Unfinished: Dyson Sphere Program

Wohoo!

The Galactic Devourer, The Eater of Worlds, He Who Drinks of The Universe;

Thy name is VinnCo.

If there are 'Jason games' then this is definitively a 'Vinny game.'

The game starts when you get a real grip on the logistics network. It's exceptionally powerful, and easier to make than any main bus design you might have in Factorio.

Factorio has combat / defense, Satisfactory has verticality and exploration, Dyson Sphere Program has Logistics.

It's really great. You're firing solar panels at the sun with a rail gun, then sucking power back to the planets while manufacturing nuclear batteries to ship to the next solar system over to power that. The first time you see your dyson swarm on the horizon, it's just amazing.

DSP to the moonSun!

Oh no, I shouldn't have watched this video... I can feel it. Feel it in my bones. The desire to build again... My next 100h of free time just disappeared before me...

Been having a lot of fun with this game when I can play it! It really started to click with me when I successfully figured out how to create a somewhat efficient production line for blue cubes. Felt like a steal at $20 at that point.

@vinny

"You won't even have time to think about the ramifications of stripping planets bare as we unlock that sweet next technology!"

I think you're missing a word there.

The zoom out really got me in terms of what the game is going for, though I'm torn between that being amazing or too much. I fell off Astroneer after 20-30 hours once I launched to other planets and realized my next few dozen hours were just recreating basic infrastructure on each planet and shipping resources between them to build things, so I'm not sure I'd be into doing that on a system-wide and then galaxy-wide scale.

But if it's done in a more integrated and efficient way, I could see it being awesome. My main problem with Astroneer was that inter-planetary travel seemed like so much of a time and resource commitment, so having to space truck between the planets ferrying resources and equipment never felt good. But here the speed with which it looks like you can travel and then likely ship (automatically?) resources between planets could hopefully turn it into a just much bigger factory-building scope.

Though overall I'm with Brad. I can't see myself jumping in this early when things are going to change and improve so much in the near term.

These kinds of Unfinished/Quick Looks are my absolute favorites. Even ignoring this being a game I am incredibly interested in, it is very much a "fun" video where it is people talking about games and concepts they like

And I have too many games to play right now to justify this at full (early access) price but the moment there is even a one cent discount... Still not sure if I like the limited resources (always hated having to rebuild my factories in a particularly long factorio game) but it seems fitting to the style of the game (stripmining) and there will probably be mods/cheats that I will insist on being aware of but never use (see factorio)

And being able to control/position the input/outputs like that makes me WAY too happy. Satisfactory always felt too static and the grabbers in factorio always felt clunky. That just looks beautiful.

FYI @vinny, the recent Factorio notes basically said it's in maintenance mode now. So, yes, sometimes these games do get finished!

Factorio is going to release a Big, Game Changing DLC. Until then, only bugs will be fixed.

The dev made a blog post where he explained his reasoning, and it's pretty sound. He only wants to add to the game in a way that changes enough of it, so that you are excited to start over.

A really big part of these games is getting over the desire to hand-craft some stuff yourself to satisfy the current very short term goal, like finishing one corner of a larger layout.

Every single material and every single structure should have an easily accessible dedicated box to pull from. Make a mall. Whenever you need to visit it, the parts will be there. If you're running low on one specific part because you're using it, pull more from the mall. Always carry a full stack of every building, and six stacks of belts.

Pack a lunch.

I hope there's a Peaceful mode or something to turn enemies off.

This was my first factory-building game, the first time I saw a video of zooming out to the galaxy cluster scale I was instantly sold, I didn't care if I've never played one of these before. If anyone's looking for a first-timer's perspective/review, it was initially a little challenging because there's almost no structure and I had no idea how to progress or anything. But after 4-5h I was very comfortable with the mechanics and having a great time.

Also, I was struck by how different Vinny's factory was to mine, and that got me thinking about how cool it would be to compare peoples' "first factory" from these games to see how peoples' brains work differently.

@deathpooky: You can absolutely automate shipments between planets in this game. After 12h I had just completed my starter planet's space elevator, which needs transport ships (and another space elevator on another planet) to start shipping resources/components back and forth. This is all based on some automated interplanetary supply and demand system that I couldn't even begin to comprehend.

The planetary and intergalactic logistic towers with drones and ships really are game changers on how you build your factories. Then when you get warp capable ships with a stable fuel production it changes again.

It goes from this little patch and vein makes one thing to an entire planet makes one thing.

How many paperclips do you start with?

I hope Vinny does some more streams of this game in the future when he starts getting into the interplanetary logistics stuff.

Well how much life do you think will be left when the sunlight is all blocked out?

This game is great, and Vinny has not even started the mid game, which I would consider when you unlock the logistics stations. Once you are able to use the towers and drones to build self contained factories, things start to kick off.

Another portion that I also love is the look of the game, once you start sending out your dyson swarms (little solar sails that can collect energy from the star) just seeing it float above your planet is mesmerizing.

@eccentricex At the moment there are no hostile forces, though it seems some are planed. I like it this way and turn them off in factorio also.

I have over 75 hours into this game...it is FUN!
Can be frustrating, but that moment when the solution to a problem you've been dealing with comes to you....Mmmmmm!

I've never played one of these, but I love the concept of space-based megastructures, so I'm thinking about picking this up.

@retroshaft: Oh to have any free time at all.

Genre name: Satis-factorio like

Looks like this dev played Planetary Annihilation. Great game.

I've picked this game up and it's pretty epic (I've also bought the soundtrack which is awesome). I'll be waiting a bit longer though before I take a deep dive into it. I'll wait for some more updates to come out as it progresses through early access.

I've played a lot of Satisfactory and that will be my go to when they finish it in 2029.

Until then I've been looking at this and Factorio. Anyone with experience with both who can tell me which of these are most easily digestable? I feel like the 1-2 hours of Factorio demo i've played left me super overwhelmed and confused.

I think this might be the first "one of these" I get into.. this looks very cool.

@silan: This one is way more digestible. While I love factorio, this game is more straight forward and is more visually readable than factorio.

Also, while I love building trains in factorio, this one skips that step and goes straight to drones for the logistic system. pulling out into the space map and seeing ships jump in and out of warp is pretty cool.

To Brad's point of realizing one would need to use the entire resources of the solar system to make the Dyson Sphere... even if that wasn't the case the solar system would still die. ALL the radiation from the star gets captured by the sphere, which means no energy is getting to the planets so they'll become frozen dead husks.

Thank you for the content.

Was just about to say, the moment I saw the mech, I was reminded of the commander from Total Annihilation.

Love when Vinny heads up a quick look. Keeping the audience abreast of what’s happening always seems to be at the top of his priority list.

@eccentrix: Yes, agreed completely. That’s one part of factorio I really don’t like. I feel like it’s a lot as it is trying to juggle all the factory aspects but then needing to juggle defense on top of it all is too much. The nice thing about satisfactory is that if you want to build you’re not constantly being interrupted by things going bad when a wave of mobs runs in, you just have to worry about it when exploring when you’re prepared for it.

@silan: Very much this so far, as there’s no enemies yet. Once they add in enemies who knows?