On November 4th, 2025, Satisfactory was released onto consoles after being PC-exclusive since it went into early access in 2019. I have played a ton of Satisfactory over the last week, but there is an issue. This game requires a fair bit of research to figure things out, but research always leads to seeing fantastic builds that are so visually pleasing and, well, satisfying.
However, I’m not great at the design aspect, and seeing those amazingly sleek builds and nicely placed assembly lines can be a little disheartening when you see your own poor planning. So to combat that, I am putting my own awful creations out into the world so people can see that things don’t HAVE to be perfect for this game to still be incredibly enjoyable.
My Ugly Satisfactory Builds
I am on phase four of five, so while everything looks hectic, it is extremely functional and has gotten me this far. I haven’t given a care in the world to optimization, so be prepared for that.
Hub
I wasn’t quite clear on the instructions for Hub placement when I started the game, so I just put it by a couple of iron nodes. It hasn’t left me much space to maneuver things around the side of the Hub, but oh well. This spot makes only the basic iron materials, so I don’t need it to really branch out anyway. It’s a fun mess.
Assembler and Manufacturer
Okay, so I prefer to put things into these two fabricators by hand. I don’t really have any other choice because I want them next to the hub. Yes, it looks bad, but I love it.
Iron Farm
This was my first foray into coal power, and I used it to power these two miners on iron nodes. The whole thing then funnels down into an assembler making motors that are currently stopped up, as I haven’t needed motors for a while. Am I going to empty it just because? No way.
Steel Production
This area branches off from the coal I was bringing to the generator above, and mixed with iron elsewhere to make my first steel plant with a foundry. From there, it made the steel pipes and beams. Obviously, the beams are needed elsewhere, so an extra foundry for the encased industrial beams started with the limestone node nearby for concrete.
Coal Generator Cluster
This started out as only a couple of generators, but then I had the idea that I could split off the water at least once and increase my power output. The idea worked, but I later rewired the thing and messed it up for a little bit.
Island Refineries
The main focus used to be a rubber refinery just to endpoint the fuel into the generator, but it has since grown. It is now also an aluminum plant because there was bauxite nearby, and it also has a packager to get rid of the unneeded water from the aluminum production.
Other Island Refineries
A little bit up the beach from there was another two ground spots for oil, so I plopped down more refineries to feed into yet another two fuel generators. The resin result is all put together with a splitter and fed into a third refinery that creates plastic. Some of that plastic is then sent back to the packager above.
Well Pressurizer Circle
I happened to find a ring of oil nodes I didn’t know about before, and immediately set to work putting down the pressurizer and well extractors. Four of them go to fuel generators, and the remaining two output plastic, with one feeding most of that plastic (with a splitter) into a packager and sink.
You get the idea. My placements are messy, and any conveyor belts are all over the place (a couple of them stretch back miles to bring in the needed coal, bauxite, and copper to the island), but everything works and makes sense to me. This game is a dream to people who like optimization and making their builds tidy, but that isn’t a requirement.