May 30

Inside the Factory: Designing Smart Systems

Modulus - Jarvs.Tasker

Hey Module Makers,

The Modulus Demo has just received its biggest update yet, packed with new systems, visual upgrades, and long-requested improvements.

While we’re saving a full breakdown of all the new features for our next Dev Log (dropping June 8th), you can check out the patch notes now.

Today we’re shifting gears to talk about what makes Modulus tick on a deeper level.
In this interview, Technical Artist and Game Designer, Thomas Preudhomme, and Head of Communications and Writer, Jarvs Tasker, take us behind the scenes of how we design smart systems, modular logic, player expression, and the scalable design that powers the game’s creative automation.

👉 If you haven’t yet, go download the updated demo, then come back and dig into this design deep dive with Thomas and Jarvs, in either video or written format.

Jarvs:
My name is Jarvs, and I'm here today with Thomas. Tom, do you want to introduce yourself a bit?

Thomas:
Hello, everybody. I’m Thomas, I'm the Technical Artist at Happy Volcano. But also have been doing a lot of game design, on Modulus. So. Yeah, kind of a Technical Designer.

Jarvs:
You're a bit of everything, to be honest.

Thomas:
Kind of yeah. Small company right? Yeah.

Jarvs:
That's what happens in indie dev guys. Everybody wears lots of different hats. It's kind of the fun of indie though, as well, isn't it? You never know what you're going to do, which is cool.
So, we're here to show off the updated version of the demo. We're really excited to share all the things that we've put into it. We've had a sneak peek at what the community thinks because we've done a playtest in the last couple of weeks for this demo build.
So the playtesters have tried it out and given us some really useful feedback. So if you are one of those playtesters, thank you. We appreciate you. And soon we'll probably do another one. But with the actual full build rather than just the demo. But for now, let's show this off.

The Building Blocks of Intelligence | Designing the Operators

Jarvs:
What was the process for designing individual operators like the Cutter, Stamper and Assembler?

Thomas:
Yeah, the process was quite a lot to be fair. I think it's very interesting because the Cutter, Assembler, and Stamper, that you see later on in the game, are kind of the basic three operators that do everything in the game. You can do every module with those, which is interesting, but also very hard to balance.
If you look at the Assembler, for example, which lets you drag and drop stuff, then you can rotate them around and basically you can do kind of anything. It's nice because you literally drag, and drop. But before there were arrows that you had to click and that kind of thing can be super wonky, but also much more precise.
When you have holes to cut out, it starts to be hard to manage. It’s a fine line we’re still making it more user-friendly. But whilst keeping the kind of playful aspect of just dragging stuff together.

Jarvs:
Yeah, I think that's one thing that we need to stress is that this is just a demo and things will change by the time the game fully comes out and they're changing all the time, mostly based on your guys' feedback. One of the things people were saying was that when they first tried the demo, moving things around in there wasn't quite as intuitive as they wanted it to be.
And that's already improved loads. And so we're listening and we are constantly iterating.

Thomas:
Also, you previously had a thing called the Rotator, which we completely removed, because now you rotate stuff inside these operators, and that wasn't the case before. It made everything way harder. I think that's also something we noticed players do, they just hated it. So we just completely removed it, and things work fine this way.

Jarvs:
So it was an extra step you just didn't need, right?

Thomas:
Yeah, exactly.

Jarvs:
So the next question is were any tools particularly hard to balance between flexibility and usability?

Thomas:
Yeah, I mean I think I just talked about it, but the Assembler is actually the hardest one to balance because you really want it to be as flexible as possible. Right? You want it to feel like you're just playing with these building blocks, right? Like as if with your hands.
But then you also need the precision, you know, to do everything that you can in the game. And so it's pretty hard to find the right balance between making the Assembler as free as possible to, you know, to use in useful ways, and then also keeping it simple to use basically.

Jarvs:
One of the things that we've got in the new demo that we didn't have before is Creative Mode, which allows you to make wild voxel designs with all of the colours unlocked along with all of the tools.
I think that's one thing that players are having a lot of fun with, playing around with challenging themselves to create all sorts of wild things, and I really like that, especially the things we are seeing being made in the Discord.

Thomas:
Yeah, for sure. I think it's also kind of an interesting thing we'll see people use, because for example, paint, which is used to paint modules is something that in the main game you have to make yourself and if you don't have an efficient factory, then you're going to struggle to actually have a lot of paint, right? But in Creative Mode it’s literally just on the ground. You can just pick it up and use it. So, it really just enables you to do whatever you want, without the constraints of what the game, you know, is trying to challenge you to do.

