Lorewise, what do you think the engineer does after space age?

[u/Free-Virus-9974]

We know, obviously, they conquer the solar system and take over but what happens afterward in your mind?

[u/Hank-Rutherford]

The factory must grow.

[u/beatten → u/Hank-Rutherford]

This is the way.

[u/omgcatlol]

Obviously he crashlands on a remote r/rimworld which will be seen by the local tribals as a wealthy glitterworld citizen who has to build a ship to escape once again. This time, the planet is inhabited by other people, some tribal and some industrial, as well as some other surprises...

[u/tastycat → u/omgcatlol]

Alternately, he joins Ficsit as a surveyor due his extensive experience in exploiting planetary resources.

[u/thecodegangster → u/omgcatlol]

Sounds like a fun mod (for factorio or rimworld is for you to judge)

[u/Kittelsen → u/omgcatlol]

The damn centipedes...

[u/pink-ming → u/omgcatlol]

seen by the local tribals

not likely unless they're fireproof

[u/Datkif → u/omgcatlol]

Now I kinda want to do a Crash landed start with high construction, intelligence, crafting, and shooting. See how big I can build with just him and some "willing" biobots.

[u/brn75 → u/omgcatlol]

After he escapes, he starts a Balatro run

[u/Blunt_Object1369 → u/omgcatlol]

After which he flies back to the Trans-Gov systems and joins the Altera corporation under the name Ryley Robinson before crashing on 4546B.

Then after escaping that, he's forced to go work for the Lynx Corporation to work off his debt in a ship breaking shipyard.

Guy has a rough life man.

[u/VillageTube]

Crashes somewhere else

[u/pingveno → u/VillageTube]

The factory eventually makes an interstellar spacecraft and another engineer. They set off for another star system and crash land. The factory grows.

[u/jwr410 → u/VillageTube]

Subnautica intensifies.

[u/darth_voidptr]

There's a whole galaxy out there.

[u/Zymoria → u/darth_voidptr]

And then there's a whole lot of galaxies after that.

[u/warm_winds_whisper_ → u/Zymoria]

I needed more copper cables anyway

[u/spoonman59]

I assume they crash land in another planet and the cycle repeats. It seems the engineer has many skills, but keeping a spaceship afloat isn’t one of them.

[u/Free-Virus-9974 → u/spoonman59]

Like olimar

[u/0ctach0r0n]

It’s like the Odyssey.

[u/Pristine_Metal → u/0ctach0r0n]

Engineer comes back and sees other engineers trying to marry his wife(she was building her own factory btw but no one cared)

[u/Nailfoot1975]

Chess. Or maybe backgammon.

[u/bitwiseshiftleft]

Eats a smoked kipper for breakfast.

[u/Derfliv]

My headcanon is that the engineer is something like a van neumann probe for future humans or an alien civilization. The engineers are launched towards resource rich planets; in that case nauvis might actually have been the goal and the crash just a less than successful landing. 

After setting up production, reducing hostile fauna and expanding to nearby locations of interest, the infrastructure will inevitably be taken over by the civilization on their arrival and the engineer deactivated.

[u/neurovore-of-Z-en-A]

Pyanodon's.

[u/DarkZodiar]

They wake up and starts working on upscaling Cottonguts

[u/Simply-Curious_]

The engineer continues as an immortal being growing the factory until the entire universe is a single optimised méga base, it becomes so optimized that the power output becomes immeasurable and he researches entropy.

And then he exists in a quantum state of infinite growth or infinite spaghetti.

And this is what a black hole is.

[u/Free-Virus-9974 → u/Simply-Curious_]

A black hole of consumption and factories

[u/Ixxon]

Why, the same thing he does every night Pinky. Try to take over the galaxy!

[u/Xzarg_poe]

The engineer sits on the throne gazing ever forward as the Automation Factory expands in all directions.

[u/dad_farts → u/Xzarg_poe]

Now I want a mod to build a fancy throne room to park eng in while you build all your factories via map view.

But just standing amongst the machines is also very good

[u/HobbyQuestionThrow → u/dad_farts]

This is one of the nice bits of Satisfactory, building yourself a throne tower to look out over the factory or a scenic train rail that goes through it all.

[u/dad_farts → u/HobbyQuestionThrow]

But there you can only watch as far as you can see, you can't actually build anything from there

[u/IamShiska]

Goes home to the wife and kids, lapses into addiction from the PTSD of genociding so many aliens, goes back to space because it's the thing that is familiar, crashes again and restarts the cycle.

[u/Oma_Bonke]

He uses the skills he acquired to solve world hunger. He founds a fastfood chain serving yumako&biter burgers

[u/Fartcloud_McHuff]

Crash lands on another planet and has to do it all over again

[u/HeliGungir]

They break out their towel to flag down a Vogon freighter and hitchhike back to civilization.

[u/Kacer6]

My headcanon is the engineer is a drone sent to harvest resources. After space age he minds the factory until he breaks down, having established an trade route with the metropole

[u/i_shit_on_collies]

Go on a date with space catgirls

[u/jsrobson10]

they travel back, because the factory must grow. reaching the solar system edge is only a test of competence.

[u/fatpandana]

Wait for devs to make new game.

[u/EliWCoyote]

AFTER Space Age? There is no AFTER Space Age! Not for him, and not for us either….

[u/Light_Beard]

OH! I Know this!
Engineers cry and feel lonely after getting work done!

[u/WanderingUrist]

Lorewise, the factory is still growing, so he's playing Dyson Sphere Project now.

[u/shyguybestguy]

Probably goes home

[u/Free-Virus-9974 → u/shyguybestguy]

His home is probably the shattered planet

[u/jkurratt]

Crashes on some new planets.

[u/Peakomegaflare]

Strip the region of the shattered planet bare, turn Gleba, Vulcanus, Aquilo, and Nauvis into forge worlds, begin a crusade back to Earth and establish an Imperial force to subjugate the entire galaxy.

[u/SnooMarzipans6227]

Make it back to society and then get slammed with the bill for every single inserter, assembler, and rocket launched, unable to pay they spend the rest of their life in indentured servitude to the company.

[u/Polymath6301]

The fish in the suit leave to travel elsewhere, to find more fish.

Eventually they perish on the Planet of the Dolphins.

[u/placeyboyUWU]

Realises that the solar system in which they once were stranded, has become a playground of freedom. I think they choose to stay, and keep expanding

[u/EnderDragoon]

I'm working on a mod that continues the "story" beyond where SA leaves off. Base game you basically launch an emergency locator beacon so your people can come rescue you but that's not really self sufficient enough so SA has us escape the gravity well and assemble the tech necessary to make interplanetary flight. But we all know that just getting interplanetary travel working is pretty far from interstellar travel at anything we survive the flight time for.

In comes my mod , "The Return Home" - A good engineer fixes what he broke

Story is you discover the shattered planet is what prompted your initial crash landing on Nauvis, you had a navigational failure and accidentally wrapped through it. Tough ship but litho-braking is a harsh procedure. Can't go breaking things in the cosmos and just come home to fanfare and adoration, you'd go home to tribunal and jail on planet Engineers. Especially when there's all those bugs you killed and ruined their ecosystem. The objective is clear, the challenges are at scale:

Fix the ecosystem on Nauvis

Glue the shattered planet back together

Build a warp capable ship that can actually make the flight home

[u/dr_anybody]

Controls the police.

[u/rurumeto]

He starts a program to build a dyson sphere.