I bought this game less than 2 full days ago.
Look at how much time I have in it at the time of this review. The only other games I've done that with are Skyrim, Civilization 5, and Elite: Dangerous. Not even Factorio brought that much immediate playtime out of me despite how much I love that game nowadays.
If you like building stuff, you will love this game. There's your TL;DR, go buy it.


A bit more in-depth:

The first thing you've likely noticed from the trailers and will definitely feel as you enter the game is its tremendous production quality, especially considering its indie origins. This game has outstanding visuals, both in terms of general graphical fidelity and the art style, with tons of little details that even AAA games with thousands of developers working on a project will overlook. This game absolutely wows me every time I stop to look around, because while you can argue that the player is the one building everything, a lot has to do with how well designed every wall, floor, assembler, and walkway is. Topping it off is a tremendous soundtrack that, for lack of a better explanation, sounds like a more industrial Minecraft soundtrack - it's fantastic.

The gameplay itself will be familiar to anyone who's played Factorio, but with the added element of verticality. Elevators are your friend - realize that early, utilize them often. Got a long track from one set of assemblers to another? Raise the conveyors and you'll find walking (or driving) around your factory becomes a lot easier, even if you're like me and place support poles all the time for aesthetics. Multi-level factory buildings are also extremely easy to do and highly encouraged, as it lets you do the work of what otherwise would require massive flat areas in relatively small confines.

All buildings are either free-placed on the terrain or grid-aligned on foundations, which you can place quickly using the "Zoop" placement mode. The biggest issue here is that Satisfactory is exclusively a first-person game - you will sometimes find it difficult to accurately place structures, as your options are either to do it up close in front of you or elevate yourself on a lookout tower or higher floor of the factory and build from above, both of which have their own advantages and disadvantages. The net result, however, is you typically put a lot more care into each building and conveyor you place, resulting in a much more aesthetically pleasing factory.

In contrast to Factorio, resources are infinite but limit how much you can extract from a given deposit. You cannot simply attach more mining drills to a deposit to boost its output - what you get is final, unless you overclock or upgrade the mining drill. This puts a very large emphasis on outpost construction to pull in more resources from elsewhere as your limitations will come from a lack of raw materials being produced rather than the worry of running out of resources. There are also no defensive walls or turrets, as combat has taken a back seat - there are no invasions of any sort, and enemies are only something you deal with when exploring new areas of the map. I personally do not mind this at all as it helps give this game its own identity that isn't just "3D Factorio", which I believe is better for both games since they don't trample on one another's ground. You'll find this game to be a lot more relaxing and laid back, with no ticks in the back of your head reminding you that something that could doom your factory might occur at any time.

Probably my only gripe thus far is the early-game power generation system. Leaves, wood, biomass, and biofuel are used to power your first Biomass Generators, which are entirely manual and cannot be automated. It does take quite a while for a new player to progress past the stage of using biomass generators, as you will have to complete the first phase of the Space Elevator (which requires a decent sized main factory to produce resources from) using solely Biofuel. That means you'll be manually running out and gathering wood/leaves, throwing it into a system that makes biofuel, and manually refueling the generators. While I understand the manual gathering of wood/leaves is a must for a fuel type like that, a port on the back of the biomass generators for automating their refueling would be appreciated. Otherwise, you will not be able to fully automate power production from start to finish until you have progressed to coal.

Customization and aesthetic stuff such as different foundation materials, support beams, catwalks, and a super useful little Factory Cart™ are all unlocked by literally throwing excess resources into a grinder for coupons to spend in an in-game store (no microtransactions, I promise). This is definitely a unique way to unlock this sort of stuff, and as the number of points necessary to get a coupon increases with each coupon, you'll never find yourself necessarily accumulating a large number of them at one point.

Overall, this game excels at one thing though: Similar to Civilization, as weird as that may sound, with its "just one more turn" feeling, this sort of has a "just one more line" feel. I COULD get off, but just that one line needs to be made...ok maybe that one too...and that one...and that one...and it's 3 AM. But really, does any game need anything more than that? That should above all else be the number one point to this game - it's addicting. Everything it's doing is being done right. And I'm sure I'll be getting a lot more time put into this game in the near future.