Jarvs:
Yeah, I like that there because I like that extra level of challenge and like having to really think through how I do it. But then I also love the fact that I can just go and play and try it out.

So one interesting thing I have seen you do a lot is setting up a system and then copying up the whole system sort of thing. That's so smart. And I was so dumb and didn't do that at the beginning of my time with the game.

Thomas:
If you look at other games, usually this kind of tool is unlocked way later on in the game, you know, it's something that's blocked for a long time because it feels very powerful. You can just, you know, pick everything up, put it somewhere else, and just duplicate. It feels very powerful. But I think it's nice that we just do it very early on, just because that way you never have the feeling of, oh, I have to do that again. Because you can just duplicate stuff. So it's like, okay, let me just copy that production or whatever. And that just feels satisfying.

Jarvs:
It is. It also comes back to what the aim of the making Modulus is; to create something that's a bit more meditative, more relaxed, and stress-free. So, whereas in your Factorio and Satisfactory types, there's a level of stress there, right? You have to defend or do things within time limits etc. Whereas we want to be like, this is a factory game, but this is a factory game to help you chill. This is to unwind and just relax. I think those sorts of tweaks and quality-of-life things, that we've really thought about, make that happen.
Plus I think people have noticed it, which is really nice.

Thomas:
Yeah, that's true.

Oh yeah speaking of the players, there is one thing that a lot of players asked for.
The ability to get rid of the trees, which you can now do.

Jarvs:
You can also place them, right?

Thomas:
You can. In the demo, you can unlock that feature. Yeah.

Jarvs:
See that's where people like me will just spend way too much time making a pretty factory. Not that it helps with the efficiency at all, but I'm that player. I will do that.

Thomas:
I get that, yeah.

Jarvs:
Obviously we haven't announced what all of the cosmetics are going to be, but we are going to be putting cosmetics into the game. We have said that. And for players like me, that's really exciting because once I've made my factory the way I want it to be, I'm then going to be the person that makes it so pretty and takes the most screenshots ever.
So being able to do that with the foliage as well as the factory I think is really nice. It's again a nice little touch that lets you really be able to make it your factory.

Thomas:
Like, personalise it for sure. It came up in Discord as well when we saw players making their own cosmetics and then using conveyor belts to populate the map with them. So we saw that and were like okay, let us just add a bunch of cosmetics.

Jarvs:
Yeah. I think it was TriXXit in the Discord that made little bunnies at Easter, and then placed them around the islands. They were so cute. I think the same person also made little people, at one point, that were like little bots.

Thomas:
Yeah, just hiding in the grass.

Jarvs:
I loved that. What’s incredible is how quickly this community has grown, it’s been less than two months since the demo launched, and already the creativity and things people have built are genuinely amazing.

Thomas:
Yeah, it is the best!

Jarvs:
They're inspiring actually. They keep us going, seeing them all having so much fun with it. We're really enjoying what you guys are doing. So thank you, if you're one of those players, because we literally screenshot what you're doing and send it to each other on Slack and we're like, “Look, look what they've done! It’s amazing.”. Yeah, just know that it's appreciated because it's really cool.

Teaching Complexity without Overwhelming People

Jarvs:
One of the big things that we had feedback on was the tutorial. The tutorial wasn't what people were wanting.
Something I think people may not be aware of is the balance of having to try and get a tutorial that works for people who maybe haven't been into this genre before but also doesn't hold the hand of players who are thousands of hours into Factorio, for example.
And I think that's hard.

Thomas:
Yeah, it is super hard, in general just making a tutorial is hard. You can't expect every player to play the same. Especially in factory games which are kind of a niche.We are trying to attract more people. And then you basically have these like factory players who just know how the game should work.
And so they expect everything certain things. I mean, if you look at Factorio, there isn’t a video tutorial, you know, it's just very, you do you, figure it out, and we could have done that. We tried that. But the amount of players who struggled because of that was just too many. So we had to compromise.
But to be fair, we are learning as we see people play, and I think later on we might try a hybrid solution where the game would detect if you're good enough or if you're playing super fast through the onboarding, and then it would probably tell you, okay, it seems like you know how to do stuff, right? So perhaps you don't want to be hand-held. Do you want to skip everything? Then you could just press "yes please".
So I think it would remove that kind of pain point that some players might hit, especially in the beginning where you have to follow the tutorial path. Which you could avoid basically. On the flip side we see that for players who need it, it's pretty useful.

Jarvs:
We've had feedback on both sides. So it's like you guys really don't want it and you guys really do. And we're trying to make you both happy.

Thomas:
Yeah, exactly.

Jarvs:
But I think we are already much further, in sort of a middle ground as it is, because we've added in, for example, a manual.

