Space Engineers — Space Engineers: Apex Survival Live Now! release notes

Hello, Engineers!

We’re excited to introduce Apex Survival, the next major evolution of Space Engineers. This free update brings new survival mechanics to the game, adding food, farming, environmental hazards, meaningful death and a brand-new buff system.

Everything is optional and fully configurable – you can fine-tune the experience to suit your playstyle. Whether you want a hardcore survival challenge where venturing outside a grid is a constant threat, or a relaxed farming loop while building your perfect base, Apex Survival lets you decide how to play.

The Apex Survival Pack includes new decorative blocks accompanying this update – perfect for bringing your bases to life. Add lush greenery, detailed grow spaces, and new design variants to create habitats that feel vibrant and lived-in.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3858380/Space_Engineers__Apex_Survival_Pack/

We’re bringing you all the important gameplay changes for free in our Apex Survival Update.

You don’t need to start a brand-new world to experience the new features (including the new Space encounters) – they can all be enabled on your old saves.

Food is now a core survival mechanic in Apex Survival, enabled by default in all new survival worlds (and off by default in creative mode). A new food bar has been added to the HUD when enabled, giving you another vital resource to manage.

Food consumption is customizable with a new world setting:

Disabled – Food system is off
Slow – 3 hours from full to empty
Moderate (Default) – 1.5 hours
Fast – 45 minutes Let your food bar run dry, and you’ll take damage until death. Drop below 20% food and you’ll face debuffs – losing 1% movement speed per missing percent, and eventually losing the ability to sprint entirely.

🥕 Food Items & Ingredients

Apex Survival introduces 9 new food items that act as ingredients for crafting Meal Packs. While many of these can be eaten raw in a pinch, their nutritional value is limited – combining them into prepared meals is the key to efficient survival. Planning your food supply and crafting recipes will give you a big advantage when living off the land.

🌿 Foraging, Hunting, and Obtaining Food Items

Food in Apex Survival comes from a variety of sources. Algae is your most basic and accessible food source, harvested using the Algae Farm block. It's not glamorous, but it gets the job done, making it ideal for early survival in any environment.

Other ingredients can be found through foraging, hunting, and exploration:

New forageable bushes spawn across Pertam, Earthlike and Alien planets. Earthlike is the richest in vegetation, while Pertam is sparse and Alien is rich in edible mushrooms.
These can be harvested by hand or via Collector blocks, and they will respawn over time if cleanup conditions are met.
Wolves now drop Mammal Meat, and Sabiroids drop Insect Meat.
NPCs and Encounters may contain lootable food items, especially in kitchen areas.
Unknown Signals often hold seeds, and NPC Trade Stations sell both seeds and food supplies.

🌱 Harvesting Seeds

To start farming, you’ll need seeds - and that’s where the Food Processor comes in. Inside its production menu, you’ll find a "Harvesting" category that allows you to convert Fruit, Grain, Mushroom, and Vegetable items into Seed or Spore Packs. These can then be placed in Farm Plots to begin growing your own renewable food sources.

🌾 Farming

Farming in Apex Survival is split between two key blocks: the Algae Farm and the Farm Plot.

Algae Farms are low-maintenance, sunlight-driven blocks that generate Algae over time. They don’t require special components or upkeep, but their output depends entirely on sun exposure. They’re a great early-game food source and work well in most situations.

Farm Plots are more complex but also far more rewarding. These blocks require active maintenance and care to function efficiently. They come with an internal water tank that must be filled via an attached Irrigation System - a block that processes ice into water for your crops. No water means dead crops.

Farm Plots grow Fruit, Grain, Mushrooms, and Vegetables, each with unique growth speeds, water consumption, and yields. Crops have health values and are sensitive to environmental factors:

Running out of water causes gradual health loss.
Exposure to vacuum or extreme temperatures kills crops in seconds.
Damaging the plot kills the crop.
Grinding the plot removes the crop.
Crops below 100% health can still be harvested, but with reduced yield. Each crop passes through multiple growth stages, and once fully grown, water consumption drops by 90%, allowing you to leave crops as decorative elements with minimal upkeep.

Farming interactions:

Manual Harvest: Use the management screen to collect crops directly into your inventory.
Automated Harvest: Use a Collector on a subgrid placed near the plot to harvest automatically into your grid’s inventory. (Same-grid collection is not supported.)

