[h2]Release date: 2022-05-18[/h2]

Game Version: 1011166

Bug fixes

• Fixed missing train sounds
  
• Fixed issue with dome/habitat birth timing
  
• Fixes issue where too many colonists would be gathered for transport (elevator and rockets).
  
• Fixed an issue when "Remote Farming" is researched and but there are no stations or domes built on a map (building either will restore the game even without the patch)
  
• Fixed stations not transporting colonists when it or the nearby dome/workplace was completed while on a different map. Should fix existing bugged stations on game load.
  
• Fixed duplicated colonists in station infopanel when SetCommand is called while they are waiting for trains
  
• Fixed issues when colonists are "teleported" to rockets, landers or elevator while in stations or trains
  
• Fixed game hanging under some conditions when colonists use the elevator
  

• Added option to manually make colonists exit trains
  
• Select the train and right click on the colonist icons in the passengers list to get them out of the train. Can be useful if you want them to take their chances walking when the train is stuck on a damaged track.
  
• Increases the number of colonists that can wait for trains at a station
  
• If you notice colonists going home from work by foot or via more distant stations check if the station near the workplace doesn't get full when shifts are ending.
  
• Fixed clogging for station depots
  
• Station depots will try to reserve "desired amount" (DA) for each resource that it can accept from drones and trains. If DA is higher than the total space divided by the number of accepted resources, clogging may still happen but in such case that DA value also becomes a hard cap for each resource.
  
• Changes to balanced mode for crates
  
• If the source depot is in balanced mode (for a resource) and has more it's DA it will try to satisfy the DA of the destination then split the quantity that it may still have over its own DA between the two. If the source has exactly its DA it will send 1 crate of that resource if the target has less than its own DA of it.
  

https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/25614/Surviving_Mars_All_New_In_Bundle/

Calling all Survivors!

The day has arrived! The 3 new CCPs (Content Creator Packs) have finally arrived, and we're excited to welcome you aboard. The packs will be available separately, or in a "All New In" bundle! You'll be able to change how you play the game with the "Martian Express Pack" created by veteran modders Lucian "LukeH" Hada and Sylvain "Silva" Maupetit. The "Martian Express Pack" allows you to move your colonists and resources between stations facilitating access to far away domes and remote resource deposits. Other outside manned buildings will also be buildable near stations without needing a dome. You can also enjoy the 10 new terrestrial building skins included in "Future Contemporary Cosmetic Pack" by modder Teerapat "Quad Rioters" Kitjawijit while you listen to the 16 new songs from the "Revelation Radio Pack".

Martian Express Pack created by veteran modders Lucian "LukeH" Hada and Sylvain "Silva" Maupetit include:

• Welcome commuters!
  Build your stations anywhere on the map and help your colonists get to work and back. Click on the info panel to see their reason for traveling and make sure that everyone gets their seat. otherwise, theyll have to wait for the next train - and be frustrated, nobody likes to miss the train.
  
  
• New tracks
  Click and drag to create tracks that connect your stations. Tracks will be elevated allowing your rovers and drones to pass underneath together with power cables, while pipes can cross over them.
  
  
• Same train, different cargo
  Traveling on the red planet has never been safer (and efficient!). Trains will have 2 wagons to transport colonists and resources at the same time. Don't worry: they'll travel on the same track with no risk of collision. Build your trains in the stations, assign them to the connected tracks and watch them go.

• 10 terrestrial building skins to give your colony some added flair.

• 16 new songs from 4 artists for approximately 70 minutes of music from the comfort of your own dome.

• The Jumbo Cave Reinforcement cannot be built if a Dome was already built nearby
  
• Rovers and RC Dozers can clean cave-ins only from certain points
  
• Anomalies from events can spawn under a deposit
  
• Landscaping projects from Surface are displayed in the Underground if one of them is finished
  
• The salvage process for Storages does not resume after they have been emptied
  
• The Bottomless Pit Lab doesn't convert some resources into research points in the Normal workload
  
• Resources stored to be used for maintenance or to upgrade the Bottomless Pit can also be converted into Research points, causing maintenance and upgrading to be delayed
  
• The Drones don't get commands after being unpacked from Prefabs by Ancient Artifact
  
• The Asteroid Extractor tooltip doesn't show the available amount of rare metals and exotic minerals in the nodes on the Asteroid when trying to place an extractor
  
• The Mystery Log cannot be dismissed on the Asteroid after completing the "Asteroid from outer space" mini-mystery
  
• Prefabs not being correctly transported to the underground via the elevator

• Elevators can now also be built from the underground.

All aboard another party train! We have another video from PartyElite about the up-coming Content Creator Pack, this time focusing on the Future Contemporary Cosmetic Pack (made by Teerapat "Quad Rioters" Kitjawijit), and Revelation Radio. Join us for the release tomorrow! You'll get a glimpse of the new building skins, including three Dome Spires, and listen to the relaxing beats from the new radio station.

[previewyoutube=RWccT79waX4;full][/previewyoutube]

Join the party and check out this sneak peek of the new CCP (Content Creator Pack) Martian Express! PartyElite has collaborated with us to show you the Pros and Cons of Using Trains, Building and Maintaining your Train Network. All aboard the train on the 28th of April!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9f-3bf56o0

Hello Survivors,

News of highly requested features are arriving with a honk! We've got 3 new Content Creator Packs coming your way on April 28th, available separately, or in a "All New In" bundle! Change up your game dramatically with the Martian Express Pack by veteran modders Lucian "LukeH" Hada and Sylvain "Silva" Maupetit, give your buildings some new flair or listen to 70ish min of new music!

The Martian Express Pack allows you to move your colonists and resources between stations facilitating access to far away domes and remote resource deposits.Other outside manned buildings will also be buildable near stations without needing a dome.

Check out the trailer for the Martian Express Pack:[previewyoutube=fME_26QzIqA;full][/previewyoutube]

Key features of the Martian Express Pack include:

• Welcome commuters! - Build your stations anywhere on the map and help your colonists get to work and back. Click on the info panel to see their reason for travelling and make sure that everyone gets their seat. otherwise, theyll have to wait for the next train - and be frustrated, nobody likes to miss the train.
  
  
• New tracks - Click and drag to create tracks that connect your stations. Tracks will be elevated allowing your rovers and drones to pass underneath together with power cables, while pipes can cross over them.
  
  
• Same train, different cargo - Travelling on the red planet has never been safer (and efficient!). Trains will have 2 wagons to transport colonists and resources at the same time. Don't worry: they'll travel on the same track with no risk of collision. Build your trains in the stations, assign them to the connected tracks and watch them go.

Release date: 2022-02-08

Version:
Steam: 1010838
GOG: 1010838
Epic: 1010838
Windows Store: 1010838
Paradox Plaza: 1010838
XBOX: 1010838
MAC: 1010838
Linux: 1010838
PS4: 1010838

Bug Fixes
Fix the game becomes unresponsive when ordering unskilled colonists from the underground
Fix no disasters when starting a new game with mods active (Fixed for save games)
Fix Colonists working in the Sanatorium/School Spire have the "Not working in home dome" status
Fix Recon discovery events are recurring while they should not
Fix loaded cargo isn't shown in the Asteroid Lander payload tooltip on quick bar when it arrived on Asteroid
Fix the Drone Hub and Hub Extenders active range is displayed after more than 2 hubs were converted into Prefabs at the same time
Fix Lander rocket always defaults to auto mode on the Asteroid and user preference is always overridden
Fix the Mystery Log cannot be dismissed on the Asteroid after completing the "Asteroid from outer space" mini-mystery
Fix Fireworks are not displayed even if Show Fireworks option is enabled
Fix the default cargo priority approving waste rock, causing issues with events
Fix the menus being allowed to open on console while having the payload menu open

Known issues/ notes:
No disasters save game bugfix: In existing savegames that have the issue where disasters are not triggered, the disasters will be reset and treated as if a new game has started. This means that it will take the same amount of time for disasters to start occurring as if a new game was started with max disasters settings.

Game version: 1010784

Balance Changes

• Adjust the Fungal Farm to have higher food production in the underground and lower food production on the surface.
  
• Adjust recon center discovery rate; discovery frequency is now less extreme, with no more multiple events on the same sol or long periods without asteroids. This also fixes recon centers with a low recon per sol not contributing to discoveries.
  
• Reduce oxygen and water consumption for underground domes, to be more in line with surface domes.
  

• Fixed expeditions rockets not loading colonists (now on all platforms).
  
• Fixed waste rock not appearing in the command center timeline stats in existing save games (now on all platforms).
  
• Fixed multiple Drones not being able to be reassigned/moved with the suggested hotkeys on the controller.
  
• Fixed The War Tension in the "Last War" Mystery not changing.
  
• Fixed Power of Three: With S.H.E.P.I.D researched, Black Cubes can appear inside of the colony with active sensor towers.
  
• Fixed crash when Toxic rain starts.
  
• Fixed Cargo UI displaying prefabs that are not available.
  
• Fixed drones endlessly fixing an Elevator on Mars surface because the underground Elevator is shrouded in the rubble.
  
• Fixed the underground staying dark in Photo Mode.
  
• Fixed Lander Rockets' Auto Mode not being able to request Seeds and Waste Rock.
  
• Fixed resources being unloaded from the Elevator being subtracted and ignored from requests.
  
• Fixed Lander rockets losing drones while transporting them to an Asteroid if more than 20 drones were requested.
  
• Fixed dome passages appearing on the other map when switching maps during construction.
  
• Fixed drones trying to make their path to deposits through underground walls if the proper route was first blocked and then cleared.
  
• Fixed drones trying to get to the unreachable areas on Asteroids in order to gather resources.
  
• Fixed orphaned drones not being able to be transported via the Elevator's Cargo UI.
  
• Fixed the Asteroid Lander having an "Unknown launch issue" status when the destination is set, the fuel tank is full but resources are still being unloaded.
  
• Fixed the missing anomaly near the Underground Entrance on a particular map.
  
• Fixed underground anomalies spawning under stone formations.
  
• Fixed regular anomalies having technical text instead of the correct description in Turkish.
  
• Fixed an issue with the remaining time of Asteroids in the Planetary view having technical text in Spanish.
  

• Fixed Underground resource nodes spawning in tunnels; they now only spawn in rooms.
  
• Fixed no disasters appearing in some cases, though this can still occur on old saves and in specific edge cases.
  

Hello Survivors!

We just released a small emergency hotfix which addresses a few issues found in the Content Update #2 for Below & Beyond DLC.

Patch notes

• Fixed expeditions rockets not loading colonists.
  
• Fixed the issue with waste rock not appearing the command center time line stats in existing save games.
  
• Fixed the disaster settings being reset (to defaults such as very low) when starting a new game with mods.
  

Game Version: 1010558

Main Focus:
In this second part, we focus on making the underground and asteroids more beneficial for your main colony and build further upon the improvements of Merbold part 1.

• Buried Wonder Upgrades: each Buried Wonder has a new upgrade or building they unlock, which benefits your entire colony (Surface, Underground and Asteroids). The story of each Buried Wonder is also extended to include these upgrades.
  
  
  • Players that already (partially) completed buried wonder events still get access to these.
  
  
• Rare Anomalies: These are special anomalies that can be found throughout the Underground which each give you a choice between multiple powerful rewards.
  
• New Breakthrough Techs: 6 new breakthrough techs have been added that can be found on the Surface, in the Underground and on Asteroids.
  
• 2 New Commander Profiles, The Spelunker and The Space Miner: The Spelunker gives easier access to the Underground and makes colonists regain Sanity while in the Underground instead of losing sanity. The Space Miner has an easier time getting to asteroids.
  

• Edit both sides of the Cargo UI: In the elevator cargo UI, you can now set requests or minimums for both sides of the elevator in the same screen. You no longer first have to switch maps to configure the other side.
  
• The Cargo UI shows an explanation on how auto mode works for Asteroid Landers and the Elevator.
  
• Waste Rock can now be transported.
  
• Truly Universal Depot: The Universal Depot now includes the DLC resources, depending on which DLCs you have; Seeds if you have Green Planet and Exotic Minerals if you have Below & Beyond.
  
• Asteroid Landers now visibly take off when they automatically launch at the very last second when an Asteroid goes out of range.
  
• Changed the Recon & Expansion tech tree order; Underground Domes and the Recon Center are unlocked earlier, while the Drone Hub Extender is unlocked later.
  
• Rovers and drones loaded into the Lander Rocket drop any resources they were still carrying.
  
• Tunnels, Wonders and Food and Mystery depots can no longer be refabbed.
  
• Added an asteroid specific skin for the RC Dozer.
  

• Greatly increase resources found on Asteroids.
  
• 2 bars guarantees resources are present, 1 bar guarantees water, metals and exotic minerals.
  
• Added metals to C-type asteroids (1 bar).
  
• Reduced Recon Center Maintenance 4 > 1 Electronics.
  
• Increase the odds of a Recon Center finding an asteroid, especially while you have no asteroids.
  
• Decrease the odds of Recon discovery events, and each event can only occur once.
  
• Generic Discoveries from the Recon Center now reward research progress.
  
• Reduce Asteroid Lander price.
  
• Slightly Increase Asteroid Lander cargo capacity.
  
• Greatly increase the cargo module upgrade cargo bonus.
  
• Increase polymer in the default Asteroid Lander loadout.
  
• Highly increase resource extraction of the Micro-G Mining Station (with colonists).
  
• Reduce maintenance frequency for Micro-G buildings (auto, water, station, habitat) and Electrolyzer.
  
• Reduce power consumption of the Micro-G Auto Extractor, Micro-G Water Extractor, Electrolyzer and Micro-G Habitat.
  
• Increase residence space in the Micro-G Habitat.
  

• Increased resource nodes in the underground.
  
• Increased the buried wonder research costs.
  
• Reduced maintenance costs of buried wonders.
  
• Changed maintenance costs of the Support Strut to Metals (instead of Exotic Minerals).
  
• Farms can no longer be built in the underground.
  
• Fungal Farms can now be built in the underground.
  
• Increased food production for Fungal Farm.
  
• Slightly increased Sanity benefit of Psych Studies.
  

• Fixed the lander rocket having the status not enough full even when the tank is full
  
• Fixed fuel filling the lander rocket resetting to 0 when editing the payload
  
• Fixed Micro-G mining buildings not taking resource grade into account
  
• Fixed MDS lasers not working if the player is on another map
  
• Fixed "Rocket can't land during dust storms" warning showing on Asteroids for Landers in orbit
  
• Fixed cargo rockets duplicating if they are sent on an expedition and the launch is cancelled
  
• Fixed cave-ins spawning on walls
  
• Fixed cave-ins spawning at the same angle so that the player sees the pattern
  
• Fixed cave-ins disappearing when cancelling the clear operation using the RC Dozer
  
• Fixed colonists having the wrong group label (martian/earth born) when transported to another map
  
• Fixed drones getting stuck on the Bottomless Pit after the Bottomless Pit Lab is salvaged
  
• Fixed freezing when the Underground Marsquake is occurring in the mid and late-game stage
  
• Fixed Colonist and Tourism top bar tooltip defining colonists as "stored"
  
• Fixed the bottom textures of a Dome remaining after prefabbing
  
• Fixed the Exotic Minerals icon not showing in the Production tab for the asteroid's extractors
  
• Fixed Underground Domes not changing color when changing building colors
  
• Fixed cave-ins falling on Buried Wonders and becoming unremovable
  
• Fixed the "Signs of Organic Matter" event becoming blocked if another Asteroid goes out of range
  
• Fixed colonists suffocating when a rocket returns from the Covert Ops (Space Race) and lands
  
• Fixed earthsick colonists losing their earthsick status from getting sent to another Asteroid
  
• Fixed uneven terrain blocking rovers in the underground
  
• Fixed Bottomless Pit: "The Pit: Experiment requirements" event checking only the nearest Dumping Site
  
• Fixed the RC Explorer and Elevator building appearing in different places in the Underground through the same Underground Entrance
  
• Fixed colonists/tourists occasionally teleporting away from the elevator when using auto mode causing colonists to suffocate.
  
• Fixed screen freeze when pressing the tab button while switching to another map
  
• Fixed the RC Explorer not being able to reach a specific Anomaly in a Underground map
  
• Fixed the bonus from the Stirling Generator Fault event not applying to the underground
  
• Fixed the Buried Wonder Log not being able to close for the second time if optional tasks were completed after the main ones
  
• Fixed the bottom rock asset emerging when a player makes a ramp over the Asteroid's pit in the donut shaped map
  
• Fixed elevator's Auto Mode duplicating the request of objects
  
• Fixed notifications from the recon center appearing in the underground map
  
• Fixed hunger game rule disabling food transport for the elevator and lander rockets
  
• Fixed the second anomaly in the Bottomless Pit event chain not reappearing if the requirements haven't been met
  
• Fixed the Astrogeologist commander profile extractor production bonus not applying to the Asteroid's extractors
  
• Fixed the elevator malfunction event being able to be bypassed by turning the elevator on or off or through a regular malfunction
  
• Fixed save screenshot missing in load game on Mac and Linux
  
• Fixed salvaging the bottomless Pit Research Center breaking the drones route
  
• Fixed asteroid extractors still extracting a large number of resources if the breakthrough Nona Refinement is researched
  
• Fixed a drone making one extra unnecessary move when repairing the elevator
  
• Fixed rovers and buildings researched with the Global Support Breakthrough not being added to the Cargo lists
  
• Fixed drones assigned to the malfunctioned elevator not being able to deliver resources while trying to repair the elevator.
  
• Fixed Lander rocket being able to take off during Dust storms when using the Depart Now
  
• Fixed requested Drones not departing with the Lander rocket if they were assigned to the a requested RC Commander
  
• Fixed drones assigned to the RC Commander being reassigned to the command centers from the surface map after being transported to the underground
  
• Fixed temporary anomalies appearing in unreachable places in the Underground with Mystery Metatron active
  
• Fixed the Lander rocket occasionally getting a 'waiting for maintenance' status after a request and but being able to return to Mars if the asteroid goes out of range
  

• If the performance of the Recon Centre building is below 86, it does not contribute to the Recon Progress or help with Asteroid discoveries.
  

Game version: 1009413

Main Focus:
In this first part, we focus on making it easier to explore and expand into the underground earlier on while also making the Asteroid Lander and Elevator easier to use. We also start making Below and Beyond content more beneficial for your main colony by introducing a few upgrades that cost Exotic Minerals.

• Elevator Grid resource transfer: The elevator now transfers excess power, water, and oxygen between the Martian Surface and Underground. This enables you to start expanding in the underground while relying on your production on the surface.
  
• Elevator Auto mode: You can now set a minimum amount of resources you want on the Surface and Underground. While the elevator is in auto mode it will automatically request resources when under this minimum. You can also still manually request resources.
  - Requesting resources for the Elevator is now done on the side where you need the resources, instead of where you send them from. With arrows indicating from where to where the resources will be transported.
  
