- Open source evolution simulation Thrive brings Multicellular Stage advancements - 31 August 2026
Everything that Spore could have been? A full evolution sim, Thrive, has a big new release out bringing in some brand new game mechanics. Read the full article here: https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2026/08/open-source-evolution-simulation-thrive-brings-multicellular-stage-advancements/
- Devblog #53: The Birds and the Bees Update - 30 August 2026
The time has finally come for Thrive 1.6, the third major update to the Multicellular Stage! So how come it's called 1.6? Three months have passed since the last major update, and a lot has been added in that time. So much, in fact, that everything in our roadmap planned up to version 1.6 was completed. https://thrive-media.b-cdn.net/a936953b-21b6-4b37-8270-556c69b2295f/page-fit.png Included in this update are two new reproduction modes, Sexual Reproduction and Mass budding, both in different way playing with the mechanics for having different cell types in one species. We also have the new Actomyosin Organelle that lets you create "muscle cells" which allow for large, yet fast and nimble Multicellular organisms. Stretching the membranes of individual cells makes Multicellular creations look much more cohesive, and auto-evo is now creating new AI Multicellular species! All in all, the M…
- Thrive 1.6.0 Public Beta is now Available - 22 August 2026
Some time has passed once again and it is time for a new Thrive release seen. As usual we have a public test build available today and the release is in one week so that we can fix all the problems everyone is sure to find with the test build. You will find a lot of major changes if you play this new version as is visible from the version number jump. We have new multicellular reproduction modes and improvements to previous ones, colony membranes now stretch towards colony members making gaps smaller, and we have initial auto-evo implementation for the multicellular stage! Besides the highlight features there are of course again a very long list of smaller changes and bugfixes, but we won't spoil those yet, they will be covered by the devblog coming out at the same time as the release. Before anyone plays the new build, a word of warning to users of slightly older GPUs: due to a Godot E…
- Thrive Soundtrack Expanded - 7 August 2026
News in the land of Thrive music! Recently we compiled a new full soundtrack containing music for every Thrive Stage, so we decided to update the soundtrack on Steam accordingly. Previously, it only contained the soundtrack for the completed Microbe Stage. A few previously missing Microbe Stage tracks have also been included. The soundtrack is now over 4 hours long in total runtime. All proceeds go towards supporting the continued development of Thrive. So if you are interested in listening to the Thrive soundtrack whenever you like, or just want to support Thrive even more, consider purchasing the soundtrack!
- Devblog #52: More Specialized - 23 May 2026
It's already time for the second major update of the Multicellular Stage! In the last update, we first introduced the Cell Specialization system. This has now been greatly improved upon by refinement of its calculation, expansion of its effects, and the addition of an adjacency bonus for cells of the same type. We also have an entirely new feature exclusive to the Multicellular Stage in Sporulation, our first new reproduction mode. The Multicellular Stage has also benefited from smaller improvements, such as a shortening of the time required to reproduce. https://thrive-media.b-cdn.net/28524b95-78c3-47cc-bf8d-8ca0bc42f097/page-fit.png There have also been many other significant changes to the game, such as a major update to the auto-evo system that makes it run more than twice as fast *and* produce better species. This is without mentioning balance changes to toxins, oxygen resistance,…
- Thrive 1.1.0 Public Beta is now Available - 16 May 2026
The next Thrive release is almost here, so it is time to do the usual early public testing to catch issues before they reach the stable release. The major features in this release is the greatly expanded specialization system that now extends to cell placement in the multicellular and there’s tutorials explaining the feature now. And the second big thing is that multicellular growth has been adjusted and there’s a first new reproduction mode: spores. With it you can make a special spore cell type and choose to when to start growing. Of course there are also the variety of usual fixes and improvements to various things. Most interesting of those is probably the performance improvements to the compound clouds which now have double the previous performance and even a half simulation fidelity mode which should make lower end computers much happier. To access the beta build, right click Thri…
- Thrive Patch 1.0.1.1 - 16 March 2026
This is a quick patch to fix a few problems when exiting the editor in the multicellular stage with certain cell layouts. And this release also improves auto-evo memory efficiency a lot. You can find the major updates recently done to Thrive in our previous devblog. For this release the patch notes: Patch Notes Adjusted the new cell layout algorithm to prevent stuck conditions Switched auto-evo to use cache keys for species to not keep temporary species around as long. This cuts required memory for auto-evo in half. Added a colony cell growth animation Converted species tolerance calculation result into a struct to save on some temporary memory allocations Fixed engulfing ejection animation not playing when the entity died, now the ejection animation plays and anything engulfed should properly exit the dying cell Fixed a very rare case of organelles not going to final positions in singl…