Thomas:
Which gives you a lot of information on basically everything.

Jarvs:
And that wasn't there at all before. So that's really helpful, especially for people like me, for example, my memory is not the greatest. So when I get a tutorial thing pop up and then it's gone, I'm like, I can't remember what that said. So having a manual to go back to, and know what these things do and how they do it, I think is really useful.

Thomas:
I think especially for these kind of things where, you know, it's like, oh, you should use like eight Extractors for a Furnace because of the speed. And you kind of show it in a tutorial but don't really explain it. And then people would maybe not fully understand and so aren’t as efficient as they could be. That's the kind of thing that now we can look up and see.

Jarvs:
And it's really easy to get to in the pause menu. You can go to it at any point and I think that's a massive improvement already on what was there before.

Thomas:
I think there is also maybe a point about the speeds. Whilst I think about it.
Because you know, this kind of stuff previously was also hard to know because you would not have that information. Now you have it everywhere. We made sure you’re kept in the know. There’s the counter and also if you enter operators, it's also said, in the left and right corners, so you can see the expected output.

You also now have the Efficiency View, which tells you how well things are working.

Jarvs:
Which is awesome! Down the side, you can see the key of what it all means and how efficient your factory is.
Expect mine to be red a lot of the time I imagine.
But it gives you a better view. And I think that, again, is another thing that makes it really easy to identify what's going wrong, and what's not. And it should help people who are new, in particular, to be like, “Oh, okay, this is where the problem is”, right?

Thomas:
Exactly. Yeah. So when you’re efficient everything will turn green because everything is running as it should. So, like, every time each machine tries to do an operation, it succeeds. That's what it means. And so when everything is green everything is always working.

Jarvs:
Another thing that we've added is the Scrapper, aka a trash bin.

Thomas:
Yep, that’s a new thing, yeah!

Jarvs:
Why did we add it? What was the purpose of it? Why did we put it in there?

Thomas:
I mean for one thing, it was like some players wanted it. So we're like okay, sure. It's easy to do. But mostly one of the big issues with the Efficiency View and the Counter, is that depending on where you put it, you wouldn't actually know that this is producing 30 per minute because nothing is passing through because may be blocked, right? Because you’re currently building on that section. Which is almost always the case. So if you place a bin after the Counter you can see exactly how efficiently that section is working.

Jarvs:
Then you can see, the maximum efficiency sort of thing with it. I think that's a really nice touch, especially for people who really want to get that optimisation to peak level right. That tiny thing helps a lot. You can use it kind of at any point along your production lines to see what's working efficiently, what's not working efficiently, what you need to change etc.
It's great that it's in there and it's just a little thing again, the Counter as well. Like another thing we didn't have before. You guys wanted to see these sorts of numbers. So we've added them in for you.

So, how do you introduce layered mechanics in a way that's approachable to people?

Thomas:
Right. Yeah, that's a good one. I think the biggest thing we changed when I look back on the development, is making everything bite-sized. The whole concept of Modulus is something you should look at and understand somewhat quickly. Making that bite-sized is very important because that's how you make a player want to continue and not be overwhelmed.
Previously what we had was… basically we would show a picture of a building and be like, okay, make it yourself. And you're like, how am I supposed to make that right?

Jarvs:
Yeah, exactly.

Thomas:
And so, yeah, I think that was the biggest change actually, just making everything a small goal or small goals one after another, and then without even knowing you just make buildings and get that, "Oh, I actually made that because I made those modules.", right? Yeah. And you only realise afterwards, which is quite nice.

Jarvs:
Yeah, I like that. It's a nice little discovery and you're like, "Oh, right, I did that. That was me.". So I think it's nice.
For those that haven't played the demo before, that's one of the things that I really liked about this game is that where in other factory games you're making stuff and it kind of goes off into a void, basically. With Modulus, everything you make there's a purpose for it. You're using it to construct buildings to make other things for your factory.
You can see that, you can literally see it do that in real-time, which is a small thing, but it's a big thing. It gives you that level of satisfaction. I made that. It went in, I saw it happen. And it's the same with upgrades, you need to actually produce the things for it to do it.

Thomas:
Yeah, I would really say props to Antoine, who is our Art Director.

Jarvs:
Yeah. He's amazing.

Thomas:
Who made this possible, right? He made every model you see. So for a building, there might be 48 modules needed to build a level of it, and they are used one by one, right? To make this building, which is insane to think about.

Jarvs
Oh, how he calculated that, and worked that out, when he was designing...

Thomas:
I still don't get it, you know. Yeah. I’m still just in awe every time.

