ATTENTION! The sound is broken in the HTML version - please play the Windows version before you rate me on audio!

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POST-JAM VERSION available on itch.io

Screenshot

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Screenshot

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COMPUTRONIUM

noun.

A hypothetical material engineered to maximize its use as a computing substrate.

A lone Von Neumann probe lands on a planet and sets out collecting and converting all the raw materials on the planet. Its goal is to create a universe of planet-sized living computers to calculate an impossible Theorem.

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Movement - WASD - (Hold shift to move faster)

Place waypoint - Space - (Then move to set its direction)

Restart - R

Build train - T - (When on the train spawner)

Build Outpost - O - (When on a Outpost)

Build Factory - F - (When enough Zinc is obtained)

Launch - L - (When enough Computronium is manufactured)

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Made for the GM48 game jam

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Cheats! - Hold 1, 2, 3 or press 4 to give yourself extra resources (for GM48 reviewers in a hurry)

Screenshot
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  • Kwis
    Lv. 67

    Ok so I might have got a bit carried away..

    Reminds me of Terra Ultima (a bit) Pretty addictive game, has cool visuals, is kinda simple. It took me a bit to get what I was supposed to do, but once it was understood, it was cool!

    I feel like it could have had a bit more to it (content wise). Another note: the text telling me I can launch doesn't always appear, strange. The game gets laggy when you have a thousand factories at the same place, which isn't surprising, but it was nice to see that as long as I move away from it, the game doesn't lag.

    Night Fuss
    Submitted

    Night Fuss

    • Luke No Further
      Lv. 14
      Luke No Further Designer of Computronium

      4yrs ago

      WHOAAAA YES that's INCREDIBLE!

      Thanks for playing my game to deSTRUCTION :D

      Yes it's from the same deep future bonkers mindspace as Terra Ultima, thankfully this jam I had enough time to code some actual gameplay :') I have another game in my deep future series if you enjoyed this and want something similar - it too has terrible performance issues in the late game he he!

      Good spot - there is indeed a bug with the launch prompt text.

      I admit I had not anticipated quite that many factories on screen at once - you really got into the spirit of the game and f*cked up that planet. I'm reminded of this comic.

      Thanks - I'm really pleased with this game and so many lovely people have asked for more content so I might just go ahead and add all the rest of the stuff on my todo list when I get a free weekend!

  • Adrien Dittrick
    Lv. 11

    very nice game :) BTW your music bug on the HTML5 version is common: you have to add in a delay betwene the moment where your game starts and the moment where your music plays, or add a loop that checks if the music is playing and if it isn't, you play it.

  • 89o
    Lv. 18

    Honestly, this might've won 1st place if it had sounds and music. Everything else was nearly perfect, I really enjoyed the game. One this I would recommend is maybe more content and to somehow motivate the player to make a good factory. I must admit I lost interest quite quickly.

    Edit: Oh ok so the exe has music. Whoops.

    • Luke No Further
      Lv. 14
      Luke No Further Designer of Computronium

      4yrs ago

      Wow thank you! I'm really glad you enjoyed it. Yes I had a bunch of items on my to-do list that I didn't manage to include - more resources, being able to refine materials and terraform the planet - that kinda thing. I very much enjoyed making this game and I'd like to develop it further.

      Sorry for the HTML sound problems! I've put a big message up at the top of the game description now to let people know so hopefully I won't get too many 0 ratings for audio D:

      Thanks for playing!

  • trolog
    Lv. 6

    (EDIT)-For anyone reading this, the html version works fine, but no music, the exe version has music, so I would recommend this.

    Wow what a game for only 48 hours! this is highly polished with the particle system, the graphics, and the mechanics and I love making "loops" to opmtise the best runs, I found that I could make endless amounts of way points, I think it would have been more cool if you limited these, so you had to carefully spend, though this would mean many more hours of just balancing the game.

    The movement feels really snappy, I played this one for the longest time, it kinda reminds me of factorio, and then you can buy more trains, I found trying to reroute some was a little tricky but it was more my competence than anything else, I lost so many to the lava haha. It would be nice if there was a cool explosion when you lose them to lava/redsquares.

    This is one of the few game jam games, I can say "yeah this could be extended to make a fully fledged game", very addictive, well done!

    • Luke No Further
      Lv. 14
      Luke No Further Designer of Computronium

      4yrs ago

      Wow thank you for your very thorough review!

      Good spot on the infinite waypoint - I did a prototype where you could use Silicon to increase your maximum waypoint budget, but I found I would build a sequence of waypoints out to a resource, only to run out before I could get back! That was a limiting and frustrating feeling and I wanted this game to feel relaxing - I think I could have worked up a compromise with a lot of testing and balancing, but in the end I decided instead to keep the trains to be the only limiting factor, as with each new one you make gives you a clear dopamine hit being able to build new loops or increase the frequency of trips on your existing loops.

      Yes re-routing trains is a little tricky, particularly when the trains bunch up and you need to separate them - the twitchy reaction time it asks of you is a bit out of place in a simulationy game like this - I'm sure there's a more elegant solution out there. And yeah I think a good consolation prize for struggling with it would be a cool explosion effect! :D

      Thank you thank you thank you - your review made my day!

  • CheekyChap
    Lv. 3

    A interesting and relaxing.

    I like the way how you can make simple loop or go over the top and create some complex loop what I found quite addictive as I kept trying to outdo my other play through.

    • Luke No Further
      Lv. 14
      Luke No Further Designer of Computronium

      4yrs ago

      Thanks for playing and for your lovely feedback! I'm really in awe of games like Anno and Infinifactory and Tekkit/Minecraft - I really like games where you build and tinker with convoluted systems for moving stuff from A to B - I wanted to capture some of that feeling with this game in a very simple and distilled way. It seems my game resonated with you in that way and I'm very pleased!.

  • Yosi
    Lv. 46

    Very fun game! I love the visuals and special effects you put in it!

  • Allison James
    Patron

    There was something oddly haunting about the atmosphere in this game. Very polished presentation and a fun time to scoop up all the elements I could, nice work!

    • Luke No Further
      Lv. 14
      Luke No Further Designer of Computronium

      4yrs ago

      Thank you! Trying to make the music in a sleep-deprived daze at 2am on Saturday I guess was actually beneficial for channelling that feeling into a lonely and oppressive atmosphere for the game :')

  • Kylazaur
    Lv. 5

    I liked this game a whole lot, was confused in the begining but i got there in the end, nice concept ^-^

    • Luke No Further
      Lv. 14
      Luke No Further Designer of Computronium

      4yrs ago

      Thank you for playing and sticking with the game until it made sense. A clear and thoroughly tested tutorial is hard create in a solo 48 hour game jam! Thanks for your patience.

  • WangleLine 🌸
    Patron

    This was surprisingly addicting.

    I haven't ever played Factorio myself, but I believe that this is exactly what it feels like. I'm in love with those graphics, reminds me a lot of Command & Conquer!

    Night Fuss
    Submitted

    Night Fuss

    • Luke No Further
      Lv. 14
      Luke No Further Designer of Computronium

      4yrs ago

      Thank you for your kind words!

      I haven't played Factorio either but whenever I see gameplay videos it definitely makes the 'Games About Building And Optimising Systems' part of my brain salivate! I wanted to make a game would illicit that same reaction in other people and so I'm very glad you enjoyed it.