- Devlog 6: Working on Civilizations update - 22 August 2026
Hi everyone!This is a quick update with the current development status of the Civilizations update.The bottom menu size and content has been reduced, so it doesn't take too much screen space and it shows mostly resources and current global status of the city.On the other hand, the demography menu now contains the temperature tolerance bar. However, I'm thinking on doing changes here so there won't be a global temperature tolerance, but... it will work per tile. So, you can have some areas of the city that are OK, but other areas are freezing. This will open new survival strategies such as allocating some space for buildings that will warm/cool the area.Of course, this means a new menu ("habitability menu" maybe?) should be added.Also, the resources menus got improvements showing now all sources that increase or consume each specific resource:Buildings menu has been totally reworked agai…
- Release notes v0.7.8.6 - 20 July 2026
Bug fixes Quick update to fix a new crashing issue with AMD GPUs introduced after adding new shaders for volumetric clouds.
- Release notes v0.7.8.5 - 16 July 2026
New features Added volumetric clouds to replace the old clouds rendering. Changes Adjustments in dust remover tool. Adjustments in terrain modifier tool. Decreased the probability of disasters based on Core Heat. Shake screen only in closer zooms and when the location is visible. No more shaking when a meteor or earthquake happens in the other side of the planet. Bug fixes Fixed dust percentage not counting properly. Fixed stats screen not showing values properly.OLD FLAT TEXTURE CLOUDS:NEW VOLUMETRIC CLOUDS:INSIDE THE PLANET:
- Devlog 5: Working on Civilizations update - 10 June 2026
Hi everyone!After some few updates and making the game compatible with Steam Deck, I returned back to my regular work on Civilizations update.This time I would like to show you things.DEMOGRAPHYFirst, I changed how population work in cities, from a single overall population number into something a bit more complex based on ages and groups of demography.If we have creatures with different ages, why not the same for cities?We will have three groups of age: young, adult and elder.Each of them will have different properties, for example in this image you can see that only adults and elder people can be workers and used in the city production.Also, there is a graph showing how demography is distributed per age.For now, I will try to keep it simple, but this will allow some more flexibility for future features.VEHICLE EDITORI shouldn't add more scope to the update, but anyway... I think this…
- Shape the planet and evolve strange creatures in Planetary Life with Steam Deck support - 25 May 2026
Planetary Life is an intriguing looking planet and life sandbox simulation game, where you get to shape everything from the planet to the creatures. Read the full article here: https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2026/05/shape-the-planet-and-evolve-strange-creatures-in-planetary-life-with-steam-deck-support/
- Release notes v0.7.8.4 - 21 May 2026
Bug fixes Fixed bug causing the game to crash, specially after loading game. Fixed bug not loading components help screen. Fixed bug causing the game to throw many errors when changing zoom in a situation with a lot of creatures. Increased a bit the camera horizontal rendering range, to reduce the pop-in effect of things when moving camera.
- Release notes v0.7.8.3 - 19 May 2026
Hot fixed a bug causing some players not able to initialize the game getting stuck in the loading screen.
- Release notes v0.7.8.2 - 19 May 2026
New features Added DirectX rendering server option. Changes Upgraded game engine. This will potentially fix issues related to black spots when using RTX 5000 series GPU. Bug fixes Fixed visual bug in water caustics when using Nvidia cards.
- Release notes v0.7.8.1 - Japanese added! - 16 May 2026
I know everyone was expecting Civilizations update to be the next, but as you can see, and unexpectedly, Planetary Life is on Steam's Daily Deal so an update was needed to follow this big day!Also, by popular demand Japanese language is being added.About Civilizations update, don't worry, this was just a little break to do some changes and additions, but I keep working hard. Soon, I will upload a new devlog about it.For now, enjoy this new update and welcome to all Japanese players :-)いらっしゃいませ！New featuresAdded Japanese language. Added individual logs for creatures and plants.Added button to find creatures/plants/fungi from the encyclopedia.Added new tooltips explaining gases and fertile land.Added total population for plants and fungi in the encyclopedia.Added new simplified time display system for some screens to avoid visually huge numbers breaking the UI.ChangesIncreased fungi repro…
- Release notes v0.7.8.0 - 12 May 2026
New features Added Steam Deck compatibility. Font size adjustments for small screens and Steam Deck. Added Plant editor in the main menu. Added Fungi editor in the main menu. Showing current player/game name when hovering on main menu’s Continue button. Changes Removed unaffected color by light from creature’s outlines causing to be bright during the night time.