- Devblog #51: Onward to Multicellular - 7 March 2026
It's finally time for the first major update of the Multicellular Stage development process! We have a new cell specialisation feature allowing you to really take advantage of the multiple cell types you can make for your Multicellular species. Additionally, you can now control the growth order of cells, giving you far greater control over the course of life as a Multicellular organism. There are also several smaller additions and improvements to the stage, making it overall more fun to play and building a foundation for future development. Though our work is focused on the multicellular Stage, we also have some more general changes, such as a new environmental tolerances UI, updates to water currents and bigger pieces of ice in the ice sheet patch. That's not mentioning the many bug fixes, balance changes and and performance improvements. This is just the first step of Multicellular St…
- Thrive 1.0.1 Public Beta is now Available - 28 February 2026
It will be time soon to release 1.0.1, which marks the official start of the multicellular development era. But for now it is time for the customary public test build. Here are some of the things you can expect to see if you give the test build a go: controlling multicellular growth order, tolerances in multicellular and new GUI for that, various balancing changes and other smaller improvements for the multicellular stage. To access the beta build, right click Thrive in the Steam client and select the "beta" as the version to play in the properties window. Please provide any feedback you have on this test build. We are especially interested in hearing about the game feel with the new currents. You can leave feedback in the comments of this post or on our community forums here: https://community.revolutionarygamesstudio.com/t/1-0-1-release-candidate-testing/8940
- Evolution sim Thrive hits the 1.0 release completing the microbe stage - 22 December 2025
Thrive is an open source evolution sim that plans to add many different stages of life with the microbe stage now considered actually ready. Read the full article here: https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2025/12/evolution-sim-thrive-hits-the-1-0-release-completing-the-microbe-stage/
- Devblog #50: Microbe Stage Complete! - 17 December 2025
Welcome all to this very special devblog celebrating the release of Thrive version 1.0! This release marks the completion of the Microbe Stage, the first stage of the 9 planned. The Microbe stage will continue to be supported with balancing and bug fix updates, and volunteers are welcome to continue to make contributions to it. But our main development efforts will now focus on our second stage, Multicellular. In the time since version 0.9.0, we've mainly been focused on fixes, adjustments and balancing to make this release the best it could be. But that still included some more notable features. This includes: new map events to mix up compound amounts, a visualisation of your population on the patch map, a slight re-work of the functioning of the pilus and more of each species' characteristics being taken into account by our auto-evo system. Graphically, a big bug was fixed that made a…
- Thrive Release 0.9.2 - 6 December 2025
To prepare for the 1.0.0 (microbe stage completion) release, this is the second of the smaller releases leading up to it. Hopefully this will be a lot more stable than 0.9.1 was, but please keep testing and reporting any issues with this release so that we can fix the remaining problems in time for 1.0. This release is mostly continuing with the fixes that didn't make it into the previous patch. In terms of new features we mostly have just upgrades to auto-evo, which now finally takes multiple new factors into account. Besides that we got a pilus rebalance and improvements to the terrain visuals. We are less than 2 weeks away now from the full Microbe Stage release so things in Thrive are very exciting right now. Not totally related to this release, but we got an interview with a Spore developer! You can watch it here: Patch Notes Added ambient occlusion textures for terrain chunks to i…
- Thrive Patch 0.9.1.1 - 26 November 2025
This is a small bugfix release to address the most pressing problems after the 0.9.1 release, which has been our most unstable version in a long while. This release should hopefully fix the prevalent crashing problem in 0.9.1 that was caused by the new division animation. And this also addresses many MP calculation related problems that should now make the microbe stage fully playable and the prototypes mostly working (we haven't had enough testing time to fully verify). There's also some balance changes included that we felt were small and important enough to put out now to get more feedback on them. Patch notes Fixed microbe division animation trying to apply for detached physics bodies. This is likely the cause of the flood of crash reports we received. Fixed various cases of the new MP system not working correctly Fixed the new MP system to work correctly for multiple cell type edit…
- Thrive Release 0.9.1 - 22 November 2025
