Gaming Space Station Designer (disclamer : might include a tiny bit of self-promotion! )

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N_Molson

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Hello Orbinauts,

I had little free time for Orbiter this last year because I was busy on a commercial project. The game is Space Station Designer, the main developer and coder is Ignacio Liverotti, and the studio is Polar Motion (we worked on BASPM too).

Space Station Designer (aka SSD) is, as the name implies, focused about designing and building space stations. The main genres are construction and management, and there are a lot of simplifications that aim to provide an interesting gameplay. What you have to do ingame is : to buy station modules, hire and manage closely your astronauts, and make sure your outpost is financially sustainable. That's where it gets really cool, as there are several ways to generate profit : industrial production of rare goods manufactured in microgravity, modules leasing, space tourism, and of course governemental subsides.​


The game is in real time, goods prices fluctuate dynamically on the market, random events and modules failure happen, all that good fun! There is much much more and the best way to get an idea is probably to try our 0.5.0 alpha release. You can downoload it for free from Steam or itch.io :​

https://polar-motion.itch.io/space-station-designer-playable-alpha

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447650/Space_Station_Designer/

The game is still under heavy development, and what you can play currently is the "first phase" of the game, that will once completed lead you through three "phases", that are sort of milestones in the expansion and development of your orbital outpost.

Last but not least SSD is meant to be an highly moddable sandbox, and you can already have a try at creating mods with the alpha version!

Feel free to give your feedback or report bugs on Steam and itch.io message boards, it will help us greatly in the development process.​

5Nge7A.png
 
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Norton won't let me run it. I have to add an exception.
Says that it detected SONAR.ProcHijack!g43 and deletes the exe.
From what I read on this, it looks like it's a false positive based on behavior.
 
Max-Q said:
Norton won't let me run it. I have to add an exception.
Says that it detected SONAR.ProcHijack!g43 and deletes the exe.
From what I read on this, it looks like it's a false positive based on behavior.
Click to expand...

Thank you very much, the information has been relayed to the coder (y)
 
Ouacaze said:
Wow ! Nice !
Congratulations from a fellow Toulousain ;)
Are you an independant dev ?
Click to expand...

Thanks ! The lead developper is Ignacio Liverotti, the 2D/3D artist Mauricio Sanjuro and we are a small independent studio (Polar Motion). :)
 
Space Station Designer v0.5.15 is out ! The last update of the year ! 🥳

A lot of changes, we really reworked many things, including :

  • A redesign of the 'Campaign' mode.
  • Changes to the existing 'Sandbox' mode.
  • A new 'Sandbox' mode, now called 'Free Builder'.
  • New maintenance-related modules, such as the intermediate and advanced variants of the Airlock, along with the newly introduced 'Maintenance Workshop'.
  • Various changes to the 'Earth Facilities' mechanics.
  • Extensive balancing and fine-tuning of the game's database.
  • and so on...

Feel free to play the first Phase of the campaign (roughly 12 in-game years!) on Windows or MacOS and give us your feedback :

On Steam :

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447650/Space_Station_Designer/

On itch.io :

https://polar-motion.itch.io/space-station-designer-playable-alpha/devlog/658385/space-station-designer-version-0515-is-now-available

Devblog :

https://polar-motion.com/devblog/

884796d37e3ba95436c6e56155fa8962c34b343a.png


976edaf5a98ccb32c876257dbf1fd84d6ea993e2.png
 
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Space Station Designer v0.5.22 is out !

On Steam : https://steamcommunity.com/app/1447650
On itch.io : https://polar-motion.itch.io/space-...tation-designer-version-0520-is-now-available

  • Added a new set of campaign objectives for the early stages of the Campaign
  • Tweaked the tech tree so that research technologies can only be acquired using research points
  • Implemented cooling/electricty proximity rules. Modules located far from cooling/electricity modules will suffer penalizations
  • Added a panel in the module installation screen so that it's easier to visualize how the new module is going to impact the station's stats
  • Failed modules within the proximity of a 'Maintenance Workshop Module' will now benefit from increased chances of repair success
Edit : v0.5.22 : hotfix regarding tutorials we forgot to update.

