Hello engineers,
Playing Final Factory with friends has been my dream since before the game came out. Today that dream finally comes true.
It took a lot longer than I wanted. I've been through a lot in my life since Final Factory launched in EA, and there were times I wasn't sure this update would ever happen. What kept me going was this community.
You kept playing, kept reporting bugs, kept showing up in Discord, and a bunch of you spent the last week in the open beta breaking multiplayer in every way possible so I could fix it. I can't thank you enough.
This update is for you. Grab some friends and go build something ridiculous.
See you in the factory!
/Slims
Just a reminder: if you're enjoying Final Factory, steam reviews help a bunch!
Patch notes
This covers everything since 0.21.0.35, the last version on the default branch.
The short version
Online co-op. Host a new game or one of your saves, and friends join through Steam. Everyone shares one factory.
A new look for space. Black holes, stars, planets, neutron stars, Dyson spheres, explosions, engine flames and lighting are all redone.
Batteries. A new building and tech, and stored power is now shown in kWh.
Enemy camps reworked. Camps come with the world and get tougher the farther out you go. Attack waves are capped at 300 ships.
A much bigger map. It zooms out five times farther and is sharp at any resolution.
Old saves load. Enemy ships are cleared once on the first load. Camps stay.
Multiplayer
Online co-op through Steam. Building, research, logistics, fleets and combat are shared by everyone in the game.
To host: open Multiplayer on the main menu and host a new game or a saved game. Any single-player save can be hosted.
Hosting a new game gives you every normal New Game option: mode, seed, tutorial, enemies and the rest.
The host sets a game name, an optional password, and a player limit from 2 to 32 (default 4). We've only tested small groups so far.
Games are public by default and show up in the lobby browser. Untick Public and only Steam friends and invites can join.
To join: pick a game in the lobby browser, accept a Steam invite, or use Join Game on a friend in your Steam friends list.
A joining screen shows what's happening, with a download bar for the world and a Cancel button.
Leave and come back whenever you like. Your ship and inventory are parked and safe while you're away.
Anyone can save, not only the host, and saving doesn't pause the others.
Research is shared. Research rewards like fleet size apply to every player.
Lumin Orbs: each orb anyone picks up gives every player one. You spend your own at the Oracle, and Oracle upgrades are yours alone.
Chat with Enter. /help lists the commands, including whispers, /players and /color.
Ping the map with G, or Ctrl+G for a danger ping. Map markers are shared.
Other players have name tags, their own colour, and an outline you can see through buildings.
The host can /kick, /ban and /unban.
A player on a slow PC no longer holds everyone back. Their game catches up on its own.
If your connection drops, the game tries to reconnect by itself. If your game drifts out of sync, it resyncs from the host.
Opening a menu doesn't pause a multiplayer game.
Achievements unlock only for the player who earned them.
Mods are off in multiplayer for now. The game offers to disable them and restart.
Everyone needs the same version of the game.
Demo: the demo has multiplayer too. Demo players can only play with other demo players, and the demo's research limits still apply.
New content and features
Battery (2x2) and the Power Storage tech, after Capacitors. A battery holds 5 kWh and keeps the factory running when generation falls short.
Capacitors now hold real stored energy, shown in Wh and kWh. Laser turrets and mass drivers pay for each shot from it.
Mass drivers on a weak grid take turns instead of all browning out. The power panel shows peak demand against what the grid can deliver.
Enemy camps reworked. Camps are part of the world from the start: none near your starting area, stronger ones farther out. Cleared areas stay cleared. Camps soak up your factory's signal and spend it on attack waves.
A separate Heat Damage warning. Map pins and arrows show only when a building is actually losing health.
Shots in flight are saved and come back on load.
A failed load takes you back to the main menu and tells you why.
Visual overhaul
The black hole is drawn from scratch. It pulls from the edge you see and destroys at the black disc.
New games open with a white hole.
New stars with coronas, new planets with atmospheres and rings, and a new starfield.
Neutron stars spin and bend the starlight around them.
Dyson bots form a slowly turning shell, with the star glowing through the gaps.
New death explosions, sized to the ship, with smoke that hangs around.
New engine flames, rocket plumes and afterburner. New beams, shots, impacts and mining lasers.
New comets with proper tails.