• Reworked cave-ins: Cave-ins no longer require a specific tech to clear, and blocked tunnels that required the landscaping tool are also removed. To still maintain an element of gradual exploration, we introduce the new Collapsed Tunnels which do still require the tech to be cleared.
  - Increased room for exploration in the underground, greatly reduced the number of tunnels blocked while the new Collapsed tunnels are placed such that they lead to larger new areas to explore or extra anomalies to find. We also increased the number of anomalies in the underground.
  
• Exotic Minerals upgrades: We introduced a few upgrades to surface buildings that cost Exotic Minerals;
  - Improved Photovoltaics; doubles power production for solar panels
  - Exotic Mineral Treatment; greatly increases health and sanity recovery from Infirmaries (and Medical Posts if you have In-dome Building Pack).
  

• Added clear warnings to the lander rocket for why it cannot depart yet, so you can take action.
  
• Added a "Depart Now" button to the Asteroid Lander, which allows you to launch the lander before the requested payload is loaded, as long as it has enough fuel.
  
• Disabled the visit asteroid button, if there is no Asteroid to go to.
  
• Removed the Micro-G Vehicles tech, RC Vehicles can now always be brought to Asteroids.
  
• Elevators can now recharge drones, just like drone hubs.
  
• Improve requested payload feedback on the elevator.
  
• Added 1 drone to terraforming initiative default loadout to fill out the cargo space.
  
• After map switching once, all switches afterwards have a fade instead of a loading screen, which shortens the loading times significantly.
  

• Halved research costs for the Recon & Expansion tech tree.
  
• Reduced Exotic Minerals costs for underground domes.
  
• Added an anomaly close to elevators which gives some Exotic Minerals, to get you started.
  
• Rebalanced Drone Hub Extender to cost less Exotic Minerals.
  
• Increased success chance of Jumbo Cave events.
  
• Increased time players have on asteroids.
  
• Adjusted the tech tree order; moving Low-G Excavation Permits and Low-G Tunnel Supports down while moving Underground Dome Construction and Micro-G Mining up.
  

• Asteroid Lander now gives correct feedback when requiring maintenance.
  
• Fixed an issue with lander rocket showing payload when landing, instead of requested payload.
  
• Fixed an issue with the elevator panel not removing colonists already transported to the other side.
  
• Fixed the lander info panel showing an incorrect status when there aren't enough prefabs.
  
• Fixed the lander showing an incorrect status after canceling the trip.
  
• Fixed the First Rainfall milestone not being achieved after reaching all requirements
  
• Fixed disasters running back to back.
  
• Fixed Lander rocket not taking off if RC Vehicles required for take-off are in the cargo of another rocket.
  
• Fixed Mirror Sphere mystery never-ending, the counter however remains on screen in existing saves.
  
• Fixed an issue with suffocating colonists continuing to suffocate when they get out of the Elevator.
  
• Fixed an issue with colonists suffocating while trying to reach micro-g habitat.
  
• Fixed an issue with drones needing several takes on a single cave-in to clear it.
  
• Fixed an issue with vehicle navigation when collapsed tunnels are cleared.
  
• Fixed Electrolyzer continuing to consume water when turned off.
  
• Fixed Drone Hub Extenders not receiving the extra range of 15 hexes.
  
• Fixed Drone Hub Extender active range not being redrawn immediately after researching the Signal Boosters.
  
• Fixed an issue with the Unknown status of drones and rovers while using the Elevator.
  
• Fixed empty tooltip and building panel of the Forestation plant when the language is set to Turkish.
  
• Fixed drones facing the wrong side while gathering Metals or Exotic Minerals.
  
• Fixed an issue with the lander rockets color being different before and after construction for some sponsors.
  
• Fixed an issue with colonists not occupying the last (14th) slot of the Micro-G Habitat.
  
• Fixed tooltip for the Micro-G Habitat colonist filter referring to a dome instead of habitat.
  
• Fixed the Jumbo Cave experiment pop-ups showing incorrect cost cuts.
  
• Fixed Cave-ins and Collapsed Tunnels not having a texture in the quick bar.
  

• Fixed Alien Artifact Anomalies spawning underground in the Dredgers Mystery.
  
• Fixed an issue with Mystery3Counter notification triggered by Countdown Sphere Unknown Event being stuck.
  
• Fixed an issue with numbers going into the negative on countdown timers.
  

Game version: 1008298

Gameplay Improvements

• Elevator colonist cap has been increased to 250
  
• New warning notifications when trying to launch a lander with colonists while not having a habitat on the asteroid or when the habitat does not have enough resident slots
  

• Fixed no disasters rule not working
  
• Fixed no terraforming rule not working
  
• Fixed disabling no Below and Beyond content rule awarding Space Explorers achievement
  
• Fixed a crash on starting a new game on macOS
  
• Fixed a crash when sending a planetary expedition that requires an RC vehicle
  
• Fixed a crash when a lander rocket returns to mars with cargo containing a transporter that carries resources
  
• Fixed a crash when requesting colonists from an asteroid
  
• Fixed a crash after the event rough touchdown when drones unload the payload
  
• Fixed a rounding error on resources prevent the lander rocket from launching
  
• Fixed a Waste Rock value being incorrect during landscaping
  
• Fixed event anomalies spawning under resource deposits
  
• Fixed the amount of surface polymers being very high
  
• Fixed The last War event preventing the loading of cargo onto asteroid landers
  
• Fixed not being able to send multiple drones through the elevator by right clicking
  
• Fixed the lander rocket request payload tooltip showing the ready status for prefabs that the player does not have
  
• Fixed the issue where the number of requested colonists gets reset to 0 in the lander rocket cargo menu
  
• Fixed where one drone gets transported through the elevator when assigning multiple drones to the elevator as drone controller
  
• Fixed maintenance getting stuck on certain buildings (fusion reactor and electronics factory)
  
• Fixed where drones were active in drone hub extender range while the extender wasnt powered
  
• Fixed the effect ranges remaining visible after refabbing a building
  
• Fixed rovers leaving the lander rocket twice
  
• Fixed the issue where multiple capital cities could be built after terraforming (Old saves will continue to contain multiple capital cities, but the option to build more is now restricted)
  
• Fixed the RC explorer continuing to scan queued surface anomalies while the RC explorer has been transported to the underground
  
• Fixed incorrect landing angle of the supply pod on a landing pad
  
• Fixed the asteroid banner not working without the Space Race DLC
  
• Fixed the issue where landscape cursor does not show
  
• Fixed the colony being automatically renamed to missing text in the planetary view
  
• Fixed the concrete extractor not being able to build underground at specific coordinates
  
• Fixed domes not being built underground because drones stop delivering resources
  

Game version: 1008107

Notes

• The in-game bug reporting tool has been removed in favour of an automatic system
  
• Playstation 4 and 5 now have Turkish translations
  

• Fixed the game crash after loading a save game with invalidated drones.
  
• Fixed the game crash when a player selects the Rock Formation object on an old retail save.
  
• Fixed missing Terraforming tech tree in the old saves.
  
• Fixed the "Advanced Martian Engines" tech adding 20 fuel to Cargo Rockets.
  
• Fixed the Transport Optimization tech not adding extra cargo space.
  
• Fixed the description of the "Banner" mentioning Mars while on an asteroid map.
  
• Fixed the Cave of Wonders description.
  
• Fixed the Lander rocket disappearing when the Rough Touchdown event occurs.
  
• Improved feedback when the Asteroid Lander requires maintenance.
  
• Fixed ramps being instantly built.
  
• Fixed the progress bar of Required Waste Rock not changing while flattening.
  
• Fixed the problem when a fired worker immediately returns to work.
  

• Incorrect value of Excess Waste Rock is displayed when Flatten in progress.
  
• The limit for colonists being allowed through the elevator is too low.
  
• Crash on certain Mac versions.
  

Game version
PC: 1008025

Gameplay Improvements

• Remove the Micro-G Auto Extractor prefab from the default loadout for Asteroid Landers, so you don't accidentally include a prefab without having one.
  
• Visual improvement to the base of asteroids (mostly for photo mode).
  

• Fixed dome birth controls.
  
• Fixed the same anomaly event appearing multiple times.
  
• Fixed dust storms, cold waves, and meteor storms not triggering.
  
• Fixed the martian surface filling with water after connecting a lake to a water producer.
  
• Fixed asteroid landers sometimes not properly showing their status when returning from an asteroid at the very last second.
  
• Fixed drone control fix for broken food storages.
  
• Fixed a crash that sometimes happened when landing an Asteroid Lander with drones on an Asteroid.
  
• Fixed a crash when Asteroid Landers departed with drones.
  
• Fixed not being able to order seeds from the earth for old saves without B&B.
  
• Fixed cold waves not vanishing after they end, in old saves.
  
• Fixed the must include filter for seniors.
  
• Fixed missing images for anomalies.
  
• Fixed smart complexes not receiving electricity after loading old saves.
  
• Fixed the "Winter is Coming" rule not being selectable in the game rules screen.
  
• Fixed the RC Safari's missing UI panel (the one showing visitors).
  
• Fixed lamps of the elevator floating in the air in some cases.
  
• Fixed incorrect ground texture after refabbing buildings within a Mega Dome.
  
• Fixed missing warning when launching a rocket back to earth while still unloading cargo
  
• Fixed sponsor-specific rovers' weight being counted twice for Lander/Elevator/Resupply cargo.
  
• Fixed the asteroid lander not loading more than one rover of each type.
  
• Fixed the asteroid hopping achievement unlocking after visiting 10 asteroids, instead of 11.
  
• Fixed wasp drones in colony always showing 0 in the resupply menu
  
• Fixed the camera zooming into the wrong sector in the underground.
  
• Fixed Philosophers Stones Mystery that couldn't be completed after destroying a stone.
  
• Fixed a crash related to the Inner Light Mystery on old save games.
  
• Fixed landing pads being unusable after canceling the construction of a rocket.
  
• Fixed an empty B&B tech tree showing for old saves.
  
• Fixed drones facing the wrong direction while gathering Metals or Exotic Minerals.
  
• Fixed the Fast Radio Burst turning several colonists into Geniuses.
  

• The crash related to food storages has been fixed for the majority of saves but can still occur occasionally, investigation is in progress.
  

Game version: 1007874

Gameplay Improvements

• The lander rocket now loads items in increments of 1 instead of 5.
  
• Moved the cave-in clearing tech earlier in the tech tree, now appearing between position 5 and 8, instead of as the 13th tech.
  
• Change the order in the cargo screens, grouping buildings of the same type together.
  
• Rebalance rewards for recurring Recon Center discovery events.
  

• Fixed colonists and drones getting stuck in food stockpiles. Attention: the fix requires the rebuilding of depots and food production buildings that display broken behaviour!
  
• Show the Lander Rocket immediately amongst the pinned items on Mars when it does its last second launch as an Asteroid goes out of range.
  
• Lander Rocket now properly loads all drones when launching at the last second as an asteroid goes out of range.
  
• Lander rocket now only starts loading drones, rovers, crew and prefabs if everything is available.
  
• The died in orbit trigger will activate only if the crew actually dies.
  
• Removed colonists that died in orbit.
  
• Cave-ins can be reached more easily by drones to clear.
  
• Fixed issue where elevator cargo could get lost if both sides of the elevator requested the same resource.
  
• Fixed issue where elevator cargo could not be updated after the initial request.
  
• Fixed vehicles cannot be transferred through the elevator using right-click.
  
• Ancient Artifact spawns the correct amount of drones.
  
• Auto explore of the RC Explorer no longer reveals hidden anomalies.
  
• Added missing icons for pinned surface passage and underground passage.
  
• Correctly updated pin dialog when transporting RCRover.
  
• Fixed incorrect game over condition when colonists died on Asteroids while there were still alive colonists on Mars or the Underground.
  
• Fixed issue where cables and pipes were created on the wrong map.
  
• Workshifts now properly update while on another map.
  
• Prevented refabbing landing and trade pads while they're in use.
  
• DLC buildings will be accessible on a new game after loading an old save.
  
• Fixed missing Passenger Rocket UI in the resupply menu on old retail save.
  
• Cheat panel improvements (available in creative mode only on Windows, Mac, Linux).
  

• Fixed startup crash on certain Windows 7 installs.
  
• Removed the assert window on Linux.
  
• Disconnecting controller issue.
  

• Dome births cannot be controlled.
  
• The game crashes when a lander rocket is departing with drones in cargo while the asteroid moves out of range.
  
• Youths, adults, and seniors occupy child-only buildings.
  
• Same anomaly events are found multiple times on the surface, breaking the game balance.
  
• There is no warning about an unloaded cargo when launching a rocket back to Earth.
  
• Crash related to Inner Light Mystery on old retail saves.
  

[h3]Game version[/h3]

PC: 7299998
PlayStation: 01.25
Xbox: 1.0.0.28

[h3]Below and Beyond[/h3]

Underground

• A new area to explore right beneath your colony. Uncovering what the Martian Underground has been hiding from us, perhaps we can even find something rivaling our wonders.
  
• Expand your colony into the Underground, providing shelter against the hazards from the surface and bringing you closer to richer deposits.
  
• Be careful, as there may be underground marsquakes that can lead to dangerous cave-ins.
  

• Venture to asteroids as they fly past Mars, giving you a limited window to visit them.
  
• Set up temporary mining outposts to extract as many rewards as you can from each asteroid.
  
• Bring back Exotic Minerals, a new resource exclusive to asteroids, to improve your colony on the Martian surface and its underground.
  
• Some asteroids may not be as they appear and have a mystery to solve while you are on them.
  

• Unlock multiple specialized buildings, rockets, and upgrades in the underground and on asteroids.
  
• Gain benefits and upgrades for your entire colony.
  

• Amphitheater - a new building to comfort your colonists and increase tourists' satisfaction.
  

• Construction Ranges - You can now hold CTRL (Y on Xbox and Triangle on Playstation) to see dust ranges of other buildings and other relevant ranges.
  
• Reorder tech queue - You can now easily adjust the order of techs within your research queue.
  
• Leak Icons - Cable and Pipe leaks now show icons above them so you can easily locate them.
  
• Cycle Grids - You can now cycle through different power grids and life support grids by clicking on power or oxygen and water in the top bar.
  
• Extended Resource info - We expanded the Top UI tooltips with more information per resource.
  

• Custom Colony Name - Change your colony's name to best fit your colony.
  
• Dome birth limit - Besides allowing and forbidding births, you can now also allow births as long as the dome still has available living space.
  
• Must include Filter - Colonist filters now have an option to include all colonists with a certain trait or specialization, even if they have undesired traits.
  

• Rebalanced the Door to Summer event.
  
• School Spire; reduced the odds of the genius trait being given.
  
• Smart Apartments; reduced resident slots and increased maintenance cost.
  
• Medical Post; reduced number of colonists that can use it per shift and increased service comfort.
  

• Drones that are busy with transporting resources do not get added to the cargo of a Lander rocket when the asteroid moves out of range. This can occasionally cause a crash
  
• After salvaging an asteroid lander, its contents are dumped on the landing pad. Any drones and RCs part of the cargo can not be used
  
• Pin menu does not show incoming Asteroid Landers from Asteroids
  
• There is no warning about an unloaded cargo when launching a rocket back to Earth
  
• Drones occasionally try to get to the unreachable area on Asteroids in order to gather resources
  
• The camera is out of the map if the player clicks on the Astronomer's pin while s/he is in orbit (Dying Wish mystery)
  

• Even after clearing debris, the area is uneven and unbuildable
  
• Some cave-ins are unreachable and therefore cannot be cleared which prevents further exploration.
  
• Shuttles can fly too high vertically in the Underground.
  

• MAC: Many UI images don't show up in the Mac build
  
• Black squares are shown instead of B&B content icons on Epic build (Mac)
  

Get ready to dig below the Red Planets surface and experience a hole new world, because Surviving Mars: Below & Beyond is now available!

[previewyoutube=8CtGyo7FreY;full][/previewyoutube]

With the Below & Beyond expansion, you can expand their colonys horizons into underground caves and lava tubes, and beyond the surface to fleeting asteroids. The redefined Recon & Expansion tech tree gives you the tools to build, discover and evolve your colony. Construct underground buildings and bases to provide the colony with additional levels of protection against natural disasters. Leverage technological discoveries to mine passing asteroids for exotic resources - just make sure to get back before it leaves orbit!

Also, dont forget about the brand new Mars Lifestyle Radio with its 16 original tracks. Available on all platforms!

Dev Diary #3 - Tech Tree and Free Update

Welcome back, Commander!

Good to have you with us one last time, we've got one more update for you about the development of the new Below and Beyond project. It's me again, Bart Vossen, design lead on the Below and Beyond planning and development team. Previously we went into the development of what lies below and what to find beyond. Today's briefing will focus on how to actually get there and some things we did to make life easier for all commanders.

As usual, let's start with an overview. The Below and Beyond project introduces a variety of new buildings, updates to existing tech, and a few new things that will help us explore the underground and exploit asteroids. This is a lot, and we don't want to overload our scientists with all this work. So, all these things are combined in the new Recon and Expansion tech tree. We recognize that managing a colony on Mars is a massive undertaking. For that reason, we also added a few new things for all players to enjoy, without having to be a part of the Below and Beyond project. These are primarily improvements to your UI and some extra control options, to help you build the exact colony you want and ensure you don't miss anything. Additionally, we made adjustments to a few buildings as some of them were being made obsolete. And in the process, we even found a blueprint for a completely new structure!

You will gradually unlock most Below and Beyond content through the Recon and Expansion tech tree. At first, we focus on getting access to both the Underground and Asteroids, giving you the basic tools you need to venture into these new environments. Underground, and especially Asteroids can be dangerous for colonists at first, so we thought it important to only introduce them after you've grown a bit more familiar with these locales. We'd want to avoid any unfortunate deaths, right Commander? In the later stages of the tech tree, we'll find techs that expand our options and opportunities, both on Asteroids and in the Underground. These advanced techs allow us to mine on multiple asteroids at the same time and possibly, under your well-orchestrated command, extract all possible resources from them.



That said, we didn't want the Below and Beyond project to be a completely separated experience. Several old techs will also improve our abilities to visit asteroids and explore the underground, such as the Advanced Martian Engines tech, which now also reduces fuel requirements for our new Asteroid Landers. This also goes the other way around. The discovery of Exotic Minerals has led to a few new options on the Martian surface. Especially the Drone Hub Extenders will prove useful when an additional Drone Hub would add unnecessary resource management.