Farming Tips

Water Is Life: The Farm Plot has an internal water tank. It must be filled via an Irrigation System, which processes ice into usable water. Without water, crops quickly lose health and may die.
Power Matters: The Farm Plot consumes 20 watts of power. Turning it off disables the light and water intake – but crops will still grow and consume water. Only damage or disabling the block will kill the crop instantly.
The built-in light on the Farm Plot is for ambiance only and has no gameplay impact. Turning off the block disables the light and stops water from refilling, but crops will still grow as normal.
Growth & Harvest: Each crop type has a full lifecycle with health, growth stages, and a recovery rate. Once mature, they can be harvested manually or automatically using collectors (on subgrids only). If a crop’s health drops to zero, it will perish.
Mod-Friendly Design: The Farm Plot supports a wide array of customization for mods, including multiple seed types, growth models, recovery rates, and water needs. Modders can define custom behavior and visuals per crop type – even requiring more seeds for larger plot types.

🥩 Meal Pack Crafting

Survival in Apex isn't just about finding food - it's about making it count. The Survival Kit can craft the most basic ration: Kelp Crisp, made solely from algae. It’s low-effort, low-impact, and great in a pinch.

For more advanced meals, you’ll need the Food Processor. This block serves as a more advanced crafting hub for all food items. In addition to cooking raw Mammal and Insect Meat, making them safe to eat, it offers a wide variety of Meal Pack recipes that use multiple ingredients. The more complex the recipe, the better the food’s nutritional value and the longer it will sustain you.

And good news, everyone: Food never spoils - so you can stock up and prepare in advance for longer journeys or hostile environments.

🎁 Looted/Easter Egg Food Items

We’ve also added rare, loot-only consumables that can’t be crafted in the Food Processor and are only found through exploration, encounters, or looting NPCs. But beware - not everything you scavenge is safe. Some of these "delicacies" might come with unexpected (or unpleasant) side effects.

Are you hungry enough to take the risk? You never know - it might just be worth it…

Apex Survival introduces new mechanics that can make staying alive more rewarding – and dying more costly.

New World Option: Reduced Stats on Respawn

To raise the stakes, the new Reduced Stats on Respawn world option starts you at just 20% across all vitals (health, food, energy, oxygen, and hydrogen) when you respawn outside of a starter craft. It’s no longer just a quick reset – death has become something to avoid.

New World Option: Survival Buffs

With the new Survival Buff system, your character gains powerful bonuses for surviving the dangers of the frontier. Every 45 minutes spent alive grants a level, which gives you significant advantages at maximum level. But beware: dying resets all progress. Survival ensures your hard-earned buffs.

You can check your active buffs at any time with Shift+B, or rebind this in your game options.

Space is no longer just cold and empty – now it’s dangerous, too. Apex Survival adds environmental hazards like weather, radiation, and updated meteor storms that directly affect your survival and your builds.

Radiation

Radiation introduces a persistent environmental threat that challenges players to build smart, stay shielded, and monitor their surroundings.

How Radiation Works:

Radiation accumulates when near a source and decreases when no longer exposed.
Safe spaces include sealed/pressurized environments, airtight cockpits, and cryopods.
At values above 75 radiation, characters begin to take damage.
At 100 radiation, damage increases significantly.
The character’s radiation level is shown on the HUD.
Note: Playing with Radiation requires Airtightness to also be enabled in the world’s settings. Solar Radiation
The sun becomes a radiation emitter.
This type of radiation is disabled by default. We view this radiation source as a “Hardcore” player’s setting. There is a dropdown in world settings which modifies the intensity of solar radiation, allowing it to be configured to the player’s desired level of difficulty.
Exposure depends on whether the character is in direct sunlight.
The atmosphere on Earth-Like, Alien, Titan, and Triton provide full protection.
Mars and Pertam provide reduced protection, not enough to prevent exposure over time.
The Moon and Europa offer no protection at all.

