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 This is my unfiltered dev journal, so please keep in mind that what I write here are my thoughts and will be outdated by the time you read this, as so many things change quickly.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 1
I have a big surprise for you – we will be adding Animated characters to populate neutral trading stations in the upcoming 209 update. They will have pathfinding abilities and a set of AI behaviors to interact with players and inhabit the stations, bringing more life to your worlds.
Space Engineers 2
Let’s talk performance. We hear you and we are working around the clock to deliver you as many short-term solutions as possible via our after-release hotfixes. We have already added support for assigning arrow keys in Controls and even gave you the proper BRRRRT. 😛
Performance is something I think about constantly, but right now our main priority is clear – we need to finish the core gameplay systems and keep the game stable. That means reducing crashes, fixing bugs, and making sure everything works together as intended. Without that foundation, optimization doesn’t really matter.
We are still improving performance with every Vertical Slice. These are ongoing optimizations across rendering, simulation, and memory. But the deeper, more systemic optimization comes later – once the major systems are in place and we know what we’re actually optimizing.
This is the same approach we used in Space Engineers 1. First we build the game, then we optimize it. After all – a perfectly optimized game with no gameplay isn’t very interesting. Our goal is to reach that point where we have both – rich gameplay and strong performance – and that’s where the big optimization push will come.
Colonization Authority
In VS2.2 you got the opportunity to meet the Colonization Authority for the first time. It is something we’ve been shaping in the background – an AI system responsible for organizing and coordinating colonization efforts across Almagest. It provides a layer of logic to the world – why infrastructure exists, how settlements were planned, and what went wrong in certain places. As you explore, you’ll start to uncover traces of its decisions, and the consequences they left behind.
VS3 – Planet Byblos
Sometimes it feels like we’re playing gods here – shaping another world for you to explore.
With VS3 – Planet Byblos, we’re focusing on giving the sparse land between the vast oceans more personality. The terrain is shaped by relatively recent volcanic activity, so instead of smooth, weathered landscapes, you’ll see sharper forms – jagged rocks, rough silhouettes, and formations that feel fresh and still evolving.
We’re also pushing variety across biomes. The same underlying geology expresses itself differently depending on the environment – from dark volcanic coasts to moss-covered rocks and snow-covered formations. These details help break up the emptiness and give each area its own character without losing the overall identity of Byblos.
Fighter Cockpit
I realized that I have shown you the concepts of our new fighter cockpit – but I never shared the final block. So here we go:
Did you catch Uncle Andy’s VS2.2 preview of Decorative Wall Inserts?
Well – they won’t be just decorative. We’re also working on functional variants, and here you can see one example: a thin Conveyor Wall Insert that takes full advantage of the 25cm unified grid in Space Engineers 2.
New Olive-like Trees
I love Roman history, I love Italy – that whole atmosphere of ancient landscapes, stone, sun, and vegetation shaped over centuries. Even on my blog you can see it – I have my portrait as a Roman centurion 🙂
And olive trees are such a strong part of that feeling. And since I am a CEO, I can sneak them into Space Engineers 2.
I hope you will love how they look 😉
Question to you: How do you like the new olive-like trees?
Share your thoughts in the comments below – I read them all, and they’re one of my favorite parts of making our games.
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wouldn’t say no to having a no-suit option when pressurization comes, or when on Verdue
Absolutely. On friendly planets like Verdure, or later in the game when you’re piloting a huge ship, it makes perfect sense not to always be running around in a bulky spacesuit. Of course, suit crafting and inventory space are also reduced in those cases.
Love the vegetation variation, cannot wait to see SE2 become everything it can be… and also dread what the modders will do when it releases 🙂
So far, cannot fault the experience for an Early Access title, the bugs are getting fixed along the way, I do hope the ‘encounters’ will get some config options to increase or decrease soon though… if it could be per type allied/nuetral/hostile that would be great too.
Please share if there is the plan to add repeatable contracts even if they provide lower rewards for the second and beyond repeats… as right now, I have no need/requirement to return to the sector stations.
Keep it up Keen.
New tree is nice, no more stompie updates?
Swat, there will be more about Stompie in the near future! Also check my X/Twitter where I post about our journey (Stompie & Marek)
Marek, Thank you to you and your team for all your hard work delivering VS 2.2. It is a fantastic update and I’m really enjoying playing right now. I love these weekly updates and it’s great to get a sneak peak at what might be further down the pipeline.
The cockpit looks great. Although, I did prefer the flatter profile from the concept art. The tree diversity is also coming along great.
I hope we can look forward to some functioning buttons in VS 2.3 as using control stations to make things work with functional blocks is a little bit immersion breaking.
I love the new ship control bar and assigning things to it, I’ve been mostly experimenting with that. I’d really like to be able to group like-modules (Example: Batteries or Thrusters) and be able to switch them on/off or set them to charge with one control bar selection instead of individual ones.
Speaking of grouping… I’d really like to be able to group inventory containers on my grids so that they become one combined inventory space. If I have four cargo containers on my ship. I’d like to be able to group 3 together as one bucket and keep one separate. Or switch it up, and have two equal sized buckets, one unified bucket or ungroup them altogether. I love versatility like that!
Anyway. Thanks again to you and the rest of Keen for all your hard work 🙂
That part about the container grouping! It’s something I’ve never even thought about but sounds like a great feature to have! 😊
Also overall great 2.2 update, haven’t gotten around to playing it yet but will as soon as I move in to my new apartment.
I’m very excited for the lcd update aswell 😁
Keenup the great work!