But I bet by now you are itching to learn more about these plans to make your life easier since they are completely free for everyone! Below and Beyond adds more places to manage in parallel with your main colony, so we wanted to focus on improvements that help all commanders manage their colonies. We launched an internal investigation to find some of the biggest pain points; cable and pipe leaks being hard to spot, no easy way to quickly have a look at all your separate power and pipe grids, and having trouble placing buildings outside the dust range of others were the biggest. It was most important for us to give you the tools to better handle these; clear feedback where leaks are, an easy way to quickly cycle through your different grids, an option to show dust ranges during construction as well as other relevant ranges based on the building you are constructing, and more information in the resource tooltips. It is important to understand what is going on in your colony so you can prepare and avoid future disasters.

Besides giving you a better overview of your colony, we also made improvements to let you manage your colony the way you want. There were again a few major points we wanted to address. Have you ever been frustrated with reordering your tech tree? Are you tired of colonists still making babies while all domes are already overpopulated? Do you also find it difficult to find that one celebrity on the resupply screen? We say - no more! We added new controls for you to reorder the tech tree, set a new birth limit policy, and added the "must include" filter option. In addition, we had a long and hard discussion with all the different sponsors and persuaded them to give commanders the rights to name their own colony. Please use this power responsibly.



We also heard the many comments about too many geniuses coming from the School Spire and putting Research Labs and Hawking institutes across all colonies out of business. We had another good look at various buildings and their purposes and decided to make a few changes. We reduced the chance that School Spires generated geniuses to ensure your scientists and research buildings are still viable options. We changed smart apartments to function as a bigger version of smart homes, while still keeping apartments relevant in case you want to house as many people as possible. The medical post now helps fewer colonists but gives more comfort, making it a smaller alternative to the infirmary. Lastly, the Door to Summer event just gave bad rewards for all the effort you had to put into it, so we made that one much more lucrative.

Lastly, we know you love to add even more unique buildings to your colonies. Thats why were happy to introduce the Amphitheatre. A building where both colonists and tourists can relax after a long day of work. It gives you an early game alternative for colonists with the luxury interest and more diversity in buildings that increase tourists' satisfaction.

It has been a real pleasure giving you these tours, Commander! Unfortunately, its the last one we can offer you for now, but the launch of Below and Beyond is just around the corner. In the meantime, we've got one more instructional video for you to watch. Now, if you'll excuse me, I could use a vacation after all this. Ive heard that Asteroids are all the rage these days. Maybe I'll see you up there. Until we meet again.

[previewyoutube=dsHNgW8MN8I;leftthumb][/previewyoutube]

Welcome back, Commander!

We've prepared another update for you on how we developed the new Below and Beyond project. My name is Bart Vossen, design lead on the Below and Beyond planning and development team. Nice to meet you! As my colleague already informed you about what lies beyond, today's tour is all about exploring what's below; the Underground!



Let me give you a quick overview before we dive deeper. Our RC Explorers recently started running into surprisingly deep holes, which, after some further inspection, uncovered an entire underground network of tunnels beneath our colony. You should be able to drop an RC Explorer down there for initial reconnaissance. We've also developed a new building, the Elevator, which will be able to transport everything we need between our surface colony and the underground. Reports tell us the underground contains more resources and should provide protection against all hazards from the surface. Though the darkness and any local quakes, caused by our expansion efforts, may pose their own challenges. To this end, we've developed several buildings to keep our colonists safe. Lastly, those who came back also rambled on about something they called buried wonders, which we'd advise you to investigate further.

Now you might be wondering, why the underground? Well, 99.9% of Mars's mass lies underground, and it gives us a network of tunnels to explore and expand into with completely new challenges. But mostly because Mars's underground has eluded us for centuries. As we got closer and closer to Mars, we were still only looking at its surface. Even after we landed, we were only able to scan the top layer. Now, we have an opportunity to fully discover what secrets Mars has been hiding from us.

Expansion into the underground will get us closer to resource veins and provide shelter from meteors, dust storms, and even cold waves. Though it may destabilize the area and cause local, underground quakes with occasional cave-ins. To better protect our buildings, our scientists came up with a nifty solution involving Exotic Minerals. This should make exploring and expanding into the underground a worthwhile endeavor to do while our surface colony is gradually expanding.



To realize this vision of an enigmatic yet dangerous underground, we started development on an explorable network of underground lava tubes. They should feel dark, cramped, and mysterious while you're exploring, but also have enough room to build and expand your colony. We created a network of interconnected tunnels, with rooms spread around to provide building space. But we left it in darkness to give the underground a real cramped and mysterious feel to it as if you're spelunking and placing lights along the way. Don't worry, we also equipped all buildings, RC Vehicles, and drones with plenty of lights and some emergency lights in case they break down. To really emphasize the exploration, we equipped our RC vehicles with scanning technology that will reveal any anomalies or resources they pass by. Unfortunately, these tunnels are placed at depths our orbital scanning technology is not yet able to analyze at any meaningful level.

Our goal is for players to explore the underground in parallel with expanding their colony on Mars. So we did some early simulations with test commanders to see if our underground maps worked with this goal in mind. Unfortunately, we found them going through the underground at lightning speed, losing the sense of exploration and discovery. To this end, we sprinkled some cave-ins and blocked tunnels throughout the underground. These give commanders natural moments to check up on their surface colony and Asteroid outposts. Blocked tunnels can be cleared with a new landscaping tool and unlock access to new rooms and tunnels. Cave-ins require a better understanding of the underground to remove, as the area is clearly unstable. But once you obtain that technology, you'll be able to clear cave-ins to find shortcuts between chambers and many discoveries hidden by the darkness.

The real treasure hidden in these depths are the buried wonders; ancient natural, and some unnatural, features long covered up by Mars's soil. Each with its own secrets to reveal and benefits to acquire. Once fully unlocked with Exotic Minerals, they are just as powerful as the wonders our technology can accomplish. Though not all of Mars is equal, besides different tunnel layouts and entrance locations, not all wonders can be found on each landing site. It will always be a surprise what we will find down there in the darkness.

Most buildings from the surface are still buildable in the underground, while we also have a few new ones to deal with the unique challenges found down there. While they're protected from the hazards of the surface, underground marsquakes, caused by our elevators and expansion, pose a real risk of burying our buildings beneath cave-ins. We've engineered support struts that should be able to take the bulk of the impact, and reinforced domes to at least keep our colonists safe in the underground.



Once we had this up and running, we had a series of test commanders run various simulations. This gave us many different results that allowed us to better adjust the underground layouts and risks and rewards. Though the biggest problem proved to be drone command. Our simulations showed placing a drone hub within a larger room worked perfectly, however connecting it required several drone hubs within the tunnels. To solve this problem, our engineers went playing with some Exotic Minerals and came up with Drone Hub Extenders. These buildings are able to extend a Drone Hub's signal through the entire tunnel. And theoretically, it should also work on the surface and on Asteroids.

My favourite part of the underground? After a long day, I like to just sit on the back of an RC Explorer and look around as it drives through the underground. Or maybe an RC Safari, if the tourists aren't making too much noise. There's something about the calm darkness as if you'll find a new treasure any second.

That should cover everything, so I'm going to find myself an RC Explorer right now and I'll see you around. Do make sure you come back, there'll be another tour soon. The next one will dive into our new tech tree that will make all this possible and look at a few ways we managed to improve your life. Still here? Then you might as well watch our instructional video on underground exploration. It might help give you a better bearing once you start exploring the underground yourself.

Until next time Commander, and I hope I'll see you exploring down here soon!

[previewyoutube=jsUJaOtQs0c;leftthumb][/previewyoutube]

Welcome, Commander!

It appears you requested an update on how we developed the new Below and Beyond project. The names Elmer Lexmond designer on the Below and Beyond planning and development team, nice to
meet you! Im here to give you a peek behind the curtain. On the agenda today is Mining Asteroids!
Let me start you off with a quick summary. We have developed a new building, the Recon Center which lets us track Asteroids that pass in close proximity to Mars. You can visit these tracked asteroids with our brand-new Asteroid Landers, rockets designed to land in conditions that would be impossible for our standard Supply Rockets. Once there, we have a limited amount of time to mine as many resources as possible and leave the asteroids before it is too far away from Mars to make the return trip. We will need specialized Micro-G Auto Extractors at first, but we can eventually get permits to send the personnel that can populate our more efficient Micro-G Mining Stations.




Why the asteroids you ask? First off, because 86% of colonists think asteroids are very cool, and
secondly because creating these short-term mining bases in an isolated location is a completely
different challenge from anything we have done on the surface of Mars so far. You will have to work
with limited resources, irregular building space, and a specific time window, but the reward is also
different. You invest resources on a mission to get access to an abundance of materials, such as the
newly discovered Exotic Minerals that are exclusive to asteroids. This makes visiting asteroids a perfect opportunity for when you are developing a project on the Martian surface that requires some time to finish.

To make our vision come true, we started by developing the asteroids themselves. Our goal was to make each asteroid feel unique. We created various asteroid types based on existing classifications of asteroids. Each type has a different spread of resources available and a different rate at which they can appear. A C-type asteroid for instance is much more common than the elusive X-Type. We also created different looks for the asteroids based on the main resources available on them. Combine this with various pre-authored maps to get a diverse mix of asteroids that require different strategies each time around.



But an asteroid on its own doesnt get us very far. We needed to decide what new buildings we
needed and which existing ones we could reuse. For new buildings, we focused on the ones with
specialized functions such as extractors and small-scale living space for colonists that wouldnt
require a full dome. For the existing ones we eliminated the buildings that wouldnt function in the
micro-G environment, this meant that we had to introduce a substitute for the MOXIE if we wanted our colonists to be able to breathe, which led to the new Electrolyzer.



With all this in place, we called upon our test commanders to run simulated missions. We got a wide
range of results, but most prominent of all was the sentiment that managing multiple locations at
the same time was quite taxing for most commanders. After investigating further, we learned that
one of the biggest problems was setting up the Asteroid Landers for their trip back to Mars. To be
successful our commanders needed to update the cargo request on the Asteroid Lander frequently
to get it loaded before the time on the asteroid ran out. To remedy this, we created an AutoLoad function where commanders can set their preferences and let the rocket AI update the cargo request continuously based on the specifications and what is available on the asteroid. The second problem was the need to launch the rocket manually. To relieve some of the stress of trying to launch the rocket at the perfect moment, we gave the rocket an AI subroutine to launch automatically when the time limit on the asteroid was reached, regardless of whether the current cargo request was fully completed. You should thank our testers, commander, they saved you a lot of stress by running these simulations before we rolled the project out to you!

Do you want to know what was my favourite part of creating the asteroids? I must say I had a lot of fun working on the naming convention for them! We took cues from how they are named and classified on earth and tailored them to be more appropriate for our purposes. You will find that our team added some creative new names to the vast list of existing asteroid names already out there!

Well, Im sure Ive covered pretty much everything, not to mention Im in dire need of a coffee break.
But worry not, there are more dev diaries on the horizon! According to the schedule, the next one will delve deeper into the development of the Martian Underground. I highly recommend youll join us again for that one, there will be some very interesting things explained there. Itll go into further detail on why Exotic Minerals are worth all this trouble. In the meantime, please watch our instructional
video on Asteroid Mining, it might help you to not lose some of that pricy new equipment to the
dark void of space.

Until next time Commander and I hope to see you on our first real asteroid mission soon!

[previewyoutube=D-NLYknhfts;leftthumb][/previewyoutube]

~Incoming transmission~

Commanders, get ready to explore the Martian depths and extract precious minerals from the elusive asteroids in this brand new DLC for Surviving Mars!
Below & Beyond pushes the limits of what is possible on the Red Planet. Expand your horizons with additional buildings, more resources, and a cavernous world full of mysteries. You can tunnel beneath the surface and construct subterranean bases below the colony and in nearby underground caves. Or you can attach rocket-propelled buildings to passing asteroids and mine exotic resources, but youll need to make it back to the Red Planets surface before the asteroid leaves orbit or else you lose your stuff and your colonists.

The DLC will launch on September 7th on all available platforms.

Key Features

• Back to the Bases - Expand your colony into caves and lava tubes under the surface. Players can use existing structures, or underground-specific buildings to build a base for exploration. Expand with caution, potential cave-ins can destroy everything.
  
• Mine Your Own Business - Players can now go below the surface and beyond the red planet for resource mining. Construct special rocket-propelled buildings to mine resources, including exotic minerals and Data Samples, on passing asteroids. Dont stick around too long or else the Asteroid will drift away with your stuff!
  
• Branching Paths - The Recon and Expansion research tree unlock additional buildings, vehicles, upgrades, and locales. They will also unlock asteroid mining and tunnel colonization.
  

Hello Survivors, welcome to PDX Con Remixed!
We have some exciting events and activities scheduled, you can view the full Surviving Mars event list here:

Friday May 21st
22:00 CEST - Reviving Mars: Meet the New Team - Discord
Get your ass to Discord and meet the folks at Abstraction Games, the new developers of Surviving Mars! Find out what it takes to bring a breath of fresh air to the red planet and ask your questions!

Saturday May 22nd
10:50 CEST - Meet the New Mars: Abstraction - Twitch
Welcome back to Surviving Mars! Weve got the team from Abstraction here to discuss what its been like working with your favorite interplanetary survival game. Join us for a look at where the game has been, and where its headed next!

11:55 CEST - Is there life on Mars? Surviving Mars Quiz - Discord
Are you a true Survivor? Challenge yourself with this quiz about Mars, Survival, and Surviving Mars, and win prizes!

We hope to see you there!

Hey Survivors,

While our team is working hard on [redacted], today we have a pocket-size patch for you with some small adjustments and fixes.

Version: 1001586

• Fixed for In-Dome Buildings Pack DLC to apply Assistive Technology upgrades.
  
• Added a missing Upgrade in the TechPreset.
  
• Removed Rain Man story bit.
  
• Fixed tourism reward screen soft lock.
  
• Fixed upgrade name.
  

Game Version: 1001569

Bug fixes

• Fixed dome filtering issue - colonists should now only live where they are allowed to
  
• Fixed Hotel issue - the door should no longer require Space Race DLC to let the colonists leave
  
• Fixed Safari sight bug - sights now work even if the player does not have the Green Planet DLC
  

• Clicking the Tourist Overview button on a Rocket will cause a soft lock
  
• Existing Hotels will load with a graphical issue on pre-hotfix saves - Rebuilding the Hotel resolves the issue
  

Hey Survivors, we have another small hotfix coming your way today.

Game Version: 1001551

Bug fixes

• Fixed Xbox One Paradox Account login
  
• Fixed tourist expedition exploit
  
• Fixed In-Dome building pack localization
  
• RC Safari visiting tweaked
  - The RC Safari should show it has a maximum of 10 passengers
  - Increasing the wait time before departing
  

• Windows 7 always starts in windowed mode
  
• Rocket Naming does not stick on saves created before the hotfix. Renaming functions correctly with new games.
  

Game Version: 1001539

Bug fixes

• Fixed Windows 7 startup crash
  
• Fixed crash that often occurred on Mega Dome completion in existing save games.
  
• Fixed an issue where colonists suddenly committed suicide in large numbers.
  
• Fixed an issue where colonists stopped aging and tourists didnt want to leave Mars after 5 sols.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Low-G Amusement Park awarded a lot more satisfaction than intended.
  
• Fixes Rocket naming issue
  
• Terra Tourism text change in English only (for now) to fit with the new tourism reward mechanic.
  

• Windows 7 always starts in windowed mode
  

Greetings, Martians!
I am happy to see you again, and it is with great enthusiasm that I present to you this Content Creator Pack that I created. For those who dont know me, Im Silva, and I started modding strategy and RPG games in 1997. After a very long break, when the excellent Surviving Mars (2018) was released, I resumed modding. I had very little knowledge of 3D and programming, but that didnt discourage me from making a large number of mods that were very well received by the gaming community. Modding has allowed me to improve my 3D modeling and programming at lightning speed.

And today Paradox contacted me to create this Content Creator Pack, giving me the freedom to choose the theme, the features to be added, and any other content. My specialty as a modder is to create new buildings, so I chose this type of content for this Pack. You see, they are not just new building skins but entirely new buildings, with new gameplay features for some of them.

[CCP trailer on YT]

The design of this Pack was done in two phases: in the first one, I wrote the game design and created each asset to make a mod. The second one was handled by Abstraction Games for the integration of my work into the game as true DLC.



I decided to focus on simple but interesting gameplay elements for the players and to limit asset animations to ensure final quality. I chose to make exclusively 8 new buildings to place in the Domes, trying to be faithful to the graphic style of the game.

I was inspired by the requests of the players, but also by my own experience, to add to the mechanics of the game and bring novelty and fun. Big settlements pose a lot of problems when the population becomes very large and the current buildings are not adapted to accommodate so many people. For example, the kindergarten is too small, so I decided to make a bigger one as well as a big school that has the feature of being a Spire, plus an improvement to give the trait of Genius to a small percentage of students.



In the advanced settlements, the number of retiring settlers also becomes a housing problem as they take essential housing for workers. This situation can cause labor problems in some Domes. This is why I have integrated a new type of residence exclusively reserved for retirees. Health can also become a big problem when there is a large population; infirmaries are too small, and medical Spires are not a priority in the choices of players. To solve this problem, I included the design of a Martian Hospital that will be able to cope with the influx of many patients.

The smaller Domes, where the choice of buildings is important because of their reduced space, are often without security or health facilities. This is why I created the Medical Post and the Security Post occupying a single box but with smaller capacities.



Another interesting building is the TV Studio, which is a new workshop where your settlers will produce Reality Shows for the Earthlings. Each broadcast will increase your funds. Finally, I added Smart Apartments, a new residential building halfway between the Apartments and the Smart Complex.



Most of the buildings are unlockable by technologies and have upgrades.

To create all these assets, I used the same tools as for modding, namely: Blender for 3D modeling, Substance Painter for texturing, and the Mod Tools from Surviving Mars to add assets to the game.

After I wrote the game design of the Content Pack, it was validated by Paradox. I didnt make any sketches or concept art to start the 3D modeling of the buildings. I had a very precise idea in my mind of the general design of my models.

Once the 3D was finished, I created the textures, respecting the graphic style of the game. Then again on Blender, I had to configure the scene for export to the game, i.e. configure the materials, the lights, and the collision boxes, as well as indicate the position of some decorative objects (benches, trees, etc.), the access paths to the building for the settlers and the door animations.

Once everything was set up correctly, I exported my asset so that it could be used by the game. I still have to create the templates and some programming to make the buildings playable for the players.



I would like to close by thanking Paradox for the trust they put in me to create this Content Pack Creator. Its a great experience for a modder, and its an excellent approach by Paradox to want to promote modding for their games and reward the most active creators.

See you soon in the Surviving games!

Silva

[h3]Tourism free update[/h3]

Game version
PC: 1001514

Changes to tourists

• Tourists have a new Satisfaction stat, which tracks how much each tourist is enjoying their holiday.
  
