What is this
Every Thursday, I will share a dev diary about what we’ve been working on over the past few weeks. I’ll focus on the interesting challenges and solutions that I encountered. I won’t be able to cover everything, but I’ll share what caught my interest.
Why am I doing it
I want to bring our community along on this journey, and I simply love writing about things I’m passionate about! This is my unfiltered dev journal, so please keep in mind that what I write here are my thoughts and will be outdated by the time you read this, as so many things change quickly. Any plans I mention aren’t set in stone and everything is subject to change. Also, if you don’t like spoilers, then don’t read this.
Space Engineers 2
The fighter cockpit has an interesting history. It originally started as a mod on the SE1 Workshop, and it became so popular that we eventually added our own version to the base game, with the full blessing of the mod author. I always enjoy moments like this, where something born in the community becomes part of Space Engineers for everyone.
Here are the first concepts of the fighter cockpit for SE2. You can see the whole journey, from the initial black and white silhouette sketches, to the rough and more refined interior studies, and finally to the early visualizations of how the finished model might look.
It is still work in progress, but this is exactly how a block begins its life in SE2 – one line, one shape, one idea at a time.
I realized we never showed you the small version of the piston, which is coming in VS2.2. Bit by bit, VS2.2 is taking shape and it will bring the tools that survival engineering really needs.
And finally, let me show you our new stackable Wind Turbine. This block has been designed so you can place one turbine on top of another, creating a seamless look and a continuous wind blade motion across the entire stack.
To me it already feels satisfying to build with – even in this early form. I am really looking forward to seeing what kind of towers and engineering solutions you will create with this.
Question to you: What block would you like to see return next?
Share your thoughts in the comments below – I read them all, and they’re one of my favorite parts of making our games.
Subscribe and get an email whenever I publish a new post!
When will you add programming blocks?
Less of what block I’d like to see return yet (because I’m in the all of them fan club) and more of what new ones might help – like a airlock/docking color block, which is probably more workable with the very nice unified grid system you folks put together
I agree with the docking block; you can’t get out of a ship without draining a whole base of oxygen. While old blocks are great, something new to add to the survival experience would be cool.
I agree, a docking port block would be great to have!
I think that both styles of the fighter cockpit should be implemented, they both look good, and give a different aesthetic that will help community growth! It also gives the community more to work with, so that’s always good.
Yes! Multiple styles of blocks based on different Faction designs. You could only get the blueprints for them after completing the respective story lines!
The blocks could have a smaller menu next to them that show varìations of the blocks you’ve encountered, with each encounter unlocking the variation of the block you’ve discovered
Rotors, hinges, wheels
This ^
we have seen rotors and hinges in a previous dev blog. we have also seen this piston image before as well.
I’d love to see an industrial cockpit make an appearance! A cockpit with visibility below is really useful. I also think there’s some opportunity for very small mechanical blocks. 25cm x 25cm pistons, rotors, and hinges (non-conveyored) would offer some really cool opportunities.
Hi Marek,
One of the blocks that should be prioritized for SE2 Survival is the humble wheel / suspension. Surviving on planets just doesn’t feel right without our trusty and handsome circular companions
It would be interesting to see a feature like blade deployment in wind turbines. When the unit is off, they are enclosed in a vertical tube, just as a design detail.
I’d like to see how this rounded cockpit fits into different builds. It looks good alone, but maybe the angled version could fit better in a variety of builds.
For pistons, did you consider adding a port on the bottom side?
Wind turbines look great. Stackable design would help a lot with more compact and accessible builds. Ideally, a thin catwalk for maintenance nearby should not affect their productivity too much.
For the energy balance in the planet’s environment, I think you should not be able to support large-scale fast refining with just dozens of wind turbines. For that, you might need large water-cooled nuclear reactors. Refineries might benefit from large power input to speed up the process. I don’t want to wait for days irl waiting for my platinum or cobalt to finish refining or build 100s of refineries. Ideally, I want to bring a big load of ore to the base, do something else for a while (like another mining trip), and when I get back, all the ore is processed into condensed and purified form I can then use for further manufacturing needs or transport it elsewhere. In other words, instead of waiting for arbitrary timers, I want to interact with the game, build sufficient power supply and fuel, use interesting game mechanics (like water for reactor cooling so it can produce more power). Wind turbines and batteries/capacitors can also be used for large scale refining, but their disadvantage is that you need to wait for the power to be generated and stored beforehand. It is a simple, cheaper but inferior solution. You can be doing something else on another base, for example, or exploring, while your batteries are charging (batteries can be just an elevated body of water filling up, although, natural “infinite” lakes would be somewhat OP), so when you come back you can still do all of your refinement in real time.
