Hello everyone!
We've been loving seeing you discuss and share your experiences playing shapez 2. It's interesting to see what features people pick up on and which are more easily overlooked. We've previously made a blog with some beginner tips & tricks to get you started with your factory, but now that some time has passed and your factories have grown (hopefully), we thought we'd give you some more tips that get a little more advanced!
While selecting everything in an area with [SHIFT] is useful, there's a more intuitive option if you want to select a single belt and everything connected to it. Select a Belt, Pipe or the space equivalent of either, then press [O]. Now, everything connected will be selected! For normal belts or pipes, this will generally select everything connected from the last Space Belt to the next. For Space Belts, this will generally select everything between the last platform and the next.
Once selected, you get an overview of everything in the window on the right. This includes the amount of buildings, the types of buildings, the dimensions and of course all the things you can do with this selection. This includes [I] to clear the shapes current being produced, useful for if you accidentally made some incorrect shapes!
[SHIFT]'s evil and forgotten brother, [ALT], allows you to deselect in the same way as [SHIFT] allows you to select. If you've got something selected, you can [ALT]+[LBM] on a building or belt to deselect it, or [ALT] and drag to make a deselection box.
If you're feeling lost in space, there are a couple hotkeys to help you get around. You can press [N] to orientate the camera to the north. If you've lost your Vortex, you can press [H] to instantly move back to it. You can thank Vortex LTD for that, they wouldn't appreciate you losing your Vortex.
Additionally, you can set up a new hotkey that allows you to jump back to your previous location if you just jumped to your Vortex. Just look for 'Jump Back' in the keybindings menu!
Once your factory reaches a considerable size, simply panning around the place looking for a specific production chain may take a while. To make your factory easier to track, use location markers! Press the location symbol in the top right of the screen, or hotkey [L], to create a marker at the center of your screen. You can now give the marker a name and assign a shape code to it, which you can copy by clicking the desired shape in any UI before making the marker.
Once made, your marker will be pinned to the right edge of your screen. Click the marker to instantly jump to its location!
Not happy with a marker? You can right click it to edit, allowing you to change its name, shape or update its location to where you're currently looking. If you don't need it anymore, you can delete it here as well.
With larger factories and/or lower-end hardware, you may notice your PC struggle a bit with performance. One unassuming setting can affect performance quite a bit: Shape Previews. While it's useful to get a preview of what shape will be produced by your most recent creation, it takes quite a bit of power to compute this.
In the General Settings menu, all the way at the bottom, you can find Simulation Settings. Here, you can set Shape Preview Speed, with lower values being easier on your PC at the trade-off that Shape Previews take longer to appear. If you don't find the Shape Previews that useful and want to turn them off altogether, you can do that right next to it.
Many may already know this, but orientation doesn't matter when delivering shapes to the Vortex! Additionally, any Pins not at the top layer of a shape is ignored as well. As long as all parts of the shape are in the correct position relative to each other, the Vortex will take them.
The only exception here are the shapes for a randomized goal in the Operator screen. Those do need the correct orientation.
By default, the hotkey for the Milestones, Shop, Jobs/Trades and Operator Level screens available in the top left of your screen are all bound to [T] as part of the 'Research Screen' keybind. When pressed, it will default to the last opened screen. However, you can set hotkeys for each individual screen if you'd like quicker access to each.
The hotkey for the Technologies/Shop Screen will already be bound to [Y], and Operator Level to [U]. The hotkey for the Milestones, Jobs (in Classic Mode) and Trades (in Manufacture Mode) screens are empty by default!
To help organise your Blueprints, you can categorize them by putting them in nested folders, up to three deep! For example, you can make a folder for 'Basic Functions', then create a folder inside that folder for 'Rotators' and 'Cutters', then put the respective blueprints in there. This can be done in-game, but also directly on your PC's disk without launching the game.
Folders can also be assigned to your hotbar for quick access by simply dragging the folder into it!
On the topic of Blueprints, you can set a keybind to cycle through the blueprints you've previously selected in your current session. Saves you some time going back and forth between screens!
When trying to place a Blueprint, you can click on the various building types shown in the selection panel on the right to deselect that building. These will not be placed when you place the blueprint. Useful for when a blueprint covers most of what you want to place, but needs one specific building type replaced.
That's it for today! We hope we made getting around your factories and making changes to it a little bit easier with these tips. We'll be back soon with an exciting update on what's still in store for shapez 2 this year, so see you then!
If you haven't read the previous tips & tricks, be sure to check it out here: