Space Engineers 2 News

Space Engineers 2 Dev Diary: January 15, 2026

The fighter cockpit has an interesting history. It originally started as a mod on the SE1 Workshop, and it became so popular that we eventually added our own version to the base game, with the full blessing of the mod author. I always enjoy moments like this, where something born in the community becomes part of Space Engineers for everyone.

Here are the first concepts of the fighter cockpit for SE2. You can see the whole journey, from the initial black and white silhouette sketches, to the rough and more refined interior studies, and finally to the early visualizations of how the finished model might look.

It is still work in progress, but this is exactly how a block begins its life in SE2 – one line, one shape, one idea at a time.

I realized we never showed you the small version of the piston, which is coming in VS2.2. Bit by bit, VS2.2 is taking shape and it will bring the tools that survival engineering really needs.

And finally, let me show you our new stackable Wind Turbine. This block has been designed so you can place one turbine on top of another, creating a seamless look and a continuous wind blade motion across the entire stack.

To me it already feels satisfying to build with – even in this early form. I am really looking forward to seeing what kind of towers and engineering solutions you will create with this.

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Question to you: What block would you like to see return next?

Full Blog Post: https://blog.marekrosa.org/2026/01/mareks-dev-diary-january-15-2026/

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“Forged Among the Stars” – Space Engineers 1 & 2 Screenshot Competition!

Hello Engineers!

We are excited to announce a brand-new community event: “Forged Among the Stars”, a cinematic screenshot competition for both Space Engineers 1 & 2.

Have an eye for scale, atmosphere, and engineering beauty? This competition gives you the chance to capture the frontier of Space Engineers 1 & 2 and have your screenshot featured as an official loading screen, as well as showcased across Keen Software House’s social media platforms. On top of this, winners will also receive a Steam gift card.

Your screenshot could showcase a massive industrial build, a quiet moment in deep space, or a dramatic planetary scene. Whether captured in Survival or Creative, we want to see Space Engineers 1 & 2 through your perspective.

Our community events continue to deliver incredible creations, and we can’t wait to see what you capture this time.

Good luck, Engineers!

Please submit your entries to [email protected] with the subject line: “Forged Among the Stars – Screenshot Competition”

Entries must be submitted in JPG or PNG format
Minimum resolution: 1920 × 1080
Screenshots must be submitted attached to the email.
Each contestant may submit unlimited entries, but can only win once
Each submission must include:
- Screenshot title
- Your in-game name

Important restrictions:

No AI-generated images
No edited or manipulated images
No mods
Screenshots must be captured directly in-game
Submissions that match the visual style of our existing loading screens are encouraged.
No creations from established sci-fi universes or intellectual properties.

Make sure that you read the rules carefully, so you know all of the contest guidelines before submitting your screenshots.

The period for submissions begins on Friday, January 9, 2026 (UTC) and concludes on Friday, February 13, 2026 at 23:59 UTC.

During the following period, we will review all submissions to ensure quality and that the rules have been adhered to. From the eligible entries, the Keen Software House team will select 10 winners at their sole discretion.

Winners will be contacted via email and announced on Keen Software House official social media channels.

5 Winners

Screenshot featured as an official Space Engineers 1 or 2 loading screen
€20 Steam gift card

5 Honorable Mentions

Featured across Keen Software House social media
€20 Steam gift card each

[h3]TERMS AND CONDITIONS[/h3]

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Space Engineers 2 Dev Diary: January 8, 2026

Did you know planet Verdure has a moon? Its name is Palatine.

The strange similarities between our Earth in the Solar System and Verdure in the Almagest system continue even here. Palatine looks surprisingly close to our own Moon, with its barren surface, crater patterns, and quiet, airless horizon. Maybe that is just a coincidence. The universe is full of circular rocky bodies without an atmosphere, shaped by billions of years of impacts and erosion. But still… the resemblance is hard to ignore.

Seeing Verdure and Palatine together will add another layer of familiarity to the Almagest system, almost like looking at a distant echo of home. And at the same time, it opens up new possibilities for exploration, contracts, and storytelling.

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Our Art team is constantly refining our voxel textures – here is the improvement of detailing on volcanic rock.

One of the smaller concepts we have been exploring is Cable Trim detailing for use in our blocks. Right now we are experimenting with different shapes, thicknesses, and attachment styles to see what fits best into the SE2 block family. The goal is to keep the trims modular, lightweight, and easy to combine so players can use them to build their own visual language on ships and stations.