Some in-depth performance statistics if you're curious:

The optimization is good - you should be able to run this on any system with at least a decent dedicated graphics card (not intel or AMD APUs). A breakdown of my performance:
My specs:
AMD Ryzen 5 5600X (No overclocking)
32gb ram (3000 MHz, no XMP or OC)
Nvidia GTX 1080 (Founders, no overclocking)
Running at 1920x1080

Most in-game graphical settings go from Low to Ultra, with low sometimes meaning 'off'. I run all graphical settings at high with two exceptions - VFX quality is at medium as it has a large FPS impact, and anti-aliasing is at low (which in this case means off) as AA can sometimes mess with my eyes and make me feel nauseous. The game is using the DX12 renderer and has the checkboxes such as contact shadows and hierarchical Z ticked, with no vsync. I found the experimental Vulkan renderer to actually cause increased GPU usage compared to DX12, but then again I am also on Windows - Vulkan may be a lot more useful to those playing the game on Linux, though I am unaware if the game is natively supported yet or has plans to be natively supported.

My framerate limiter is set to 90 FPS as I don't enjoy maxing out my computer (especially given my aging, single-fan 10 series founders card), but the device with the most usage at that 90 FPS limit is my GPU - it holds about 55-60% usage according to Open Hardware Monitor, with spikes up to 80% when loading stuff in.
CPU load is much lower at 20-25% usage, though that may increase as the factory grows further.
VRAM usage is about 4.4 gigabytes, though turning down settings such as textures would help with that if you have a card with less VRAM such as a GTX 1050 or 1060.
Ram usage is only about 3 gigabytes, though overall ram usage (admittedly with the game, store page, a web browser, and discord open) is about 9.8 gigabytes, so whether or not I would trust 8 gb of ram to be enough to comfortably run this is a bit iffy.

As mentioned, definitely a fairly well optimized game considering its scale and the fact it's on the Unreal engine. Lag spikes are practically nonexistent - the game consistently holds a high framerate without hitching. I have no experience with AMD graphics cards, but I can safely say any nvidia GPU in the 16, 20, or 30 series will be able to run this comfortably. The GTX 1050 base with 2GB VRAM may struggle, but other 10 series cards will do fine.