• Tourists no longer pay 10M funding upon arrival. Instead, they pay funds when departing from Mars based on how much they liked their holiday, shown in the Satisfaction stat, rated between 1 and 5 stars.
  
• Tourists now board any nearby rocket when they are looking to go home (instead of only boarding rockets that just landed).
  
  New Feature: RC Safari
  
• The new RC Safari allows you to create sightseeing tours around your colony for tourists to enjoy.
  
• Set waypoints near domes, wonders, vistas, rock formations, and many other sights to increase the satisfaction bonus tourists get from the safari.
  
• Order the new RC Safari from earth, or complete the Rover Printing research to build these yourself.
  
  New Tourist Buildings
  
• Hotel: Provide tourists a luxurious place to stay on Mars; spending the night increases their Satisfaction. Hotels can be built after completing the Smart Homes research.
  
• Low-G Amusement Park: Provide tourists with the best ways to experience the low gravity environment. Visiting tourists get an extra bonus to their Satisfaction.
  
  Other changes
  
• Adjusted the deadlines for the Tourist Trap challenge, which now also gives 20 tourist applicants at the start.
  
  
  
  [h3]In-Dome Building Pack CCP[/h3]
  
• Smart Apartments: Apartments that provide the same luxuries as smart homes.
  
• Senior Residence: A lovely place for your senior residents to retire.
  
• Large Nursery: A larger version of the nursery, able to house more children.
  
• Medical Post: For when you need a smaller infirmary in the area.
  
• Hospital: A larger, more relaxing version of the infirmary. It also comes with the exclusive Remote Medic upgrade, which reduces the number of colonists required per shift.
  
• Security Post: A more compact version of the Security Station.
  
• TV Studio Workshop: A new workshop building which also generates funding.
  
• School Spire: Build the school as a spire building. It comes with the exclusive Superior Education upgrade, which has a small change to give the Genius trait.
  
• 2 new colony logos: Colonization Effort, Red Target

fixes some crashes and other things that affect PDX and internally

This update should fix stability issues that have been reported

Go to Mars and support the fight against COVID-19! In an effort to support WHO in their efforts against the COVID-19 pandemic, Paradox is holding a fundraiser sale on Steam!

Surviving Mars is included in this sale, together with Hearts of Iron IV, Cities Skylines, Age of Wonders Planetfall, BATTLETECH, Shadowrun, Tyranny, Pillars of Eternity, and Knights of Pen and Paper 2.

The sale ends on April 3rd, 7 PM CEST, and all of the proceeds will go to the COVID-19 Solidarity Response Fund for WHO.

Check it out here: Paradox Interactive Covid-19 Fundraiser

We just deployed the Evans Update, which brings fixes for some of the reported issues for both Surviving Mars and Green Planet. It will also solve issues in Space Race and Project Laika.

Surviving Mars:

• Fixed an issue that caused colonists' suffocation when moving between domes. This issue was reported here.
  
• Fixed an issue that would cause the game to freeze when a drone is trying to create a stockpile at an invalid location.
  
• Fixed an issue that caused colonists to roam outside their domes when dehydrated.
  

• Fixed an issue that causes the colonists to roam outside when dehydrated.
  

• Fixed an issue that caused noticeable frame drops when displaying a lake. This issue was reported here.
  

Surviving Mars: "Cernan" Update Patch Notes

Thank you all for giving us a tremendous release for Green Planet - which has thrust Surviving Mars into the spotlight all across the internet and on Steam. We've had so many players come back to the game for this expansion!

We know there were some bugs, as is usual for any release, and we're happy to have squashed a bunch of them. If you're still having trouble playing the game, please go to our support forum or just click CTRL + F1 to send us a report from directly within the game!

Green Planet:

• Fixed several game freezes (reported by the community, related to RC transports in savegames, and Dozers)
  
• Fixed terraforming info showing in infopanels in savegames started without Green Planet
  
• Fixed Transport Optimization tech applying to RC Dozer
  
• Fixed Lakes to check local (actual) temperature to determine frozen state (not global temperature)
  
• Fixed terraforming buildings' Amplify upgrades to take into account Overcharge Amplifications breakthrough
  
• Fixed RC Transport interacting with Open Farm crops
  
• Fixed endless (toxic or water) rains
  
• Fixed Outdoor Farms harvest not being collected by Drones
  
• Added harvest information in tooltip of Open Farm
  
• Added check for breakthrough availability when terraforming is disabled
  

• Fixed flying Drones coming back to life after destruction
  
• Fixed flying Drones affected by explosions when too high
  
• Fixed Advanced Stirling Generator heat output in a cold area/during cold wave
  

• Added Encyclopedia entries for Ranch and Outside Ranch
  

• Fixed crash when constructing buildings at the map border
  
• Fixed several game freezes related to wisps (St Elmo's Fire Mystery)
  
• Fixed game freeze occurring when a Drone is destroyed while embarked on a Rover
  
• Fixed old savegames not applying current logic when accepting trade offers/converting Landing Pads
  
• Fixed savegames displaying Seeds as farm crops in games without Green Planet
  
• Fixed Drones unloading resources from Expedition Rocket when resources are loaded by RC Transport
  
• Fixed events effects continuing when the event is completed (broken Drones in "Drone Prototypes")
  
• Fixed display of tooltip in "Clear" button in Infopanel
  
• Fixed display of dome radius
  
• Fixed camera issue while zooming out during an ongoing marsquake
  
• Fixed Drone behaviour when changing priority during construction (building is no longer cancelled)
  
• Fixed resource allocation when destroying buildings
  
• Fixed scripting logic choosing invalid events from planetary anomalies
  
• Fixed colonists living in the nursery (it's time to grow up!)
  
• Fixed Rocket cargo display when returning from expedition
  
• Fixed Landing Pads becoming unusable after rocket construction
  
• Fixed Trade Rockets accepting wrong amount of resources in automated mode
  
• Fixed Large Dumping Site infopanel slider behaviour for desired amount of waste rock (controller-only)
  
• Fixed UI scale not allowing passenger selection when set to maximum
  
• Added hover and click sounds to main menu news feed
  
• Added separate spots and fixed orientation of drones when constructing Rockets
  
• Latitude and longitude coordinates are no longer translated to allow coordinates sharing in non-English versions of the game
  

• Added modding functionality for FX elements (sound, decal, light, colorization, particles)
  
• Added modding functionality for Animals & Vegetation
  
• Added Tech Field ModItem
  
• Added message to indicate if a detected scripting error is related to a mod
  
• Tables for Rival Colonies converted to global for easier modding
  
• Updated modding documentation
  

• Fixed linking PDX account when exiting PSN and restarting console
  

• Green Planet
  
• Space Race
  
• Project Laika
  
• Digital Deluxe Edition
  
• Colony Design Set
  

Changelog for the Armstrong Update of Surviving Mars

Thank you to all of our beta testers, you have been amazing.

FREE Update Section
New Features:

• 5 Landscaping tools/buildings - Flatten terrain, create Ramp, Change Surface texture and construct Small Rock Formation or medium Rock Formation. They're available since start and do not require research. The Flatten and Ramp tools consume a lot of drone time and require or produce excess of Waste Rock. The Rock Formations are constructed with Waste Rock. The Change Surface tool consumes drone time and damages the local soil quality.
  
• 3 Special Projects - Capture Meteors, launch High-Speed Comm Satellite and Launch SETI Satellite. They become available when the first batch of Planetary Anomalies gets discovered (Sol 10-15) and do not require previous research. These three act as alternative sources of raw materials (Capture Meteors), sponsor research (HGS Satellite) and funding (SETI Satellite).
  
• 2 new buildings - Large Dumping Site and Rocket construction site. The significantly larger dumping site is because we're now producing and consuming far more Waste Rock. The construction of Rockets was added as an alternative to the buying of Rockets, which is not possible when you lack Funding. The Large Dumping Site is not locked via research, the Rocket requires Advanced Rocketry to be researched. (Advanced Rocketry is a vanilla tech that now enables the construction of Rockets, as well.)
  
• Self-sufficient dome - you can now place a Basic Dome with minimal life-support buildings. You only need to connect it to a power source. Once constructed, the structures will act as independent buildings. International Mars Mission has a free prefab of the self-sufficient dome.
  
• New event chains - 19 for the base game, 1 for modding purposes, 9 for Space Race DLC
  
• New research UI with vertical flow replaced the old research UI
  

• Added order-queuing for Rovers
  
• Added multi-selection of units for mouse and keyboard and hybrid control schemes. You can use lasso or double-click over a unit type to mass-select nearby units of the same type
  
• More informative reasons for unavailable diplomacy options
  
• Fix for proper show/hide behaviour of hex ranges of domes for outside workplaces
  
• Build Menu: Rovers are moved to separate sub-categories
  
• Added conditions where colonists can change dome regardless of home availability in other domes
  
• Double click or Controller Button (X) on items in the build menu, which require known but non-researched techs now open the Research UI
  
• Trade rockets to rivals are not automated by default
  
• New Photo Mode effect added - Motion Blur
  
• Added "-nomods" launch option, allowing to start the game without mods. To set this option, you need to open the game PROPERTIES from the menu in Steam (left-click on the game in Steam Library). In the first tab GENERAL open SET LAUNCH OPTIONS. A small popup window will open where you can enter text. You need to enter: -nomods
  

• Documented the Lua loading procedure, mod versions and dependencies, creating mods for DLCs and other minor documentation updates
  
• Added a filter for mods compatible with the game version
  
• Build menu subcategories are now presets, which can be easily added with mods
  
• Added a set of mod items that add easily modifiable options to your mods
  
• Fixed 'copy from' field in building template mod items and mission logo mod items
  
• Unused tech field icon property removed
  
• Mod dependencies show if the mod they depend on is missing or incompatible (outdated)
  
• Added a sample story chain
  
• Improved mod upload - it provides status update, better UI flow, feedback about report upload problems
  
• [PDX modding] Fix to enable auto-update of mods from PDX modding backend
  
• [PDX modding] Fix for re-uploading mods to PDX modding backend to keep their dependencies entered in the web interface
  

• New resource and global parameters which track terraforming progress
  
• New terraforming buildings in a separate build menu section
  
• New special projects with global effects
  
• New tech field Terraforming which unlocks buildings, resources, special projects
  
• New breakthrough techs focused on terraforming
  
• New disasters Toxic rain and Marsquake
  
• Vegetation on Mars plant it, watch it thrive or wither and die
  
• New main menu background video and updated Surviving Mars logo
  
• New Green Planet wallpapers
  
• New terraforming milestones
  
• 10 new achievements / trophies
  

• Pets are coming to Mars: 25 different pets of 10 animal types will start living alongside colonists after Founders stage is over, there are enough colonists and comfort is high enough. Pets include cats, dogs, penguins, platypuses and more.
  
• 2 New buildings for in-dome and outside-of dome animal husbandry produce Food for the colonists
  
• Domesticated animals are coming to Mars too: 4 types of animals for each of the new buildings will provide different options
  

Green Planet is Available Now!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwMMEWmKgGk
Green Planet is available now worldwide! Take on the greatest challenge of Mars with global terraforming by implementing new technology, buildings, and resources. Mars will soon be a second home for humankind

You've made it to Mars, you've landed your colonists and began a new home, but now it's time to take up the greatest challenge yet: making Mars feel like home. In Green Planet you will take on terraforming at a planetary scale with all new buildings, resources, technology, and special projects!

How can I get Green Planet?
https://store.steampowered.com/app/952890/Surviving_Mars_Green_Planet/
Cost: $19.99 / 19.99


What is this Project Laika?
Project Laika is an animal pack that the community named for us, and it's releasing alongside Green Planet

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1042360/Surviving_Mars_Project_Laika/

• 25 different pets that will appear alongside your colonists
  
• Livestock and ranches to grow food for your colony
  
• Cost: $5.99 / 5.99
  

Hello fellow survivors!

Were back with another dev diary for Green Planet. Today we will be discussing the awesome free update, which is going to be released together with Green Planet and Project Laika DLCs. Weve added a bunch of new content and Quality of Life improvements in this update, the most notable new feature being landscaping. All owners of Surviving Mars will get new Special Projects, events, research UI, multiselect, rover orders queue, and new buildings as well.

The Armstrong update is going to add a new section in your Build Menu: Landscaping. This new section contains the following new tools Flatten terrain, create Ramp, Change Surface texture and an option to construct Small Rock Formation or bigger Rock Formation.



The Flatten terrain tool allows you to select a flat surface on Mars and protrude it, leveling the terrain where it passes. It allows you to fill craters, extend plateaus or clear rough terrain for construction. Once you select an area to flatten, the tool will create a new landscaping project which is visualized with a construction hologram on your display. Each landscaping project evaluates the underlying terrain and calculates how much soil is needed and if excess soil is present. Then your drones will deliver or remove the Waste Rock as needed to complete the project.



The Ramp tool works similar to the Flatten tool but it allows you to connect two flat surfaces with different elevations, creating walkable ground between them.



The Change Surface tool marks an area, which will be gradually reworked by your Drones. They will break the rocks to make sand, or replace sand with rocks.



Additionally, you can use your excess Waste Rock to construct various Rock Formations. These are purely decorative combinations of rocks, which can be placed on flat surface. They were created for those moments when you have made Mars too Earth-like and want to bring back some natural Martian landscape.



The Armstrong update comes with 3 free Special Projects: Capture Meteors, launch High-Speed Comm Satellite and Launch SETI Satellite. Theyre marked on the Planetary View with blue icons and become available as soon as the first batch of Planetary Anomalies gets discovered. Usually, this happens at Sol 10-15.



The Capture Meteors mission tasks one Rocket to go and divert meteors towards Mars. The Meteors then fall as Meteor Storm, leaving Metals and Polymers deposits. Just bear in mind that the storm may hit your colony.

You can construct orbitals by sending a rocket loaded with resources to deploy either a High-Speed Comm Satellite or SETI Satellite. HSC Satellites grant you daily sponsor research, while SETI Satellites grant additional funding.

The Armstrong update comes with 20 new events, scripted specifically for the early days of your colony and will grant you various benefits that will boost your expansion early on.

Weve added 2 new buildings in the Build Menu as well: Large Dumping Site and Rocket Construction Site. The Large Dumping Site allows you to store more Waste Rock in a tight area and you can now construct Rockets the same way you construct Rovers. But youll need to research Advanced Rocketry to construct Rockets.



As part of our on-going efforts to redesign Surviving Mars UI, the Armstrong update comes with a flashy new Research UI, better suited for our everlasting modding community.



Last but not least, the Armstrong update is going to introduce 2 long-since wanted features: multi-selection and rover orders queue.

You can now drag select colonists, drones or rovers and then assign them the same task. Relocating all colonists of a Dome to another one has never been quicker!

To queue orders, select a Rover and then hold Shift while clicking on various points of interest. You can now task your Explorer to scan all anomalies on the map in a given order and then return back to the safety of the colony.



The Armstrong update is coming with a long list of QoL improvements, optimizations, balance changes and bug fixes. Stay tuned for our next dev diary, which is dedicated to the ultimate goal of the terraforming initiative, making Mars hospitable for life outside of the dome.

Ivan Grozev,
Lead Designer,
Green Planet

https://store.steampowered.com/app/952890/Surviving_Mars_Green_Planet/
Hi Everyone!

Were back with another dev diary for Green Planet. Today's topic is disasters, how to avoid them and how to cause them. We'll be discussing the new Special Projects in more detail, as well.

In Green Planet the climate gradually changes as you improve the atmosphere, temperature, and water levels of Mars. The raising global temperatures make the cold waves shorter and less likely to occur, the denser atmosphere burns more meteors before they hit the ground. Eventually, the once severe disasters become a thing of the past, but other ones arise.



In Green Planet your actions have global consequences, remember this the next time when you schedule a rocket to nuke the North Pole! As you pump greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and increase its temperature, you're creating the perfect conditions for ice to liquefy, evaporate, and then fall back to the ground as toxic rain.



Initially, toxic rains will pour for multiple sols, erode the soils, and potentially cause lichen and other wild plants to wither and die. Wide toxic pools form on the ground which will kill all vegetation and render the local soils unstable for construction of new buildings. Once the rains have ended you can send drones to clean the area. Making Mars' atmosphere, temperature, and water levels more Earth-like will result in less toxic rains and more normal rains. The clean water will improve the soils and it helps for the spreading of wild vegetation throughout the colony.

Occasional marsquakes will tremble the ground and destroy buildings near their epicenters. Marsquakes are direct consequence of the colony's efforts to create stronger magnetic field and they strike near Magnetic Field Generators. Endure the marsquake and then send your drones to fix the damaged buildings. Keep your Magnetic Field Generators away from vital infrastructure and remember that more MFGs equals more marsquakes.



Recurring toxic rains and marsquakes will happen as direct consequence of the on-going terraforming of Mars, but there're other ways to trigger them, like the Import Greenhouse Gases special project.



The Special Projects are new points of interest on various locations throughout the planet. They are visualized with special green or blue symbols on the Planetary View. The green ones are special terraforming projects and directly affect the overall progress of the terraforming initiative. There are 7 Terraforming Special Projects, listed below:

The Capture Ice Asteroids project dedicates one rocket to find and pull ice asteroids towards Mars. The melting ice increases the water levels of the planet.

As long as Mars can support liquid water and normal rains, the Cloud Seeding project triggers massive rainfalls, which improve the local soil quality and help plants to grow.



During the Import Greenhouse Gases mission, one rocket gets refurbished and sent back to Earth to collect greenhouse gases from its atmosphere. The compressed GHGs are then released on Mars, which can cause severe toxic rains.

The Launch Space Mirror project requires one rocket to be dismantled in orbit and turned into a highly reflective surface. The mirror focuses sunlight on the face of Mars and increases its temperature.

The Launch Magnetic Shield mission installs an artificial shield between the Sun and Mars, which counteracts the solar winds and decreases the loss of Atmosphere over time.

When Melting the Polar Caps, remember that this may cause prolonged Dust Storms. You can nuke the polar caps as many time as you wish, adding water vapors and greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. But each successive nuking of the shrinking polar caps will grant less terraforming progress. The release of heat during this special project will temporarily stop the cold waves.

Finally, when feeling ready to make Mars green, send Rockets full of Seeds to Seed Vegetation. They will carefully spread their cargo in the atmosphere and increase the vegetation coverage of the planet.



To enable the 7 Special Terraforming Projects on the Planetary View, research the related techs in the Terraforming field of the Research UI.



There are another 3 Special Projects, visualized with blue icons on the Planetary View, which do not require research and will be available when the first planetary anomalies are discovered on Mars. They are part of the free update and we will be talking about them in the next dev diary, which is dedicated to all the cool stuff we're giving away for free.

Ivan Grozev
Lead Designer of Green Planet
Haemimont Games

https://store.steampowered.com/app/952890/Surviving_Mars_Green_Planet/

Hi Everyone!