Jarvs:
Antoine is just a wizard basically. An absolute wizard. And Szilard as well, he's our Art Intern. They're both absolutely amazing. Every time they pop something in Slack and they're like, oh, this is this. And you look at it, you think,"That looks really cool." and then when you sit there and you think, "Wait a minute, that actually has to be made like block by block, and every single part of that that had to be thought about in terms of like how how it's going to look when it gets put together and making sure that all the space is filled by the modules!".
Antoine's a proper architect, right?

Thomas:
Yeah, exactly. As well because you have to upgrade and, you know, place one after the other.

Jarvs:
He blows my mind. He really does. He's going to be really embarrassed with us doing this, but like, genuinely that man is a wizard. He's so good at what he does. And Szilard too. He's at uni, right? So, to be as good as he is, where he is in his career. It's really impressive.
So, we work with some pretty badass people. That's really cool.

Okay, next question. Any lessons from playtesting about when players click with a certain system, like something they particularly liked that you didn't expect, for example?

Thomas:
I think that there wasn't specifically a thing that we didn't anticipate players would like. I guess the biggest surprise for me, at least, was more of the creative side of things.
Where people just like to make pixel art or 3D cosmetics items. We talked about that kind of thing. I mean, we always knew that there was going to be some sort of art. But not to this extent. That's probably the biggest surprise that we got.

Jarvs:
It really was surprising, wasn't it? Because within like a week or so, someone made an entire world map with a QR code in the middle of it, that linked to the store page. All we asked for a QR code and they made a world map. I was like, How? How does your brain work to do that in a factory game?

Yeah, that blew us all away. We were very much like, oh, this game is going to be like that for these people. Like they're going to make wild things that we didn't even think were possible. Which is cool because it's a completely different type of player. Right? You've got the people who are in it just for the factory side of things, and then you've got it for the people who are more the cosy player, right, who play it to unwind or to be creative.
And I think that's what makes Modulus special, to me anyway, is that it's not just one thing. It's different for different players, which makes it more approachable. Definitely more approachable. For example, Shapez I can play Shapez. I like Shapez. I enjoy that. But Factorio is not for me. There’s too much pressure. Too much need to be good at optimisation.

Thomas:
I see what you mean. There's also, you know, enemies and stuff that you have to take care of. So it's always in your head.

Jarvs:
Yeah. Whereas for me Modulus I can play and be really methodical and have that side of it. But I can also just chill and unwind with it. And I think that's something that makes it really special and I love that about it.

Balancing Creativity and Efficiency

Jarvs:
Is there a tension between solving and expressing in Modulus? So, making a pretty factory, but making it efficient at the same time. Or do you think that that's fairly easy to do?

Thomas:
I wouldn't say tension. I think you always have these modules to do and to solve them. Think of them as puzzles. Then you end up with something. May it be beautiful or not? And I think you might have some players who go back and make everything pretty, if they want to.
You really don't have to. But I can imagine why you would do that.
Also pretty is kind of a subjective thing to think about.
You can also think about compactness and I don't think it's necessary. You have enough space to do whatever you want, right? Of course, at some points you might not, to make it a bit more challenging for you later in the game. But, yeah, I think that's more of a overlap rather than tension.

Jarvs:
I agree, I think a lot of people will make the modules however they need to, and then those that want to make it pretty could, like you said, go back and then adjust things.

I think the space thing is a good question to ask. That wasn't one that I wrote down but it’s one that some players have raised. Because they're used to games that just have infinite space, for example, they’ve come up against the fact that we're doing it differently in that aspect, where we've got our islands, and they’ve found that challenging to get their head around.
What was the reasoning for doing it this way?

Thomas:
Do you mean using islands?

Jarvs:
Yeah. Instead of just letting them have infinite space to build.

Thomas:
Yeah, we tried both ways, and we actually like both solutions. I think it's interesting to see players who like having a restricted area. It makes for interesting challenges when you have a limited amount of space.
The bridge, for example, looks simple but at some point in the game you get to a point where you have a lot of stuff going on, and it starts to become a very small space because, you know, you only have six, or seven spaces to transport items through on that bridge.
And so then that becomes kind of a challenge. In general, just having less space is a good way for us to keep having a logistical challenge in the game.
I think it's also a way to kind of dim down the powerfulness of the copy and paste, because if you have any amount of space, you could literally just, you know, copy paste everything in the area. But that's not possible here because of these kind of blockers. You have to have some limits to every tool you have. Right?

Jarvs:
Yeah. And also I think that's another; Modulus is more puzzle based than I think other factory games are and I think this really leans into that aspect of it. Again, it's another thing that makes it a bit more unique is that it's not just do whatever you want with your factory and keep going.
It's okay I have this space to to build within and there are confines within that. So, how am I going to think cleverly about using this space, and that is a big part of it.

