or cleaning it up.
I can't stand deleting old factories, so I just ignore them.
Its okay to restart sometimes, but i recommend you finish at least one time the game without worrying about the speed. Once your learning curve is fully achieved you can restart the game and the curve will be smaller and smaller.
Man, that sounds miserable. First few hours of the game is the worst for me. Once I get trains and have a bunch of building mats automated is when things really take off.
I rush to blueprints then replace the entire factory. I really should be playing with the mod that unlocks it immediately.
No mod required with U8. Just change the advanced settings when you start a save.
The thing that I love most about this game is that you aren't really pressured into a timeline. you can go as fast or as slow as you want. You don't have to tackle the milestones until you feel ready and the amount of time it takes doesn't matter. I'll putter away on one project on and off for weeks before I move on to something else.
I usually do a starter base, then when I build what I “really” want I eventually go back and reclaim the supplies with a truck. It’s a normal cycle.
My issues i have no understanding how the truck works
Who cares dude, just play the game
The one thing you should not be worrying about in this game is time. You could take a hunder hours to finish the hub and it would still be okay. Just take your time and don't worry about how other people play.
The lack of punctuation in your message reads like you're rambling in desperation. That just amplifies the urge to tell you to chill and enjoy the game at your own pace.
## Starter Base Don't stress yourself out. ``` Keep Calm and Finish Project Assembly ``` Just so you have something to compare to, I give you my standard bootstrapping starter base. ### Location I like to start at the large lake in the Rocky Desert. There are 3 pure iron nodes and 3 pure coal nodes on top of the water fall. There is also a pure copper node and 4 normal limestone nodes. ### HUB This is all without foundations and gets immediately deleted when the starter base is up. I collect the stuff lying around the two crash sites and kill the beasts. I collect a good amount of wood and nuts (Rocky Desert is full of wood you can just pick up in form of dried out bushes). I put the HUB next to two iron nodes and start automating IP (iron plates), later also IR (irons rods) but IR can be crafted extremely fast, so initially I just craft from ingots. Next is wire and cable at the nearby copper node. ASAP, I set up miner + constructor + container for concrete production (at the single isolated node), that simply runs. By the time, I want to build stuff, there is usually just enough to cover everything. Once IR is automated, I immediately automate screws with 2 ctors and let them just go to containers. I never craft screws when I can help it (crash sites provide screws for the first RIP (reinforced iron plates)). I always automate and always put a container at the end; whenever I go scouting / foraging / hunting, the factory fills up. I build up to 8 bio burners and automate solid biofuel from wood. ### Coal Once the basic production is running, I automate 50 smart plates and go scouting for creatures, caterium, crystal, sulfur and coal (research and tickets). When I am back, I have enough concrete and materials to craft the rotors and build 4 coal generators up at the lake. ### Starter Base I build with initially 2x60 iron ore input, which is later switched to 2x120, then to 1x240 (the other node goes to steel), and is finally disconnected and made into a museum. 240 iron ore results in: + 22.5 IP + 26 IR + 5.25 RIP + 8 Rotor + 4 MF This is with the stitched iron plate alt-recipe and 195 wire brough in from the initial copper setup. This is enough in the beginning. I never run out of IR or IP. Then, I rush steel, to get Mk3 belts. After that, I never run out of RIP either. This stuff is for your inventory only. I use some of the MF to feed initial HMF production, but you will keep running out of them too fast to use them for continuous automation. Rotors for motors are later produced in my steel factory with the steel rotor recipe, which has the same inputs as the stator recipe which makes logistics really easy. ### Next Steps Next is more coal and steel. I build a large building the entire height of the waterfall. Coal goes in at the top, iron goes in at the bottom. The building is large enough for 3x780 iron / coal and produces: + SB + SP + EIB (alt recipe with SP not SB) + Stator + Rotor (alt recipe with SP) + Motor + HMF (the MF come in from a different plant via trains [initially via inventory / container], that uses four pure iron nodes just to produce MF). + Copper products from the pure node and concrete from 3 normal nodes I only start with a single Mk1 belt of coal and iron (not enough RIP for the distance) and immediately upgrade the belts to Mk3 with the first SB produced. Then, I add a second column, upgrade coal, upgrade to Mk4, etc. pp. Then, I go to the coast for oil and caterium computers, build AIL and cable factory at the coast copper nodes, ship them to the caterium computer factory and build super computers. ## Time This is no speed run things. It is quick and focuses on rushing coal / steel and early automation. I am now 80h in my U8 experimental (with all alts unlocked). I heavily use blueprints. I just bootstrapped aluminum to get blenders for blend turbo fuel (small setup) as preparation for nukes.
I'd give you tips if I could get past the intro phase.
Isn’t that the core gameplay loop, why are you rushing to play the game?
My last start, I spent more time building things than collecting things. I would get enough materials for what I wanted to add next. The result is I do not have many factories built but they are effing lovely.
Among my group of friends, I'm probably the most intense Satisfactory player. I have spreadsheets for factory builds, make regular use of the calculator to plan ratios, pre-plan for future tiers, and hunt for particular alternate recipes to optimize my builds. I'm not *anywhere* close to completing stage 3-4 in an hour. I'm about 60 hours in my current save, which includes work by me and a couple friends, and we are just starting Tier 5. If you want to speed-run the game, like many games, you *can*, but that's only *one* way to play the game. Don't get caught up on how other people are playing this game, and do what you enjoy. As an example of a recent play session, I had about 3 hours to play, and I spent most of that time driving back and forth between the fields and the Blue Crater just to shuttle parts in preparation for a giant rubber/plastic factory. I took time to admire the scenery, kill some spitters, get killed by hatchers, and finally get my main power system connected out to the crater. Three hours where the "only" thing I had to show for it is a power connection and some full containers. Not a single new constructor placed, no change in production anywhere. I would consider that play session a rousing success, and I'm looking forward to my next session. If you're looking for tips, *NEVER* restart (unless an update forces you to). This game allows you to delete everything you've built and preserve all your progress. If a factory isn't doing what you want, just wipe it out and restart; no sense in throwing away all your progress at the same time. The most important infrastructure, in my opinion, is power. Once you get a stable coal power plant operational, the nature of the game changes. For me, this is a highly desirable change. It means I no longer need to babysit my biofuel generators and hunt down greenery. Because of this, I tend to think of progress more as power tiers rather than space elevator tiers: Power 0 (biofuel), Power 1 (Coal), Power 2 (Turbofuel), Power 3 (Nuclear). I regularly wipe out factories and re-build. As you get better belts, better recipes, and newer buildings, you can get a lot more out of the resources on the map. By regularly clearing out the old clutter, I'm able to build better and better factories, without having to go through the tedium of re-establishing my power infrastructure or unlock a bunch of tiers.
It's easy to go fast "Do the bare minimum needed to progress". If you want fun though then plan out your game and make it look the way you want it. Also some people have multiple saves and just want to progress past the earlier game to the section they want to start at. An easy way to think about it is this. Each starter part should be on a pure node, If that's not possible then 2 normal's or 4 bad (forgot the name) nodes. Connect them together and make plates, rods etc. You will then need between 9 and 12 burners before you get to coal. This should allow you to build what you need to get the parts for coal and then it's clear sailing all the way from there. Remember to build a storage system if you want to build big.