I would also love to have some sort of slider per item in cargo container control menu. You could set certain ammount of item cargo container could pull from other blocks and grids. There would be toggle buttons for pull listed items and push out unlisted items. There could also be toggle for ordering missing items from production line.
You could use pop up window for item filters to prevent clutter on main control window. This slider and toggle system could be vanilla solution for certain cargo and production management scripts from SE1.
The idea of grouping and combining inventory is very cool
Thanks for the suggestion (cargo container grouping). I added it to my notes. Feel free to send more, ideally via our support portal where people can vote on it, and it helps us prioritize: https://support.keenswh.com/spaceengineers2/pc/
Thanks Marek.
I did put my idea on the Support Portal. It got quite a few votes, but then I think it got auto-archived. I don’t think the support portal gets enough visibility to be honest. I feel like I have to pimp my ideas on discord to get people to go and vote for it. Seems a bit futile.
Loving these dev diaries, is there any plan to implement something akin to air locks for connectors in the future?
Something I find a little deflating in SE1 is docking/connecting grids together and then being unable to traverse that path between grids.
I have no idea how difficult it would be to even apply such logic but even if it didn’t pass items and acted more like an airlock so you can traverse between grids and pass power for example, would be pretty cool and add the the immersion.
It can be done in SE1 with just 4 merge blocks, or/and with a merge block and airtight hangar doors. However it takes a lot of space. With new unified grid system in SE2, it might be much easier to make in compact size.
Hey Marek. I’ve had a ticket open since December because the game crashes my graphics card driver after a while. Your fixes from December didn’t help at all. I’ve attached all the relevant information. Nothing has happened yet.
My graphics card driver is up to date. And it only happens with SE2. It doesn’t happen with UE5 games or Star Citizen, etc., and everything runs smoothly.
It would be great if this could finally be fixed.
Not a dev however have a tip might help as this could be unrelated to SE2. Try switching your GPU Driver to Studio instead of Game Ready. Should be able to do this on the Nvidia App, guessing you have a Nvidia card. This is something that has helped a lot of people over in the Icarus Community. IF it can help elsewhere spread the word.
Hope you see this, hope it can help. If it is sucessful spread the word and report back here so Keen knows. Perhaps them and the Icarus crew can sort out the issue with Nvidia. They are 2 different Game Engines so be curious to know if it works.
I have AMD Card and have No Problems in other Games.
Tino, sorry for the troubles. I know about some AMD GPUs still having troubles with SE2, even with latest drivers – we are working with AMD to fix it.
Can you send me the link to your ticket from December, so I can look into this in more detail?
GPU Crash:
https://support.keenswh.com/spaceengineers2/pc/topic/51705-game-causes-graphics-card-drivers-to-crash
And Please Please Please Marek disable the 30 FPS Cap when Frame drop to low:
https://support.keenswh.com/spaceengineers2/pc/topic/50348-fps-are-locked-at-30
Olives as a sustainable?
Olives confirmed??? Olive Armour Blocks!
Continue to love the direction space engineers 2 development is going, and always enjoy these quick peeks into the development process and upcoming updates – thanks for these, Marek!
I know that the sandbox vs story conversation comes up often in these blogs/comments, so just a quick supportive note that I love the idea of the colonization authority backstory and content – would love to see this continue to get fleshed out going into main release.
Might be worth thinking about a framework to add a world start setting to turn on/off the content – I know some sandbox purists or scenarios play thoughs may prefer a mostly “empty” world at start, but I personally would love to see a world map full of old ruins, outposts, orbital space stations, and npc towns built from a pool of points of interest then procedurally added to the world. It adds a extra feeling of exploration that integrates well with the new world map system, and it enables a more reliable economy of scavenging and scrapping if desired.
one other quick blurb – still hazy on where plans for aerodynamics in atmosphere have landed for SE2. id appreciate hesring if there are tentative plans for this in a future blog!
what is the lowest computer specs the games is planed to be able to run on? on a lowest of low settings scenario
More functionalty for ships toolbar like block groups please? Also artificial horizon for ship hud 👍🏻
Yes, this is SORELY missing.
Hi,
I have a suggestion to make the economy more dynamic and realistic:
Each faction could have different prices based on their resources.
If a faction goes to war or has shortages, prices should change.
Some resources could be rare in certain factions, making trade more strategic.
This would make trading and resource management more interesting and realistic.
don’t forget to add laser blasters and turrets for space. oh and shields, like from starwars. oh and programable blocks, also heres an interesting thought what if the NPCS could help man parts of a ship, also very much looking forward to multiplayer.😁 thank ya’ll so much and keep up the good work.
You guys Rock! I am so happy SE1 is still getting Dev Love!
Hey Marek, I would love on the SE2 bigger atmospheres. Would great we have two layers of clouds, one more dense and other more fine.
Hello Marek.
I have a question about NPC, about pirates. Where can i ask it? Or may i ask here? Just curiosity.
ok, hear me out: non player crew. make the npcs be able to be directed or assigned to seats or positions on the ship, and make them sorta programmable, ie: you assign an npc to a seat, and name their role, say, gunner. you can then tell them what does what, eg: activation slot 1 fires, left and right rotates turret, ect. this could be set up as a basic variable-value system, where the “variable” is one of many predefined definitions, fire, move left, move right, ect, and the “value” is the input that incites the action. is it kinda like the ai we already have? yes, very much so. but would it be way cooler to have actual “people” help pilot your ship in a singleplayer world because people are sometimes not exactly the best? also yes.
“Relatively recent volcano activity”
Does that mean there are possible still active volcanoes in Blybos…?
A Volcano base would be pretry cool. Maybe use the Delfos ‘killing field’ for the lava 🙂