New "EVA experiments" module, allowing to generate Research Points very early in the game, available as "Base space station tech" (got inspiration from the Kibo JAXA ISS module) :

8ccc6d9afb5d79784140484884f4e25b5e4ea71d.png


New "Module installation panel" :

5d9b142c3f173521b4d68faba4862907c0648846.png
 
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Space Station Designer v0.5.25 is out !

On Steam : https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447650/Space_Station_Designer
On itch.io : https://polar-motion.itch.io/space-...tation-designer-version-0525-is-now-available

To put it shortly, we have completely overhauled the propulsion mechanic, it should now be more realistic and take basic physics into account!

  • Replaced the previous propulsion/mass mechanic with a new system that makes the distinction between 'orbit control' and 'attitude control'. This includes new modules (thrusters pods), changes to the UI, changes to the way the orbital decay is computed, and changes to the Debris Avoidance Maneuver (DAM).
  • Added a mechanism for relocating modules with propulsion capabilities in order to maintain a healthy orbit control/attitude control score as the station evolves. Note that relocating modules effectively reduce their service life.
  • Implemented new 'Orbit control and attitude control' interactive tutorial.
  • Changed the Debris Avoidance Maneuver (DAM) mechanics in order to reflect all the changes to the propulsion system. Now the 'average throttle' set by the player will determine the amount of space station modules that can be potentially affected by the debris, whereas the 'attitude control' score will determine the probability of those modules to actually suffer damage. We've also modified the mechanics so that the service life of the thrusters pods used during the DAM is decreased.
  • ... and many other fixes!

Propulsion_update.png
 
Back when the Shuttle first started to fly NASA had a screen shot from mission control called 3D world that looked a lot like this. It would be great to see this in a MFD to help track spacecraft in Orbiter. Thought I had a screen shot but cant find it
 
The project is going well. We added a lot of features and mechanics recently (Ignacio is the coder, he is doing the hard work). Playing through the 'Phase I' takes me like 7 hours, and at this point I'm probably the person that played the game the most on Earth, as I'm doing the testing (lol).

There are very goods news in the tubes, but I can't say more for now! 🚄
 
Space Station Designer v0.5.35 is out !

On Steam : https://store.steampowered.com/app/1447650/Space_Station_Designer/
On itch.io : https://polar-motion.itch.io/space-station-designer-playable-alpha

Many Quality of Life improvements on this update, also now the game can be played to the end of Phase II ! QoL improvements include various interface improvements and features, along them the possiblity to team up the astronauts into crews using colors tags.

Phase II introduces new concepts and mechanics such as Space Tourism, Modules Leasing and Commercial Services. There's also a new set of 20 contracts.

Here's the Steam announcement post :
steamcommunity.com

Steam Community :: Space Station Designer

Space Station Designer - Space Station Designer is a construction and management game that puts you in charge of creating and expanding a network of space stations in Earth and Lunar orbits.
steamcommunity.com steamcommunity.com

Phase II.jpg
 
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Oh man, how did I not notice this thread sooner, this looks awesome! Definitely going on my wishlist.
 
So, we've been in talks with our 'historical' publisher, Slitherine, for a couple of months. We worked with them for BASPM (speaking of which, there's a -80% sale on Steam). So Space Station Designer is now officially a Slitherine product :

store.steampowered.com

Space Station Designer - Polar Motion and Slitherine teaming up to elevate Space Station Designer - Steam News

Space tourism, modules leasing, commercial services, new contracts, and more!
store.steampowered.com store.steampowered.com

Beta-test application here : https://www.slitherine.com/beta/space-station-designer
 
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https://www.pcgamesn.com/space-station-designer/new-strategy-game-beta

Warhammer 40k publisher’s new strategy game is like Cities Skylines 2 in space​


From the publisher behind Warhammer 40k Gladius, Space Station Designer challenges you to build a functioning colony in deepest space.