It would be interesting to see a feature like blade deployment in wind turbines. When the unit is off, they are enclosed in a vertical tube, just as a design detail.
Those combat cockpits look incredible! And the wind turbines are going to be a huge help; it’s a significant leap in quality compared to SE1. Personally, the part I’d really like to see on the ground is the wheels (on a vehicle). I wonder if some kind of wheel could add buoyancy to the vehicle—would that be possible?
The event block..
In addition:
A counter
4 1-bit memory cells
4 input nand gate
Parachute hatch
I have a suggestion about the interior of the cockpit, so that it can be a bit more “realistic” to how the player controls their ships. Instead of throttle and stick, it should probably be two sticks, one to control rotation and one to control thrust.
Add all cockpit variants for the fighter aircraft.
It would be cool to see both the rounded version and the angular version.
Looking at the work on the fighter cockpit i can’t help but question wether you couldn’t make it more distinct mechanically instead of beeing just a block skin. Maybe give this cockpit an auto eject feature, a special hud, or gravity/oxygen behavior? I’d love if there was more reason for me to pick it than “this looks cool”.
love to see projector block or get more info on block wrappers
The projector is very necessary, it is extremely inconvenient to assemble ships in survival when the entire projection is displayed.
is it possible to see the charged amount of a battery if in inventory or in a socket ?
If not I would prefere to see in a battery slot the percentage of loaded energy.
thank You
I love it when you introduce new blocks. For example, I’m thinking of a navigation block that brings up the map (it breaks immersion for me if I can just access the map directly). This block could then also be needed for long-distance travel (later in addition to the Jump Drive equivalent).
MFD thoughts: Idea for the fighter cockpit is to maybe make the two MFDs interactable and customizable, for three reasons:
First, modern spacecraft and fighter jets are moving to a touchscreen mfd design, with a couple switches or buttons as needed, i.e. Dragon Capsule or the F35 variants. The concept art for the fighter cockpit already emulates this nicely. Add some switches and knobs for the players to interact with would add much immersion and functionality(easy rule of thumb would be that any specific keyboard shortcut would have its own switch (gear, lights, power, etc) while any system page would have its own mfd option (drill behaviour, reactor status, hydrogen tank options, etc)
Second, having a nice looking desk/chair/cockpit is good, but crashing or losing in a dogfight in one is not so much. In the ‘Ares at War’ podcast, as soon as the moving map screen was available, they ripped apart their meticulously built flight deck to put one in, due to just how useful it was. There is a tremendous amount of information available to the player, but inaccessible. Make some of that available (artificial horizon, distance to reach full speed, distance to stop, altitude, radar altitude, target information, etc), but also customizable with what gets displayed on their suit/hud/screens/mfd in addition with the defaults, so a player can adjust or expand it to what they want or need.
Third, it would ensure longevity for future expansions and player modding. Someone will try to make a clickable cockpit or to add more info systems. Make the framework so they can have a more standardized and an easier implementation doing so.
As an aside, I’m a loooong time space simmer, and your art team people really did a pretty amazing job on the art design for SE2, very impressive. Hope to see much much more from them, and whatever else y’all are cooking up for us 😉
After the mechanical blocks, I would love to see the Event Controler, Timer and Programmable Block to return.
For me it transforms my ships from static grids to automated emmersive ships.
I rarely comment, but when I do, it’s because I genuinely want to contribute to improving things. And perhaps I should do so more often. Overall, I’m consistently impressed by these concepts. As an artist and animator, and as someone who has enjoyed Space Engineers for many years in my spare time. This game is truly my kind of creative playground. Because of that long term connection, I feel a strong desire to give something back to its development.
—
I’d like to share a few observations regarding cockpits, particularly when working in fully creative builds. In some cases, cockpit details feel visually awkward once integrated into a final ship design they are often cut, partially covered, or clash with surrounding elements. One possible improvement could be designing cockpits with an “integrated appliance” mindset, similar to built in refrigerators or ovens, allowing them to blend more naturally into the furniture. When it comes to cockpits themselves, I would love to see deeper internal functionality. Something that encourages the player to remain in first person view rather than switching to third person. More animationss, more dynamic displays, and especially an animated entry sequence would significantly enhance the immersion. The process of entering the cockpit how it opens, the sounds associated with it, and the physical movement of the player. This offers an opportunity for deeper immersion while also adds an additional feature “cockpit decompression” that enhances the game’s survival element. I also notice that many small cockpit windows (Variant A) are present, yet they offer no useful visibility and primarily adds extra polygons without much functional benefit. From my perspective, what truly makes something feel advanced or “sci-fi” is not always complexity or excessive detailing, but purposeful functionality. Often, simplicity leaves a stronger impression. The interior cockpit design already looks excellent. I can clearly see the forms and imagine the polycount. With added functionality of course, interaction, animation, and sound, these cockpits could become truly useful spaces that players want to be in, not just place. Oxygen bottles could also be added as dedicated slots within the cockpit, similar to battery slots, allowing it to function independently when not connected to a generator.
