Idle clicker business sim games abound across a wide variety of gaming platforms but most especially on mobile ones. Whether it is a supermarket, a farm, a hospital, or numerous other production lines and manufacturing establishments, typical idle clicker business sim games offer familiar scenarios hooked on existing enterprises or at the very least have semblances to reality.
ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe is a space-themed idle clicker strategy sim game from ExoCorp that is unlike any mobile game of its kind. ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe does exhibit some of the common traits found in conventional idle clicker games like passively earning cash and continuous progression regardless of how you go about your business. Being set in space and mining resources on different planets, however, ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe provides a truly unique endeavor for space game enthusiasts and idle clicker game fans alike.
ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe is not limited to merely gathering ores as resources and selling them. Resources you gather can be further processed through refining and refined items are base materials for other products you can sell or use in research. There are also astronauts to hire and facilities to invest cash in for upgrades.
Despite its simple and rather straightforward gameplay mechanics, ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe is designed in that adherence to set objectives, imposing prioritizations, and employing the right business strategies can tremendously improve profitability and rate of progression. The initial set of activities you engage in provides all the basics you need to know but the rest of what the adventure offers is relatively easy to pick up.
Just like any idle clicker sim game, ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe guarantees earnings even if you choose to do nothing after the tutorial session. However, for a fast-paced company growth leading to your goal as a top mining tycoon in the universe, our ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe will help you out with some useful tips, tricks and strategies!
1. Focus On The 3 Objectives
ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe is not just about simply earning cash as that can be done regardless of your choices. With your ultimate goal of being the top tycoon in the universe, it is never enough to simply earn profits. Rather, what you should continuously push for is maximizing profits through solid investments and expansions in terms of product lines and territories.
Although ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe is built upon very simple gameplay mechanics, there are well over 60 ores, alloys, and ingots to discover and craft, making the process of prioritizing a little more complex the further you progress your space mining venture. To ease the burden of having tough choices all the time, ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe provides you simple objectives from one level to the next as a guide for your progression.
You will naturally start off at level 1 and there are 3 main objectives at the top of your screen that you need to accomplish before getting to the next level. These objectives all relate to the usual activities you engage in although some may be less usual than others. Mining a certain amount of a specific ore as well as refining them and producing other items count as simplest tasks and some targets require using boosters.
In addition to introducing you to the rest of the mechanics in ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe, each level you complete also earns you valuable rewards. Levels are not just numerical indicators of progression as well and can serve as keys towards unlocking some research nodes. Be sure to remember ranking up by clicking on the level number after accomplishing all 3 objectives.
2. Consider Basic Investment Strategies
Experienced players of almost all other idle clicker business sim games should already be very familiar with the basic strategies that should be followed when it comes to cash flow and investments. While games falling under all other genres make it important for you to exercise some degree of prudence in terms of managing even the basic currency, the best way to go in ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe, in general, is to expend them as fast as you earn them.
Although cash is primarily earned only after selling ores, refined ores, or other products, the most basic materials are mined continuously, ensuring that you will continue to earn cash regardless of what you do. Cash is primarily spent on expanding your territories and upgrading deposits, both of which result in earning you more cash.
You will start off mining ores in just a sole deposit at the start of your adventure but you will naturally be able to discover and unlock additional ones that generate different varieties of ores. Each deposit has 3 upgrade points consistent across all of them although costs are different for each deposit, largely depending on the rarity of ores that can be obtained from them.
Mining speed is very much self-explanatory, determining how quickly ores can be harvested from the deposit. Ores are naturally transported from the deposits to the miner so upgrading it lets you earn ores at a faster rate. The transporters, which appear like bullets travelling from the deposits to the miner, have a carrying capacity as well so upgrading load capacity lets you earn more ores with each transport.
Considering everything, all 3 upgrade choices per deposit are equally important as each one fairly contributes to increasing your yield from the deposit. When you have cash to invest, there should be no priority issues among these upgrades but rather which deposit should be prioritized first or if you should choose to spend cash on unlocking other deposits or purchasing other upgrades. Cash you earn can also be used to spend on more refining slots or construction slots. These, however, will cost huge amounts of cash that exponentially increase with each new one.
A core concept that prevails across every idle game like ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe is that you can continue to earn resources even if you are offline and away from the game. Considering that upgrades on deposits increase output and directly lead to more earnings, what you should always consider is to invest back the cash you earn to upgrade them and reap even more profits.
As far as choosing from among numerous deposits available, the best way to go about upgrades is to consider the cheapest options first. That way, you will get more upgrades for your money’s worth. Basically, what you want to maintain is that upgrade costs across every available deposit is on the same price range as much as possible.
Doing this, however, raises the question on how you will be able to save up cash to afford expansions and upgrades to your refining and production, given that those investments typically require large sums of cash. If you keep spending cash for upgrades on deposits, then it could also mean not saving anything at all to afford the expensive investments.
ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe does provide opportunities for you to earn lumps of cash, almost always enough to purchase the most expensive upgrades you can think of. Since no player can continuously play 24/7, it is expected that long breaks will frequently recur. Hopping back into the game after a long break will naturally earn you lots of idle rewards and these are the opportunities for you to be able to sell resources by bulk for huge amounts of cash. Ideally, this will be the instances to go for the expensive investment options.
3. Keep Refinement And Production Active
Simply mining various ores and selling them for cash would make ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe as simple and straightforward as conventional idle clicker business sim games. However, what makes your mining adventure more colorful and challenging lies in the production lines that enable you to make more cash out of the ores that your deposits yield.
When you first start your adventure, you will only see your miner at the center of all the deposits where carrier drones travel to and from as you collect ores from various sources. With some progression you will see attachments to the miner starting with the refinery and then soon followed by the production facility.
Both refining and production can be accessed through the hammer icon at the bottom of your screen. Refinement and production are separated by tabs and you will also start off with just a single slot to start refining ores as well as producing items. You can see the level of refinery and production at the right side of the window. Levels can be upgraded separately for each processing facility and costs relics, which is a premium currency. Expectedly, higher upgrade levels will cost more relics.
Refining each ore also comes with a price tag so in order to refine rarer minerals, you need to be ready with enough cash as well. The same goes for construction. Each new item you can produce will have a one-time cost to unlock them. Note that unlocking new refined items and products count as investment options as well so you can expect that money spent on each of them will have their respective contributions to increasing your profits in the long run.
On top of new refinement options and items to construct, you should also consider investing in extra production slots so you can process more ores simultaneously. Slots will practically cost a fortune and have exponential cost increases with each additional one. However, as your mining and production business grows so too will your needs multiply so having extra slots, though not absolutely necessary, will be of great help in your expansion and profit boosting.
Knowing that you have to expand your product line and production slots is one thing and knowing exactly when you need to do so is another. Strategizing on how to expand can become a little more complex as your mining firm grows.
As a guide, you should consider the main objectives you need to accomplish to get to the next level as well as the research nodes you can unlock to move forward. These considerations may or may not be related to one another at all times but each should be a determinant for you to decide on when to proceed with a new product line or launch a new production slot.
4. Consider Research Nodes For Production
Ores you mine in ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe are certainly enough to keep generating profits but ores themselves do not command a high price compared to their refined counterparts. Likewise, with refined ores being the main requirements for producing new technologies, you can expect products to sell at a much higher price tag as well.
Refined ores as well as every other product you can create through them are not exclusively used for profits. These items are also important for expanding your mining business and are used as ingredients for research. You can access the research feature via the node icon at the bottom of your screen. It may appear as a confusing web of nodes early on but you will quickly get used to it after some time.
The research nodes work in such a way that you need to unlock each one progressively one node at a time. You can click on each node to check for the requirements and easily identify which ones are within your reach. Naturally, nodes close to the starting point have requirements that can be harvested at an earlier point in your adventure while some may require more progression for you to mine, refine, or produce.
The strategy to consider here is to take note of requirements you need to comply with, particularly ones you will be able to unlock with your current resources. These should be your priorities in mining, refinement, and production while the rest of the items you have in your inventory can be sold off for profits.
Unlocking new research nodes have various effects, which either help you expand your territories further or boost the performance of your different facilities. In effect, research is an investment means that may cost a lot but reap you rewards well worth the patience and effort.
5. Collect, Upgrade, And Strategize On Astronaut Deployment
The huge task of managing your planetary mining business will start off as a one-man job but it does not mean that you will not have extra sets of hands to help you with all the deposits under your care. You can and have to employ astronauts as soon as you can to improve the performance of deposits they are deployed to and hasten the flow of ores that you need to generate cash. You can see the ones you have in your roster via the astronauts icon at the bottom of the screen and both the shop and the crate are sources of astronauts you can recruit.
In the shop, which you can access via the cart icon at the bottom right side of the screen, random astronauts will be available to recruit using relics. Since astronauts have different rarity grades, you can expect that their costs will differ depending on their grade. Common astronauts cost 5 relics; rare astronauts cost 20 relics; epic astronauts cost 50 relics; and legendary ones cost 100 relics.
You can also gamble with your relics and purchase crates through the box icon at the bottom of your screen. Common crates only cost 3 relics and can earn you common astronauts as well as other resources. Epic crates cost 6 relics and can earn you rare or epic astronauts while legendary crates cost 15 relics and can earn you rare, epic, or legendary astronauts. Note that costs pale in comparison to the shop as this is a gacha system and there are other possible rewards to earn instead of actually recruiting astronauts like cash, science points, or a resource.
There are actually only 10 different astronauts to recruit in ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe. There is a good chance to secure extra copies of ones already in your roster, most especially the lower grade astronauts. These instances, however, are hardly a negative experience as you will need extra copies of astronauts to upgrade them.