Thomas:
Exactly.

Jarvs:
You will unlock way more space than there is in the demo right now. So although the demo feels a little bit restrictive, there's going to be loads of islands. I don't know the definite amount because I think we're still deciding that at the moment. But from the concepts that Antoine has shown us, there's going to be loads.

Thomas:
Yup, it’s going to be massive.

Jarvs:
Yeah. There are also going to be upgrades in the Tech Tree that allow you to make your conveyors go across the space where there aren't bridges.
The Tech Tree will also open up new ways to utilise the space in different ways.
So although it might not seem like it, when the full game is out, there'll be lots more options for you when you get to that point. And I think, that again, it’s about thinking creatively. How can I change what I've already done to work with the new upgrade and make it more efficient?
I really enjoy that challenge, and I know a lot of players do too, so it's cool.

Thomas:
Later on in the game, you might come back to the previous set-up and try to optimise them or change them because of the new things you unlock.

Jarvs:
Yeah, it is. It gives you a reason to return to the space and make it more efficient.

So then I guess the next question is, how do you support both the hardcore optimisers and the laid-back builders when designing systems for this game?

Thomas:
The fact that there aren’t any drawbacks to not being fast at building means there is no fear of missing out, right? There is nothing that tells you, oh, you should have done this or you aren't fast enough to do that or whatever. You really do it at your own pace.
I think that's what's great about it because if you're fast about it, then great. You just move faster and you go and make more buildings or you take more time optimising, and then you really can choose whatever you want to do.
There aren’t active things we think we have to think about to handle both types of players because inherently the game is like that, you know, it's already for everybody, in its core design.
So I think that's great.

Jarvs:
Yeah, that makes it really special as you can lean into it as much as you want to, or just play at your own pace, there's no pressure. That's the key thing. Right? You play it your way. Which is really nice, I love that.

This is a complete prediction-based question, but do you think we'll see more players that are leaning into being clever and optimising, really thinking about efficiency, or do you think we'll see more of the creative people going for beautiful factories?

Thomas:
That's a great question. It's hard to say. I think the player base is most likely more people who like optimisation and efficiency, compactness, you know, because those are usually the factory players. But I think because we are attracting so many of the creative type of players, we might see that more in the Discord. Also because usually art’s kind of seen more, visually.
But yeah, I think it's going to be both types, which is great. Hopefully.
People are already making super compact, super efficient setups and sharing that.

And then other people are just making super creative art and sharing that instead. So I think that's great.

Jarvs:
That's a good point, we do want to see both. For those who don’t already know, we do a weekly screenshot competition. Every week, you have a chance, in our Discord and now on Steam as well, to submit a screenshot from the demo, it has to be completely unedited so you can’t take it out and make it prettier with Photoshop. It has to be in the game. But basically, whatever you want to do within the game, you can then screenshot it and send it in.
Sometimes we'll have a theme. Sometimes we don't. This week we don't have a theme, and in those weeks, we're not looking for anything in particular. It's whatever comes in. We will pick the three that we like the most as a team, and it doesn't have to be something that is beautiful in terms of like you've drawn a work of art. It can just be a really efficient factory that looks badass, right? We appreciate both. We like both styles of play. We love the output from both styles. So don't think you have to be an artist to enter the competition. Because really organised factories are beautiful to us. Especially to David. David gets very happy when he sees a very organised factory.
So yeah, do enter that because you can win the chance to get your screenshot in the game for a week, a code for the game when it goes live, and now you're also entered automatically into a draw for a Modulus mystery merch bundle.
Now that there's been an update, you can do more things in the game so I'm really looking forward to seeing what you guys produce.

Smart Mistakes and Happy Accidents

Jarvs:
So any unexpected player strategies or builds that surprised the team? Did anyone do anything that you weren't doing yourselves or think of some really smart way of utilising something?

Thomas:
Yeah, I think, one that comes to mind is I saw some players merging modules into one. Just put different modules into one big one just so that they could configure it on one conveyor belt and save space. Then later on they would just split it back into the modules that were merged, you know, and so that was like a more compact way of transporting modules like different ones.
That was so interesting to think about. I’d never thought about doing that honestly. It’s super smart.

Jarvs:
Really smart. I would not have thought of that. I can't wait to see what other things like that will come up because there will absolutely be things that we haven’t anticipated.

Thomas:
Yeah absolutely.

Jarvs:
You always do things I hadn’t thought about.

Thomas:
I just love trying to make super compact factories. Recently I like wireless setups and the way that they look is so funny to me.

Jarvs:
It does look like it's just on its own, but it's just underground which I like.