We are also testing face rigging and lip sync for our future cutscenes. This is one of those areas where I feel that even small improvements make a huge difference (the whole uncanny valley thing). When a character blinks at the right moment, or their mouth shapes the words naturally, the whole scene suddenly feels alive. Right now we are experimenting with the basic rigs, checking how well the deformations hold up, and how to sync the mouth movements with spoken lines.

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It is still early work, and everything looks a bit strange and raw at this stage, but that is exactly why it is so exciting. These first tests are where characters begin to emerge from static models into someone I can actually talk to.

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Bit by bit, this will help us bring more personality and clarity into the SE2 story moments.

What can I show you that you haven’t seen before? Camera and capacitors!

Question to you: What will you build on the Palatine moon?

Full Blog Post: https://blog.marekrosa.org/2026/01/mareks-dev-diary-january-8-2026/

Please join us for Space Engineers 2 Developer Livestream!

🚀 Friday, January 9th, 6 PM UTC
🛰️ Twitch: https://twitch.tv/keencommunitynetwork
🛰️ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@SpaceEngineers

Image Credits: Mission Runner by Diggrok

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Space Engineers 2 Dev Diary: January 1, 2026

Happy New Year, Engineers!

We are always trying to automate the more mundane tasks in our workflow and make our development pipeline faster and more reliable. Tools like this help us spend less time on repetitive manual work and more time on actual game design and content.

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Here we can see a sneak peek of our new Blender tool, which allows us to quickly generate fracture pieces for our blocks. This tool will help us speed up our workflow while maintaining consistent fracture quality across all block types.

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Creating fractures is not a simple boolean operation. It requires several steps in geometry generation, material assignment, and clean mesh separation. In the video, you can see that every time the mesh is split along an edge, we generate an additional edge with the same material as the top layer.

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The inner split uses a special damaged material with parallax mapping and shelf shadows, giving fractures more depth and a more believable broken look. This kind of automation saves a lot of time, especially as the number of blocks grows, and it lets us keep the visual quality high even when producing a large number of fracture variants.

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[h3]VS3 - Byblos WIP[/h3]

Planet Byblos will not be only a water world - it will be a world of fire and ice. The planet will push the survival experience in two extreme directions. On one side freezing temperatures and the cold depths beneath the waves. On the other side, volcanic activity that breaks the endless water surface, carving underwater channels and creating sharp, scattered islands all across the planet.

These contrasts make Byblos feel unpredictable. The meeting point of boiling heat and freezing water creates a world that is far more than just an ocean planet. It is a place shaped by constant tension between elements, with terrain that tells the story of eruptions, flows, collapses, and glacial erosion. And this is only the rough beginning of what we want to build on Byblos.

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Question to you: How do you like the planet Byblos so far?

Full Blog Post: https://blog.marekrosa.org/2026/01/my-review-of-2025-plans-for-2026/

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Space Engineers 2 Dev Diary: December 25, 2025

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all of you, Engineers!

As we reach the end of the year, I want to thank every one of you for being part of this journey. Your feedback, your builds, your videos, and your enthusiasm are what keep this project alive.

Developing Space Engineers 2 in such an open way is challenging, but your support makes it worth it. I hope the holidays bring you peace, joy, and some time to relax.

We have a lot of exciting things ahead, and I cannot wait to share them with you.

We have been running some wild tests with our volumetric clouds. Our clouds are fully 3D formations that react to light, cast shadows, respect biome patterns, and change with the time of day.

Flying through them or watching them roll across the horizon completely transforms how the planets feel. What you see here is just us playing with the system, pushing it, breaking it, and experimenting to understand how far we can take this new layer of atmosphere.

[h3]Laser antenna – from concept art to finished block.[/h3]
Let me take you on a quick journey through SE2 block creation.

The process always starts with a simple black and white sketch to lock down the basic shapes and silhouette. Once we are happy with the form, our artists begin playing with colors, materials, and paneling to find a visual language that fits the rest of the SE2 block family. After that comes a series of iterations, refining details, proportions, and functionality until the design finally feels right.

When the final sketch is approved, the block moves into 3D modeling, where all the shapes become real geometry. And from there, it is on the way to the VRAGE3 Editor. This is the moment where concept art stops being a drawing and starts becoming something you can build, place, and engineer within the game.

The Passage set of blocks is getting its turn as well. These blocks may look simple at first glance, but they are an important part of how players shape the interiors of their ships and stations. Passages define the flow of movement, the rhythm of corridors, and the way spaces feel when you walk through them. Our goal is to make them clean, practical, and modular, so you can build interior layouts that feel functional and believable.

And thanks to our 25cm unified grid system you can add any details you want!

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Question to you: Cloud planets – yes or no?

Full Blog Post: https://blog.marekrosa.org/2025/12/mareks-dev-diary-december-25-2025/

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