You’ve built your cheese factory, connected the machines, and finally got everything running. The numbers are looking good, production is up, and you’re making more money than you expected. Unfortunately, you’ve made too much.
Welcome to Cheeseonomics Deluxe, where the United Plates of Gouda-merica has some very strict ideas about how much profit a cheese factory should be making. Fall below the minimum and you’ve failed. Go above the maximum and you’ve also failed, which means getting your production line working is only half the job.
Magnetronic Games‘ roguelike factory builder enters Early Access today on Steam, mixing machine-building puzzles with corporate nonsense, questionable accounting, and a company that expects you to work your way up from the bottom.
Sometimes Making Less Cheese Is the Answer
Every challenge in Cheeseonomics Deluxe asks you to build a factory that earns somewhere between two profit limits. You’ll put together machines, connect their different parts, and work out how much cheese your contraption can produce. The equipment has a Rube Goldberg feel to it, with different components working together to turn a collection of machinery into something that can actually make money.
Getting everything connected is one problem, and making sure the final numbers are right is another. A machine could increase your production, but that isn’t much help when you’re already earning too much. You might need to rearrange parts, rethink the design, or deliberately make your factory less efficient to stay within the government’s limits.
You also need to collect and use Memos. These consumable directives can change the rules of a challenge, giving you ways to interfere with how the factory works without having to rebuild everything. Finding the right one could save a design that was heading straight for failure, especially when you’re only a little over the maximum and don’t want to start pulling the machinery apart.
Big Cheese Corp Has a Career Planned for You
Before you get to the roguelike side of things, there’s a 36-level campaign to work through. You’ll start at the bottom of Big Cheese Corp and gradually learn the different systems as you climb through the company. Six playable characters are included in Early Access, each bringing their own functionality to the factory-building puzzles.
There are a few people to meet along the way too. The Big Cheese is the company’s elderly founder, while Ricky Romano is a middle manager with plenty of experience and a career that might not be entirely straightforward. Then there’s RAM-SAY, the corporate computer you’ll eventually have to prove yourself against, and The Big Milk, the mysterious CEO sitting somewhere near the top of the business.
The campaign even includes CD-style voice acting, adding to the game’s old-fashioned corporate presentation as you work through the increasingly strange demands of your employers. Once you’ve learned how everything works, you can try surviving an actual working week.
Seven Days, One Job, and a Lot of Cheese
The roguelike mode puts you through seven randomly generated days of factory-building challenges. Each day brings another profit target to hit, forcing you to put together machines and make use of whatever options are available. You’ll need to keep your earnings within the allowed range while dealing with the changing challenges, and making too many mistakes means losing your job. At that point, you’re sent back to the office to pack your belongings.
If you survive all seven days, Overtime lets you carry on working and see how long you can keep the business running before something finally goes wrong.
There’s also a Scenario Editor, where you can create your own factory puzzles and experiment with different contraptions. It’s a chance to build something without the pressure of a manager waiting to tell you that you’ve earned the wrong amount of money.
Cheeseonomics Deluxe enters Early Access today with its campaign, six characters, roguelike mode, and Scenario Editor included. Magnetronic Games expects to spend up to a year adding more characters, levels, and improvements before the full release. For now, Big Cheese Corp has a factory waiting for you, and the government has already decided exactly how much you’re allowed to earn. Better check those numbers before you hand in your report.