For people that haven't played the demo, maybe go into the Stamper and explain it?

Thomas:
So, yeah, when a module comes into the Stamper you can rotate it around, and then you can basically select whatever area you want, which then will be removed and separated. It makes producing holes in modules way easier because if you had to do that with Cutters and an Assembler, that would be a pain.

Jarvs:
I like the Stamper. It's one of the ones that, in Creative Mode, I can have a lot of fun with like making different things and seeing what I can do with it. Especially especially for creating pixel art as it is very useful for drawing, for sure.

Sandbox vs. Challenge

Jarvs:
How did you approach designing the game knowing that there's no combat, timers or fail state? How would you show success in the game, for example?

Thomas:
I think it comes from the fact that you're actually making everything. It feels like a project, and every project that you succeed in completing is always rewarding. The bigger the project, the more rewarding it feels at the end. This is great, but it's also dangerous because you could present a huge project to players and then they just get overwhelmed, rather than excited.
But that's how you get reward out of the game. It's because you did something. You overcame the challenge itself. You do it. And then that's just satisfying in itself to complete it. Right? To just finish a building.

Jarvs:
Yeah, and you see it happening on the screen, which is just so satisfying when it all just slots into place at the end. There’s a really nice little animation because you see them going in bit by bit, then at the end, it kind of takes the modules back out and drops them all in one go.
It's really satisfying. They're also just really pretty when they're finished as well. I think, again, Antoine managed to make these buildings modular and work with the system, but also made them really cool to look at.

Thomas:
Yeah, for sure, for sure.

Jarvs:
So, they're not in the demo yet, but we've spoken about them, the Monuments. Which are basically big ass buildings. Like the biggest thing possible. And there is a reason for building those, which you will uncover in the narrative that goes alongside the game.
Because there is a narrative. It's not a heavy narrative, but there is a narrative. You will discover that on the release rather than in the demo really.

But part of that is getting to these Monuments, which are huge. They’re really cool to look at as well. When you complete those, that level of satisfaction is going to be on a different level because you've had to really consider how you get there.
I'm really looking forward to watching streams to see people finally do their first Monument and look at how they react when they do it.

Modular Limitations and Why They’re Good?

Jarvs:
I think we've kind of covered that a bit, when we were talking about the size of the islands. But, how does working with voxel constraints encourage smarter thinking?

Thomas:
Yeah, I think there are many aspects. The fact that we went to voxels was mainly because it's more creative in a sense, you just have more possibilities than going 2D, for example. But there are also obvious limitations. You don't want to just be able to have clay or something and just model clay because that's just technically impossible to do properly. And then, it just becomes too much information to try and process.
I think what's nice with voxels is you can really look at the final product. So for any module required, you can look at it and already you can visualise every step needed to make it.
You can just picture the whole process by looking at the module. And I think that's very important to be able to grasp basically.

Jarvs:
Yeah. Because you have to be able to think about the stages you need to go through in order to make it.

Thomas:
So yeah, exactly.

Jarvs:
It's intuitive without hand-holding.

Thomas:
Yeah, for sure. I think that's also how we kind of judge the difficulty of making a module. A big thing is the perceived difficulty. You look at something and think, oh, this looks super hard to do or oh, this looks easy to do. What we aim at doing is to almost trick the player into thinking something’s easy to do when it's actually not. Because that's like the best flow you can be in. Right?
You're like, oh this looks easy. Let me just start on it. And then without knowing two hours pass, then you're like oh how did I get here? That's good.
But the other way around is pretty bad, right? If you look at something and for some reason you think, oh, this looks super hard to do, even though it isn't, you may just not bother to try.
We had that during playtests a while back.We had this module which was super easy to do, but for some reason players always thought that it looked hard. Even though it wasn't. Then a lot of them were just dropping off at that point.
That's the perceived difficulties. It’s pretty interesting to play with from a design perspective and also just very important.
I think yeah, having these voxels makes it easier to do because you can count them. It’s basically maths.
We even added information on the numbers in the module descriptions.

Jarvs:
Literally today we were talking about adding an extra section to those descriptions. To show which colours you need to make it even more approachable basically. So you can see very clearly how many blue you need, how many white you need, etc.. Which for accessibility is great. But even just in general, that's really useful because it means you don't have to sit there and count.

Thomas:
In the demo you might think, yeah, I can see there are three different colours right? But later on, when you have six, it starts to become, like a pain to have to count them all, right?

Jarvs:
Exactly. So I think that that's again another little thing that we saw from what people were doing and were like, okay, we should add this in, as it will help people. Which is nice.

Did you ever cut or reject an idea because it made things too easy?