If an astronaut currently has buffs that increase mining speed and transport speed by 2.2x, upgrading them will double the effects of those perks to 4.4x. Upgrading, however, requires science points in addition to extra copies of the astronauts and science points are also relatively difficult outside of randomly acquiring them from crates.
The challenge attributable to strategizing around using astronauts in your roster comes with decision points on where to deploy them. It will take a while for you to even gather 5 astronauts and you most certainly will have more than 10 deposits running consecutively even on the first planet.
In general, you should consider stationing astronauts on the deposits that have the rarest of ores or the ones with the most expensive upgrade costs attributable to them but you should also consider your current needs in terms of objectives and research targets to determine which resources you need more of.
6. Shift Production Focus From Time To Time
Despite having the capacity to refine multiple items at a time as well as different products simultaneously, the number of ores as well resources for end products will simply be more. As such, there will never be an instance where you can have everything in process without leaving some items out.
Priorities are expected to change over time following the completion of the 3 objectives per level as well as the availability of nodes to unlock under research. As such, the type of ore that you are refining for a while certainly cannot be held in place for long periods. For one, what could happen is that refinement will slow down if it happens that you do not have enough base materials for refinement to continue. In other cases, the refined item may simply no longer align with your current needs.
This same consideration applies to the construction side of production as the end products you create will either be direct requirements to unlocking nodes in research or serve in part or full as a material to create higher level products. It is likely that this can become a little confusing for starters but once you have unlocked several nodes, the idea of how to do this efficiently will become almost too familiar in that you will be able to assess resources and needs quickly.
The first step should always take you to peek into your current resources following the identification of the product or products you need. Resources can be seen through the diamond icon at the lower left side of the screen. Initially, resources that are in abundance become your top candidates for direct selling but given that their value after processing exponentially increases, then items in higher quantities should instead be considered for refining.
Under the refined tab are yet another et of numbers attributable to each refined element. You can once again consider these items for sale since the task of upgrading and needing cash for it is a perennial necessity. However, you should also consider the amount of refined resources you have, especially in conjunction with the third and last tab on the menu, which takes you to the components.
In terms of value, components yield the most profits if you sell them. Before doing so, however, make sure that you do not need components for a pending research task or target and that the component in question is also not an ingredient for other components you need. In any case, be sure to have some in reserve following current and future research needs.
7. Take Advantage Of Boosts, Ad Boosts, And Freebies
Considering everything we have discussed so far, ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe makes it fairly easy for you to feel progression in your campaign although it does not overdo progressions to the point where completely effortless management of your mining firm as well as the absence of strategies will still trigger a solid amount of growth.
While you do not necessarily have to always be available and online for long hours to reach peak performance, taking advantage of boosts, ad boosts, and freebies in the game can take your rate of growth and progression to another level.
Boosts, which can be accessed thru the lightning icon at the bottom of the screen, are potentially the feature players visit the least. Boosts generally cost relics, which is a premium currency you should save for more important purchases. However, the item boosts are also regular rewards you can earn from completing set objectives and reaching higher levels.
Even with that, you should consider exercising prudence in using them considering their effects significantly improve based on your progression and that some objectives actually require you to utilize specific boosts. On the other hand, the Idle Time Boost is the ones that you should consistently take advantage of, especially before leaving the game.
By default, idle rewards that you earn when you are offline and away from the game can only accumulate up to 2 hours. With every ad boost you play, your earn 2 extra hours of idle time and this can be stacked up to 8 hours. Even if you think that you can get back online within just 2 hours, there is no harm done in maxing out the idle time as it will remain stacked if you do not consume it.
Occasionally, you may also see an ad boost icon at the upper right side of the screen. Playing a short video ad though this pop-up can earn you huge amounts of cash or even some relics. Note that the amount of cash or relics you can earn from this ad boost increases depending on your progress, which means that the values offered grow bigger the longer you have played the game.
If you remember our discussion involving crates earlier, there is actually a free crate you can earn once every hour. Although it is just a common crate that costs 3 relics, a free one can go a long way especially since any of the random rewards you can earn will be very useful in your adventure. Do note that the 1-hour countdown commences after you play the ad and claim your rewards.
You can also earn random amounts of relics from the shop from time to time. You actually do not need to play a video ad to claim these freebies. Each time you see an indicator atop the cart icon, click on it and claim your free relics. Relative to the shop, check the available astronauts as well as good offers may present themselves randomly.
There are still plenty of surprises that await you in new planets you will conquer in ExoMiner: Idle Miner Universe. For now, though, this is where we will end our beginner’s guide. Though our tips and strategies are aimed towards maximizing growth and progression, you do not necessarily have to fully adhere to all of it and instead focus on enjoying the adventure as casually as possible. Have you stumbled upon unique tricks of your own or want to share your own story? Do not hesitate to reach out to us and let us know through the comment section!