Were back with another dev diary for Green Planet, this time focusing on the greener aspects of the expansion plant life. So far we talked about global vegetation and the need to import, produce and spread huge amounts of seeds to cover the planet in flora. We briefly mentioned the Forestation Plant as the main way to engage with local forestation and the Open Farm as a way to produce food and seeds by planting various crops on a larger scale. Its time to dig deeper into vegetation!

If I was to summarize what we did to make Mars green, I would have to use the phrase we went crazy!

The original vision for the surface of Mars was a silent, barren place, where the only objects that dotted the landscape were old, eroded rocks with otherworldly appearance. We imagined that the rocket you land and the vehicles that scurry around it would be the only thing that moves aside from the occasional dust devil. Later you would construct domes that vastly contrast with the reddish sands with their lush green and bright lights during the night, which would appear as if someone placed a piece of Earth on the planet.



Then the ideas behind Green Mars came forth. We envisioned a completely different planet at the end of the process, a place where the previously contrasting borders between the lush-green domes and the outside world are blurred or non-existing. Dense forests dominate the horizon and lush-green grass spreads everywhere, with only the largest of rocks still remaining as an effigy of an age past.



And we wanted you to do all of this without melting your GPU Praises to great programmers and their magic!

We started with a bunch of statements like each hex of the colony could be populated with wild plant life, or plants should grow and wither according to terraforming progress and soils are important, and then we worked on them until, finally, we had a working forestation system.

In the beginning there were the soils We were inspired by The Martian and the possibility to sustain Earth vegetation on the seemingly barren sand. We did our research and designed the system. The soil quality of the original Martian soil is set to 0%, and the most fertile soil you can create is denoted as 100%, a rich Earth-like soil. This calculation is made for each hex of the colony every hour and is displayed on the screen as a Soil Quality overlay - the greener the hex the better the soil.



Now that we had the concept of soil, we needed to add factors that change its quality. So, the idea of rains and toxic rains was born. Of course, we all want rains to spread nutrients and meliorate the soil, but unless the planet has stable atmosphere, the falling rains would be toxic. They reduce the soils quality and create toxic pools that harm the growth of nearby plants.



As you add more water to the atmosphere, the toxic rains gradually end and clear water rains begin. They increase the local soil quality via erosion, create subterranean waters and water the plants. Additionally, artificially constructed Lakes leak water into their surrounding ground, improving significantly the local soils.



So, what can you plant on Mars?

Initially the soil quality is so low that you can only grow lichen. Lichen are famous for being very resistant and able to survive almost anywhere on Earth. Youll be able to plant lichen pretty much from the start of the game. They do not require terraforming progress or soil quality and they improve the local soil quality over time. However, they will easily die during toxic rains.



As the terraforming initiative progresses, you will unlock other types of vegetation: grass, bushes, pine trees and mixed trees. Grass grows quick and also improves the soil quality, but its not as efficient as lichen and trees. However, itll spread on its-own over time, so it does some of your work on its own. Bushes grow slower but can be harvested for seeds, while Trees grow the slowest, provide the most seeds, and stabilize the local soils a lot.

Grass, trees, and bushes will spread on their own over time. The speed with which they spread is directly affected by the amount of vegetation around the colony and the global Vegetation coverage. The spread is initially slow but speeds up over time.



Vegetation booms will occur at certain terraforming thresholds. During vegetation booms, a lot of seeds are carried away by the winds and wild plants get seeded around the colony.

Youll also be able to plant various crops in the Open Farm. These require good terraforming conditions, a lot of water, and high soil quality, but yield huge amounts of Food. Most crops significantly decrease the local soil quality, while others increase it. These crops do not spread on their own and are harvested by Drones to free space for new plants.

As mentioned, planting of crops or wild plants require some seeds to be spread around. The Seeds are a new resource in the game, which is initially imported from Earth and later produced in farms on Mars. Theyre measured in tons and used as base material for the creation of substantial plant life on Mars.

This pretty much summarizes the basic principles of the vegetation system in Green Planet. See you next week, when well be discussing the new Special Projects and disasters in more details.

From Haemimont Games,
Ivan Grozev,
Lead Designer of Green Planet

We're also presenting Part 2 of our Feature Breakdown video, where you'll be able to hear from Haemimont and Paradox employees about the upcoming expansion: Green Planet!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bkzCLJb8yQ

Mark your calendars for the release of Green Planet on... May 16th!

Terraforming, new buildings, vegetation, and more are coming to Mars. Transform the planet into a new home for humankind, a Green Planet

https://store.steampowered.com/app/952890/Surviving_Mars_Green_Planet/

PDXCON2019 is coming and we couldnt be more excited to meet our community at the event - which takes place on October 18th - 20th, 2019. Tickets go on sale on May 7th, but weve got a secret to tell you

If you head over to the PDXCON 2019 website at https://pdxcon.paradoxplaza.com/ you can sign up to the mailing list. Anyone that signs up will be given 8 HOURS early access before the public availability of the tickets to buy before everyone else! Sign up now and keep your eyes on the news well be sending out because tickets will sell out.

Hi everyone!

Last time we talked about the terraforming process and what it means to turn the Red Planet Green, today well take a look at two new tools to achieve this tremendous goal:

Terraforming Research and New Buildings

In Green Planet weve added 7 new buildings, which are dedicated to the terraforming efforts. Some of these buildings require specific planetary conditions to function properly. Three of these buildings appear much later in game and require significant research progress to even become available! They have the spatial dimensions and the construction costs of wonders but may be constructed more than once. Theres this rewarding feeling when you cover an area with huge smoking chimneys, knowing that youre changing the planet on a large scale.



The terraforming buildings will be added to a new category of the build menu Terraforming. Players are in complete control of when they choose to start the terraforming progress by deciding when to research the first tech in the chain. Every step in the chain unlocks new buildings and improvements which will help in your mission to terraform Mars.


Heres the list of the buildings you will find inside:

The Forestation Plant (or the Sprinkler, as I love to call it) spreads seeds imported from Earth, or produced on Mars, to plant wild vegetation in its range. Initially, it plants only lichen, but later grass, bushes, and trees become available as the terraforming project progresses. As some of the seeds get carried away from the colony by the winds, each Forestation Plant helps for the increase of the global vegetation.



The GHG Factory (short for Greenhouse Gas) burns a mixture of fuel and locally extracted carbon to produce greenhouse gases, which are released into the atmosphere. Thus increasing the average temperature of the planet.



Similar to the GHG Factory, the Carbonate Processor converts waste rock into carbon dioxide. The release of CO2 in the atmosphere improves its density and creates the necessary circumstances for oxygen-producing bacteria to thrive and for rains to occur.

The Core Heat Convector is a system of pipes that go deep into the Martian crust. It uses water to transport heat from the planetary core and improves the atmospheric temperature, while heating its immediate surroundings.



The Magnetic Field Generator improves the magnetic field of the planet, decreasing the loss of atmospheric gasses. It has a secondary function as a science facility and generates research according to the current state of the atmosphere. As a side effect of the strong magnetic field, the MFG may trigger marsquakes in its immediate vicinity. So take care to place these far away from the heart of your colony.

There are several different sizes of lakes, each having different forms. Lake beds are dug up by drones and then gradually filled with water. If liquid water is not yet possible on Mars, the lake remains frozen. When the conditions allow for it, the water liquefies and the lakes start to gradually improve the global water levels through evaporation.



The Open Farm is a huge unmanned facility which grows various edible plants away from your domes. This open-air farm spreads a mixture of water and seeds, which grow or wither according to the local soil quality and the overall terraforming progress. Once fully-grown, plants are individually harvested by drones for food.



All terraforming buildings are unmanned and can be built as soon as you research their corresponding tech in the Terraforming field of the research UI. For those of you who intend to terraform Mars before sending the founders of the colony, we added one additional building, the Capital City.

The Capital City requires the atmosphere of Mars to be breathable and warm. Its the most spacious dome design and it doesnt have a cupola, or metallic frame. Instead, its surrounded by trees, doesnt consume Oxygen and can be placed on rough terrain.




Ill be looking forward to your screenshots!

From Haemimont Games,
Ivan Grozev,
Lead Designer of Green Planet.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ieYJrZuISk
Haemimont and Paradox Interactive present a feature breakdown about some of the new features, mechanics, and missions within Surviving Mars' upcoming expansion: Green Planet!

Schedule for this week:

• Thursday: Dev Diary #2 - New Buildings and Wonders
  
• Friday: Tutorial Video by FeedbackGaming
  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtijP5PltXQ
Hi everyone!

My name is Ivan Grozev and I've been working as a game designer at Haemimont Games for more than six years now. I've been fan of Paradox Interactive's games for decades. I've enjoyed thousands of hours of Europa Universalis and Crusaders Kings, always striving to achieve the next world conquest, and I've always loved large scale, long-term games. There's a saying in the design team that we've made a game especially for me. Frankly, I've loved working on Surviving Mars since the start and I'm excited with my current position as the Lead Game Designer for this project.



Today, I have the honor to briefly introduce to you the second expansion of Surviving Mars, Green Planet.

So, how did it all start? The inevitable truth that surviving Mars' barren deserts would eventually lead to humanity changing the Red Planet has stuck with us since we started working on Surviving Mars over 2 years ago. Back then, we didn't know what the future of Mars would look like, but we did envision that one day we would add terraforming. The growing desire for more late game content among our fans made this vision more and more appealing, as terraforming an entire planet would be a gradual and painstaking process. Believe me, we strived to make it challenging but worthwhile!

In Green Planet, you'll be able to fully transform the Martian surface. Starting with endless, barren deserts and leading to frozen ice caps and fields of lichen, and finally ending with a planet covered with lush green forests and oceans. You'll be able to plant different types of vegetation all across your colony, dig artificial lakes and fill them with water that freezes or evaporates according to the average global temperature, decrease the severity of dust storms as atmosphere improves and watch Moisture Vaporators produce more because of oceans evaporating water into the atmosphere.

In order to do so, you need to achieve progress on four major terraforming parameters: Atmosphere, Temperature, Water, and Vegetation.



The Atmosphere parameter symbolizes the density and the content of the Martian atmosphere. At 100% Atmosphere terraforming progress, Mars has an Earth-like atmosphere and deep blue skies, capable of sustaining human breathing without artificial aid. There are several ways to improve this parameter, varying from mass production of greenhouse gases to melting the polar ice caps. Initially, it's easy to improve the atmosphere; however, its raising density means that more and more gases are lost due to Mars lack of a strong magnetic field. To continue the process, the need for magnetic shields in orbit and massive magnetic generators arises.

The Temperature parameter symbolizes the average planetary temperature. It's necessary for liquid water to exist on the surface of Mars and for more advanced plant life to survive the extreme Martian conditions. The increasing temperature creates conditions for the polar ice caps to melt and changes the existing ice fields into blue lakes, seas, and oceans. Higher average temperature also means that cold waves are shorter and less likely to occur.

The Water parameter symbolizes the amount of water accumulated in the atmosphere and in water bodies on the surface of the planet. Water is a major ingredient in the making of acidic and pure-water rains. It directly affects the output of Moisture Vaporators and is required for more advanced plant life to grow and spread.

The Vegetation parameter symbolizes the sustainability of plant life on the planet. Initially, plant life consists of adapted cyanobacteria and lichen but it will eventually form huge, continent-wide forests. This parameter directly affects the spreading of plants around your colony. On one side, it increases the likelihood that locally seeded plants will spread on their own. On the other side, it guarantees that, over time, seeds carried by the wind will grow in various locations on the map.



You're probably asking yourselves "How could I achieve all that?". You'll notice that Green Planet has added a new technology field, Terraforming, in your Research UI. The 20 new techs there are harder to research but will allow you to start terraforming whenever you feel ready for the challenge. To begin, just unlock the first building in the tech tree. You achieve terraforming progress by constructing and maintaining terraforming-related buildings, or by completing dedicated terraforming projects such as sending rockets to capture ice asteroids. We're going to talk more about these in the following dev diaries.

Speaking of which, next week on Thursday well have another dev diary all about the new buildings and wonders coming in Green Planet.

Ivan Grozev
Lead Designer of Green Planet
Haemimont Games

Get out and vote!

You can cast your votes on Facebook, Twitter, or our Forum

https://www.facebook.com/SurvivingMarsGame/videos/2566622680032356/

You heard right! Animals are coming to Mars. Not just farm animals, which will serve useful functions in your Mars colony, but also cute and fuzzy pets to keep your space-faring colonists company!

But what to name such a pack?

Give us your best suggestions below and tomorrow we'll put it to the vote!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-E0w5xL8uA
It's finally here! The next expansion in the award winning game:


The next step in mankind's quest to becoming a multi-planetary species is coming! Prepare your colonists for their newest mission: turning the red wastes of Mars into a Green Planet, and a new home for the human race.

Learn more on the Steam store page!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/952890/Surviving_Mars_Green_Planet/

Want to know more?

Follow along on our social media channels and the forums to discover Green Planet and all the features coming your way!

Wednesday, April 10th
- Animal Pack Naming Contest
- Live Stream at 3pm CET: Sharing more information on the Animal Pack and naming contest

Thursday, April 11th
- Dev Diary #1

Friday, April 12th
- Video Tutorial #1

Monday, April 15th
- Name reveal for Animal Pack
- FAQ for Animal Pack

We'll continue to have video dev diaries, video tutorials, and more each week! The release date for Green Planet will be announced at a later time.

Happy Terraforming!

Last week we invited modders and asset creators to help us with a special project that is coming to Surviving Mars soon - and we have not been disappointed by our amazing community members! We have approximately 50 interested modders at this time (with 23 prizes to give out, that's good odds to win something!).

The deadline to participate in this project and contest is February 5th. So if you're interested in making any kind of mod/asset/UX/whatever please message us directly on Facebook or Twitter! The deadline for completion will be February 20th, when we announce the project to the world!

BUUUUUT that's not all!
Because we want to reward and encourage our modders (fancy way of saying "bribe") we've decided to up the stakes. Say HELLO to the new and improved contest rewards:
- Three RTX 2080's
- Three $300 Gift Cards to a Retailer of Your Choice
- Twenty $20 PDX Gift Cards

The grand and runner-up prizes will have three distribution categories:
- Chosen by Us
- Chosen by You
- Completely Random

Attention all modders and asset creators!
Paradox Interactive has a new mission preparing for launch on February 5th.



We need top-secret creators to join our soon-to-be-revealed project and create a mod or asset for Surviving Mars. This will require a simple NDA, so Direct Message us on Facebook, Twitter, or contact Azurespecter on our forums here

What's in it for you?



Modding Contest Rewards include:
1 GeForce RTX 2080
3 $300 Gift Cards to a retailer of your choice
20 $50 Gift Cards to the Paradox Store

The Grand Prize and 3 Runner-Ups will be chosen by a panel at Paradox Interactive. The 20 Paradox Store Gift cards will be People's Choice Awards, chosen by the players!

Players from all games are welcome to try their hand at winning these amazing prizes and helping Paradox with our upcoming project.

So remember to message us if you'd like to create a mod or asset for our secret project, and we'll fill you in on the rules and details!

Haemimont Games and Paradox Interactive have been hard at work to bring you a fresh set of fixes, updates, and helpful additions!

One big thing you'll notice is a series of hint messages and helpful encyclopedia entries to assist you in Surviving Mars.

Kuiper Patch

General
- Added videos in Hint messages
- Added videos in Hints section of the Encyclopedia
- Changed text alignment in Hint messages
- Fix for Hint messages getting restarted when the selected object changes
- Fix for screen remaining blurred in some cases
- Fix for Black Cubes destroying passages
- Fix for Find Water Milestone not being completed in some cases when Water is found
- Fix for Amplify upgrade of Rare Metals Refinery to properly increase production per day
- Fix for Waste Rock Dumps becoming irresponsive after loading of old save games
- Fix for Triboelectric Scrubber no more cleaning stuff after change of its range

Gamepad
- Fix for RB/LB control of sliders in info panels
- Fix for unnecessary selection of "Basic Resources" and "Advanced Resources" rows in depots' info panel

Fixes in the following events
- Fix for event-related techs missing in the absence of Space Race
- Long Winter
- Dust Sickness
- Power Surge
- Broken Dome
- Frozen Batteries

Modding
- Changed naming convention for "New" in mod editor toolbar to avoid ambiguousness
- New Specialist msg now supplies the specialist
- Fix for garbled file formats in drop-down list of the "open file" dialog

Space Race is out now! And if you don't have it already you can buy it here.

PATCH NOTES:

Reimagined Mission Sponsors - Each sponsor in Space Race has a new unique building and a unique new vehicle that may be a Rocket, Rover, Drone or even new type of Probe. All of these dramatically change the way the individual sponsor plays and develops their strategy.

New Sponsors - Brazil and Japan have entered the competition to carve a new home on the red planet! They come with their unique buildings and vehicles, sponsor goals and challenges for the colonization of Mars.

Rival Colonies other Sponsors now set up their own Colonies and compete with the player for anomalies and events, engage in trade, covert ops and answer distress calls

You are no longer alone on Mars. With Space Race you have the option to start a new game with 1 to 3 rival colonies which will land on other coordinates on Mars.

You can contact other colonies and exchange technologies or open trade routes. You can also request help or provide aid to another colony.

All colonies on Mars compete with each other for milestones and planetary Anomalies and only the first colony will reap the benefits.

You can steal their Drones and Tech, sabotage their buildings and even attract their best Colonists to your own colony! Be warned - your standing with the rival colony will plummet and as they tighten security measures, you might lose the covert ops team and even the Rocket!

Events, related to Space Race - Events are story elements that depict different situations arising in the colony and will play out randomly as your colony grows. Sometimes there will be difficult decisions to make, and sometimes your choice of Commander Profile and Mission Sponsor will affect the decision options you have.

There is a unique set of events that can unfold only if the Rival Colonies are present, and they require the Space Race add on to happen.

6 new Challenges A set of 3 new challenges for each of the new sponsors, Japan and Brazil

New Decoration set a set of out-of-dome decorations including flags and monuments

New Dome skins a set of skins to add variety to your new colony

10 new Achievements:

Space Shopping - Play as USA and have a Geoscape Dome with a Megamall before Sol 100

Tao - Play as China and have Tai-chi Gardens in 10 Domes before Sol 100
Space Capitalism - Play as Blue Sun Corporation and produce $100,000 M Funding before Sol 100

Europa Universalis - Play as Europe and reach daily production of 10,000 Research before Sol 100

Waste Not, Want Not - Play as India and convert 3000 Waste Rock to useful materials before Sol 100

The Pace of Progress - Play as SpaceY and complete all Sponsor Goals on challenge rating 500% or higher

No Pain, No Gain - Play as Russia and have 500 colonists on challenge rating 500% or higher

The Garden of Eden - Play as Church of the new Ark and have 250 Colonists at 70+ Comfort before Sol 100

Bushido - Play as Japan and train 200 specialists before Sol 100
Gold Rush - Play as Brazil and convert 2000 Waste Rock to Rare Metals before Sol 100

New Features:

New UI The user interface of Surviving Mars has been completely updated to a new visual style

Sponsor Goals - Each sponsor now provides a set of five unique goals. Completing those goals awards various rewards from Funding and Applicants to free prefabs of Domes and even free Rockets.
The five goals have varying difficulty and can push you to play in a specific direction if you want to get their reward quickly. The more difficult sponsors have tougher goals which sometimes even have a time limit.
Sponsor goals are an improvement and an overhaul of the current Mission Evaluation mechanic which is retired with the update.

