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Factorio

Factorio

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About

Factorio is an open world simulation management and construction video game released in 2020 by Wube Software for PC, Mac, and Linux. It was first released in early access in 2016. The game focuses on building fully automated factories on alien worlds by gathering resources and building various machines to survives the local alien life. The game has a significant fanbase online, resulting in many memes, pieces of fan art, and mods.

History

Development of Factorio began in 2012 by Czech video game developers Wube Software, originally consisting of only one man, Michal Kovarik, or "Kovarex" online. The game went into crowdfunding on IndieGoGo[1] in 2013, surpassing its goal of €17,000 and raising €21,626.[2] On April 30th, 2014, a trailer for the game was released, garnering over 930,000 views in seven years (shown below).



In August 2014, Kovarex said on Reddit[3] that the Minecraft mods Industrialcraft and Buildcraft were inspirations for the game. Wube Software began selling early access versions of Factorio starting in 2016. On August 14th, 2020, Factorio released in full (2020 tralier shown below).



On September 17th of that year, Elon Musk tweeted,[17] "Speedrunning Factorio in real life …" garnering over 109,000 likes and 6,200 retweets in nine months (shown below).


Elon Musk @elonmusk Speedrunning Factorio in real life .. 3:15 AM · Sep 17, 2020 · Twitter for iPhone

Michal "Kovarex" Kovarik Uncle Bob Controversy

On June 18th, 2021, u/FactorioTeam made the 366th "Friday Facts" post to /r/Factorio[5] linking to the Factorio blog.[6] In the post, Kovarex recommends game developer Uncle Bob's YouTube[7] series on project management and programming. Uncle Bob has previously come under fire for sexist comments, as well as quoting Donald Trump in a tweet[8] talking about far-left facism. A Redditor commented advising Kovarex against recommending Uncle Bob, to which he responded, "Take the cancel culture mentality and shove it up your ass," (shown below). The exchange has since been deleted, but was reshared on Twitter[9] by @cigsender that day in a tweet thread starting, "wait til kovarex finds out a good chunk of the game’s fan base is trans."


( Factorio 26 Comments 三个 000 You probably need to be a bit more careful about promoting Uncle Bob though. I believe you probably haven't heard of it yet, but while his teachings certainly have their merits, he as a person is... controversial.Here's one summary but once you start searching there's a lot more to be found. I know I know, politics and games don't mix well, but promoting a controversial person without any reservations _is_ a political act. So it might be worth considering to add a disclaimer. His actions and words have hurt a lot of (typically) underrepresented people and l'd personally prefer to avoid more people getting hurt by promoting him. summary substack.com/p/tech-b--------explained-uncl... kovarex V 13 Developer 37m •.. Take the cancel culture mentaility and shove it up your ass. RACK_UP_DOWNVOTES ↑4 ..• 16m That's a pretty disappointing response. It's fine to disagree, but I thought as the founder of Factorio, you would have had more tact than that. Linaori 10 •0• 28m Yikes. Uncle Bob is a racist piece of &*!# and a bigot. I always had big respect for your development team, but now? You can shove it up your ass yourself. kovarex 8 Developer 15m I won't even search him up. You know why? Because I don't care at all. I don't care if he cheats on his wife, is a bigot, or pays proper tips in restaurant. These things are simply not relevant If Stalin had a

Before the Reddit[10] thread was locked, Kovarex responded again talking against cancel culture and denying being a "right wing bigot," claiming he didn't know Uncle Bob's controversies beforehand but that it shouldn't matter anyways (shown below). The controversy divided fans, with many seeing it as an unfair cancelation attempt and others accusing Kovarex of transphobia and bigotry because of it.


[-] kovarex Developer 93 points 21 hours ago O 2 e Why am I right wing bigot again, I hear it again and again, and yet, I didn't hear any reason for that claim. This clearly shows the weird one dimensional world you see. Everyone is either a friend or an enemy, and we need to decide fast! All I did is to deny bashing on someones proffessional work for his political views, I didn't even know what they are, and somehow, you had to put me on your political axis somewhere, and sicne your political axis is so full of hate, you assume that I hate you or LBGT+ people, or whatever you don't like about the other side your axis. You have to understand, that I'm not from the US, and I'm nowhere on your little axis, I'm not your friend or enemy, I'm just a guy who would like to decouple ideas from реople.

Kovarex later responded to another comment arguing that supporting someone with harmful views is harmful, responding in part, "I'm not defending that women shouldn't be senior software engeneers, but if someone would defend that, it doesn't make him a bigot" (full comment shown below).[14]


[-] kovarex Developer -46 points 2 days ago o I'm not defending that women shouldn't be senior software engeneers, but if someone would defend that, it doesn't make him a bigot just because he proposes that and have some arguments, only if those arguments were debunked and the person wouldn't be willing to change his mind, then yes, it sounds like a bigot. But my feeling is, that this step is completely ignored in most of the cases. People are called bigots without any attempts at understanding the reasoning, it is the easy way.

