The Cave - No Space Age

The Cave – No Space Age Standalone Base-Game Edition for Factorio 2.0

The Cave – No Space Age is a separate, standalone edition of The Cave made specifically for players who own only the Factorio 2.0 base game.

It does not require or use the Space Age expansion. All expansion-only planets, official belt stacking, quality, spoilage, freezing and other Space Age systems have been removed or replaced with Base-game-compatible progression.

This is currently a public test build. Please report any loading error, runtime error or unexpected behaviour.

Important Requirements Requires Factorio 2.0 Base Game Space Age must be disabled Quality must be disabled Elevated Rails must be disabled The normal Space Age edition of The Cave must be disabled Start a new game Saves created with the Space Age edition are not supported Do not enable both editions of The Cave at the same time

Current test version: 1.0.2

Core Cave Gameplay

The entire world begins buried beneath Solid Rock.

Mine the rock directly to reveal the cave and expand your underground factory. Digging can uncover:

Open cave terrain Resource veins Treasure Enemy ambushes Enemy Nest rooms Guarded caverns Special mission entrances Fortified Vaults Uranium Salvage Caverns

Exploration results are generated from stable map data, helping keep discoveries consistent in multiplayer.

Four Depth Zones

Distance from the starting area determines the cave’s difficulty:

Easy Medium Hard Nightmare

Medium depth begins around 300 tiles from the centre, Hard around 700 tiles and Nightmare around 1,000 tiles.

Deeper areas contain stronger enemies, more dangerous rooms and more valuable rewards.

Caverns and Special Rooms

The cave contains multiple room types, including:

Mixed-resource halls Treasure chambers Enemy Nest rooms Guarded resource rooms Oil discoveries Fortified research rooms Uranium Cave entrances Special progression rooms

Enemy rooms scale according to depth, evolution and the selected global difficulty.

The mod also guarantees an early crude-oil discovery roughly 80–100 tiles from the starting area. It remains hidden until the player digs close enough to reveal it.

Resource Generation Mixed Resource Veins

Instead of only generating isolated resource patches, The Cave can create long, connected veins containing combinations of:

Iron Ore Copper Ore Coal Stone

Mixed Resource Veins can be disabled for players who prefer classic single-resource patches.

Resource patch size has eight configurable levels.

Digging Mode

Optional Digging Mode removes most normal ore patches and makes mined cave rock the primary source of resources.

Available levels:

Hardcore: 0.5× digging rewards Digging I: 1× Digging II: 2× Digging III: 3× Digging IV: 4×

Oil and small progression-protection deposits remain available.

Ore Patch Missing

This optional challenge secretly removes one basic resource from natural cave veins. The missing resource must instead be recovered by digging through cave rock.

Ore Patch Protection

Resource deposits can be protected from accidental destruction during cave generation, combat or scripted events.

Resource Tools Filter Mining Drills

A selection tool allows players to drag over mining drills and configure them to mine only one selected resource.

This is especially useful when several resources are mixed beneath the same mining area.

Resource Eraser

An optional administrative tool can permanently remove selected resource entities.

Access can be configured as:

Disabled Administrators only All players

The tool has a 10,000-resource safety limit per selection.

Darkness Infestation

Darkness is a real survival threat.

The 5×5-chunk area around the force spawn point is protected. Outside that area, players must remain close to powered lighting:

Small Lamp protection radius: 12 tiles Lamp Post protection radius: 30 tiles

After remaining unprotected for 30 seconds, cave creatures begin spawning nearby and attacking the player.

Driving a vehicle resets the darkness timer. Protected Train Interior surfaces are always safe from Darkness Infestation.

This system can be disabled in Startup Settings.

Cave Collapse

Cave Collapse is an optional structural survival system.

When enabled, unsupported cave sections can become unstable and collapse. Players must use walls and researched Support Struts to protect important factory areas.

Features include:

Visible collapse countdowns Structural support calculations Wall and Support Strut protection Ten Support Reach research levels Increasing supported ceiling distance Permanent destruction of unsupported terrain and buildings

The complete system can be disabled for a more traditional cave-building experience.

Advancing Collapse

Advancing Collapse is a separate optional survival mode.

The world becomes a northbound ribbon that is 510 tiles wide and divided into 704-tile zones. The southern route is permanently sealed.

Players receive two hours of connected gameplay to prepare. After that, terrain begins disappearing from south to north.

Anything left behind can be permanently erased:

Terrain Buildings Vehicles Rails Factory infrastructure

Players must continuously move their factory and supplies north.

This Base-game edition uses only Nauvis-style zone palettes.

Uranium Salvage Caverns

From Medium depth onward, certain cavern rooms can contain a Uranium Cave entrance.

Entering begins a 30-minute underground expedition.

The lower cave contains continuous veins made from approximately:

50% Uranium Ore 50% The Cave Scrap

Both resources require sulphuric acid and an electric mining drill.

The Cave Scrap can be processed in assembling machines to recover random Base-game components.

Uranium Cave systems include:

Separate underground mission surface