Factorio, at present, is my favorite game. In this video, I attempt to explain why I like it so much. I also explain why it and similar games have become so successful when compared to their peers with much larger budgets.
In Tynan Sylvester's book (creator of rimworld) he writes about how we get emotional responses in games from what have helped us survive in the past. Also in the case of Rimworld the "bad" graphics are intentional because the mind fills in the details making the experience richer. For example if some colonists start fighting and you read that one of them said a joke about a banana, you start imagining the details of the joke, how the different colonists reacted, how their relationship has changed and a picture is formed in your mind. Maybe this has happened before and you think one of them is sensitive or maybe you think this other colonist is being a asshole. It emerges from the simple systems of the world and take place entirely in your head. In reality the fight might have just been a random encounter. If Rimworld had realistic graphics or gave you minor details this would not happen. Very interesting video!
I think what made me fall in love with the game is that the tension with your environment scales with your factories. Decreasing entropy inevitably produces conflict.
Great video! You touched on many interesting and important points, here is a list of thoughts in random order about what you said: - Chaos vs Order is really interesting and it explains much about human nature, culture and history. Games are a great place to explore that space! - As long-time minecraft-lover, I have been thinking about it quite some time: What is it, that I really like so much about this game? And I think the answer lies very much in this chaos-order tension, where I can try to bring order in the natural-wild-untouched block world. My second favorite all-time game is Rimworld (Factorio somewhere in the top ten). And now after what you mentione it in the video: All three of those games share this feature of "chaos vs order". - Very interesting that you made that direct connection to Peterson's lectures. I think what he describes is often not really exclusive to him or his views, but I find he explains psychology in very interesting and understandable way (I watched a semester or two from his Psychology lectures, I think because Xtra-Credits said that game designers should have some understanding of psychology ;). Also, some things I got from his lectures helped me to understand why many games make use of existing religious/mythological themes and symbols. - The Peterson impression was hilarious and on point. How many times did you have to re-record that part? :D - More people/gamedevs should make content like this, and I hope you will be able to continue making these videos
Such an interesting topic. I agree mostly. Also I observed that there are other really deep human drives, as you mentioned: crafting and surviving, but others like drive to explore, interested in stories, and also solving logical puzzles are in there, probably in everyone, but it's universal for someone to be driven by survival, than to he driven by creating order, solving logical puzzles, or to explore. I think you're right, that survival is the most fundamental, thus it's not suprising that a genre of games that tingle that fundamental drive can be so popular.
I think it was intuitive to call Terraria side scrolling minecraft at one point, since you place blocks. Now, I'd call it a survival metroidvania, where the loot you find and structures you make allow you to navigate more hostile biomes and tackle increasingly difficult bosses. Minecraft, to its detriment, has seemed to chase Terraria's strength of dungeons and bosses instead of focusing on the 3D building sandbox or its cave generation (took YEARS for the cave update, which I think was excellent).