—
Regarding hinges and pistons, I feel this is an area with great potential for further refinement. At the moment, having only two size options feels quite, quite limiting, especially in a game that is fundamentally about engineering, experimentation, and creative problem solving. When designing machines, mechanisms, or small functional details, finer scale components would make a significant difference in my opinion. Tiny hinges and pistons would allow for more precise constructions and open up new possibilities for intricate devices and subtle animations. Additionally, while the concepts of these mechanical parts are visually impressive, they carry a high level of surface detail that can sometimes work against the integration. In many builds, these components are meant to function as structural or “hidden” elements rather than visual focal points. Introducing “alternative versions of hinges and pistons,” designed specifically for integration with simpler geometry and reduced visual complexity, could greatly enhance creative flexibility and help optimize a ship’s overall geometry. It would also reduce the load of the blueprint or ship on the player’s system. Keeping the details simpler can actually make designs work better, letting the functionality and engineering ideas stand out. This would give players more freedom to create precise, believable mechanisms while keeping their ships and machines looking clean and well built.
i think we should to get both version, the rounded and the angled version would fit different kinds of designs.
about blocks that i would like to see back: angles for the armor blocks (including a 25cm variant) and all the logic blocks (timers, event controllers, remote controls, programable blocks…) also with 25 cm versions (theres no point on having smaller blocks if all the functional blocks will force us to keep our creations big)
now, what i really want to get back from SE1 into SE2 is the building controls. using the symetry and toolbars the same way they worked in SE 1, with the scrollwheel to switch blocks between one group and using the toolbar key to change the size of the block.
Both cockpit variants look good.
I wonder if we will ever get interactable cockpits (like in DCS) so we could bind various blocks to buttons on the cockpit.
The fighter cockpit designs look great and will certainly be a welcome addition to the game as many of my smaller builds used it. Whilst I like both designs I do feel that the version with the sloped sides at the back will integrate far better into a lot of builds as the square back may feel more “tacked on”. The main blocks that I’d like to see returning before any are smaller windows. I’m currently struggling to build anything of equivalent size to SE1’s small grid as the 2×1 windows are the equivalent size of large grid only. Similar to this, for smaller builds, it would be super helpful to have 2×1 versions of the detailing blocks, as currently they are restricted to the 1×1 blocks, limiting usage to 45 degree angles only.
What I really want in terms of new blocks is a separation of wheels and suspension.
I want to be able to use suspension for more than just wheels such as landing legs, or to have more complex wheel arrangements on a single suspension. Despite how landing legs in SE1 looked, they were fundamentally just solid blocks with no actual damping effect.
I also want to be able to have things rotate based on standard control inputs without needing to use a standard suspension with wheel, instead of having to do jank things with a rotor and my hotbar.
Definitely Hinges and Rotors.
being able to change the angle of a block coupled with rotation is something I miss from SE1. work so well with programmable blocks too 😉
Dear Marek,
I enjoy your weekly insides in the development of SE2 very much. that creates a feeling of transperancy and gives us as community the possibility to give you valueable feedback.
The fighter cockpit looks astonishing and I would like to have it as soon as possible for my fighter builds. keep up with the great work!
Regarding the small grid pistons (pistons, rotors, hinges in general), they all look fantastic too, my wish is, that you focus very much on the hitboxes and the resulting problems with “exploding mechanics/mashinery” because of the issues with the mechanical parts especially in multiplayer in SE1.
I looking forward to spend thousands of hours in SE2 too
i
There should be some randomness in the rotation speed of wind turinbes, so that stacked turbines would rotate at slightly different speeds. This would fell more like real life.
Hi Marek,
thank you for your weekly insides in the development of SE2, thats great transparency and give us as community the possibility to give feedback.
I’d love to see the amazing looking fighter cockpits on my fighter grids soon.
Regarding the pistons (which look gorgeous actually) I have one big wish (for pistons, hinges, rotors in general) please focus on performane and stability of all
mechanical parts (preventing sudden explosions or crashes like in SE1) espacially in mulitplayer.
thanks and keep up with the great work!
Regarding the Pistons, I think it would be a great idea to limit the weight being able to be pushed by a single piston WHILE taking into account the speed of the piston.
That way it would solve the mach 10 Piston row from Space Engineers 1, where 50 Pistons extending at once would go waaaaay to fast to be realistic.
