This is a list of frequently asked questions. If you have a question that's not listed here, pop in to our Discord.
If you are coming from previous versions of Machinery, be sure to scroll down to read some important info on what's changed.
How to play
Machinery is an incremental game. There are many varieties of incremental games, but the gist of it is having some sort of a production process, and then improving it - making it more efficient and more automated.
If you've never played such games, the idea might sound strange on paper. But it's a very accessible type of gaming, and many incremental games command audiences of millions of players. So, give it a try!
In Machinery you start by clicking , and as your energy tank begins to fill up, you will be able to begin upgrading your generator. There are four generators altogether, and after a while you will be able to improve all of them.
Another important part of the game is warping. Once you've collected enough Antimatter, you will be able to warp, which will reset the game, but provide you with significant boosts to your generators, as well as unlocking new machines.
Gameplay questions
3 is the lowest recommended value for your first warp. Holding out till 5 will allow you to buy Panel Upgrade I.
You do not! Antimatter Amplifier bonus is completely independent of your antimatter cubes.
In the game's universe it's a known issue with the Plasma generator that gives off low frequency rumble and that none of the engineers know how to fix. More context in the news ticker, but suffice to say, not anything you should worry about as a player ;)
The battery doesn't do anything for the generators. In fact, it drains their power. But it's an investment!
And don't worry about wasting your time on it: developing it will allow you to unlock the Magnetron fairly quickly, and Magnetron is your friend!
Most subsequent machines will also provide bonuses to your generators. All of these machines will require a well developed Battery to function.
This means that the generator cannot be developed further and you should instead buy its new generation. I realize that this is a pretty awkward user experience, and I'll be thinking of ways to improve it.
Mathematically there's a reason for it - the button disappears when the cost of upgrading your generator becomes more expensive than buying the next generation. In fact, as soon as the new generation is available, it makes sense to simply buy it and not waste money on the remaining upgrades.
I get quite a lot of questions about the Magnetron. It might sometimes seem to have a mind of its own, as if it's sitting there, staring at you with its large button. But, in fact, it's a very basic piece of machinery that relies on a random number generator.
And our intuitions about what's random are pretty bad. If you ask someone to provide a random string of 0s and 1s, they are more likely to write something like 100101101010001011, as opposed to 000000000010000000, although if the generation of individual digits is independent, both strings are equally as likely.
The reason why Magnetron might seem less agreeable with time is because you are getting exposed to the whole range of its probability, which will include long periods of idle time. Additionally, Magnetron will become more necessary in later stages of the game, because a lot of your progress will have relied on Magnetron's boosts for many warps, making everything extra slow without it.
Becoming Chief Engineer and continuing to collect Plasmic Frogs will make Magnetron more probable with time.
This could be because of the auto-upgrades: the Engineering Den and the Research Lab auto-buy. If any or both of these options are on, triggering overdrive will lead you to automatically spend the bonus.
If both auto-upgrades are on, the funds will first be spent on Research Lab. You can also temporarily switch both off before triggering overdrive if you want to spend it on something else.
Yes, this is the current end of the game. You obviously can continue playing, pushing those upgrades as far as you can and collecting all the 5 Quantum Numbers, as well as pushing the generators to generation X.
The game is not meant to end here, and the decision to end at this point was because building a Space Station and becoming Chief Engineer sounds like a nice achievement, and I needed to start showing the game to players before committing to even more work.
I am planning for more machines and, as hinted in the Quantum Numbers panel, there's even going to be a deeper level to this whole thing.
And, of course, I am also going to be working more on the existing machines. In other words, it's not only going to be about adding completely new content, but also tweaking, improving and enriching the already existing portions of the game. For example, I'd like to have way more warp upgrades. I'd like to have more missions. I'd like the Space Station to be doing something, and so on.
Oh yeah, and we'll get spaceships and venture into deep space!
It might be but I wouldn't count on it: it's not that it's difficult to make the saves compatible. It's that the game between versions is bound to change enough that your save won't make complete sense gameplay-wise.
For instance, I have grand plans for Interdimensional Warp, and it is very probable that Quantum Numbers are going to be something different and will also be obtained in a completely different manner.
Technical questions
Unfortunately, this is a known issue and many incremental games suffer from it. Vendors try to optimize browser performance and reducing the speed of code execution of tabs that are not in focus is one of the ways to get there.
I have observed that at least in Chrome leaving sound on (even if at a very low level) forces the browser to run the tab normally. This is not a universal workaround, but it has helped many players.
I will at some point look into ways of solving this problem.
Chrome seems to provide the most consistent performance.
I have tested the game on several laptops, running Linux and Windows. Both Firefox and Chrome performed fine on Linux systems. On Windows, Chrome ran the game normally but I have witnessed Firefox slowing it down even when the tab was in focus.
I have also tested the game on Chrome on an Android phone and it ran fine.
Future improvements
If you have ideas on how I can improve the game, feel free to reach out on our Discord. But just so that you know that I am aware of some of the basic requests and things to improve, here's an incomplete list of what I plan to address:
Section for folks who have played previous versions of Machinery
Nope! Machinery 0.99.1 is not compatible with any of the previous versions. Neither would you want it to be: it has way too many changes, including changes made to basic mechanics. If you would like to explore it, you would have to start anew, but I think you won't regret it!
This is no longer necessary! If you see that a new generation is available, buy it - and all the multipliers will be set correctly.
I did receive truly awesome feedback and genuinely liked many ideas.
I have, in fact, implemented many of them. But not all! Mostly due to time constraints and the need to prioritize - I am but a single developer working in his free time. I did make sure to implement most pressing quality of life suggestions, and there are still quite a few on my list that I plan to work on in the future.