On that day, a Steam[11] user made a post to the Factorio community board stating Kovarex is transphobic because of this, to which they were criticized heavily by the game's fanbase. The post has since been removed. The cancelation attempt gained support on Twitter,[12] including in one post made on June 18th showing that a user's post about a "trans train" in Factorio was deleted as to not spark further discussion about the controversy (shown below, left), garnering over 6,600 likes and 860 retweets in five days. A similar tweet[13] on that day garnered over 2,200 likes and 440 retweets in the same span of time (shown below, right).


Mae is BACK AND SHE'S TRASNGENDRE ... @thefemmekytty Imao you aren't allowed to be trans on r/factorio now cause the mods don't want to deal with bigots r/factorio Posted by u/therealmae · 13m • i.redd.it trans train, the train is trans Fan Creation + Vote 1 Share BEST COMMENTS V simonk241 MOD•5M Moderator This post was removed to prevent the discussion in the FFF thread moving into other threads. The Lady Weird Sloth Cow @CaseyExplosion ... *Sigh* I love Factorio. It's hands down one of my favourite indie games of all time, I've recommended it constantly, streamed it, I play it coop with friends, bought loads of copies as gifts. so seeing one of the devs go all out "CANCEI CultUrE" is a real kick in the teeth. GIF

Online Presence

Factorio gained a significant fanbase over the course of its roughly nine-year development cycle.

On November 20th, 2016, YouTuber[18] DaveMcW posted a video recreating the "Standstorm" music video in Factorio, garnering over 1.2 million views in five years (shown below). The also provided a tutorial on how it was made on the Factorio forums.[19]



/r/Factorio Subreddit

The Factorio subreddit, /r/Factorio,[15][16] was opened in February 2013 and has gained over 200,000 members as of June 2021. The subreddit works as an official community for the game, and is modderated heavily by the game's developers, including Kovarex. The subreddit is often used to share memes about the game (examples shown below, left and right) as well as showcase playthroughs, mods, and share tips.


Could make a pair of night vision goggles, but decided to illuminate the planet instead The Virgin Italian Chef The Chad Bus Driver Drones used to carry base ingredients Got lazy bastard in his first playthrough, didn't know it was a thing No red spots in all of the charted territory, uses artillery shells to chart territory Every product on the intermediate products tab has a place on the bus Has 15 oil spots on minimap, can't figure out how to murica Pistol only Has no idea where most of his products come from or go Constantly afraid of pollution, biters not even remotely in range constantly running around to refuel burner inserters fueling Could have opted to use solar power as to not disturb the locals, decided to remove the locals instead Uses radar view to expand base Hasn't touched a yellow belt in 2192 game hours his coal drills Biters have yet to evolve from any- thing oth- er than time Logistic robots serve purely as on-demand ammunition, steel pickaxe and nuclear fuel resupply Could have constructed a nuclear reactor, but steam attracts locals towards the artillery and there are better uses for the uranium Uses only one side of beits for ore, the other for coal Furnace farm is one long line of stone furnaces Multo Bene All belts are devoid of all entropy Can't figure out trains, uses kilometres of yellow belt Can barely afford green science Perimeter defense consists of a long line of artillery dedicated power armor mk 2 deconstruct the entire train before being touched. Invites new players to his base, only to kick them. Has yet to place down any power lines that aren't standart 6 Rp/s Kills: 0 Trees: 1120 Got stuck on new hope level 2 Half of production hand-crafted light armor only Last attack on nest ended assembly line in death by small worm OCD Individuals would get addicted to watching him play THE GUY SHE TOLD YOU YOU NOT TO WORRY ABOUT

Mods

Factorio is highly modded, with Mods.Factorio[4] working as an official hub for the game's mods.



Search Interest

External References

[1] IndieGoGo (via Wayback Machine) – Factorio Indiegogo

[2] Rock Paper Shotgun – Factorio Trailer

[3] Reddit – Nerd3

[4] Mods Factorio – mods

[5] Reddit – The only way to go fast, is to go well

[6] Factorio – ff

[7] YouTube – Uncle Bob playlist

[8] Twitter – there is a new far-left fascism

[9] Twitter – wait til kovarex finds out

[10] Reddit (via Archive) – Why am I right wing bigot again

[11] Steam (via Archive) – main dev is transphobic

[12] Twitter – thefemmekytty

[13] Twitter – CaseyExplosion

[14] Reddit – the hold goes deeper

[15] Reddit – balancers

[16] Reddit – It's time for a Factorio Chad meme

[17] Twitter – speedrunning factorio

[18] YouTube – Factorio Sandstorm

[19] Factorio – how to sandstorm

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