Events Events are story elements that depict different situations arising in the colony and will play out randomly as your colony grows. Sometimes there will be difficult decisions to make, and sometimes your choice of Commander Profile and Mission Sponsor will affect the decision options you have.
There are more than a hundred Event chains, each telling a different story of life on Mars, with more than 250 individual Events. Perhaps a Dust Storm caused a major malfunction in a Fusion Reactor, or a Renegade sabotaged the launch of a Rocket returning to Earth... Once in a while its just interesting to see how people may relax and have fun on the red planet.

Planetary Anomalies and Expeditions Martian Anomalies are no longer found only in your sector now you can discover them all over the planet. To analyze such a planetary anomaly, you will need to send a rocket to its coordinates on Mars. You will also need Drones, Rovers or Colonists for the expedition. Planetary Anomalies can yield research points, new Techs and Breakthroughs as well as resources and offer bigger rewards than Anomalies in the immediate vicinity of your colony.

Supply Pods - You may need an urgent delivery from Earth every now and then, and your rockets can be on the far side of Mars now. Supply Pods are one-use delivery space vehicles that can transport a limited payload from Earth. They are faster than Rockets and can land in any conditions, even during Dust Storms, but incur $100 M extra cost on launch. Also, they can be salvaged after crash-landing.

New Points of Interest in your sector new "Research site" and "Vista" locations can be now discovered in your sector map. They boost comfort and research (respectively) in nearby buildings and domes; they are revealed when a sector is scanned; those locations are randomly placed but depend on visible terrain features

Sponsor Logos a set of new sponsor logos, based on the national flags of the sponsors

Important changes:

Completed Milestones now grant Research Points as reward
Added a new building - Waste Rock Processor - unlocked by Waste Rock Liquefaction tech
Unused research points now go to the cheapest tech if no assigned research exists
Shuttles can transport waste rock
Updated sensor tower infopanel UI to include information about working units and disaster early warning
Added ability to enable/disable shuttle service for storage depots
Black Cubes Mystery: Black cubes can no longer destroy passages or appear over deposits
Buildings locked behind technologies will now list the tech field and name in their description
Added new functionality to Shuttle Hub - switch transportation modes between "people", "cargo", and "everything"
Removed Fuelled Extractor's upgrade from Concrete Plants
Wildfire Mystery: fix for long-term consequences of not researching the Cure
Mission Evaluation removed (replaced by Sponsor goals)

Other fixes:

Fix for factories to update Production per sol in real time
Fix for "Charge" hint for RC Generator (fixed both description and controller shortcut)
Fix for closed solar panels to not accumulate dust
Fix for the timer of completed challenges - in-game
Fix for RC Transport route creation when using overview map
Fixes for manual control over a Drone for cable/pipe construction, RC Transport unloading, construction site clearance
Fix for misleading text for pause/unpause
Fix for game freeze when packing numerous drones over short period of time
Fix for colonists migration and job allocation between connected domes - colonists now check if working in connected domes is forbidden when searching for a new dome
Fix for load/unload functionality of RC Transport
Fix for construction process to properly clear construction site when construction is on the edge of construction range
Fix for occasional overlap of buildings
Fix for passage placement to limit some invalid passage positions
Fix for cable placement when outside of drone hub range, which shows cable lines in unbuildable places
Fix for auto-pin option for exceptional colonists
Fixed controller button info when using rename feature
Fix for Crystals in Philosopher's stone mystery, to no longer spawn with a dome base
Fix for Waste Rock Processor model, now does not intersect with pipes
Fix for metal deposits placement to avoid inaccessible locations
Fix for rocket launch failing because of disembarking transport
Fix to keep new deposit positions fixed to map seed
Living Quarters renamed to Living Complex to reflect building sizes naming convention
Fix to remove concrete terrain once a concrete deposit has been depleted
Fix to prevent drones being assigned to destroyed commanders
Fix for drones idle movement while waiting to recharge
Fix for Research screen tooltip to update cost for repeatable techs in queue
Fix to allow sending an empty passenger rocket from Earth (also added a warning)
Added on-screen notification for destroyed buildings
Updated upgrade rollover text to show available resources
Fix for scaling of particle of anomaly scanning
Fix for construction rover to properly utilize/deal with resources on construction site
Fix for loss of control when performing quick actions in the build menu with a controller
Fix for Dome infopanel to better communicate comfort issues
Fix for follow-up camera when units disappear
Fix for setting traits in School/Sanatorium
Fix for pathfinder, reported as automated rover not responding
Removed old mission evaluation system and related notifications when loading pre-Gagarin saves
Tutorial 3: added shield against player spending all money and unable to continue a tutorial step
Various performance optimizations

PC specific fixes:

[OSX] Fix for window resize and occasional crash after using Command+Tab
[Linux] Fix for switch between Full screen and Windowed mode

Surviving Mars: Space Race Expansion has Launched!
Available now for download

Space Race has officially launched! Challenge rival sponsors in the race of the century with all new features and gameplay. Available now, so click here to play!

Gather your colonists, prepare your rocket, and descend upon the red planet to show those rival sponsors how it's done... the Space Race has begun!

A few of the major features you'll find include:

• Rival colonies will compete to discover planetary anomalies and unlock the secrets of Mars
  
• Negotiate with or terrorize your rivals with new diplomacy options
  
• Unique buildings and vehicles for every sponsor
  
• New events will shape your colonies progression - for better or worse!
  
• Two new sponsors (Brazil and Japan)
  
• Complete unique sponsor missions to help your colony succeed
  

Hello, fellow Martians! I am Boyan Ivanov and today Im here to share some juicy details about the cool new features coming in Space Race - the first expansion for Surviving Mars.

New and Improved Sponsors (paid feature)

With Space Race, we wanted to improve upon the variety of each playthrough and make the choice of sponsor matter even more. Each sponsor in Space Race has a new unique building and a unique new vehicle that may be a Rocket, Rover, Drone or even new type of Probe. All of these dramatically change the way the individual sponsor plays and develops their strategy.

Instead of spoiling all the changes to existing sponsors, Im going to showcase my favorite sponsor the Blue Sun Corporation.

The Blue Sun Corporation is all about making money and having additional uses for Funding. Their new unique building is the Corporate Office which generates funding each Sol based on the number of workers in the office. This provides a good alternative to mining Rare Metals, however working in an office is not really the life colonists imagined on Mars and they take Comfort penalties when stationed there. Of course, you can offset the Comfort loss with additional services.

You can read the dev diary in full here.

***ALSO*** Join us for the Space Race Launch stream tomorrow at 17:00 CET. Susie and Niki will be joined by Haemimont on stream to take a good look at the expansion and celebrate its release (it will release at 18:00 CET and we have an awesome release trailer which we will also show off on the stream! You can watch the stream here: https://www.twitch.tv/paradoxinteractive

Join us for a special stream featuring Mixer streamers FieldersChoice, Pfeiffer and ChaosMole

Which colony will survive? Who will win the race to space?

Watch it this Wednesday 7 November at 17:00 CET (08:00 PDT)

https://mixer.com/ParadoxInteractive

We are happy to announce that the Surviving Mars: Space Race DLC will be released on November 15th!

Are you ready to take part in the race to Space? Delve into the details right now with the Feature Breakdown Trailer.

https://youtu.be/stznAOwFaCw

Hello everyone!

Take part in the Dome Design Contest and win an official Surviving Mars poster!

To participate do the following:

Create the coolest looking dome you can and take its picture with the games photo mode.

• It has to be a picture of a single dome.
  
• You can design its interior however you like.
  
• You can apply any skin you like.
  
• Upload the picture to: Steam Community Hubs Artwork section with #DomeContest tag in its description. https://steamcommunity.com/app/464920/images/ (or here on this thread)
  
• Only one picture per entry. :)
  
• Last day to post your entries is 8th of November (cut off at 18:00 CEST).
  
  
  Between the 9th and 14th of November, a panel of Paradox staff will judge your entries. Well select the 10 best and post the winners domes in a special announcement on 15th of November!
  
  We will pick 10 winners - 5 from Steam and 5 from the Forum and each winner will get an official Surviving Mars poster.
  
  Good luck! We can't wait to see your domes. :)
  
  

Below is a video summing up the free content so far:

https://youtu.be/ZDz51Do8rY4



In other news, expect a feature stream for Space Race on the 1 November!

And the closed beta for the DLC ends today - it went well and we are already incorporating the feedback we got from the beta into the DLC. So thanks to all of you that participated.

Just a quick clarification for the Season Pass/First Colony Edition holders as we have had a few questions.

1. You are, of course, getting all 3 pieces of DLC announced together as a part of your Season Pass.
2. There is more content left in the Season Pass. :)

We are super happy to announce our first expansion Space Race!

Space Race focuses on rival colonies and mission sponsors. It pits Earth’s greatest countries and most powerful companies against each other as they compete for the limited resources available on Mars. Whether it’s stealing key colonists or monopolizing crucial discoveries, be sure not to let your comrades in colonizing get the upper hand!

Space Race releases later this year.

Save 10% by pre-ordering it here: Space Race

EDIT: Just to clarify if you have the Season Pass you automatically get this content.

Hey!

We are currently running a closed beta testing the new paid DLC and a few new updates to the game.

If you are a Surviving Mars modder we would love for you to be involved.

There are 20 spots open - with the criteria that you have to have modded Surviving Mars.

If you would like to join the beta please email susan.mcbeth@paradoxplaza.com.

We will then send you an NDA which you will sign and return and after that, we will send you details on how to join the beta.

The beta is open until 14th!

Thanks
Susie

Senior Community Manager

What key stats about your colony, in extension to the information presented in the infobar, would you like to easily access and view? For example, in the Command Center screen (Z).

We are currently addressing the Command Centre UI and would like player feedback to know where to aim.

Please let us know your thoughts so we can make the game the best it can be and give you what you want :D

Hey everyone. Just a quick heads-up - we have just released a hot fix patch to address a couple of minor performance issues originating from the source code.

As always, if you find any bugs, please report them on the Surviving Mars bug forum: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?forums/surviving-mars-bug-reports.1003/

Tomorrow, at 5p.m. CEST Stockholm time, we'll host a Q&A stream!

Come by, ask us questions about the "Sagan" update, the game's future, present and stick around for some unexpected news later!

:D

New Feature: Challenges
Challenges are a new game mode where you have to accomplish a specific objective within a time limit. Mission parameters, game rules and colony coordinates are predetermined and unique for each challenge. A total of 24 challenges are now available.

Self-sufficient Rovers
Rovers no longer have batteries and there’s no need to recharge roves from Power cables. We reevaluated this mechanic and decided that the amount of micromanagement it required was more tedious than actually presenting a meaningful challenge. We are removing it as part of our initiative to reduce the unnecessary micromanagement in the game and allow the player to focus on more important tasks.

Rover Command AI tech now enables automated mode for Explorers and Transports.

Changes to Concrete Deposits
We have reworked the Concrete Extractor to work more in line with other extractors. Concrete Extractors have to be placed in the vicinity of the concrete deposit marker and no longer take into account the specific patch of terrain they cover. This way concrete deposits can be fully exploited even with a single extractor.

Changes to Maps
Due to the changes in concrete deposits, as well as other fixes to the random map generator, all maps have been generated again and will look different than previous versions. Environmental variety of maps has been improved.

Changes to Research
The randomization of research (both order of techs in the research tree and breakthroughs discovered from anomalies) is now tied to the random seed of the individual map. This means that techs are always the same on the same map but different between different maps. This change allows players to compete for score on even terms on the same map coordinates and to have the same experience with techs when attempting Challenges.

Changes to Messages
Popup messages will now arrive first as blinking notifications, which will pop up after some time has passed. This way popups will not interrupt your current actions like placing or managing buildings. Some important messages will still pop up without a notification.

Controller Support for the Infobar
"Resource Overview" buttons are removed from the HUD for both mouse and controller interfaces. The Infobar can now be navigated using controller. Rollover highlights have been added to the Infobar in the controller version of the UI.

Balance Changes

Reduced Mega Trigon Dome construction and maintenance costs
Trigon Dome now requires Polymers for maintenance
Dust generated from Building and Rocket sources has been increased

General Fixes and Improvements
Crystals in “The Philosopher’s Stone” mystery should now work properly
Resource deposit markers are now aligned to the building grid
Increased the range in which the Transport Rover looks for Transport Route resources to 25 hexes
Fixed the sound effect of the Artificial Sun
Rockets no longer require cargo to be launched towards Mars
Meteor Storm epicentre now moves during the disaster
Improved Pipe placement logic, related warnings and cost predictions
Price of Pipe segments placed over non-buildable or rough terrain is now properly calculated
Landing Pads are no longer being suspended by disasters
Deep scanning progress for sectors is now properly reset after surface scanning
Sub-surface Heater & Mohole Mine are now protected from freezing
Endless Supply game rule now disables achievements
Fixed the game not launching on some Linux distributions
General performance improvements

UI fixes and improvements:
Dust radii of Extractors and Rockets are now shown on placement and selection
New auto pin settings in Options > Gameplay, that allow customization of pinned objects
Key-bindings now properly appear in rollover hints
Added key-bindings for passages and passage ramps
Added warning sign over buildings that lack input resources
Settings for Photo mode are now properly saved
Added Reset button to Photo mode
Fix for Photo Mode, which removes black artefacts appearing on some buildings
Fix for the "Build Menu" shortcut to work as a toggle button instead of only opening the build menu
Various encyclopedia texts have been updated to reflect Sagan changes
Added description text for Health lost due to the "Infected" trait
Reworked the early warning notification for disasters to be more informative

Hello and thank you for checking out this shiny new dev diary dedicated to the upcoming update, codenamed Sagan. While our previous update (Da Vinci) catered mostly to our players that like to focus their efforts on city-building in Creative Mode, Sagan's main feature is targeted towards our more hardcore survivalist crowd. It introduces a new game mode meant to test your colony building skills as well as your mastery of not just surviving under the alien conditions, but being fast and efficient while doing so.

Challenges
How can you measure the skills of a player in a sandbox city-builder? Even in a survival-oriented one, like Surviving Mars, the difference between a very good player and merely a competent one is often in the efficiency and game time they need to accomplish their goals. While the existing Score system tries to evaluate this to some degree, it is far from perfect, and there is really no fair way to balance it for all possible play styles and game rules.

Challenges are meant to be our answer to this problem, introducing a new way to test your skills. Each Challenge presents a single objective before you that may be as simple as "complete the Founder stage" or more complex like "research all technologies". All Challenges are time-limited, so you have to optimize your approach and be efficient to pass the test.



You can read the dev diary in full here.

New Feature - Creative Mode
Creative Mode features a set of new game rules that allow you to enjoy a simpler playthrough with endless resources and everything unlocked. Added a Creative Mode option in the main menu which has these game rules on by default.

• Easy Maintenance - Buildings don't malfunction due to lack of maintenance
• Easy Research - Start with additional 3000 Research per Sol and all base techs revealed
• Fast Rockets - Rockets travel ten times faster
• Fast Scanning - Sector scanning is ten times faster
• Free Construction - Buildings don't require resources to be constructed (they still have construction time)
• Iron Colonists - Colonists can't lose Health or Sanity below 50 and they cannot become Earthsick
• More Applicants - 500 additional applicants
• Overfunded - Start with $100,000 M Funding

Some of the new rules disable all Achievements.

New Feature – Desired Amount in depots & storages
You can now set a desired amount in storages and depots. Drones will try to keep at least the desired amount of resources in depots and storages taking resources from other storages if need be.

• New UI – reworked the UI of depots and storages to allow the enabling/disabling of resources in depots more easily. The player can also enable/disable resources in all depots of the same type via Ctrl + Click

Changes to Power Networks
• Adjacent power producers & consumers will now connect to each other without the need for a cable.

New Feature – Follow Camera for vehicles and colonists
Follow camera is activated from the selected unit infopanel. Follow camera removes all UI until deactivated.

Balance Changes
• Reworked default initial rocket cargo for all sponsors to include a Stirling Generator prefab and more drones to allow for faster starts
• Reduced the construction cost of many buildings to reduce the amount of resources being carried by drones and improve game pacing
• Increased speed of drones by 20%, techs that increase speed of drones have their effects slightly reduced
• Drone battery capacity increased to reduce how often drones need to recharge. Initial battery of drones randomized to avoid having all drones run out of battery at the same time
• Reduced fuel needed to refuel a rocket to 50 (30 with tech). Paradox sponsor is down to 80(60 with tech)
• Shuttles require less fuel to operate
• Reworked applicant generation so the starting pool of applicants is of greater importance. Sponsors with larger starting pools will continue to have more applicants down the line.
• Increased the effects of the Celebrity and Genius trait but they now have requirements – Genius colonists will grant research points if their Sanity is high (in the green); Celebrity will grant funding if their comfort is high (in the green).
• Electronics Factory now requires maintenance of 2 Machine Parts instead of 3 Electronics
• Increased power consumption of Polymer Plant & Electronics Factory to 10
• Reduced maintenance of Smart homes
• Outsourcing is now limited to five orders at one time
• Tourist trait has been reworked - it now grants 10M funding when the colonist arrives. The tourist stays for 5 Sols and then leaves (on the next rocket to Earth). When the tourist leaves Mars they generate 2 new tourist applicants.
• Working medical buildings provide birth rate boost bonus for the next 24 hours.
• Added new commander profile: City Mayor – 2,000 M additional starting Funding; buildings require upkeep less often; bonus tech: Mars Nouveau (building costs in Metals & Concrete are reduced by 20%).
• Added new game rule – Increased Production – base production of all resources is doubled
• Endless Supply game rule now lowers difficulty by 200 (instead of 25)
• Chaos Theory game rule now lowers difficulty by 50 instead of increasing it

Changes to Disasters
• Cable faults and Pipe leaks now happen only during dust storms or as a result of dust devils and meteor strikes. Their effect has been increased but the repair time is much quicker.
• A popup message describes the effects of disasters the first time they trigger in each playthrough
• Solar Panels are now disabled during Dust Storms and automatically close down
• Buildings left without power during a Cold Wave now freeze 3 times slower (after 24 hours, was 8 hours)
• Health and Sanity damage, suffocation, dehydration, and freezing effects from disasters are now randomized– colonists will now die or have a sanity breakdown gradually during an emergency rather than all at the same time when time runs out.
• Lightning Strikes during Electrostatic Dust Storms have been fixed and will now disable buildings for 24 hours rather than 4 hours. They will also drain power accumulators they hit.

