Reviews from

in the past


I'm enjoying this more than most factory games precisely because it's so chill. Nobody is blowing up my carefully laid production lines, I'm not running out of things constantly, I can just enjoy building to specifications and marvel at the larger and larger tangle that results. Almost feels like an IO game at times. The soundtrack is lovely as well. The only negative I've encountered so far is that the huge amounts of product required to advance later in the game can leave you feeling like you're playing an idler at times, if you don't feel like building the same factory over and over again. But the upgrades to your tools offer supplementary puzzles to fill your wait time.
Edit: Tapped out at the rocketship which, even after looking up the solution, tipped my fun/aggravating scale in the wrong direction. Still had a lovely time until then.

Cute automation game that keeps everything simple, but has the components to go to some great depth. Very fun but there is a "last objective" in making a MAM, which is cool, but doesn't offer much else after that in terms of making more interesting computational parts (at least not compactly) after that.

charming and simple factory builder that can get very boring and repetitive after a bit

Da es kein größeres übergeordneteres Ziel gibt, wirkt es nach einiger Zeit doch sehr langweilig und unnötig zu optimieren.


Good game, but you really need to like factory builders, and especially ones that demand you produce arbitrarily high numbers of stuff instead of organically making you want to produce more stuff.

i lost 2 weeks of my life to this game

Bof, este juego, bof.

Porque perdi los juegos de Epic Games, pero esto era guapisimo.

Literalmente cada vez tenia que construir mas grandes y complejas estructuras para crear figuras cada vez mas complejas. Bono jogo

Esta bien para un cumpleaños (5 horas)

Makes me want to try Factorio

i might actually like this more than factorio

I got lost playing this game for about 3 days. It is very engaging if you enjoy making small optimisations to your factory with every upgrade you get.

Having said that, gameplay does come down to placing machines and conveyor belts. It's relaxing and chill, but it isn't winning awards for being a master piece. Cheap buy or for free, worth a play.

The factory genre stripped down to an irreducible element: throughput.

I really like fiddling with algorithms, trying to make things more efficient and elegant. But I bounce off most factory games (assembly line games? process-likes?) because they gate experimentation behind resource scarcity and acquisition.

Shapez skips all that boring stuff so you can focus on the pure joy of fucking around. Infinite resources, infinite space, no fail state. Plus, they dodge all the nasty themes of extraction and colonization that every other game in the genre stumbles into. It's just good vibes, chill music, and me going insane trying to make a rocket ship on a blue and grey background.

A factory sim that is a bit distinct from Zachtronics-style puzzle games in that it takes place on a large persistent map, rather than having a separate workspace for each level. It also has one single immovable drop off point in the center of the map. This encourages a big sprawling factory with lots of highways to move things around, but drawing roads gets dull after a while. Resource spawn points aren't movable either, and relatively sparse on the scale of your factory components, so you have a choice of either building near your hub (as near you can, as your factory expands) and drawing long roads to supply resources, or building near the resources and drawing long roads back to the hub.

The logistics are supposed to be part of the challenge, but it's not a very interesting one. I don't think I'll be playing much more of this, but I am still interested in the sequel that is supposed to come out this year.

Great automation game to keep on in the background and tab into occasionally to adjust your factories. Nice for going brain off mode.

A factory sim game stripped to its rawest elements. The unlimited resources allow your creativity to truly flow into your designs, but like any other factory sim you will probably make the most abhorrent unoptimizable embarrassment of a factory as possible.

addicting factory game that I luckily lost my save data for

This is like that one CartoonNetwork.com game where you help Ed, Edd n' Eddy build a jawbreaker machine except this game is minimalist so it's for adults.

[this is a compliment]

Si te gustan los puzzles de optimización, de conseguir que una cadena de elementos consigan un resultado de la manera más óptima, este juego es especialmente entretenido.

Está muy chulo pero pide muchas cantidades arbitrariamente altas y llega un punto en el que puedes copiar y pegar y casi que deja de apetecer optimizar para llegar a las cantidades. Buen approach casual a los juegos de producción y optimización.

Not enticing to me at all despite liking factory building games. I just felt unmotivated to do anything.

Played for a few hours because I'm a huge fan of Factorio, but found it kinda boring

This game is currently in the Humble Choice for September 2022, this is part of my coverage of the bundle. If you are interested in the game and it's before October 4th, 2022, consider picking up the game as part of the current monthly bundle.

A manufacturing factory simulator but using simple shapes

The gameplay of Shapes may look common to players who have played games such as Factorio and Satisfactory, and that’s because it is. You build a sprawling factory that continues to need to pull in more resources to create complex production lines to satisfy the current level’s needs, and each time you beat a level, the game leaves your factory and just keeps asking you to create something different or new. There are no enemies and no cost, so players can just build their lines to their heart’s desire. There’s also what feels like almost an infinite amount of area to build out towards.

This looks a little simple to play, but the challenge will come from optimizing designs, building larger features, and trying to create exactly what’s being requested. The game tells you this isn’t an idle game, and that’s true, no matter what you’re working on you can improve and increase the flow of items. There are also new pieces of machinery to unlock, and upgrades you can gain that increase the efficiency of different pieces.

Pick this up if you like Factorio or Satisfactory, this is a very similar game but without the combat, it also feels unique. If you haven’t tried those games, you should, but this is also in that same area as Zachtronics titles, where the goal is more puzzling out more efficient ways to do tasks. Which means this game is perfect for me. I first played this when the developer released an early version of the game on r/incremental_games and loved it.

If you enjoyed this review or want to know what I think of other games in the bundle, check out the full review on or subscribe to my Youtube channel: https://youtu.be/KaOfaR3TjNI


It's fine! It can get complex but I just was not super invested in it personally.

As far as factory games go this one is very minimalist. You are literally producing simple shapes and using the different machinery to rotate, layer, and colour the pieces to meet different specifications.

There really isn't more to it than that and it's possible to complete in a short time. The art style really ticks my box for vector graphics but once you've scratched the itch there's not really any reason to go back.

For the factory fan expect the most basic experience.

Satisfying. Relaxing. Always have something to do. Everything you'd want from a factory game with a shockingly amazing and catchy soundtrack

SUCH A BANGER very simplistic but complete as well, waiting for the shapez 2 full release