Lore

Spoilers: this page reveals the story / the end goal.

BlockFactory tells its story the way Factorio does: with very little text. The world, a few records in the bunker and short scenes at milestones carry it. This page puts the pieces together.

The Ancients

Long ago this land was green. It belonged to a civilization known only as the Ancients. You are one of them.

• Golems were their workers.
• The Great Portal connected their world with others.
• The Portal of the Ancient near the spawn is one of their smaller portals. You recognise it, but you no longer understand how it works.

The war

A devastating war destroyed the Ancients and their world. The ruins scattered across the steppe are what is left, and some of them are still guarded by War Golems that never stopped fighting (see Enemies).

As the war ended, the Great Portal began to fail. Whoever could still walk fled through the portals into other worlds. Then the Great Portal went dark.

Cryo sleep

You stayed behind. When the sirens fell silent, you sealed yourself into a bunker beneath the ground and lay down in a cryo capsule. The sleep cycle was set to indefinite. The emergency lights would run for a very long time on their own, but not forever.

Awakening

One day the last of the bunker's power ran out. The capsule opened, and you woke up in the dark, with only the red emergency lights to show the way (see The Bunker).

The steppe

Outside, nothing of the green land remains. A pale, empty steppe stretches to the horizon, with ruins half buried in grass. On the horizon stands the Great Portal, dark.

The steppe is not empty for long. Dust creatures live in burrows far out, and they do not like noise (see Noise and Unrest).

Why the factory

All the knowledge of the old world is gone. The only way out of this place is to build: dig, smelt, assemble, and rediscover the old technology piece by piece. That is why research means relearning (see Research), and why the old knowledge "comes back one scroll at a time".

You are not alone for long. Through the Portal of the Ancient come those who survived elsewhere:

• Goblins are not from the Ancients' world. They come because it glitters and clatters here, and they work for plates and gears (see Goblins).
• Golems return, but without a heart of their own. They need a Golem Core (see Golems).
• Outlanders are the descendants of those who fled through the portals during the war. They come back as strangers and try out the old technology without fully understanding it. That is why things smoke and bang at the Outlander Test Site.

The Great Portal

The end goal is to wake the Great Portal (see Great Portal). Your factory feeds it, its runes light up one by one, and at last it opens. You do not step through, and the game does not end. The way out stands open. Whether anyone ever takes it is left open too. The portal keeps taking goods, and your factory can keep growing.

In multiplayer the Great Portal exists once. The first team to fill its bar opens it for everyone, and every team earns the achievement when it fills its own.

How the story is told

Bunker terminal

Once you connect the bunker's power connector outside to a power grid, the lights come back on and the Bunker Terminal starts. It shows five records from the time before the sleep:

Record	Content
Log 1 – Day zero	The bunker is sealed, the sirens have stopped
Maintenance note	Capsules calibrated, sleep cycle indefinite
Intercepted transmission	A broken message about the great gate failing
Personal note	The steppe used to be green; a handful of seeds in the locker
Last entry	A message for whoever wakes up and brings the power back

The terminal also replays the scenes you have already seen.

Scenes

Short scenes play at important moments. Each plays only once, you can skip it, and the world keeps running while it plays. If you were too far away to see a milestone, you get a short notice instead.

Scene	When
Awakening	You enter the world for the first time and wake up in the capsule
First Look	You leave the bunker for the first time
Light in the Bunker	The bunker gets power for the first time
The First Goblin	The first Goblin arrives in this world
The First Heart	The first Golem arrives
The Stranger	The first Outlander arrives
The First Bang	The first research is completed at the Outlander Test Site
The First Attack	The first attack group sets off towards a factory
War Golem awakening	A War Golem rises from its rubble for the first time (not replayable at the terminal)
Departure	The first train leaves a station
The Gate Awakens	The Great Portal opens

See also

• The Bunker
• Portal of the Ancient
• Great Portal
• Outlanders