General Fixes
• Added new construction colorization of building placement cursor - orange - to indicate possible placement of a building outside drone controller range
• Autosave Count and Interval settings added in Options > Gameplay
• Buildings inside a Dome are turned off when the Dome is turned off
• Colonists can now eat from stockpiles in connected domes when starving
• Night shift Sanity loss introduced for training buildings
• Fix for passages not returning resources when salvaged
• Terrain is properly restored after demolishing a Geoscape Dome
• The Stirling Generator will no longer take more dust than intended
• Funding is now properly modified by global modifiers
• Large Water Tank now freezes and defrosts for the same time as the basic water tank
• Constructions in Domes are no longer affected by cold areas
• Fixed the Renegades counter in Infobar
• Supply grid now properly reconnects through a Passage
• Fixed unintended disabling of some buildings by Ion storms

UI
• GDPR notice removed. Rejoice!
• Fixed various scrolling problems. UIs are now scrollable instead of using pages
• Added new keybindings for tilting the camera up and down - F, G
• Clicking on icons in the Info Bar now cycles through stored resources, free jobs, free residences, unemployed and homeless Colonists
• Wind Turbine production boost during Dust Storms is now indicated in the info panel
• Command Center graphs timely update
• Renegade morale no longer visible in Command Center
• Trait selection in Schools fixed
• Yellow decals no longer remain stuck on the martian surface
• Added "Low Storage" notifications and removed duplicate other notifications
"Domes without Life Support" notification replaces separate notifications about dome problems
• Added list of problematic buildings as rollover of the "Buildings not working" notification
• All ground vehicles are collectively called "Rovers". The old "RC Rover" is now named "RC Commander"
• Changed displaying of Collaboration loss in Research buildings
• Power percentage is no more visible for pinned Rovers after Rover Command AI gets researched
• Fixed Ctrl+click not setting desired specialization in all Martian Universities
• Added resource conversion ratio in the infopanels of Factories
• Added Queue first option in the Sector scanning queue
• Added Disabled residential slots stat in the Info Bar
• The Info Bar now lists the different sources of Funding for the last Sol and how much Funding was gained from them
• Added space communism

Mods
• Added Radio Station ModItem and related documentation

Greetings from the red planet! Our Dev Diaries are back, and we have a new free update coming out hot from the pipeline for you. Codename: Da Vinci. That's right - we changed our naming convention because we were starting to run out of Mars missions and we are planning to support Surviving Mars for a good long while. From now on we are naming updates after great persons such as scientists and space explorers. The reason we chose Leonardo as our patron is that he seems like the best fit for the major feature of this patch - Creative Mode.

You can read the full Dev Diary here.

What it fixes:

- doesn't submit Steam/GOG user IDs to our Mantis
- several ways for the game to hang, popular with the community
- submit game difficulty to telemetry (which we regrettably forgot to include in the initial release)

As always, if you encounter bugs please report them on the Surviving Mars bug forum! Thanks!

Hey everyone,

If you, unfortunately, happen to encounter any bugs in the game, please report your bug on the Surviving Mars bug forum.

This way we can get the devs to deal with it as quickly and efficiently as possible. It also helps give us an idea of how many people are affected.

The bug forum can be found here: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?forums/surviving-mars-bug-reports.1003/

Thanks!

Save 30% on Surviving Mars during this week's Midweek Madness*!

*Offer ends Friday at 10AM Pacific Time

Surprise! We are releasing Mysteries Resupply Pack today on PC and tomorrow on Console.

It is a totally free DLC that basically resupplies your mysteries!

Below is some information about the new mysteries contained in the pack:

St. Elmo's Fire - Colonists find it hard to get a good night’s sleep, especially when mysterious lights begin appearing where they have no reason to be. What is causing these unexpected apparitions and is it connected to the confusing changes in the water supply?

The Philosopher's Stone - Encounter beings that are a far cry from the fleshy bags we call carbon-based life when the colony stumbles upon entirely crystalline entities. Are they here to be of assistance or only out to protect the family jewels?

Metatron - Colonists look to the sky agape as a great floating monolith has parked itself directly above the fledgling colony. Does it come in peace or is it even sentient? Either way, it is certainly blocking the views from the dome!

We hope you have fun unravelling them.

New Features:

Five-part Tutorial - Comprehensive tutorial separated into five thematic sections, introducing the core gameplay concepts in the different stages of Surviving Mars.

New Domes - Curiosity introduces five new Dome types. These are entirely new models with new shapes, functionality and costs. With one exception, they do not require new techs to be researched. The smallest domes do not allow Spire construction

Infobar – Provides general overview of all the resources of the colony, including research progress

Command Center - The Command Center is a handy new UI toolset that provides historical data for the colony and the ability to inspect and manage multiple buildings, colonists or vehicles without selecting them individually. It has been developed as part of our effort to reduce the micromanagement and to provide a more informative overview interface for certain gameplay aspects. The Command Center currently offers five different tools: Graphs, Buildings, Domes, Colonists, and Transportation.

Important changes and fixes:

- New Game Rule: "Endless Supply" - the first Universal Depot you place will automatically fill with resources each Sol.
- Removed "Request maintenance" button and related functionality
- Vehicle pin icons now indicate battery level
- Added "Home dome" to colonists infopanel
- Updated Mouse pointer/cursor texts for Rovers, drones, and colonists
- Added rollover about colonists to Resource Overview
- Added stored food in service buildings to Resource Overview
- Added ticks to completed mysteries in pre-game menu
- Clicking on the HUD pause button toggles between pause and last used game speed
- More detailed cursor messages when trying (and failing) to place passages and ramps
- Fix for "Reassign all" button to no longer reassign uncontrollable drones (dead, disabled, embarked, rogue)
- Added new photo mode filter, "Orton" - dreamy and saturated
- Added frame rate cap in options
- Fix for reborn colonists (Project Phoenix) to keep their traits, including their specialization
- Fix for biorobots specialization to allow college education
- Ctrl-click on drone prefab buttons converts five drones at a time
- Fix for colonists to properly select new home when current residence is turned off
- Fix for Psychologist commander profile to properly provide 5 Sanity boost
- Added Simplified Chinese language

Other changes and fixes:

UI:
- GDPR-related changes to Privacy Policy and Terms of Service, and in case you have been living on another planet the past two weeks, it is related to the mandatory EU regulation of the same name.
- Fix for Research UI to shield scrolling instead of pressing Outsource or Close buttons
- Controller: Workslot rollover now properly updates after firing a colonist
- Controller: Fix to go back in the Encyclopedia hints section with the "back" button
- Controller: In-game menu now handles safe area margins better
- Photo mode: Hide UI fix
- Fix for Rover infopanel to hide battery when "Rover Command AI" tech is researched

Mysteries:

- Added check to avoid spawning an anomaly inside dome
- Black Cubes: Fix for some remaining single Black Cubes, now properly collected
- Spheres: Fix for wrong positioning of sound sources when Spheres make cold areas

Passages and related issues:

- Fix for Passages and Ramps to return resources when demolished
- Tweaks to job selection logic in the presence of Passages
- Updated dome warning/error messages to work better in the presence of passages
- Fix for Passages to light up only if at least one of the connected domes has power
- Fix for a bug where colonists became suspended in the air and walk in place

Mods:

- Added Building Entrance Path to entities
- Documentation fixes and additional details
- Removed obsolete texture channels from Blender exporter
General fixes:
- Fix for proper calculation of Sponsor effects in launch UI
- Shielded case where it was possible to accept legal agreements while in Steam offline mode
- Fixed certain cases of stuck drones, coming from reporting unreachable destinations
- Colonists can no longer eat from Rockets
- Colonists now wear space suits when exiting Rockets in all cases
- Pathfinding: fixed a bug where passage entrance/exit may be inaccessible
- Fix for missing palette when changing skins during dome placement
- Fix to prevent rovers from going into another rover that is uncontrollable (e.g. broken)
- Fix for Automated mode rockets to wait their inbound cargo to be fully unloaded before taking off
- Fix for Rockets takeoff, happening without refuel
- Fix for proper demolishing of Automated Depots
- Self-maintenance buildings are excluded from maintenance resource overview calculation (caused negative values)
- Drone controller load notification now displayed only for working Drone controllers
- Fix for in-dome sounds to be more prominent when in-dome or when a dome is selected
- Fix for resources not displayed on the construction depot when placing a building on a pile of resources
- Fix for Triboelectric Scrubber to stop resetting its cleaning cycle every time it is selected
- Fix for a pathfinder bug leading to drones stuck near dome entrances
- Fix for better handling of unreachable buildings by drones
- Drone reassignment and packing/unpacking streamlined; added to RC Rovers and their infopanels
- Malfunctioned and dead rovers block other units' movement
- Fix for anomalies and surface deposits which blocked constructions around them in a too wide radius
- Fix for assigning of workplace/residence with right-click
- Fix for colonists to stop going outside domes when food depots are empty
- Fix for drones getting stuck in Rockets in some rare circumstances (yet again)
- Fix for flickering elements of construction hex grid
- Fix for meteor cycle button notification
- Fix for the negative resource amounts in depots
- Fix for a water production bug happening when upgrading a Water Extractor with Fueled Extractors
- Fix for proper effect of Storage Compression tech for water tanks
- Numerous fixes for to RC Transport right-click actions
- Fix for negative water consumption of farms in certain cases
- Fix for Dome working state leading to "x" icon on Dome pin
- Fix for yellow grid appearing under domes
- Fix for Rocket alignment when landing
- Fixed a Rocket launch condition which led to take off in automated mode during dust storms
- Fix for misaligned cranes when rotating mechanized storage depots
- Fix for a non-refreshing infopanel re. electricity
- Clicking the Hints button now opens the Encyclopedia on the last dismissed hint
- Fix for colonists to look for workplace considering specialist filtering
- Gamepad: "Invert look" option now properly applies to zooming in and out
- Fixed scaling of Space Elevator rope
- Fixed missing launcher icon on some Linux installations
- Fix for mod radio stations to work properly on some Linux installations
- Fixed double click on Linux
- General performance improvements
- Sound fixes and improvements

Opportunity changelog

New Features and Buildings:

Passages
You are now able to connect your domes together by constructing Passages. These transportation tunnels allows colonists
to move freely into adjacent domes and utilizing the workplaces and services available there.
- If one Dome has no power, oxygen or water for over a Sol, all passages leading to it are disabled until the problem is
resolved. This will cause workers being fired from their workplaces as if the passage has been destroyed.
- These passages are fragile, and your Colonists may die if hit by a meteor while in the Passage
New Buildings & Related Changes
- New high-end automated storage building which can take over 4,000 units of separate resource is available for your
Colony.
- Added 3 new workshop buildings. Workshops allow colonists to work their vocation providing more employment for the late
game.
- A new Landing pad makes sure the Rocket lands at the designated spot and eliminates the dusting effect of the
surrounding structures
- A new Large Water Tank, storing up to 1,000 units of Water is available to suit the needs of your developing colony
- Added new Milestone related to workshop buildings to reflect achieving post-scarcity vocation-oriented society
- Added new Technologies, which allow construction of Workshops, Automated Storage and Large Water Tank

Game Rules
You can now choose brand new options during game setup to activate additional rule-sets for the mission that will impact the
difficulty, making the mission easier or harder.

Available Game Rules:
- Prefab Colony: Begin with free prefabs for all buildings necessary for a small colony.
- No Disasters: Disables all disasters (excluding those coming from mysteries).
- Hunger: Can't import food from Earth.
- Inflation: Import prices increase over time.
- Long Ride: Rocket travel time to and from Mars is three times longer.
- The Last Ark: Can call a Passenger Rocket only once.
- Amateurs: No specialist applicants.
- Rebel Yell: Colonists periodically become renegades. Crime is more severe.
- Chaos Theory: Tech fields are fully randomized.
- Winter is coming: Cold Wave rating set to a new Max level for all locations on Mars. Cold waves increase power
consumption even more.
- Armageddon: Meteor rating set to a new Max level for all locations on Mars.
- Dust in the Wind: Dust Storm rating set to a new Max level for all locations on Mars.
- Twister: Dust Devil rating set to a new Max level for all locations on Mars.
Other fixes and improvements:

Balance:
- Added upgrades to the Mohole Mine and the Excavator to increase production

UI:
- 3 new notifications: for busy drone hubs, busy shuttle hubs, out of fuel shuttle hubs
- Better alignment for traits in school
- Added on-screen notification for split Power/Life support networks (by player actions or meteorites)
- Colonists with special traits, coming from a rocket, will no longer be pinned for colonies with over 100 colonists
- Fixed overlapping of deposits (from random map generation and anomalies)
- Storages and Depots are divided in subcategories of the Build Menu
- " Milestone failed" message alignment fix


General Fixes:
- Fixed air producers (wrong) production in some cases
- Fixed calculation of challenge bonus in milestones
- Fixed Triboelectric Scrubber not rotating after first clean
- Fixed TOS to no longer reappear when changing language
- Fixed a bug where more than the maximum number of colonists in a Dome can have homes and/or work
- Fixed an issue with unemployed statistics in Dome not updated when moving a Colonist
- Fixed a bug where turned off/malfunctioned supply storages (incl. Batteries) would reconnect to grid after modifying any of their storage props
- Fixed upside-down positioning of shuttles
- Fixed an issue where colonists became starving from eating uncooked meals
- Androids now have no initial specialization
- Marsgate Mystery: Fixed Rover Command AI tech to not affects hostile rovers
- Marsgate Mystery: Fixes for hostile rovers to prevent them from salvage after battery drain
- Fix for Autonomous sensors to not show "outside drone control" icon after Autonomous Sensors tech is researched if sensors are build prior research completion
- Beyond Earth Mystery: Fix for saves swarmed by trade rockets, causing infinite loop from pinned rockets
- Fixes on Polymer Factory production (now depends on its workers)
- Fix for some edge cases of automated routes for Transport Rover
- Fix for chance for crime prevention (capped at 50% when Security Officers outnumber renegades 3 to 1)
- Fix for Waste Rock production to now properly depend on the grade of Concrete, Metals and Rare Metals deposit used
- Fix for colonists and drones to stop going through Spires
- Improved estimation of the load of the drone controllers (Hub, Rover, Rocket)
- Buildings are now considered to be in dome range if one of their hexes is inside dome range
- Updated University description
- Clarified immigration policy texts
- Various performance optimizations
- Various stability improvements
- Various sound FX tweaks

Mods:
- Documentation for Effects - building blocks for Mission Sponsor, Commander Profile and Game Rule mod items
- Added "GlobalEffects" mod item
- Default mod preview image format is set to PNG
- Kept backward compatibility with mods that use the old tags system

If so - what was your favourite?

The new frontier... The perils of the unknown... The great difficulties and the great hope for the next generation? No, I'm not talking about colonizing Mars. I'm talking about the greatest technical risk we took on with Surviving Mars: building the game for modding support.
Haemimont Games has shipped a cool 15 games on various platforms, but not one of them has had official modding support. And modding was something Paradox wanted from the very beginning of the project. Games that welcome the players to join in the creation are loved more, played more, and live more, they said. What's the point of partnering with a well-respected experienced publisher if you don't heed what they say?


The bad news was that over the previous several games, the data loading process of our engine had been optimized in the opposite direction, to be as monolithic and economical as possible, to allow for minimal loading times. This had to be reversed, and many types of data can now be loaded in pieces, or late after the game has started, to allow for asset authoring and tested.


The good and much more important news was that our games are written in a mixture of two programming languages: C++ to handle the low-level stuff like graphics, audio and talking to the underlying hardware; Lua. Which allowed us to implement virtually everything you think of as "game", from the simulation logic of the colonists on Mars to the user interface that allows the player to control them. And Lua is not only much easier for modders to learn - it's also easy to be loaded from different places, even when the game is running. We knew that we needed to give modders this ultimate power, to modify and add new Lua code to the game.


The overarching goal of the mod support is, in the words of Alan Kay, simple things should be simple, and complex things should be possible. For the simple part, we identified a handful of small but impactful changes to the game that can be implemented by anyone who's not afraid of their computer. Mission Logos, for example, let you leave your imprint on every building of your colony. You only need to supply a simple, transparent PNG file

You can read the full dev diary here

New fixes! Check out the full patch notes below. And as ever, please keep reporting your bugs in the Surviving Mars bug forum.

OSX,Linux: Added OpenGL mods' shaders support
Linux: fixed occasional crash when loading savegames
Window: fixed white borders on some UI elements

UI: Research dialog now scrollable with mouse wheel and camera controls, saves last position on close
UI: Colonists with special traits are pinned to the menu bar, only when there are less than 100 colonists in the colony
UI: Voice notification for Pipe leaks/Cable faults disabled for colonies with over 100 colonists
UI: Tourist trait shown in "Review Applicants" UI
UI: Fix for cancelation of change of display settings
UI: Fix for senior colonists workplace display after the research of "Forever Young" tech
UI: Fix for Automation Upgrade Icon (displayed inconsistently in Fungal Farms)
UI: Fix for Custom anomaly icon disappearing from time to time
UI: Fixed missing sounds when some Mods are active
UI: Martian University infopanel now does not show colonists which are not part of the workforce (senior, child, tourist, stressed, etc.)
UI: Rockets have correct (default) skin on game start

Gameplay: Removed exploit for endless export from the Space Elevator
Gameplay: Refugees are now immune to Earthsick condition
Gameplay: New dome fractures should be repaired properly (this unfortunately does not affect already fractured domes from previous saves)
Gameplay: "Vocation-Oriented Society" tech performance bonus now works as intended
Gameplay: Fix for drones not to be abandoned by RC Rover
Gameplay: Fix for maximum drones allowed to work on trade rocket
Gameplay: Resource stockpiles now properly marked as 1-hex large object - should fix drone behavior to move stockpiles adjacent to construction sites rather then underneath them
Gameplay: RP cost of repeatable techs now increase after each research
Gameplay: "Alien Imprints" tech effect reduced
Gameplay: Fix for Fuel Extractor upgrade effect in the Concrete Extractor building (now 30% increase instead of 50%)
Gameplay: Fix for stuck drones when picking up resources from destroyed farm
Gameplay: Fix for resource count when interrupting drone after picking up resource cube from RC Transport
Gameplay: Fix for RC Transport when changing skin while loading resources
Gameplay: Fix to properly treat RC Transport as resource depot when adding new drone controller (Rover/Hub/Rocket) or changing active radius of drone controller
Gameplay: Fix for Rocket take-off in some cases
Gameplay: Fix for RP calculation to allow modifiers to have effect in cases of little RP production
Gameplay: Workers properly select workplace based on their specialty
Gameplay: Fix for workplace and training buildings requiring maintenance when turned off
Gameplay: Easy start now always starts with a Mystery
Gameplay: Scanning que increased
Gameplay: Shielded combination of incompatible traits (e.g. Genius/Idiot combo)
Gameplay: Biorobot gurus no longer create biorobots
Gameplay: Fix for replacing existing techs by using mods

Visuals: Dome glass has correct self illumination
Visuals: Meteorite craters no longer appear over and next to objects
Visuals: NVIDIA 1050s family now loads "High" setting preset
Visuals: Fix for proper positioning of newborn child colonist at spawn

We have made some changes to the MAC build, we hope this improves some of the issues reported by the community:

- Bug addressed: missing huge pieces of the interface on mac OS
- Bug addressed: orange blocky terrain on Windows + pre-GCN Radeons (5700, 5800, etc.)
- Bug addressed: corrupted terrain issues
- Bug addressed: tourists stay on Mars at least 10 sols

Known issues we are currently working on:
Quitting the game causes a hang
Flickering shadows.

