Hi again,
Before I continue a little info. I am a videogame addict for many years now, I will soon become an old man hehe but I still play for many hours a day. II really like strategies and resource managment games. Amoung my favorites are Sim City, Civilization, Age of Empires, Starcraft, Railroad Tycoon and many others. I also liek Minecraft, and what I like about it the most was automation of certain tasks, using red stone circuits and stuff, but it was lacking something I couldnt really put my finger what it is. So i built a giant self processing, self sorting rail station, got bored with it and never touched it again. Thne I discovered Factorio wich also a really nice mining crafting production chain game. But somehow out of all of these your game has the most potential to be the most fun in my personal top 5 list.
I understand that it is hard work and it is still work in progress, so I decided to make your life even harded and to give you a ton of suggestions!
I made a list of suggestions and added some explanations to it, sorry it is a bit long .
Containers
- no teleportation between containers
jI think no teleportation between containers would add functionality and gameplay, as player would have to design material hubs with warehouses as well as transport paths using wheeled carts and such to deliver raw items to construction sites and production areas.
- Various sizes for different size items
It is weird to be able to insert a 100 logs into a small container, I think logs could be stored in a stack on the ground or in a special roof covered building, kinda like bot storage. Metal ore and other raw material for example could be stored in a pile inside a concrete semi fenced area like in real factories.
- warehouse building
a special warehouse building that can store several types of res at a time to save space and could also be connected to rail system. For example it could have a loading dock. Now that I think of it, it would also be fun to have to build a cargo barge as an alternative to a bridge between water separated areas.
Items
- items have weight
Items should have weight, as it would be difficult for a player to lift and carry an entire tree trunk, and store additional six of em in inventory. Actually, when I first saw the game several weeks ago, I was finally happy to see someone implementing something similar to carrying capacity in the game (that is before I learned that you could put six more trees in your inventory and still run around) I like games like Minecraft and Factorio bur it is so weird to be able to carry three tons of processed metal in ones pocket.
- dimensions
I think similar rules could apply to item size. Inventory could be represented as a grid of tiles and different items could occupy different amount of tiles.
transportation
- various transport equipment for different tasks
As was mentioned earlier, if magic teleportation between containers was removed an additional fun element in the game could be implemented. It would be great to have wheeled carts, pump trucks or something like that.
- vehicles for bot crews, folk and player
A type of truck could be added that could transport certain amount of resources as well as several bots. For example a bot construction crew loaded with material could arrive at the site to start building.
- rail system
Fastest way to deliver items across the map. Also transportation capacity is significantly larger.
equipment
- may malfunction
It would be fun to have to manage equipment, For example a saw blade could wear off with usage. Or a random malfunction could take place which would require a maintenance bot to service it using specific tools.
Electricity
- Electricity would be nice to have for additional morbid fun! Wind turbines or coal burning generator or water wheel operated. But all equipment should have a source of power including bot batteries.
bot batteries
- Bots need to connect to charge station or require battery replacement
Bots may need to work in shifts on the same task as it takes time to recharge abatttery at the charging station.
starting setup
- at the start player has some essential items
If you do decide to implement some of the thing mentioned. I think it would make sense to give player some processed resources at the start of a game, For example a Basic wind turbine module packaged in a container that a player can unpack and install.
- tools and material to build basic machinery
Also, a player could receive not only material like planks and poles and some gears to assemble initial workshop equipment there would also be essential tools like hammers and wrenches or screwdrivers.
- player chooses initial drop zone for starter items
Maybe it would look like an air drop or delivery from space. But at the start of a game player could choose and area where starting gear would land.
Folk
- folk can wander into dangerous areas and become victims of own curiosity
- depressed folk can display aggressive attitudes and engage in vandalism
]
bot programming
- ability to extend bot memory with upgrades like data storage
- IF ELSE OR AND capability and nesting
- algorithm DB for command reuse and code assembly
for bot programming purpose it would awesome to have a database where you could choose to copy commands a bot has learnt. Initially you would have to show a bot what to do by example, but as you colect more code snippets you could reassemble it, produce a script load it onto a drive and load it into a nex bot.
Of course these suggestion are soming from someone who is into strategies and stuff, I undersand that sometime for the sake off fun many things are not included in a game just so people dont start yawning.
Also if you ever need a Russian or Ukrainian localization I would be happy to translate it for you free of charge.
Vladimir