Small Spitter

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Lore & Background

The Small Spitter is one of the indigenous fauna of the alien planet in Factorio. It is a ranged attacker that deals direct damage to the player and their factory. These creatures are part of the hostile ecosystem that includes biters and worms. They live in colonies which can be destroyed by the player to prevent further enemy spawning. Small Spitters become increasingly hostile as pollution is emitted by the player's factory, necessitating consideration of the balance between the player's production and the enemy's aggressiveness. The player can use defensive turrets, tanks, and other weapons to eliminate them. As the game progresses, enemies evolve and become harder to defeat. Players may also elect to set the game setting to 'peaceful' during the start of the game, in which the fauna will still spawn but only attack the player and factory in retaliation from direct physical damage on themselves or a neighboring unit.

In Their Own Story

The smoke from the first furnace hung heavy in the air, a gray shroud over the red dirt. Elara stepped back as the ground trembled slightly. From behind a cluster of thorny bushes, three green shapes emerged. They didn't walk so much as skitter, their bodies pulsing with an unnatural rhythm. One tilted its head, sensing the heat signature of her suit. A glob of viscous green liquid flew through the air, splashing against her iron wall with a hiss that sizzled even from behind armor. She raised her rifle, heart pounding. This was it—the moment the planet decided she wasn't welcome anymore.

Reader's Guide

The Small Spitter is a hostile alien creature that attacks the player and their factory. It is a ranged attacker that deals direct damage. These creatures live in colonies which can be destroyed to prevent further enemy spawning. They become increasingly hostile as pollution is emitted by the player's factory. To defend against them, players can use defensive turrets, tanks, and other weapons. As the game progresses, enemies evolve and become harder to defeat. Players may also elect to set the game setting to 'peaceful' during the start of the game, in which the fauna will still spawn but only attack the player and factory in retaliation from direct physical damage on themselves or a neighboring unit.

Did You Know?

• The Small Spitter is one of the indigenous fauna known as 'spitters', alongside 'biters' and 'worms'.
• Spitters become increasingly hostile as pollution is emitted by the player's factory.
• Players can set the game to 'peaceful' mode, where spitters only attack in retaliation to direct physical damage.
• As the game progresses, spitters evolve and become harder to defeat.
• Spitters live in colonies which can be destroyed to prevent further enemy spawning.

Origins and Development Timeline

Factorio is a factory simulation game developed and published by Czech studio Wube Software. The game was announced via a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo in 2013 and released for Windows, macOS, and Linux on 14 August 2020 following an early access phase, which was made available on 25 February 2016. The game was released on Nintendo Switch on 28 October 2022 and ported to Nintendo Switch 2 on 22 December 2025. A paid expansion called Space Age was released on 21 October 2024, adding 4 new planets and expanding the game past the initial planet. In June 2026, Wube Software announced that Factorio 2.1 would be the last major update to the game.

Core Mechanics and Factory Automation

Factorio is a construction and management simulation game focused on resource-gathering with real-time strategy and survival elements. The player advances by locating and harvesting resources to craft various tools and machines, which in turn create more advanced materials that allow for the progression to more sophisticated technologies and machines. Players progress by expanding and managing their factory, which automates the mining, transportation, processing, and assembly of resources and products. Progression incentivizes the player to design and create their factories in ways that allow for larger scales of production and automation. Players research advanced technologies that allow them to create new structures, items, and upgrades, starting with basic automation and eventually leading to oil refining, robots, and the ability to launch a rocket. The game features a blueprint system, which allows players to create reusable blueprints for factory parts or entire factories. The circuit system allows for the creation of complex networks that widen the range of actions one can automate. The base game is won by launching a rocket. Constructing a rocket requires a large amount of resources and research of technology, which motivates the player to set up a sizeable, effective factory in order to achieve this goal. After launching the rocket, the player can continue to build their factory.

Hostile Fauna and Combat Dynamics

The player is tasked with defending themselves and their factory from the planet's indigenous fauna, known as 'biters', 'spitters', and 'worms', who live in colonies which can be destroyed by the player to prevent further enemy spawning. Additionally, they become increasingly hostile as pollution is emitted by the player's factory, necessitating consideration of the balance between the player's production and the enemy's aggressiveness. The player can use defensive turrets, tanks, and other weapons to eliminate enemies. As the game progresses, enemies evolve and become harder to defeat. Players may also elect to set the game setting to 'peaceful' during the start of the game, in which the fauna will still spawn but only attack the player and factory in retaliation from direct physical damage on themselves or a neighboring unit.

Expansion Content and Community Ecosystem

The Space Age expansion include four new planets to explore, as well as a new end goal of interstellar travel. The player can travel to different planets via 'space platforms', which are factories in space that can be expanded and moved; players and objects must be launched from rockets to be sent onto space platforms. Each planet features new methods of acquiring resources, unique challenges, and novel technologies. The planets added are Vulcanus, a volcano-themed planet with ways to get basic resources from lava; Fulgora, a lightning-plagued desert planet hosting the ruins of an alien civilization, which can be mined and processed; Gleba, a lush jungle-like planet of diverse lifeforms which can be farmed and processed to get resources; and Aquilo, a frozen planet covered in a liquid ammonia ocean. The expansion encourages users to greatly scale up their factory's production and automate interplanetary logistics, assisted by new machines and equipment. New enemies are also present on Gleba and Vulcanus, taking the forms of a spider-like race called 'pentapods' on Gleba, and large territorial worm-like enemies called 'demolishers' on Vulcanus. The Space Age expansion includes 'Elevated rails', a developer-made mod which enables more flexible rail transport system using elevated railway tracks. The expansion also includes a chance-based tier system for all machines and items in a separate mod called 'Quality' to upgrade their abilities. Both 'Elevated rails' and 'Quality' are required to enable the Space Age expansion, but they can also be enabled in the base game by users who have purchased the expansion. Upon completing the Space Age expansion, players may upload a snapshot of their game, which includes the map of their base and general statistics, into an online star map, called the 'Galaxy of Fame'. The release of the Space Age expansion came with a free update to the base game which introduced a number of quality of life improvements, including updated fluid dynamics and new terrain generation, as well as in-game tips and tricks.