Ed Smith
Published: 1 day ago
Space Station Designer

Sometimes, I look at my constituents in Cities Skylines 2 and I think ‘yes, I would like to blast you into outer space.’ If it’s not garbage collection they’re complaining about, it’s traffic, or bus routes, or that taxes are too high, or that the weather is too warm and it’s melting the ice cubes in their cocktail. I want to take the whole city and just eject it into the stratosphere. Space Station Designer lets me live out that dream (albeit with a more optimistic and humane tone). A strategy game set in the deepest reaches of the big black, it feels like Cities, mixed with Manor Lords, mixed with space. Published by Slitherine, the label behind Warhammer 40k Gladius, if this sounds like your thing, you’re in luck – a demo just went live.

At the start of Space Station Designer, you’re approached by four of the world’s biggest superpowers: The USA, Russia, China, and the European Union. Each wants you to construct a space station on their behalf and offers different incentives. Sign up with the US and you start the game with more cash, for example. Once you’ve picked an ally, you launch your first core module and, after that, it becomes a strategy game of collecting resources, managing astronauts and staff, and gradually expanding outwards.

As well as building the ideal space station, you’re responsible for forging new and better supply lines between the Earth and the cosmos. Random events will disrupt your progress and the morale of your staff will fluctuate depending on their assignments. Ultimately, you want to climb the tech tree and push beyond the exosphere, exploring into mid and then high Earth orbit, and eventually establishing a station close to The Moon. Your contract, however, is only for 50 years, so although you can explore and experiment with new designs, you need to balance your creativity with practicality.

While we’re waiting on a release date, Space Station Designer has a new beta that lets you try the campaign, sandbox, and no-limits free builder modes. Developer Polar Motion says the beta contains about 24 hours worth of total material, so there is plenty to explore. If you want to try it out, head to the game’s official Discord here.

Otherwise, try some of the best space games, or maybe the best simulation games available today on PC.

You can also follow us on Google News for daily PC games news, reviews, and guides, or grab our PCGN deals tracker to net yourself some bargains.

Ed Smith : Previously of Edge, Vice, Polygon, and the BBC, Ed is symbiotically connected to the gaming news matrix, covering everything from Cities Skylines 2 road tools, to Half-Life mods, and classic boomer shooters. Between Counter-Strike 2, Starfield, and Resident Evil - as well as everything and anything related to GTA 6 - he has a close eye on the heady world of videogames, and can often be found lamenting the tragedy that IO Interactive’s Freedom Fighters never got a sequel. He was once in the top ten for speedrunning the original Resident Evil 2 and has a weird knowledge of how RNG works in Doom.​
 
Hello all,

It's been a while since we posted an update of our game 'Space Station Designer'. The development process continues at a steady pace, and during 2025 we've published several updates.

DevDiary09-BannerImage(1).png
A station in LEO

The full list of changes is quite extensive, but some notable mentions include realtime currencies, an improved rendering system, loads of new game mechanics that tie the stations across various orbits (LEO, GSO, L2, and L1) much more tightly, and of course the Lunar Space Elevator Megaproject. If you're curious about the details, we keep a live release notes document here.

LSE.jpg
A station in Lunar Orbit

DevDiary09-01.jpg
The Global Screen

In addition to this, we've published a series of Development Diaries that go deep into certain aspects of the game. If you're interested in them, you can find the full list here:

Dev Diary #1 - Introduction to Space Station Designer - Part I
Dev Diary #2 - Introduction to Space Station Designer - Part II
Dev Diary #3 - The station in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) - Part I
Dev Diary #4 - The station in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) - Part II
Dev Diary #5 - The station in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) - Part III
Dev Diary #6 - The station in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) - Part IV
Dev Diary #7 - The station in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) - Part V
Dev Diary #8 - The station in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) - Part VI
Dev Diary #9 - The station in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) - Part VII
Dev Diary #10 - Stations in Higher Earth Orbits - Part I
Dev Diary #11 - Stations in Higher Earth Orbits - Part II
Dev Diary #12 - The Lunar Orbit Station - Part I

DevDiary10-01.jpg
Station in GSO

There is a lot of content in place, with the full Campaign featuring over 40 hours worth of gameplay. We don't have a firm release date yet, but if you're interested in trying 'Space Station Designer' and give us your feedback, you can apply to our closed beta here.

Feel free to share your thoughts about the game with us!