Also, just to note, we will have proper names for the patch notes going forward, we are just deciding on the naming order :)

As always, if you come across any bugs or issues - please report it in the Surviving Mars Bug Forum.

Surviving Mars is now out & we have been looking at all your feedback on social, Steam and our Forums! We know you have questions & we want to give you the answers. Join us for a special Q&A stream this Wednesday 21, 17:00 CET: https://www.twitch.tv/paradoxinteractive - We will also be live streaming on Steam as well.

Given that there are a few pitfalls when trying to get into the game, I thought it might be a good idea to give some basic advice for beginners.

(1) Decide how you want to play the game!
The way I look at it, there are two main ways to experience the game. One is to survive and play through the story, taking as much time as you want. The other way is to play score-attack style and trying to get as many points as possible by completing objectives as quickly as possible on as high of a difficulty as possible. Both are perfectly viable ways to play the game, but they require very different strategies. If you are looking for a challenge: My best game so far was ~70k points within 120 Sols at 250% difficulty.

(2) You can build cables and pipes on the same tile!
This might be super obvious to most people, but is actually a thing I didn't immediately realize on my first game - and it caused some major headache when I tried to find a good base layout. So don't make the same mistake - stack them.

(3) Don't create large cable and pipe networks!
The larger a network becomes, the higher the chance for cable and pipe faults. Creating a massive single network for everything will cause frequent leaks, costing you resources and keeping drones needlessly busy. Don't use more cables or pipes than necessary. Also, *I think* you can use buildings and domes to separate your networks by connecting on one side and continuing on another access point.

(4) Make sure to bring a Transport Rover!
There are plenty of surface deposits for Iron (and sometimes Polymers) on the map. They are revealed after scanning a sector and can be collected by a Transport Rover. If you use the CREATE TRANSPORTE ROUTE button (or however it is called now), the rover will even automatically go back and forth between the two selected points and gather all surface deposits within range (until there are none left). Given that manpower is in short supply throughout the early game, this is an excellent method to gather iron during the early game.

(5) A Science Rover will be quite useful!
When scanning sectors you will find plenty of anomalies. Analyzing them will give you extra tech options, free research or other random benefits. Try to bring at least one science rover along if you can - it will make the early game a lot easier.

(6) Build enough depots!
Make sure that you have enough depots to store goods, and make sure that they are spread out through your colony to reduce transport distances. If you have multiple drone hubs, you can place a depot in their overlapping range - this will allow your drones to more evenly distribute materials across the colony.

(7) Make sure you have enough drones!
Once you have your basic infrastructure in place and start to expand your colony, you will need additional drone hubs - and more drones at existing ones.Some indicators for a lack of drones are: goods piling up, extractors stopping to work because stone isn't hauled away, rockets taking a long time to load, unload or refuel and maintenance or repairs taking longer than expected.

(8) You do not have to build dumping sites!
If you do not have any designated dumping sites, your drones will just drop the stones next to the extractors. From what I noticed, this didn't seem to have any effect on performance. So if you hate the site of piles of waste rock - you don't have to suffer through that.

(9) Only build things you actually need!
Buildings deteriorate and require maintenance goods, even when they are disabled or not used. So be VERY careful with what you construct during the early days of your colony - an unnecessary battery during the early game might cost you 5+ Polymers by Sol 20. Build in moderation and do not exceed your requirements (too much).Don't build that Moxxie several Sols before you ferry in first your colonists.

(10) Stirling Generators are awesome!
If you play as a rich sponsor, consider bringing a few Stirling Generators. They are very costly, but a great long-term investment. While closed, they do NOT deteriorate, which means they have no maintenance cost. If you have an energy shortage, you can temporarily open them if necessary. If you are desperately short of maintenance materials, you can also cycle through them before any generator deteriorates to the point where it actually requires maintenance. Later in the game, you will acquire a technology that unlocks a building that removes maintenance cost from anything within range - with that, you can keep your Stirlings open permanently for a massive permanent energy increase.

(11) Scanners stack!
Every scanner provides a massive boost to scan speed for nearby sectors, but on top of that, there are additional stackable effects: Each scanner gives a base +10% scan speed anywhere on the map and it also increases the ahead-of-time warning for disasters. If you are playing on maps with high disaster risk, consider building multiple scanners to get warnings several Sols ahead of time.

(12) Build Clinics!
A clinic reduces the comfort requirement fo childbirth, which is very important in the early game since your domes usually won't be able to provide all services requested by your colonists. They are especially important if you play a sponsor that have a low amount of applicants (e.g. Europe), but even those with lots of colonists would usually prefer to ferry goods instead of people.

(13) Specialize your domes!
In the early game space within the domes is scarce. Most of the time a dome will only provide enough living space for a farm and one, maybe two production buildings. A good early game layout for Small Domes in my games was: Living Quarters x3, Farm, Clinic, Grocer, Small Park, 1 production building inside + 1 production building/mine outside. If you use a small production building like the Research Lab you can add an extra Grocer and Diner.

(14) Do not use high maintenance service buildings in the early game!
Buildings like the Casino, Art Workshop and Electronics Store will require a lot of advanced materials to maintain. I highly recommend to NOT use them until you have a steady production of these goods.

(15) Make sure to fully staff your production facilities!
Production facilities have high upkeep - make sure you fill them to capacity to get the most out of your inputs. I had some cases where an electronic factory was actually so unproductive that it used more electronics than it produced. If your average sanity is good, feel free to also assign a night shift.

(16) Make use of the Heavy Workload option!
By clicking on the little clock icon next to a shift you can set it has a HEAVY WORKLOAD shift. Workers on heavy duty will slowly lose health (restored by the clinic) and sanity (recovered by sleeping), but on the flipside, their productivity will increase significantly. Early on manpower will be your most limiting factor, and this option allows you to get the most out of your workers when you need it the most.

(17) Inhabitants from different domes can work in the same outdoor building!
While people cannot use services of nearby domes, they can work collaboratively in outdoor buildings. So if you build two domes within range of a Mine, that mine can be staffed by colonists from both domes.

(18) Mines can access multiple deposits and deposits can support multiple mines!
You can have 2 Rare Material Extractors for a single Rare Deposit, and you can have 1 Rare Material Extractor that draws from 2 deposits within range.

(19) Do not hire Idiots if you can avoid it!
No, really. If a colonist with the Idiot trait is working in a factory, they have a chance to cause a breakdown, which will require full maintenance by a drone. Needless to say, that can be VERY costly on a lot of buildings. The trait should be filtered out by default, but double check just to be safe.

(20) Spread out production shifts on your production buildings!
Most production buildings require a lot of electricity and/or water. If you are not planning on running 3 shifts, make sure you spread them out over the day to even out electricity/water demands to match your production - solar panels only work during the day, after all. This is particularly useful for farms since they only have a single shift per day.

(21) Many buildings have multiple skins!
By clicking on the little brush icon on the right-hand side of the UI you can switch freely between these skins, even after construction. That does include domes.

(22) People can migrate between domes!
If a dome becomes overcrowded, colonists can migrate to other domes. If another dome with living space is available in proximity they will go on foot, while long-distance migration requires Shuttles.

(23) The map view shows hints for potential deposits!
When you are zoomed out to the map grid, hovering over a sector will show a tooltip that mentions which resources you are likely to find in said sector. It is not a guarantee, but a good hint where to scan first. You can even try and search for a better initial landing site by scanning a few sectors that show promises of everything if you have brought a few probes.

One of the things that were decided from the get-go with this game, was that modding would be highly encouraged and if you look at the store page you will see that even the devs have been creating a few.

Have you tried any? And if so, what did you think?

Will you be making any of your own?

One of my personal favourites is the Synthetic meat - this will probably be my favourite until someone (or maybe me, as I intend to learn how) does a farm mod so the colonists can eat the real deal!

And just to clarify, in case you are wondering - the mods won't disable achievements :)

Hey everyone,

Quill18 worked together with us to create a video tutorial series for Surviving Mars and I wanted to make sure you all got to see it!

You can watch the first episode below and the rest of the series on his YouTube channel.

https://youtu.be/mUKDzg4_MbQ

An update has been pushed. Check out the fixes by reading the patch notes here: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/new-fixes-patch-notes.1080383/

Surviving Mars is Now Available on Steam!

There will be challenges to overcome. Execute your strategy and improve your colony’s chances of survival while unlocking the mysteries of this alien world. Are you ready? Mars is waiting for you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJyw-cyynQE
We survived March - Now, you can Survive Mars!

The time to make the red planet your home is here.

Surviving Mars is available to buy right now!

Hello everyone, my name is Boyan Ivanov and I'm another lead designer of Surviving Mars. With only a day to release I want to take the time to talk to you about the research in Surviving Mars and how it allows us to make every playthrough feel and play differently.


The Basics


Some of you have already seen our research screen in previews and let's plays. There are 5 tech fields - Biotech, Engineering, Robotics, Physics and Social as well as a secret field that contains the most awesome techs in the game, but more on that a bit later... You can queue up techs from the fields for research. Each tech has a cost in research points which are generated gradually from different sources. Every time you research a tech in a given field a new one will be unlocked in that field. You can start researching and planning your progress through the tech tree the moment you arrive on Mars. Your sponsor will provide you with a basic research point production back on Earth (unless you are playing the Church of the New Ark) and you can even outsource additional research by spending some funding. However, the main way to generate research points is by building research buildings on Mars.



Eureka!

Exploring the Martian environment plays an important role in research, especially early on. As you scan the surface of Mars you will find anomalies which can be analyzed by Explorer rovers. There are different types of anomalies to find - some will provide research points and help you research techs faster; others will unlock new techs providing you with a wider choice of techs to research; some will trigger events where you'll have to make a choice.

You can read the full dev diary here: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/dev-diary-7-for-science-by-boyan-ivanov-from-haemimont-games.1079418/

It is live right now:

https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/84cft2/we_are_haemimont_games_developers_of_tropico_and/

The devs are around and happy to answer questions all day!

This is a quick look at the day one Yogscast mod for Surviving Mars.

The game is fully moddable and we are super curious as to what other mods will be created once the game is released. Any modding plans or ideas, please share - we'd love to know!

https://youtu.be/TIPFRsKrmBo

Plus, check out these sweet new buildings that are a part of the new Surviving Mars-themed DLC for Cities!

https://t.co/2LKiMIroF6

In anticipation of release - we asked Quill to put together a tutorial series, this is the first in that series!

https://youtu.be/mUKDzg4_MbQ

https://youtu.be/aima8QfXpTI

https://youtu.be/uZSoukbk7bA

https://youtu.be/Wyxg5VhiNuM

https://youtu.be/8XqKfiN6ky4

https://youtu.be/tpnEDm6oM7U

https://youtu.be/UlqxMsw422c

Hey everyone!

We are streaming again today! This time we will be joined by our colleague Shams and we are hoping we can show one of the Mysteries!

If you missed any of the last streams you can catch them below (if you have youTube autoplay on it should play the full series).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DUNAiYO_LPY

Or if you want to watch today's stream live - you can catch it at 17:00 CET here

If you have any ideas, I would love to pass these suggestions on to the Devs!

Hollie B will be attempting to build a functioning colony on Mars in her PlayStation Access live stream for 'Surviving Mars' at 2pm GMT tomorrow!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_YScuEIlGI&feature=youtu.be

Hi folks! With the release looming closer we are picking up the pace with the Dev Diaries. Today I plan to talk about the Wonders in Surviving Mars. But first, let's take a quick trip down memory lane, back to 1999 when, in the words of Douglas Adams, games were real games, and small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri were real small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri.

I adore sci-fi games of all kinds, but my single favorite of all times is Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. I remember fondly so many things about this game, but in the context of today's dev diary I want to talk about the so-called "secret projects". They were an inspiring and very thematic adaptation of the Wonders of Civilization, that proved to me that the concept could work very well in a sci-fi setting.

With Surviving Mars belonging to a totally different genre, our Wonders ended up nothing like the secret projects in Alpha Centauri, yet for me, that was the very first inspiration for them. We wanted to create a set of special late-game buildings that evoke a sense of grandeur and epic scale, each of which feels like both an achievement and a reward on its own.



You can read the full dev diary here

Are you ready to make the red planet your own? I am happy to tell you that you can pre-order your copy of Surviving Mars now!

https://youtu.be/7Js-9zMQ1oQ

We are super excited to announce that Surviving Mars will be released on March 15, 2018! Not too long to go!

While you wait, why not delve into some of the mysteries that await you on Mars!

https://youtu.be/u3swV4JJKAc

Hey guys,

Last time Boian Spasov of Haemimont (Blizzard_Haemimont), Eternal Designer, Second of his Name and Protector of Game Mechanics, promised you guys a Dev Diary that will be… mysterious. And while that Dev Diary indeed is being crafted as we speak - we’d like to wet your appetite with one in-between. And this one is about Cold Waves, their consequences and how you can protect yourself. The game is called Surviving Mars, after all, not Takin’ A Sunday Stroll On Mars.

So class, please have a seat and let’s get started. This information may well save your life one day.


What can we expect when hit by a Cold Wave?



While we don’t want to completely ‘spoil the surprise’ by talking in-depth about all of the disasters that could decimate your beautiful colony, you may safely assume that the environment on Mars is a harsh mistress. Sure, them rocks and that red sand may be looking pretty peaceful, beautiful even. But don’t be fooled. All of a sudden your Sensor Towers may be reporting an incoming Cold Wave that freezes everything in its path, turning the Red Planet white from extreme frost.

you can read the Dev Diary in full here

This year is nearly up and we are counting down until our Spring release!

Looking forward to sharing more with you all in the New Year!

Hope you all have a happy holiday season. Here's to colonising Mars together next year!

Hi everyone!

Niki (Surviving Mars, Producer) and me (Senior Community Manager) will be starting our Let's Plays of Surviving Mars on Jan 4th. These will take place weekly on a Thursday at 17:00 CET.

If you haven't seen them already, we recently did a couple of one-off streams focusing on Resources and Domes - these can be found on the Paradox Extra YouTube channel.

We hope you will join us Jan 4th - come get a better look at the game :)

Watch Video Here

Hi, folks!

I am back with the final dev diary for you this year, this time focusing on the human habitats and the lives of the colonists in Surviving Mars.

While setting up an automated colony staffed by the little drone guys can be a fun experience by itself, it also serves a larger purpose - paving the road for the first human settlements on the red planet.

But why would you need humans in your colony at all?

Thank you for the excellent question, Mr Skynet. The human colonists are required to perform many complicated tasks such as producing most of the advanced resources, managing complex underground mining endeavours and doing research. There are over 100 technologies, all unlocking new benefits for your colony. So, plenty of research to keep you busy!

You can read the full Dev Diary here

Hi everyone!

Boian Spasov from Haemimont here (@Blizzard_Haemimont here on the forum) with another dev diary on Surviving Mars. While I focused on the high-level vision in my previous diary, this time, I plan to dive in the nitty-gritty gameplay details, talking about the many resources relevant to your bold colonization mission.

Design Goals

When creating the resource system, we had three major design goals in mind

Resources are very different from one another - we didn't want to create a system where resources are differentiated by their icons on the user interface and nothing more. Quite the opposite - we made a concentrated effort to make them very different in terms of acquisition, production and/or purpose. This created a somewhat steeper learning curve compared to the typical city-builder, but opened the potential for much deeper gameplay.

Resources feel scarce - Surviving Mars is a city-builder, but it has a strong survival element. It felt right to make resource depletion and scarcity a constant problem that you will face. The decisions where to land your first rocket and where to expand require some careful planning. Scanning for new resources is important. Finding a rich deposit is a cause for celebration. Failure to secure a certain resource is a much bigger problem than in the typical game of the genre - it can even spell out the end of the entire colony. As a last-ditch effort, buildings and vehicles may be salvaged to reuse some of their construction resources in order to survive a critical situation.

Becoming self-sufficient and independent from supply with resources from Earth is an admirable long-term goal.

Resources are positional - transporting a resource to the place where it is needed is just as important as getting it produced in the first place. The bulk of the resource transportation happens automatically once set up, but a specific delivery can be manually ordered in case of an emergency.

Power cables and pipe infrastructure is present in the entire colony. Drone workers and larger vehicles carry most of the other resources here they are needed. Rocket ships land occasionally to deliver emergency supplies from Earth. Getting resources to the places where they are needed should not be trivial - underground tunnels may be required to reach isolated parts of the map and the transportation vehicles usually require resources to perform their function, threatening to shut down your carefully planned systems in case of a Power or Fuel shortage.

You can read the rest of the Dev Diary here

Hi everyone!

My name is Boian Spasov, and I've been working as a designer at Haemimont Games for more than ten years now. I have been a long time avid reader of the Paradox dev diaries, so I feel very excited to write the first dev diary for Surviving Mars. We've been teamed up with Paradox on this project for a while, but it was very hush-hush until a few months ago, so it feels really good to finally be able to talk openly about our baby.

The survival city builder in space​

Coming from the Tropico series we wanted to create something really different both in terms of theme and gameplay and I can confidently say that Surviving Mars ended up unique. Your task in Surviving Mars is to create a beautiful and functional colony on the surface of the red planet. The game is undoubtedly a city builder, but not your average city builder. It is an intimate experience focused on creating interconnected systems and testing them against the threats of the harsh environment.

Read the Dev Diary in full Website link

We have some new content. PC Gamer is showcasing our first video Dev Diary and a fantastic interview with Gabi.

To watch the video and read the interview - click here

Also, we have more new content tomorrow!

New content will soon be coming out and just to give you a taste, here are a couple of screenshots from within the game. Just a couple of drones making their way to the surface from their rocket ship and a beauty shot of the red planet's surface.