To prepare for the 1.0.0 (microbe stage completion) release, we are making a few smaller releases to get more player feedback on the changes we are making. The biggest changes in this release are that all the reported save loading issues should be fixed now. And the remaining MP calculation system is totally redone, again, which should now result in there not being any MP refund exploits. However, due to the tight release schedule there has not been much testing at all so please continue reporting any MP related problems. There's also of course new gameplay features like new patch events and map visuals as well as multiple auto-evo and balance improvements. You can share your feedback on the release in the comments below or on our forums here: https://community.revolutionarygamesstudio.com/t/0-9-1-general-feedback-thread/8756 Patch Notes Reimplemented the MP calculation system (again) A…
- Thrive Patch 0.9.0.1 - 4 November 2025
Here is a small patch release to fix the most reported problems after the 0.9.0 release. This fixes multiple saving problems and multiple infinite MP exploits, but there are still some non-optimal MP refund behaviour in this release and probably some more complex edits can still lead to too large MP refunds. To fully fix the MP calculation system more time is needed than what was available for this quick patch. Read the previous update for details on the new major features that 0.9.0 added. Patch Notes Fixed loading a save where endosymbiosis was started or completed Fixed 3 reported ways to exploit the microbe editor to get infinite MP Fixed loading a save made in the multicellular editor where the player had a grown colony before entering the editor Added a new system where known compatible save versions can be marked and those can be loaded without any warning popup Updated translati…
- Open source evolution sim Thrive adds graphics improvements and more planet customization - 3 November 2025
Giving evolution a little bit more visual flair, Thrive is a scientific open source sim about surviving and growing as a tiny creature. Read the full article here: https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2025/11/open-source-evolution-sim-thrive-adds-graphics-improvements-and-more-planet-customization/
- Devblog #49: Microbe Terrain - 1 November 2025
Welcome all to Thrive 0.9.0! Characterized by improvements to visuals, the environment, and gameplay polish, Thrive has begun its rapid race towards the completion of the Microbe Stage with some significant headway. Read more about these changes in the text below, including details about terrain, current visual overhauls, metabolism changes, save-system polishing, and more! https://thrive-media.b-cdn.net/0d5b50dd-2daf-49c4-a5b6-a63b8429fb65/page-fit.webp Read on for more details, or play the new version now. Shiny Rocks - Microbial Terrain https://thrive-media.b-cdn.net/35a7e038-afb8-4df7-914f-e502f7c3810e/page-fit.png A long-awaited feature, procedural terrain is now present in Thrive! With in-game material now expanded beyond compound-emitting chunks, players will now be present with more dynamic and filled environments. Terrain serves as a way to increase the visual richness of Thriv…
- Thrive 0.9.0 Public Beta is now available - 25 October 2025
After a bit of a delay, Thrive 0.9.0 is nearing a state it can be released in. Usually we put out a Release Candidate build, however this time the build is being just called a beta, because it is in much rougher shape than usual, but we are putting it out anyway as we don’t want to delay 0.9.0 further. The most major omission in the build you are likely to notice is that it is not possible to save the game while in the editor. Saving has been only reimplemented for the swimming around portion of the game. Besides the background work the most major visible new feature is the microbe terrain system that adds bit of inert terrain in many patches and the tweaked current particles and some other visuals. There are also major balance changes and new features added to auto-evo. This build had to be delayed a few weeks due to the saving reimplementation, which took much more time than expected,…
- Open source evolution sim Thrive adds planet customization - 25 August 2025
Open source evolution sim Thrive version 0.8.3 brings in some more customization in how you play, along with new additions to the gameplay. Read the full article here: https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2025/08/open-source-evolution-sim-thrive-adds-planet-customization/
- Devblog #48: Planet Achievements - 16 August 2025
Have you ever wanted to customize an alien planet? Do you yearn for the glory of making a microbial lifeform unlock an achievement? Does reading about balancing force you to the edge of your seat? If you answered yes to any of the above, then look no further: Thrive 0.8.3 is here! https://thrive-media.b-cdn.net/d62481fc-643d-4b57-8a2e-78ab348cb50d/page-fit.png Read on for more details, or play the new version now. Achievements https://thrive-media.b-cdn.net/72226c0c-b562-44f7-a9ec-e88d8610dd24/page-fit.png Achievement hunters beware: 12 achievements have now been implemented in Thrive, allowing players to measure their progress, strive for unique goals, and overall, hunt for the glory of 100% achievement progression. Massacre cells, pursue exotic metabolic strategies, and compare your progress to other Thrive players! The achievement system will be expanded upon as Thrive itself expands…
