‘Space Engineers’ leaves Steam early access with an overhauled survival mode

After being one of the first games on Steam early access, “Space Engineers” was officially released Feb. 28.

There is a lot to be celebrated by the game’s development team pulling this rare occurrence off.

The first update for “Space Engineers” came out Oct. 25, 2013. Since then, it has endured weekly updates for nearly six years.

Leading up to the game’s official release, fans and players alike had only small tidbits of information and no weekly updates to the game (the developers usually push out weekly updates) to go off of, but “Space Engineers” leaving early access should have fans of the title excited.

Here are a few of the most exciting things brought by this update.

Ladders

One of the most requested items from developer Keen Software House was to add ladders to the game. Yes, ladders. When designing ships, players would only have stairways, their jetpacks and clumsy elevators to maneuver ships.

Many times, it would be easier to have a ladder to navigate up and down a ship rather than to construct an overly complicated device to reach another level.

Wind turbine

Back in the day, if a player were to land in an area full of iron and nickel, they would be OK until they needed more power and uranium to fuel reactors.

Now, with the addition of wind turbines into the game, players can get a small, but constant flow of electricity to run equipment and tools. These are only useful when in an atmosphere, but the higher up in the air they are, the more power they can generate.

Progression tree

A progression tree has also been added to the game. This is used to help track how a block, or an assembler, will be used to build something else. This tree will be helpful when figuring out what the next move will be while constructing a ship or base.

It also helps with managing resources by only allowing players to build something within the reach of available material.

Never surrender scenario

This new survival scenario sets a goal for players after they have achieved space travel (other than finding pirate dens and blowing them to bits).

This scenario reveals the location of a base about to be attacked by an overwhelming swarm of drones. Only the best ships and equipment can stem the tide.

For a complete list of items, head to the Keen Software House forum.

Throughout the development of “Space Engineers,” the team from Keen Software House was always responsive and listened to its player base. And now that the game is officially out of early access, it is safe to say that the team is still doing just that.

Despite “Space Engineers” being a “completed” game, it will still be continually updated until it is seen as perfect from both the perspective of the community surrounding it and its developers.

“Space Engineers” can now be found in the action games tab of the Steam store. Go forth and build something amazing.