Thomas:
I would say pretty much every other operator that we designed we threw away. We had the Assembler, Stamper, and Cutter very early on in the game. When prototyping, we had those and then we would just add a bunch of new operators. This one you can tear a module or whatever. Oh, this one, you do whatever it is. Right?
And then we were always looking at those and realising actually they were just making a certain setup that you could do with Cutters and Assemblers already but too easily. Right? They just removed the logistics.
You would look at the final factory and then you would have one operator to do one whole module which was not what we wanted. We want to have a system of operators set up. We want players to use a few elements, to try and make something more complicated.
So yeah most operator ideas that we had, we just threw away. They were just making something you could already do but faster or easier. And then we didn't want that because that's just like removing the fun out of the game.

Jarvs:
So pretty much, it's like those games that like to let you buy level upgrades. So you are making the game shorter for yourself, right? What's the point?

Thomas:
Yeah.

Jarvs:
Yeah if you want to play the game, play the game. You don't need to skip half of it.

The Future of Modulus

Jarvs:
Okay. So this is just the demo, there's lots more to come, and now we're going to talk about it.

What do you want to share about what's coming in the future of Modulus? Go for it!

Thomas:
I think at least for me, the most interesting thing coming is a deeper level of logistics. Such as the Sorter, which is an operator that will allow you to sort modules based on what they are. So you could merge two and they would then be on the same belt. You would then have an operator that selectively picks one of them and lets you put it somewhere else.
That makes it so that you can basically add some logic to the game.
I think that has a lot of potential of making things automated, and more finely tuned. That's something for those factory players who really like just automating and finding new ways of doing systems that are just more compact, as it allows you to just merge everything into one line and then sort them back.
I’m really looking forward to seeing what players come up with using it.

Jarvs:
Me too.
One of the things we've touched on that we haven't talked about a lot is that there's going to be a Tech Tree. So do you want to maybe kind of explain a bit about the Tech Tree and what the idea is?

Thomas:
Currently in the demo, you only have bots to deliver to the depot and that's it, right? You just deliver them. Nothing happens. You will, in the game, have a separate, overarching system where you can transform the course that you're making into these buildings, into Data Shards. That's going to be a new resource, which will be used in the Tech Tree. So you will be farming, let's call them points, to use on the upgrades in the Tech Tree.
That's going to be a pretty good incentive to make you want to build more because you will essentially be building for yourself, to upgrade. You can look at an upgrade like, using drones that go between the islands, or you can just buy more islands, or you can upgrade the speed of whatever you want.
There's a whole bunch of upgrades. So, new operators, a Warehouse that just stores items, and just a lot of different things that you can unlock through the tree.
So you're going to look at it and be like, oh, I really want this upgrade, let me just work for it.
So I think that's going to be a pretty big change in how we perceive the game. Because currently it's just the game telling you, okay, make bots for me and you’re like sure. But that doesn't give you anything, right?

Jarvs:
It also adds to that level of satisfaction as well, as you're actually making stuff that benefits you as a player. And I think, again, that that adds an extra step of like, okay, I'm doing this for myself, which is really rewarding. I can see progress happening in this Tech Tree and I'm working towards a specific thing.
That's one of the comments we had about the original version of the demo; "Why am I doing this? What is the point in making the bots?". Essentially the demo is here to teach you what the core systems of the game are, and how you play Modulus on a base level.
Moving on from that, you're going to unlock deeper levels. You're going to unlock the Tech Tree you're going to unlock as you said, different operators. Then that's where the narrative comes into play, which will actually start making sense of why you're doing the things you're doing.

Thomas:
Yeah, exactly. We kind of tell you in the demo, that we say you’re supplying the Colony. We don't tell you what the Colony is, but yeah, we kind of hint towards the narrative side of things that you will later in the game also deliver robots.
But it’s important to note that you will have both the narrative goals and your own goals.
That's actually a pretty big difference as well. Currently, when you make buildings in the demo, you make a building and then that unlocks a new one and you go and make that new one, etc.. But later on, you will actually choose if you want to make new buildings, that's going to be a thing to actively select.
You could finish a building, then think actually I don't want to make this second building. Let me instead focus on bumping up the production of one to make grey cores, which could be just to transform them to great Data Shards to use for certain upgrades.
You don't have to build buildings yet. I think that's going to be nice as well, to just let you choose what you want to do.

Jarvs:
It goes back to that level of freedom of expression again. It's finding that balance always between letting a player build towards the goal, but also expressing themselves through their factory. I think that's what you guys have designed really well. It always impresses me the level of expression you can get in this game.
I can't wait to see what other people do with that.

