"It unclear when or by whom these machines were invented, but it is clear that it was sometime before the Great Winter enveloped the Earth.
Our best guess is that Frostpunk’s timeline diverged from our timeline at a much earlier date: 1822. In 1822, the English mathematician Charles Babbage conceives of a steam-driven calculating machine that would be able to compute tables of numbers. The project, funded by the English government, was a failure in our timeline, but in the world of Frostpunk, Babbage succeed in building the world's first computer. Jump forward to 1886, and through the combination of complex clockwork mechanisms, advanced difference/analytical engines and powerful steam-powered actuators known as steam cores, these metal behemoths were born."
Here is the problem. Whomever had written this clearly misunderstands the nature and purpose of automatons. They're NOT robots. They're just a stand in for trains and tractors. Work is done by 1)using it as a mobile steam engine that is connected to the machinery to do manual work, 2)by it's own crew of experienced mechanics. Medical Automatons aren't Autodocs of sci-fi, they're ambulances. And they're made quadrupedal to save time on pathway issues that adding actual vehicles would have caused. 37.214.83.223 01:08, 24 November 2018 (UTC)