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How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

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Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#131

Post by herval »

OJFord wrote: post #130
herval wrote: post #127

Lots of comments on this thread in the vein of “I dislike this game because it’s not productive”. My honestly question is… why? Why is “being productive” this goal that has to consume your entire life?

I think because - or to speak for myself, the reason I've never bought/played it, despite being interested - it's similar and yet not productive. Versus say Call of Duty or whatever that you might lose yourself in, which is also not productive, but bears no resemblance to work. Pilot communities probably say similar things about flight sims (or flight components of games) that aren't good enough to be useful practice…

It’s not in any way similar to coding, though - it’s a puzzle-solving game. It’s not made to simulate any engineering discipline, nor user to train engineers (like flight sims are)

Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#132

Post by ghostpepper »

herval wrote: post #131
OJFord wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think because - or to speak for myself, the reason I've never bought/played it, despite being interested - it's similar and yet not productive. Versus say Call of Duty or whatever that you might lose yourself in, which is also not productive, but bears no resemblance to work. Pilot communities probably say similar things about flight sims (or flight components of games) that aren't good enough to be useful practice…

It’s not in any way similar to coding, though - it’s a puzzle-solving game. It’s not made to simulate any engineering discipline, nor user to train engineers (like flight sims are)

You don't find coding similar to solving puzzles in any way?

Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#133

Post by mrgoldenbrown »

herval wrote: post #131
OJFord wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think because - or to speak for myself, the reason I've never bought/played it, despite being interested - it's similar and yet not productive. Versus say Call of Duty or whatever that you might lose yourself in, which is also not productive, but bears no resemblance to work. Pilot communities probably say similar things about flight sims (or flight components of games) that aren't good enough to be useful practice…

It’s not in any way similar to coding, though - it’s a puzzle-solving game. It’s not made to simulate any engineering discipline, nor user to train engineers (like flight sims are)

Many people are quoted in the article claiming it is in fact useful for training/educating software engineers.

Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#134

Post by dpkirchner »

serf wrote: post #56
dartos wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When making software that's supposed to be used, you can't mess around that much. At the end of the day, someone has to use it and if its weird it'll be bad. This makes me sad. You don’t need to make software for mass appeal. Git is weird and bizarre (especially when initially released), but it’s used and well loved.

>This makes me sad. I gotta say, I think I agree. Maybe it's just rose-tinted-glasses, but I remember a time when software was split between "IBM-Corpo" culture, and zany SV/MIT/Caltech culture where people threw things at the wall and proceeded when stuff stuck. It kind of saddens me that it feels like it's now only IBM-Corpo, and everyone feels the need to be ever-productive and adhere to strict rules and schema. t…

> It kind of saddens me that it feels like it's now only IBM-Corpo

I think about this whenever I see a new open source library hosted on its own domain with a polished and slick promo material. I really don't mean to throw shade at designers for making nice designs, but it just feels weird and corporate-y to me that the polish is a priority.

There are, of course, open source projects that serve as a hook for selling SaaS products, which is corporate by nature and thus doesn't trigger the same feeling in me.

Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#135

Post by hluska »

satvikpendem wrote: post #79
delichon wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I asked Kovařík about this, he brought up Euro Truck Simulator, a wilfully mundane game about hauling cargo. The developers, who are friends of his, once told him that many of their most enthusiastic players are ... truckers. Truckers who spend their time off from their trucking jobs pretending to do more trucking ... a lot of people actually enjoy the work they do. They just don’t always enjoy their jobs that m…

Good for them, fortunately I'm not a trucker.

Life is way too short to be boring.

Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#136

Post by herval »

mrgoldenbrown wrote: post #133
herval wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not in any way similar to coding, though - it’s a puzzle-solving game. It’s not made to simulate any engineering discipline, nor user to train engineers (like flight sims are)

Many people are quoted in the article claiming it is in fact useful for training/educating software engineers.

People say the same thing about Sudoku. Or any video game (historically claimed as a hobby that creates coders, just because many coders liked computers at an early age, I suspect)

Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#137

Post by herval »

ghostpepper wrote: post #132
herval wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not in any way similar to coding, though - it’s a puzzle-solving game. It’s not made to simulate any engineering discipline, nor user to train engineers (like flight sims are)

You don't find coding similar to solving puzzles in any way?

IMO coding is to solving puzzle the same way as any other discipline (from people management to architecture) is to solving puzzles

Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#138

Post by beeflet »

AtlasBarfed wrote: post #37
satvikpendem wrote: post #35

I know lots of people who play Factorio but for me, I guess it just feels too much like work? Whenever I play it, I get the distinct feeling that I could instead do the same thing but productively instead, such as by contributing to my OSS projects (sometimes, maybe even for profit instead). I never got into these types of programmatic games for precisely this reason but I'd like to understand other perspectives on t…

Fps: the US military thanks you for training for infantry in your spare time.

Gonna enlist and be the first man to rocket jump

Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#139

Post by exodust »

SigmundA wrote: post #66
satvikpendem wrote: post #35

I know lots of people who play Factorio but for me, I guess it just feels too much like work? Whenever I play it, I get the distinct feeling that I could instead do the same thing but productively instead, such as by contributing to my OSS projects (sometimes, maybe even for profit instead). I never got into these types of programmatic games for precisely this reason but I'd like to understand other perspectives on t…

I feel the same way sometimes, it definitely closer to the same loop of plan execute refactor then many games. I do find my self getting wrapped up into then backing off because it does feel like work. But I like the fact that I can see it working in realtime, its just pretty, this machine I built that I can zoom into and see the smallest detail actually working. Wish software was more like that, a good debugger can…

You're right. The intoxication of graphics and visual design in games can't be underestimated. It's more than a paint job or window dressing. It slots into the whole itch-scratching appeal and addiction.

I agree debugging tools could make more use of visualisation. I remember the excellent HTML 3d view in Firefox, removed from version 47. For some reason we can't have nice things: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqHV625EU3E

Not sure if there's a way to get it back. I heard it's available in Edge, but I don't use that browser.

Re: How 'Factorio' seduced Silicon Valley and me

#140

Post by derektank »

barbarr wrote: post #129
herval wrote: post #127

Lots of comments on this thread in the vein of “I dislike this game because it’s not productive”. My honestly question is… why? Why is “being productive” this goal that has to consume your entire life?

Internalized capitalism

I'm not sure if there's any economic system that could survive long term without people being productive. Just because the farm is collectivized doesn't mean you aren't working from the crack of dawn to sunset
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