Automation and factory-building games have become pretty popular over the past few years, with Coffee Stain Studios’ Satisfactory being one of the stars of the genre. I have always admired the sprawling conveyor belts and mega structures of the factory-building powerhouse from a comfortable distance, dipping my toe into the waters with messy (but kind of functional) factories of my own. Soon, factory builders will have a whole new way to build out their process, as Mood Publishing, the same publisher behind Hitman: The Board Game, is looking to bring the beloved factory sim to your tabletop with Satisfactory: The Board Game and the launch of their latest crowdfunding campaign over on Gamefound. We were sent an early prototype copy to check out, in addition to playing a demo with the game’s designer, David Thor Fjalarsson, to see if a tabletop game can capture and refine the Satisfactory experience down to the size of a kitchen table-sized factory.
In Satisfactory: The Board Game (referred to simply as “Satisfactory” going forward), designed by David Thor Fjalarsson, up to four players will have to mine, refine, and upgrade their factories in an effort to earn the most FICSIT points before the space elevator is finished. The turns themselves are surprisingly straightforward; on your turn, you will perform two actions, either build something, move around the map, or have your factory do its work. Once each player has taken their turn, the production phase occurs, where everyone’s mines will activate, drilling for one of the three basic materials—limestone, iron, or copper—and existing materials will move down their conveyors towards getting refined into better resources. Then, the whole cycle repeats itself. Even in my first game, by the time my group had reached the second or third round, we had the flow down.
The game itself takes place on a large hex-grid representation of the video game’s massive world, with random creatures and biomes that get placed during setup, along with various material-rich points where mines can be placed. The “Move” action is pretty self-explanatory, allowing you to move your piece up to a number of spaces equal to your movement value, with some spaces that can only be crossed once certain technologies or vehicles have been built. Landing on a point can grant you resources, or allow you to claim one of the tokens mentioned earlier. If you prefer to get some extra work in at your factories, you can instead opt for the “Workshop” action, which lets you either move a beltline of resources down a spot or refine a single block of material into a higher-tier version, which is a crucial component for when you build.
Speaking of building things, the “Build” action was my favorite, and what I would consider the core thing to do in this game. At any time, players will have access to build their staple devices—extractors, refineries, et cetera—in addition to a random pool of cards of varying tiers that get unlocked over the course of the game. These cards, like the Jet Pack to help you get around quicker or weapons to tackle the wildlife, are a great help, but the main structures you can construct have an added little treat to them. Depending on what you build, you will have a bonus action that you can take, determined by what you have built. Building a miner, for instance, will allow you to immediately build a Belt, which will then trigger the Belt’s bonus, giving you a free movement action, or the Constructor, giving you an extra action you can take on your turn. Stringing together these bonuses to create some wild turns was some of the most fun I had playing Satisfactory.
When it comes to playing, Satisfactory’s tabletop adaptation has opted for a competitive “race for points” experience for its main game, instead of the cooperative focus from the PC title — though the promised final game will include a co-op and solo modes as well. That said, don’t expect to be bombing or taking out the other players’ extractors and belts with some cardboard corporate terrorism within the game. Instead, once a player has claimed a tile by building something on it, no other player can develop on it, though they can still cross over with no issue. Satisfactory can still be “mean,” but it’s more like cleverly getting in the way or making expansion for your opponents annoying as opposed to turning the planet into a battlefield.
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