Cheers,

Ignacio, Nicolas & Mauricio from Polar Motion
 
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Dear Station Designers,

Back in early September we released 'Space Station Designer' version 0.5.72, which included a series of improvements and a whole revised set of Interactive Tutorials. Today we're happy to unveil 'Space Station Designer' version 0.5.90, which is exclusively focused on polishing the overall game experience. Please read on to learn about the main highlights. You can find full detailed release notes here if you're interested in the details.
​

Improved Visuals, Music, and SFX​

We went through every screen in the game and added a coat of paint by including a series of animated backgrounds, which add a touch of personality compared to the dark backgrounds used in previous versions.​

1764948854641.png
1764948881327.png

In addition to this, we expanded the game's OST by including a range of new tracks, and added sound effects across the whole user interface. Unfortunately, we cannot provide any screenshots for these two additions, but we're sure you'll like them!
​

Improved Strings System​

The strings system has been revamped so that it includes not only characters, but also the various symbols and icons used throughout the game. This helps reduce the amount of 'walls of text', while also helping reinforce the game's concepts with their associated icons.​

1764948920355.png​

Information Awareness Tools

We continue conducting heavy playtesting of 'Space Station Designer', and despite the fact that we're getting really good at it, we realise that the late stages of the game can be quite intense: random events, multiple ongoing engagements, a large astronaut roster, four full stations to manage, etc. To help players stay on top of things, we implemented an overlay mechanism that identifies the modules that require their attention. This includes modules that:​

  • Are being refurbished.
  • Are inoperative.
  • Are missing a connection with a Core Module or a Control Center.
  • Are too far away from a Cooling module.
  • Are too far away from an Electricity module.
  • Are partially inoperative.
  • Are part of a Production Line that doesn't have adequate inputs to complete its monthly production.
  • Is a Manufacturing module that isn't currently assigned to a Production Line.
  • Has reached the end of its Service Life.
  • Is getting close to reaching the end of its Service Life.
  • Has no astronaut assigned to it (note that this is only applicable for Research and Industrial R&D modules).
1764948952782.png

We also took this concept one step further and added a mechanism in the Global Screen that points to the stations that require attention, too.

1764948983097.png

We've also added an indicator to let players know that there are no Research Technologies in development. This is particularly useful after the recently introduced changes in the Research system where technologies are no longer instantly acquired.​

1764949003114.png

Management Tools Enhancements​

As mentioned in an earlier section, the cognitive load in the late stages of the game can be particularly high. To address this, we revamped the 'Dispatch Resupply Spacecraft' screen so that it includes the resupply spacecraft across all stations. We've also added additional sorting buttons, so that it's easier to find out, for example, which resupply spacecraft needs to be deorbited first based on its remaining autonomy.​

1764949026796.png

We've also extended the astronaut management screen by including additional sorting buttons, and added a visual indicator that indicates the number of astronauts approaching their max stay at the station. This is particularly useful when coordinating crews across all four stations.​

1764949057233.png

Some additional management-related QoL improvements include a mechanism to open the 'Production Lines' management screen from within the module information card, and a button to unassign astronauts from their current task, provided that it's not a long-term commitment (e.g., Space Tourism, or a Commercial Services engagement).
​

Other Minor QoL Improvements​

In addition to the management-related QoL improvements mentioned earlier, we've included some minor ones, including 'trackers' to the Contracts and the Campaign Objectives, more 'input' settings, and the removal of some confirmation dialogs which were slowing down the game experience (we may end up removing even more in future updates). We've also extended the save game slots, which now support a short description. This is handy for managing multiple game files!​

1764949090280.png

Bug Fixes​

No update is complete without a bug fix or two! You can find the full list in the release notes, but some notable offenders in this release include UV mapping issues in the Spaceport modules and minor string glitches. A special mention goes to the one that was causing a 'black halo' around the Core Module's launch rocket.
​

Closing thoughts​

We hope you enjoy all the improvements brought by this new update. We're currently running a closed beta, so if you want to give it a go, please consider applying by using the following link.

This will be the last update of the year. For the next version, we'll be focussing on gameplay additions, new content, and more QoL improvements. We continue monitoring our Discord server and the forums, so don't hesitate to let us know if you have any feedback or comments.​

--Ignacio, Mauricio, and Nicolas (Polar Motion)
 
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