So in the end it would be great that a single piston could push x weight at full speed, and if you add on to that weight past a certain point then the speed of the piston is forcefully reduced
its only my oppinion, but i think we need smaller mechanical bloks (rotor, pistons)
P.s. and programmble blocks!
Ball joint. !
(non powered, just free move in X/Y+rotation)
maybe add Lock
small 25cm door hinge
I like the design of the fighter cockpit (both variants) and the interior has given me an inspiration:
On the left screen there is an outline of what is presumably the vehicle the cockpit is mounted in.
I suggest making this into a hull intergrity display, as used back in the day by the Wing Commander line of games. It could either display the state of one’s own ship or that of the enemy. As the ship gets damaged, the outline gradually gets red. When parts break off, the outline reflects that.
On another note, I have noticed that the blocks for renewable energy are shrinking while the power output stays high. This power density was already exaggerated in SE1, now it is getting a bit too much.
When in space with the Sledge and orienting the 5m solar panel towards the sun, output reaches up to 500 kW. In real life Earth orbit, insolation is 1370 W/m2. Multiply by the surface of the panel, and you should end up with 15-20 kW output at 100% efficiency. Not 500 kW. Fudging the numbers a bit for a game is fine, but at some point it becomes obvious we are in fantasy land and not doing “real engineering” any more.
Or usable MFD touchscreens…? it would be great to be able to map different screens to the MFDs that a player can use. On the ‘Ares at War’ podcast, when they had access to a moving map, it inmediately became a necessity to have in the flight deck. They started ripping out parts of their beautiful cockpit ro nake room for that screen.
On a side note, the art team at Keen are fantastic! They have been doing amazingly good work on -all- their designs so far, they are continually impressive…!
please for the love of god give us both models if the fighter cockpit
These concepts look wonderful, and with the new unified grid system and small detailing cubes we can even make our own little cockpits from scratch too! However in my experience I have had in making small cockpits from scratch in both SE1 and SE2, I have found myself having issues with the character spawning outside or stuck inside the cockpit when leaving the seat. preferably I would spawn right where I clicked to get in the seat which is usually behind it. Especially when airtightness becomes part of the game I would like to stay inside my cozy interior. Please take a look at this, It would be much more useful and immersive to get out of the seat where we got in. Thankyou.
Can we please tone down the amount of warning labels on everything? The cockpit looks great but it doesn’t need 12 warning label decals all over it.
These cockpits are beautiful. Is there any chance we can get new or updated cockpits for SE1 like these? Cause honestly, the standard cockpit and fighter cockpit feel very outdated to use.
Wheeeeeels 😀 But please with a better physics and without all the weird problems of SE1 😉
Both versions of figher cockpit look good. can we have them both?
Will the distance of damaging blocks from thrusters be the same as SE1? Need that information for my designs.
The block id like to see return is a block that was never added to space engineers 1 and it’s always been shocking to me it was never added. A recharge station that also fills bottles.
i don’t go to the water tower in my city to fill up my cup of water and i don’t go to the oil refinery to get oil for my car so why do i have to refill my hydrogen bottles at the hydrogen tank? we got close with the medical bay having the graphics of a bottle refill station but it’s not functional. then we got the refill station which… doesn’t refill bottles….
please give us an actual refill everything station
Cockpit looks great, I already saw where the armor connections will be. they both have a really nice window as well.
The wind turbine should have an idle / no wind animation as well, where the blades retract.
Hi, love the look of both the fighter cockpits and the turbine!
This is not really next block related, so apologies if this is not the right place to ask, but will you be looking to implement an option within thruster settings to allow engineers to set the % of power a thruster produces? That way they could be configurable for different operatioanl functions (take off/landing, cruise mode, a cargo ship running empty/full etc) – Thank you
The hinge block but in a scalable version that dose not look awkward on large builds like it dose in SE 1! Q: do pistions and hinges sync?
Q: will we see a ship’s mast block with sails for water world that could doubble as solar sails for space travel
ok hang on… i picked up SE2.. to have a look after 10months..
really i have been waiting for coop or mp.. to play with my engineering colleagues. Dont get much gaming time these days with ankle biters running around.
and….. Wow… SE2.. is really looking incredible.. i love the tutorial entrance.. really fun for exisisting players.. the intro story on survival is great.. very KEEN to see where you take it..
now even more excited for coop and mp.
thanks Marek..
CromeX
When are you going to allow remapping key bindings?
I’m left handed and wasd is a non player for me. I seriously do not enjoy se2 because of that single issue, which is sad because it is so much better than se1.
Hi dear Marek, is ticketing system working ? or is there a certain response time ? I am waiting for 1 week since I open my ticket about publishing my mod