Campaign structure ideas

[Volrak]

I wanted to share some thoughts regarding the overall campaign structure - I hope they are of interest.

Though it would be absolutely fine for e.g. a tutorial sequence, I found the 3 demo levels to be slightly disjointed in that your starting setup in the next level is different to your end setup in the previous level. I think that this kind of mission structure does not take not take best advantage of Factorio's fantastic gameplay.

For me, the core element of fun in a game like Factorio is transforming a virgin landscape into a buzzing hub of industry. This kind of long-form game play is immensely satisfying. Do others agree? I think that repeating this process a number of times under different scenarios, each having different challenges, resource levels, goals, and possible techs, under a single overall high-level story-driven progression, has a lot of advantages over setting a number of very short and possibly disjointed missions, each to complete some minor task.

One way to implement the overall high-level progression would be a space view, where choosing a mission involves selecting a planet to travel to. You would usually have 2 or 3 missions to choose from at any given point, and completing missions can unlock new missions (e.g. a tree-structure, culminating in some final story-driven goal such as invading the alien homeworld). Each mission is a "from scratch" long-form game, and each has a different goal. The goals could be quite varied - e.g. mapping the planet, retrieving precious items, terraforming, escaping from a crash-landing on an unintended planet, or building up infrastructure in preparation for colonisation. Preparation for colonisation could itself have many different flavours - building a bio-dome, building landing pads for colony ships, building housing, an electricity grid, and so on.

In role-playing terms, the tutorial could be a sequence of simulated "training" mission before actually leaving for the stars in your professional capacity as a planetary surveyor (or whatever it could be called!) Once you have set off into the real galaxy, missions could be more free-form - it would be your job as a player, and also your job in role-playing terms, to decide how best to tackle each situation.

That's it - apologies for the length. I'm sure I'm not the first to have some of these ideas, but hopefully all the ideas together have some merit!

[ssilk]

Necroing.

This is just outdated. There are some more actual suggestions, which point to the tutorial.