Hi Miners! ⛏️
Masters of Oil, our first major roadmap update, is now live!
With Phase 1, Ore Factory Squad expands beyond traditional mining and into a brand-new industrial layer: oil extraction, fluid transport, petrochemical production, and fuel-based manufacturing.
Here’s what’s included in today’s update:
🏜️ New Property – Desert
A forgotten desert town outside Redstone City is now open for business, and there is still plenty of oil waiting under the dirt.
This new property takes you to an old desert settlement with an active oil extraction facility, an abandoned motel, and plenty of buried oil waiting underground.
The land may look empty at first, but there are still active reserves beneath the surface. Turns out, empty desert plots can be surprisingly valuable.
Be careful around old oil pipes left behind in the area. They may not be as harmless as they look.
🛢️ Crude Oil & Oil Reserves
Crude Oil has been added as a new underground resource, but finding it works a little differently than regular ores.
Oil is found deep underground as a reserve that needs to be cleaned with the Jackhammer before extraction.
The Ore Detector now includes a new Radar Mode, which works like a simple underground sonar to help you scan oil density beneath you.
Once you reach the oil bed, clear the reserve, install the Pipe Head, and get ready for extraction.
⛽ Oil Extraction & Tanker Truck
Oil extraction introduces a completely new fluid-based workflow.
The Oil Pipe Head acts as the surface unit for pulling oil from underground reserves.
The new free-placement pipe system lets you extend pipes piece by piece from the surface unit all the way down to the reserve.
The new Tanker Truck is used to collect Crude Oil from the extraction point and bring it back to the factory.
Once connected, the motor starts running and Crude Oil slowly transfers into the tanker.
Back at the factory, the new Oil Tank lets you store the Crude Oil for later processing.
🏭 Oil Refinery & Oil Processor
Oil brings a new petrochemical production chain to your factory.
The new petrochemical license unlocks the oil processing workflow.
The Oil Refinery separates Crude Oil into Fuel and Bitumen.
The Oil Processor turns oil-based materials into products such as Asphalt Mix, Lubricant, Rubber Sheet, Tire, and more.
Some oil products connect back into older production trees, so your existing automation lines may become useful again.
⬆️ New Upgrades
Besides petrochemical licenses to unlock the oil production chain, several new upgrades have been added with Phase 1.
A new Off-Site Mining Training tree has been added, allowing you to improve Miner crate capacity, efficiency, and oil extraction ability.
A new factory size upgrade has been added, letting you expand the factory one more step with more building space and 4 new storage output sockets.
🤖 Merge Robot & Stackable Boxes
A new Warehouse Robot type has joined the factory, and moving building boxes should be much easier now.
Merge Robot is a red Warehouse Robot focused entirely on keeping your storage cleaner. If multiple pallets inside a Pallet Drop Zone contain the same item, the Merge Robot moves items from the smaller stack into the larger one.
Building boxes can now be placed on pallets, allowing you to stack and transport multiple building boxes at once instead of moving them one by one.
Elevated Belt pieces now allow other belts to pass underneath them more consistently. This also allows robots to pass under Elevated Belts more easily.
Several robot behavior improvements have been made to make automation smoother and more reliable.
🧭 Compass, Depth Indicator & Equipment Wheel Update
Digging navigation has received a new helper UI.
A new indicator now shows your compass direction and how deep you are underground while you are at a digsite. You can disable it from the settings as well.
The Equipment Wheel has also been updated. Placeable digsite buildings are now grouped into a second radial menu after selection.
Equipment Wheel behavior has been improved, including better tap and hold behavior for opening and closing the menu.
🌍 New Languages
Two new languages have been added:
Dutch
Danish
🛠 Other Fixes, Improvements & New Stuff
Added Inspect animations for the Shovel, Pickaxe, and Jackhammer. You can now inspect your trusty tools with the default I key on keyboard, or through the Inspect option in the emote menu.
Added the ability to change the wallpaper on the computer, allowing you to customize your desktop background.
Added a new update notification interface to the computer. When new content is added and you return to the game, it can briefly show what’s new and direct you to the related Info Book page.
Increased the Level Cap to 12. New machines and licenses can now be unlocked through the new level range.
Made broader balance changes across early-game and end-game progression, especially to better support the new oil production chain and the expanded level range.
Rebalanced Off-Site Contracts, especially around higher-volume end-game resource flow, so later-stage contracts should feel more rewarding and better aligned with upgraded Miner Employees.
Added UI elements showing whether a property has oil reserves and how much oil remains in the active property.
Broken hazards, such as gas pipes in the Construction Site, now disappear after a while instead of staying suspended in the air.
Fixed an issue where the player could fall after climbing the ladder in certain Vertical and Horizontal Mining Lift connection setups.
Fixed an issue where resources were not spawning inside hidden caves in the Forest property.
Fixed an issue where resources inside machines were not being saved correctly after save/load.
Improved several UI interactions and descriptions for newly added Phase 1 systems.
Improved localization across multiple languages and fixed several incorrect translations.
Made small polish improvements across multiple gameplay systems introduced in recent updates.
Improved save/load consistency for several gameplay systems.
Added several performance improvements, especially for larger factories and later-stage saves.
Fixed several other reported bugs and small inconsistencies based on community feedback.
Thank you again for all your support, feedback, and patience while we continue expanding Ore Factory Squad. We’re excited to hear what you think about the new systems. See you in the factory! 💙
💬 Feel free to join our Discord to follow development closely, share feedback, and be part of the community from the beginning or just say hi!