Planetary Radiation

Europa is now a source of radiation, exposing the character to higher amounts the closer they get to the surface. Weather-Based Radiation
Certain weather conditions are now radioactive:
Electric Storms on Pertam
Toxic Haze on the Alien planet
Rain has a cleansing effect, gradually reducing radiation buildup. Block-Based Radiation
Damaged reactors now leak radiation. The closer the character is to the damaged reactor, the higher their exposure level.
Unlike other sources, this radiation is powerful and can leak through grids and structures - there is no cover, and it can be very dangerous if left unattended.
Reactor size directly impacts the amount of radiation gained per second, and also dictates the size of the contaminated area.
Only Nuclear Reactor blocks are impacted, the Prototech Fusion Reactor does not emit radiation when damaged. Radiation Countermeasures
A new consumable has been added: Anti-Radiation MedKit
Grants 10 minutes of immunity from all radiation sources.
Gradually clears accumulated radiation over 30 seconds.
This item can not be crafted, and can only be looted from encounters and NPC storage.

Weather Hazards

All weather effects have been updated with new values and improved visuals. Some extreme weather types are now directly hazardous to characters, dealing damage over time when exposed. Grids are not affected, and shelter will fully protect characters from these effects.

Sandstorms can be encountered on Mars, Titan, Pertam, Earthlike and Alien planets.
Hailstorms can be encountered on Mars, Titan, Triton, Earthlike and Alien planets.
Caustic Rain and Toxic Haze can be encountered on the Alien Planet.
Electric Storms can be encountered on Pertam.

Meteors

Meteors have been reworked to feel more natural and immersive. Meteors can still damage players and grids, they’re no longer a primary threat – instead, they bring excitement to otherwise quiet corners of the universe.

Meteors no longer target grids directly. Instead, they spawn near the player and pass through the area, adding atmospheric flair rather than devastation.
A new event system ensures that meteor showers don’t stack in multiplayer – no more getting hit repeatedly just because you’re near other players.
Meteors no longer deform voxels or leave craters on impact.
Planets like Earthlike and Alien have thick atmospheres that block meteors entirely, making them safe zones.

Apex Survival brings a fresh batch of content to space with 30 brand-new Space Encounters. These new encounters offer a wide range of gameplay – from curious exploration opportunities and light storytelling to unexpected dangers that will challenge your survival instincts. All legacy encounters have been removed, ensuring every encounter you discover feels new and purpose-built for the current game experience.

These random Encounters remain a space-exclusive feature and spawn only at predefined locations determined by your world seed. The system itself hasn't changed, but to improve clarity, the world setting formerly known as “Encounter Density” has been renamed to “Random Encounter Density.” This setting still controls how frequently these encounters appear in your world.

Reorganized World Settings

The world settings menu has been streamlined and reorganized into clear, intuitive categories. Settings are now grouped based on their function, making it easier to find and adjust the options that matter most for your gameplay style.

Additionally, tooltips for all world settings have been revised for clarity - giving you better insight into how each setting affects your survival experience.

We’ve substantially increased the drop rates for all skins on Steam from Unknown Signals until September 22. Strong Unknown Signals, which have a chance to drop the rarest skins, are especially rewarding during this period. We’ve also reduced the cooldown between possible skin drops, so you’ll have more chances to earn cosmetic rewards as you play.

Happy hunting, Engineers!

The next 208 update will bring a welcome focus on bug fixes and quality-of-life improvements. We’re also researching the much-requested joystick support, and we still have a few surprises up our sleeve.

Over the past updates, we've reworked nearly every aspect of PvE: Prototech, Factorum global encounters and planetary encounters in Contact, Cargo Ships and Unknown Signals in Fieldwork, and now Hazards and Space Encounters in Apex Survival. The last major piece of that PvE puzzle? Economy stations and missions in the 209 update.

We can’t wait to show you what’s next.

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**Algae Farm** (1 block, L grid) - The Algae Farm passively produces a very small amount of the algae item for use in crafting rations. When in sunlight this block produces items, which are deposited directly into its own inventory. Efficiency is dependent upon how direct the sun exposure is on the block.

**Farm Plot ** (1 block, L grid) - An open planter bed with soil at the center. Perfect for cultivating a wide range of crops.

**Irrigation System** (1 block, L grid) - This block consumes ice and distributes water to all connected planter beds.

**Food Processor** (1 block, L grid) - An advanced food preparation and packaging system capable of crafting a wide range of meal packs and harvesting seeds and spores for gardening.

We are always looking for ways to improve, and that includes adding value to prior releases. During this update, we are adding new content to Fieldwork Pack[/u