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Comment by roydivision | Hacker News Reader

I have purposely avoided Factorio just because I'm convinced that I'll sink so much time into it. It looks super fun, but I have stuff to do.

Maybe one day....

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Stay away if you value your time. It's not a joke when they call it cracktorio. Especially on the Deck...

Tangent but if you 'value' your time but don't use the time to entertain yourself I'm not sure you're using it right.

The concern isn't that entertainment is bad, it's that Factorio is so entertaining that it tends to get its claws into you, making it difficult to turn off. If someone struggles with time management or self-control, avoiding Factorio is perfectly reasonable.

Entertaining one's self is not the end-all, be-all.

Well, yes, but it can get out of hand.

On the Steam deck? How? With external KB and mouse?

Probably because you can pick up and play anywhere at any time.

Playing on a PC vs the Deck (or other similar portable) is like the difference between being an addict and the dealer using their own product.

I’m personally not a fan, but lots of folks report that factorio works fine on the deck.

They made some UI tweaks to make it work well on the Steam Deck. https://factorio.com/blog/post/fff-370

I haven't tried it but I've heard that it is completely playable, although I'm sure not as convenient as using a mouse and keyboard.

Controller support landed in June, a long time after that blog post.

https://forums.factorio.com/viewtopic.php?p=586148#p586148

It has native controller support as well, evidenced by the fact that it is also available on switch.

Custom input map with extensive radial menus and layers.

I haven't played Factorio (yet...), but the trackpads work surprisingly well for other mouse based games such as Planet Coaster, FTL, point and click games etc.

While I wouldn't play RTS games on it, the pads combined with the fantastic steam input that lets you rebind any button to any keypress (or a macro of presses) makes it so you can be fairly sure you can play most mouse keyboard+mouse games on it.

Initially with a custom input map, took a little customization and getting used to, but was very natural afterwards.

Now with the controller support added to the PC version of the game from the Switch release.

I really like this game but the colors are hell on my eyes. I'd like to play more but I have such a hard time trying to figure out sometimes what is connecting where. I wish this had some nice bright colors and I would for sure play much more.

You may enjoy Dyson Sphere Program, then, as it has a much brighter palette and (currently) no biters. I have yet to figure out why I like DSP more than Factorio but I just do. It's more _fun_ to me

Yep, I bought that and have played it a bit! I like the graphics much more for sure. I need to get back to digging in some more as I've barely gotten off the ground.

Both games have a "lull period" in them, just at different stages of progression in my experience. But the "game changer"(heh) for me was when I realized that I really needed to start DSP games by spacing out things waaaaaaay more than one might think necessary at the time. Every time I've been glad to have the extra space when I needed to add more production or rework something and didn't have to tear down the whole city to do it

It was made brighter and more colourful recently(ish) :

https://www.factorio.com/blog/post/fff-320

Has anyone tried Space Exploration mod on steam deck? Does it run alright?

I've been meaning to try it, but also know its going to suck me in hard if it works well, so have been waiting for the right time.

I've been doing an SE run on my Deck, I'm not that far in, but I think it'll probably be fine, Factorio is extremely light on the Deck given how long the battery lasts with it, so there should be plenty of performance headroom available.

I played through the demo levels, loved it, and then decided NOT to buy it for exactly this reason - it’s so perfectly addictive! No thanks I already played TTD for thousands of hours in the 90s, can’t do another game that sucks you in like that.

Seeing you played TTD for thousands of hours means this is on track for at least a thousand as well. Keep avoiding it or take a long vacation from real world

We've had two people at work take days off in the wake of being told about factorio lol

Totally, just try EVE for a bit to blow some time.

Less sarcastically, it killed a couple weeks of my life, but it does have a natural ending point. If you don't get into modding or ramp up the difficulty it's not too bad to pull away from the brink.

They don't call it "cracktorio" for nothing.

The time sink risk is for the whole factory building genre, not just the excelent Factorio.

My personal problem with these games is that it feels too much like programming an work, and I do all that at work :)

The difference for me is at work, I need to deal with code reviews, users, and aligning with business objectives. In Factorio, if I decide to refactor my entire base because I want to improve something, I'm free to do so (as long as I keep the biters in mind).

I totally get this perspective. My first foray into Factorio ended abruptly when I realized I'd made a total mess and was now signed up for a bunch of miserable refactoring.

Later, I realized that was the wrong approach - just go build a new factory somewhere. It's fun to take a more "hacky" approach to Factorio than I allow myself at work sometimes.

Of course, that was when the game really got its hooks into me, and I quit after a few dozen hours when I realized that I was scratching the same itch that I could use for side projects and other learning.

It's a balance, idk. I'll definitely play the new expansion at some point, but I do find myself feeling a bit strange when I'm spending time learning how to do something ultimately worthless when I could be using the same kind of mental energy to build something tangible or learn some new skill.

I have long-believed that programmers can be divided into two camps:

* "Factorio is just like what I do at work all day - why would I do that in my free time?" * "Factorio is all the best bits of what I enjoy about work, with none of the bad bits (obfuscated errors, meetings, dependencies on other teams, politics) - I want to do this forever!"

Personally I'm in the latter camp, but the former are certainly not wrong.

You can probably beat the game in two weekends though, just FYI. I haven't felt that much need to replay it since then (though I'll probably try Space Age) but it's great fun.

As much as I love the base game, I would have quit long ago if it weren't for mods.

Mods are what keep me coming back.

I stopped playing because it is a time sink and also because it becomes more and more like work to me.

I would end up going to bed and dreaming about it the whole night.

Wait until you have children and then play it with them.

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