this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2023
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This game gets universal praise and I'd love to play it but as a PC gamer I refuse to as I wouldn't want to support a dev who not only never does sales but raises the price because of "inflation"
Why did you put inflation in quotes like it isn't real?
https://www.rateinflation.com/inflation-rate/usa-inflation-rate/
At $35 right now the game is reasonably priced for the amount of value you will get out of it. I believe there is an expansion on the way as well...
$35 being reasonable is an understatement. Most people take 50h to get through their first "full playthrough" and the replayability is limitless. Then there's free workshop content that'll take abase game and add another 200h onto it (Space Exploration, Krastorio, Sea Block, Bob's, Angels, etc)
Plus: They still have a free demo with no time limit too. You get exposed to the core loop within five minutes of playing and you'll know if it clicks or not for you before you even have to buy.
I bought the game at $25 but I'd buy it again at $35 and not regret anything...
I have like 400 hours and have never launched a rocket, used logistic bots, or made a train, lmao fml but I adore this game
Lol. I basically only do rail worlds now or heavy mods (I'm like 75h into a space exploration run and just started going to other planets).
But no logistics bots? You mad man
I have a bad habit of restarting all the time, and I've always loaded up on mods.. I've just never expanded enough to figure out logistic bots which kinda intimidate me.
Bots are straightforward:
Storage is storage. This is where the bots put things you deconstruct and where the bots grab things to build.
Requestor chests use bots to attempt to always have the amount(s) you set in them at all times.
Active providers attempt to be empty all the time. Logistics bots will move items out of these chests into storage.
Passive providers are like active providers but don't need to be empty all the time. Bots will take out of a passive provider before storage (even if storage is closer to the destination)
Buffer chests are weird. I don't fully understand them but i believe they're basically normal chests until you get over X amount in them then they turn into active providers? You can set an option on requester chests to request from buffers and then i believe that it then ignores whatever buffer settings you have... I never use them...
An important nuance is that the network will try to keep the same item in the same chest so if you have wood in a storage chest in the north bots will fly PAST empty storage to go to that specific chest that already has wood in it. Also bots will never put items back in a provider and will never take out of a requestor even if the items inside are no longer requested by the chest.
Basically throw down a lot of storage chests in one place. Put passive providers as the output for stuff you build. Put requestor chests as input for assemblers (if you copy an assembler with a recipe you can paste it onto a requestor to automatically request the ingredients). Do not put gears in your network it's just easier to move iron around and make gears where you need it.
Okay that actually helped a lot! What about the other bots?
Construction bots just build blueprints and deconstruct things marked for deconstruction. They take items from providers first (active then passive) then storage. They'll put things picked up into storage (not sure if they go into requestors directly though).
You can build a personal robo port and put it inside your suit, then robots you have in your personal inventory will construct/deconstruct in an area around you and put/pull from your inventory only.
Usually you'll want more logistics robots than construction but you can select any robo port and see the number of available/idle bots of each type in the network. If you wanna get real fancy you can get these numbers out with wires and use combinatiors to do some logic like: Only add bots if all bots are in use or other such things
Edit: Construction bots will also repair damaged buildings! Just have repair packs in storage in your network somewhere and they'll make sure every building inside your network is at 100% health!
Construction bots: if you place a blueprint for a building, if it is in construction range of a roboport, a construction bot is free, and it has the item to build it in a provider, storage, or buffer chest in the network, then a construction will go get that item and then build that building.
Moving to construction bots is transformative to the redesign and rebuild loop because you can deconstruct an entire area with a deconstruction planner and a sweep of your mouse, then paste down 6 copies of your new design with a blueprint in a few clicks and just let the bots do the grunt work, while you focus on design.
The two things that broke me out of restarting everytime I hit midgame were learning construction bots, and trying for the Lazy Bastard achievement. Since I did that, I've never felt like ending a run before rocket launch.
Logistic bots are a game changer. For real.
Nah, logistic bots are just a matter of convenience. While it helps with compact builds, most of the time they simply are a substitute for belts.
Construction bots are where its at.
Right you are, apologies, construction bots are a game changer. Logistic bots can be convenient though.
The quotations was due to the fact that no other digital only game increases it price after release because of inflation. I get the devs are updating the game still, but the price of the base game shouldn't go up with time. But that's just my opinion.
Off the top of my head, Rain World did it too.
I guess it's how rain world handled it by bundling it with a major base game update at the same time. See my response to Serenus.
Is it that different than adding expansions? The only difference is they aren't charging current owners for all the new content.
There is not really much in terms of new content. Just minor bugfixes, some optimization and modding improvements. The announced expansion will also be payed content.
My later replies clear up my thoughts better but I will say, expansions are not the same as you don't need to buy the expansion to play the game. I've seen games give expansion for free to existing then paid for anyone new but the base game is still purchase that you can buy by itself.
They probably used quotes because it's only one part of the equation. If wages are stagnant like they have been for a while (at least in USA), money has less purchasing power and people have less savings/spending money.
Raising the price in economic situations like this is squeezing the customers (whether it's intended or not), and I doubt most prices hikes with successful things are just to keep the lights on. Which is the big issue now with rising inflation and record profits.
Wube is Czech, located in Prague, it's not like their grocery bills got smaller. Inflation figures actually don't make up for that the Crown is quite stable against the USD, both are dropping against the Euro, and Eurozone countries are Czechia's main trading partners, by, like, an enormous lot. Me buying some Czech beer doesn't really make up for importing Spanish and Italian tomatoes.
If you want to complain about rising prices blame Nestle et al as well as real estate speculation.
I mean it seems like it's been a household name for a while (I say as someone who does not closely follow pop-culture). Has their food/beer/housing money run dry? By all data that I can see, there is something wrong if they're not a multi-millionaire. That's putting it mildly as I'm sure they reached the "can live off this for the rest of my life if I don't blow it" point many times over very quickly even if you pretend early sales don't count.
Also low-cost gamedev is a lot more viable now thanks to gratis tools+internet help+modern funding options etc. Mindustry comes to mind. Price hikes aren't(/shouldn't be) needed to buy a dev a coffee/beer.
Though honestly my main reply was about the inflation claim in general that people like to use (common AAA conversation). But this is pretty silly too, inflation doesn't have much effect on an already-made digital product (and if the product is already fun, I don't see the point in upselling like the hired-an-orchestra type stuff).
It's not just the three original devs any more they actually have a payroll to worry about and are easily burning through a million a year.
Raw yearly sales (assuming 500K at $30) is $15M though. This seems far from struggling territory or even breaking even, and their current costs are probably diminishing returns/unnecessary.
Even if you think the increasing investment is worth it, that's a different argument than inflation. To me it sounds like a lie for continuously growing profits just like any other company.
5M easily go to taxes, steam takes another 2M and with the 33 people that are listed on their site they probably loose 2M on salary alone. Then there is another 0.5M for license, real estate and infrastructure. While it still leaves 5.5M per year average, that's an extremely tight budget for the development of a new game.