Space Engineers 2 News

Space Engineers 2 Weekly Release: Table & Structural Supports

Hello, Engineers!

This week’s update adds more decorative blocks to help you shape and furnish your builds. We’re introducing the Table, along with two new interior structure elements: Structural Support (Straight) and Structural Support (Straight Wide). These blocks are perfect for reinforcing hallways, adding detail to interiors, or just giving your base that extra touch of style.

As always, all blocks are available now!

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[h3]PSA[/h3]
There will be no Weekly Release or Dev Diary next week – the entire Keen Software House team will be attending our yearly company meetup! See you the week after, Engineers!

Given my AI agent focus this week, my SE2 time went into writing the SE2 Vision document - a comprehensive guide defining requirements, constraints, and KPIs for the team.

Our north star: Make SE2 mainstream while delivering 10x improvements across every dimension - art, code, design, quality, performance.

The key insight: SE2 will match or exceed SE1's complexity, but we're wrapping it in an accessibility layer. New players start with intuitive, manageable systems. Complexity reveals itself progressively as skills develop.

We're also prioritizing engaging gameplay loops and meaningful progression. The complexity remains - it just becomes fun to master rather than overwhelming to encounter.

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Please join us for Space Engineers 2 Developer Livestream!

🚀 Friday, June 6th, 5 PM UTC
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https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/512959549469100249
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/512958914879292598
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/651444063625545214

Space Engineers 2: Modding Sneak Peek

Vertical Slice 1.5 – Modding is closing in, and we’re almost ready to put powerful new tools in your hands. Here’s a quick sneak peek at what’s coming:

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https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/512958914879292598
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/651444063625545214
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/651444063625545231

Space Engineers 2 Weekly Release: Bed & More Armor Blocks

Hello, Engineers!

The Weekly Release is here! Today’s update adds more decorative blocks to help you shape your builds and prepare for future survival gameplay.

We’re introducing the Bed block – decorative for now, but it will become functional in Vertical Slice 2. Alongside it, we’re expanding your armor palette with two new shapes: Armor Half Corner and Armor Half Tall Slope Inverted, perfect for refining details and adding more subtle geometry to your designs.

As always, all blocks are available now!

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This week's work was mainly about survival gameplay - discussion with the designers and playtesting what already works.

[h3]Resource Gathering[/h3]
Drilling and Ore Detection - The basics work! Now we need to polish it: better animations, particle effects, and voxel deformation (how terrain changes when you drill).
[h3]Building and Repairing[/h3]
Projection Building - This is different from SE1. You place blocks as semi-transparent holograms first - just projections without physics that you can walk through. Then you weld them block by block to make them real.

Why we went this direction: You see what you're building before spending resources, you can place entire Workshop blueprints as projections, and we can bring creative mode features like undo/redo into survival - since you're just manipulating projections, not actual blocks!

Build Planner Queue - Every projection you place gets added to a build queue. This queue can be sent to production blocks to craft the components you need. It's all connected!

Repair HUD - A new concept we're working on. The game compares your current grid against the original blueprint (or a saved snapshot), shows missing blocks as projections, and displays them on your HUD (similar to GPS markers). Should make repairs much more intuitive.

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[h3]Testing the Loop[/h3]
I've been playtesting this myself. Placed cockpit projections around me - some on ground, some in air (supporting truss blocks are added to keep the block while welding it). Then I mined iron and silicon and welded them using backpack building. Very satisfying to see your build take shape!

Note: Backpack building (direct crafting) is only for early game basic blocks. Later stages require manufactured components and/or block wrappers (which I may talk about next time).
That's it for this week!

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https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/651444063625545214
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/651444063625545231
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/512957645996427006

Space Engineers 2 Block & Survival Preview: The Smelter

Hello, Engineers!

This month, we’re giving you a first look at a brand new Space Engineers 2 block: the Smelter. With Survival mode coming in VS2, this block will convert raw ores directly into simple components - unlike its older sibling, Space Engineers 2 will omit the ingot stage.

The Smelter is the first step in the production chain: its output can be used directly as ingredients for certain blocks or passed along to the next stage - the Assembler. While primarily intended for stationary setups, the Smelter is also well-suited for use on medium-sized dynamic grids.

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Want to get our teasers early and enjoy exclusive content? Subscribe to our newsletter at https://www.keenswh.com/newsletter and be the first to get the latest updates, sneak peeks, and more!

Space Editor is a handy standalone tool designed for fans of Space Engineers 2 who enjoy a bit of tinkering.

Currently it provides a simple way to edit key bindings, making it easier for players to tailor controls to their personal preferences. Another useful feature is the ability to unlock PCU limits, giving players more freedom to experiment with larger and more complex builds.

⚙️ https://github.com/InflexCZE/SpaceEditor

Additional features will be added over time. Space Editor is community project and contributions are welcome!

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/651444063625545231
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/512957645996427006
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/512957012199343550

Space Engineers 2 Weekly Release: Hydrogen Thrusters, Armor Half Slope Inverted

Hello, Engineers!

The Weekly Release is here! Today, we’re adding new decorative blocks to expand your building options and enrich your creations!

The Small, Medium, and Large Hydrogen Thrusters are a decorative addition - for now they have the same performance as Ion Thrusters. They will provide propulsion for grids in both atmosphere and space by consuming hydrogen.

We’re also adding the new Armor Half Slope Inverted block, offering more shape variety to help you create ships and stations with unique angles and subtle visual enhancements.

As always, all blocks are available now!

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Every two weeks, we hold an internal team biweekly presentation where individual teams share their progress. This week’s session was particularly exciting!

Most of the SE2 team is working on VS2, focusing on planets and survival mechanics. Here’s some of what they showcased:

Procedural World Generator: This now spawns asteroid fields and rings with a realistic distribution.
Clouds: Already in-game and visible in many screenshots (though they’re still programmer-art clouds; artists will refine them later).
Planet Flora Generator: We now have grass and trees on planets! Currently, it’s just one type of tree everywhere, but artists are working on a flora library that includes dozens of trees, bushes, fynbos, plants, and even underwater flora.
Backpack Building and Welding: This feature is nearly complete, which is exciting because we’ll soon be able to playtest the full survival game loop and start iterating on improvements.

[h3]Water Team[/h3]
The water team gave what might be their best presentation yet. They showcased several impressive improvements:

Enhanced performance.
New marching cubes for the water surface.
New particle effects for dynamic water (think waterfalls and splashes from your ship).
Improved resolution of the water simulation, plus many other upgrades.

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[h3]Art and Visuals[/h3]
The artists made another pass on improving voxel materials for the planets, and the results are stunning—screenshots are starting to look photorealistic. On top of that, our planets are fully volumetric and destructible, allowing players to dig tunnels and add materials.

The new particle effects on the Hydrogen Thrusters look fierce, and new character models are in development, which are shaping up to be very cool.

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It’s been an exciting week, and I’m looking forward to seeing how these features evolve in the coming sprints!

Full blog post: https://blog.marekrosa.org/

Please join us for Space Engineers 2 Developer Livestream!

🚀 Friday, May 23rd, 5 PM UTC
🛰️ Twitch: https://twitch.tv/keencommunitynetwork
🛰️ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@SpaceEngineers

Image Credits: Detailed Tunnel Section by Manta

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/512957645996427006
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/512957012199343550
https://steamcommunity.com/games/1133870/announcements/detail/512957012199342562