Like you said, we have hinted at there being a reason for what you do in the game. The Colony. But what is the Colony? Where are they? Who are they?
I like that there's that level of narrative, because predominantly I'm the type of player who plays story-based games, and I will dip into this sort of game as an in-between. So like when I've been playing a story game for 500 hours or whatever, and I need a break, I want to play something creative or whatever.
I think Modulus allows for that kind of player to really enjoy the experience, in a way that other factory games don't, because it does have that extra level to it.

We've recently just completely revamped the narrative too. So you will probably notice if you played the original demo you were making, stuff for the Grand Neural Network, right?
Again, you don't know who they are, what they're doing etc., but you know that it was the Grand Neural Network. We've changed that now. We worked more on refining our story and I think I'm really excited to see that added into the main game and see what players will think of it.
It's going to be fun to have that additional layer.

Your Personal Design Ethos

Jarvs:
So when you sit down to build in Modulus, what's your first instinct? Do you want to go for efficiency? Do you aim for aesthetics? Are you trying different things out? What is your main way of building?

Thomas:
I really like experimenting. And most of the time what I do is make it compact and efficient. If you look at just how green everything is in my Efficiency View, everything is perfectly making the correct amount of things. Which is great. But sometimes I also go, like, full-on spaghetti mode and cause chaos everywhere, because that's just fun to do. I mean, especially when I get to later stages where I kind of want to make a building faster rather than trying to make it efficient.
Overall, I would probably call myself an efficiency/compact kind of player but also experimenting is…

Jarvs:
…You’ve got a wild side!

Thomas:
The wireless setup, I mentioned earlier, is a new thing I've been trying out. I like doing different things just for fun, you know, just because it's funny to try something new and see how it pans out.

Jarvs:
That comes back to what I was saying about how even though I'm not in the core audience of the game, I did that in the demo too. Like I completely redid the demo multiple times just to see the different ways I could do it. And I think if I'm enjoying doing that, then people, who are like yourself, are definitely going to enjoy doing that.

Thomas:
Yeah, exactly.
Also, I might have some screenshots, but one time I made the whole demo, only using grass tiles, I would only build on grass tiles basically.

Jarvs:
Wow.

Thomas:
Just for fun. I like random challenges that you set yourself. It's funny to me.

Jarvs:
I like that though. In all sorts of games, people do that sort of thing, right? Where they just put their own limits on things. And I think that that's an extra level of fun. So, yeah, that sounds like something I would do. I would fail at it. But I would try it. I wouldn't be as smart as you.

The last question is, is there a moment where it all just clicked for you during development? A moment where you went, this is going to be awesome?

Thomas:
Back in the prototype stage. There was a point where we had all the basic operators, and we started designing a few different orders for them and we had houses like you would have a house that you had to make, right? And they were just too overwhelming. So we were trying different stuff. And then at some point, David, the Game Director, came up with a list of modules to make, and we all just spent a few hours making them in the game and had so much fun. I didn't realise how many hours I had put in until I finished playing. After playing for hours and hours, I looked at the time, and I was like, oh! The time flew by and I was like, okay, this is… yeah, I'm loving this game now.
That's when it clicked for me.

Jarvs:
That's special. When a game does that to you, you lose all track of time. That's something really special. I love that. It's really nice to hear you had that with Modulus. I think a few of our players who are in the playtest right now are already going through that. There's one in particular who's at 40 hours or so, and it's a two-hour demo.
It's it's great though. It's really nice to see that and just imagine the playtime of the full game.

Thomas:
It will be out there, yeah!

Jarvs:
So, well, thank you for taking time out of your ridiculously busy schedule to show off the game. It's been really fun chatting to you.
We're all in the Discord so if you want to hear more from Thomas we have an Ask the Devs forum, a Suggestions forum, and we also have a Bug forum.
So if you have questions about anything you've read today, hop in there or hop on Steam, as we genuinely love chatting with you guys.

Thomas:
Please do join the Discord, and if you do give us feedback. Personally, I look for feedback and push it very aggressively on to the design team. I think it's just so important to listen to people’s feedback, especially for things like factory games where individual features are very important.

Jarvs:
Especially because the players are experts in this, right? We want to listen to you guys. What do you think? What's important?
This is our first factory game but it's like your sixth or seventh right? So we want to hear what you have to say. Hopefully you can see, from the answers that Thomas has given today, that we already do that quite a lot.
We listen to you, we put it into the game and we work as hard as we can to improve the quality of life for you, to make Modulus as good as it can be.
So, I hope you're enjoying the demo if you’ve already played it. If you haven't, whack it on download, get stuck in, share what you've made. Join the screenshot competition, share pictures as we want to see.

We'll catch you all very soon.