I bought this game less than 2 full days ago. Look at how much time I have in it at the time of this review. The only other games I've done that with are Skyrim, Civilization 5, and Elite: Dangerous. Not even Factorio brought that much immediate playtime out of me despite how much I love that game nowadays. If you like building stuff, you will love this game. There's your TL;DR, go buy it. A bit more in-depth: The first thing you've likely noticed from the trailers and will definitely feel as you enter the game is its tremendous production quality, especially considering its indie origins. This game has outstanding visuals, both in terms of general graphical fidelity and the art style, with tons of little details that even AAA games with thousands of developers working on a project will overlook. This game absolutely wows me every time I stop to look around, because while you can argue that the player is the one building everything, a lot has to do with how well designed every wall, floor, assembler, and walkway is. Topping it off is a tremendous soundtrack that, for lack of a better explanation, sounds like a more industrial Minecraft soundtrack - it's fantastic. The gameplay itself will be familiar to anyone who's played Factorio, but with the added element of verticality. Elevators are your friend - realize that early, utilize them often. Got a long track from one set of assemblers to another? Raise the conveyors and you'll find walking (or driving) around your factory becomes a lot easier, even if you're like me and place support poles all the time for aesthetics. Multi-level factory buildings are also extremely easy to do and highly encouraged, as it lets you do the work of what otherwise would require massive flat areas in relatively small confines. All buildings are either free-placed on the terrain or grid-aligned on foundations, which you can place quickly using the "Zoop" placement mode. The biggest issue here is that Satisfactory is exclusively a first-person game - you will sometimes find it difficult to accurately place structures, as your options are either to do it up close in front of you or elevate yourself on a lookout tower or higher floor of the factory and build from above, both of which have their own advantages and disadvantages. The net result, however, is you typically put a lot more care into each building and conveyor you place, resulting in a much more aesthetically pleasing factory. In contrast to Factorio, resources are infinite but limit how much you can extract from a given deposit. You cannot simply attach more mining drills to a deposit to boost its output - what you get is final, unless you overclock or upgrade the mining drill. This puts a very large emphasis on outpost construction to pull in more resources from elsewhere as your limitations will come from a lack of raw materials being produced rather than the worry of running out of resources. There are also no defensive walls or turrets, as combat has taken a back seat - there are no invasions of any sort, and enemies are only something you deal with when exploring new areas of the map. I personally do not mind this at all as it helps give this game its own identity that isn't just "3D Factorio", which I believe is better for both games since they don't trample on one another's ground. You'll find this game to be a lot more relaxing and laid back, with no ticks in the back of your head reminding you that something that could doom your factory might occur at any time. Probably my only gripe thus far is the early-game power generation system. Leaves, wood, biomass, and biofuel are used to power your first Biomass Generators, which are entirely manual and cannot be automated. It does take quite a while for a new player to progress past the stage of using biomass generators, as you will have to complete the first phase of the Space Elevator (which requires a decent sized main factory to produce resources from) using solely Biofuel. That means you'll be manually running out and gathering wood/leaves, throwing it into a system that makes biofuel, and manually refueling the generators. While I understand the manual gathering of wood/leaves is a must for a fuel type like that, a port on the back of the biomass generators for automating their refueling would be appreciated. Otherwise, you will not be able to fully automate power production from start to finish until you have progressed to coal. Customization and aesthetic stuff such as different foundation materials, support beams, catwalks, and a super useful little Factory Cart™ are all unlocked by literally throwing excess resources into a grinder for coupons to spend in an in-game store (no microtransactions, I promise). This is definitely a unique way to unlock this sort of stuff, and as the number of points necessary to get a coupon increases with each coupon, you'll never find yourself necessarily accumulating a large number of them at one point. Overall, this game excels at one thing though: Similar to Civilization, as weird as that may sound, with its "just one more turn" feeling, this sort of has a "just one more line" feel. I COULD get off, but just that one line needs to be made...ok maybe that one too...and that one...and that one...and it's 3 AM. But really, does any game need anything more than that? That should above all else be the number one point to this game - it's addicting. Everything it's doing is being done right. And I'm sure I'll be getting a lot more time put into this game in the near future. Some in-depth performance statistics if you're curious: The optimization is good - you should be able to run this on any system with at least a decent dedicated graphics card (not intel or AMD APUs). A breakdown of my performance: My specs: AMD Ryzen 5 5600X (No overclocking) 32gb ram (3000 MHz, no XMP or OC) Nvidia GTX 1080 (Founders, no overclocking) Running at 1920x1080 Most in-game graphical settings go from Low to Ultra, with low sometimes meaning 'off'. I run all graphical settings at high with two exceptions - VFX quality is at medium as it has a large FPS impact, and anti-aliasing is at low (which in this case means off) as AA can sometimes mess with my eyes and make me feel nauseous. The game is using the DX12 renderer and has the checkboxes such as contact shadows and hierarchical Z ticked, with no vsync. I found the experimental Vulkan renderer to actually cause increased GPU usage compared to DX12, but then again I am also on Windows - Vulkan may be a lot more useful to those playing the game on Linux, though I am unaware if the game is natively supported yet or has plans to be natively supported. My framerate limiter is set to 90 FPS as I don't enjoy maxing out my computer (especially given my aging, single-fan 10 series founders card), but the device with the most usage at that 90 FPS limit is my GPU - it holds about 55-60% usage according to Open Hardware Monitor, with spikes up to 80% when loading stuff in. CPU load is much lower at 20-25% usage, though that may increase as the factory grows further. VRAM usage is about 4.4 gigabytes, though turning down settings such as textures would help with that if you have a card with less VRAM such as a GTX 1050 or 1060. Ram usage is only about 3 gigabytes, though overall ram usage (admittedly with the game, store page, a web browser, and discord open) is about 9.8 gigabytes, so whether or not I would trust 8 gb of ram to be enough to comfortably run this is a bit iffy. As mentioned, definitely a fairly well optimized game considering its scale and the fact it's on the Unreal engine. Lag spikes are practically nonexistent - the game consistently holds a high framerate without hitching. I have no experience with AMD graphics cards, but I can safely say any nvidia GPU in the 16, 20, or 30 series will be able to run this comfortably. The GTX 1050 base with 2GB VRAM may struggle, but other 10 series cards will do fine.