New lighting. Glowing machines light the floor and their neighbours.
The Knights' Guardian shield grows in and shrinks away instead of popping.
Flying stations show a hover field.
The map zooms out five times farther, draws at your screen's resolution, and has bigger icons and star icons.
The minimap shows more of the world.
Fog of war opens and closes smoothly.
Ships, belts, arms and progress bars are drawn smoothly every frame.
Quality of life
"Inventory full" tells you when crafting or mining has nowhere to go.
Crafter tooltips show the real rate, with power, overdrive and bonuses counted.
Cores, cargo holds and mass drivers show which side they output to first.
Hovering a mass driver highlights its links.
Ctrl+click on a belt also picks up the items at its ends.
A blueprint's icon shows on the cursor while placing.
Cargo barges are placed at the start of their route.
When a loot or inventory transfer is refused, you see why.
Only the newest research popup is shown.
Station Move and Land answer the click straight away, with a marker on the target.
You can board a flying station and put items into it.
Belt items stay on the belts of a flying station.
Items go round curved belts at an even pace.
Idle fleets hold a formation instead of jostling.
The exploration centre's range ring matches what it reveals.
The Save and Load panels open fast with lots of saves.
New descriptions for the power buildings. The power panel flags a grid wired in a loop.
Bug report and diagnostics upload is on by default. You can turn it off in Settings, under Privacy.
Balance changes
Enemy attack waves are capped at 300 ships, whatever your settings.
Wave size follows your factory's signal: about 3 ships early on, 32 at 2,000 signal, 100 at the very top of the curve, before your attacker setting.
The Ancient Guardian heals 3% of its health per minute.
The black hole's pull starts closer in (300, was 400) and it destroys at the disc (86, was 200).
Station Movement Programming now needs Planetary Science.
The Afterburner starts with a full charge.
Ships and turrets give up on a target they can't damage and pick another.
Low power slows research bots instead of shrinking what they deliver.
Enemy shots hit the nearest fleet ship in range, not the farthest.
Lumin Orbs from obelisks appear within reach.
Removing a frame that was never built no longer gives a free item.
Performance
The game now simulates 16 times a second and draws smoothly in between, in single-player too. It keeps real time on PCs that can't hold 60 fps.
Belts with items at rest cost far less (about 77% less belt time in our big test).
Cheaper lighting and shaders, with a lighter Low quality setting.
Less work each frame once your map is explored.
Notable fixes
Bats and other fleet ships could sit idle and never fire until you used Frenzy.
Idle fleet ships didn't wake up when enemies came close.
After alt-tabbing you could be stuck unable to move, most often on a Steam Deck.
Stop Inserters and Stop Construction Bots reset every time you loaded.
A cargo hold with every slot disabled blocked its belt.
Upgrading or pasting onto a cargo hold scrambled its disabled slots.
The asteroid "low on resources" warning never cleared.
Leaving a game with the map open gave a white screen in the next one.
Q could pick up an enemy building as a blueprint.
Crafting more than you could afford threw an error. It now queues what you can afford.
Hovering a fleet ship with the mouse did nothing.
The ride prompt picked the last vehicle in range instead of the nearest.
Wandering enemies jittered when they bumped into each other.
The selection panel could show the previous building's details.
The craft queue spilled over two rows.
Tutorial text said "silica asteroid" where it meant bauxite.
Known issues
Multiplayer is new. Desyncs can still happen. The game resyncs you by itself, and if that fails twice you're dropped and can rejoin.
We've tested small groups. Big lobbies are uncharted.
No mods in multiplayer yet.
Demo and full version players can't play together.
Saving in multiplayer gives the player who saves a short hitch on a big base.
If you get a desync, a report is saved. Sending it from the in-game bug reporter helps a lot.
Old saves
Saves from 0.17 onward load, including everything from 0.21.
Enemy ships and attack waves on their way are removed once on the first load. Camps, spawners and the Ancient Guardian stay, and camps rebuild their ships.
Capacitor charge is converted to the new stored energy.
Oracle levels above an upgrade's maximum are brought back to it, and the Lumin Orbs are refunded.
Connector filters you opened up are kept as "All" so landing doesn't reset them.
A save made in this version won't load in the old one. Keep a copy if you plan to go back.