- Devlog 4: Working on Civilizations update - 12 April 2026
Hi everyone!It's been a while since the last update. Civilizations is hard to implement, it's almost like adding a new game inside the current game. But I'm getting there!I think I have (now yes!) all system on place and I'm happy with the current state of the systems, so moving forward it will be about adding the content, assets and polishing.Sadly, despite of the time lapse since the last devlog, I cannot show you too much :(Not because of lack of content, but because I want to keep few things for myself until they are in better state to show.OK, now, let's talk about main the changes since the previous devlog!PRODUCTIONThe new production system it's a bit more complex than before, so I will explain column by column:1- Base production per worker: In the example, 1 worker will produce 0.8 of food. 2- Nature potential: based on natural resources around the city, this value will go from…
- Devlog 3: Working on Civilizations update - 13 February 2026
It's been a while since the last time. And I understand that people is getting worried about when the next update is coming, I would be too if I were in your shoes.Sadly, as usual, this is taking more time than expected :-(On one hand, because Christmas is a terrible period for productivity: celebrations, family stuff, etc...But also because... I decided to rebuild some systems again (sorry!).Last time I showed you the building menu, the culture menu, negotiation screen and religion & politics.Do you remember that building menu? Well... it has been changed again ːsteamfacepalmːBUILDING SYSTEMBefore, it was a circular grid with fixed positions for all buildings, limited to around 40 building slots around the city center.But now, it's tiled based!This means, you will be free to choose adjacent tiles an expand your city in any direction, adding up to three buildings per tile.This allows mo…
- Release notes v0.7.7.4 - 28 December 2025
Bug fixes Fixed potential crash when playing the game in a non-supported language (thanks to Svardmastaren for finding it!). Fixed error causing to no recovery settings from the backup.
- Release notes v0.7.7.3 - 23 December 2025
Bug fixes Fixed visual glitch on plants. Fixed mouse cursor appearing under some controls.
- Devlog 2: Working on Civilizations update - 20 December 2025
I continue working on Civilizations update, and this is taking some time, more than expected, but well... we can say that the usual in game development.Meanwhile, I will try, time to time, to upload some updates about other stuff.In terms of development, currently, the most difficult part is the design of the system.How everything it should work? How to fit Civilizations with the current game? How many options and menus?Previously, I uploaded another devlog showing an screen of the progress, today you will see that screen doesn't exist anymore. This is because of the continuous cycle of doing and redoing everything after testing some stuff or realizing that maybe it wasn't good enough or not in the expected direction.I would like to share with all of you some information and screenshots, and explain what is my plan and how I'm designing everything.As usual, everything you will see here,…
- Release notes v0.7.7.2 - 19 December 2025
New features Added HOME button to return directly to your home star. This will avoid softlock when you run out of energy and you are in another star where you cannot claim a new planet. But, to travel back to your star home you will need to pay with all your energy as punishment! Added new rare colors for planets. Changes Improved the area of shadow of the planet. This will fix an issue with poles not being cold anymore, and also improves the tidally locked planet’s hot/cold areas. Improved tidally locked hot/cold areas: Improved tidally locked hot/cold areas:
- Release notes v0.7.7.1 - 16 December 2025
Really minor one to fix one little annoying thing. Changes Reduced the snow/underwater fog intensity. Showing virtual keyboard in all input fields when running the game in Steam Deck.
- Release notes 0.7.7.0 - 14 December 2025
While I continue working on the exhausting Civilizations update, I decided to take a break for a few days to work on something different and give you an update. This patch contains some new small stuff and changes. But there is one which is quite IMPORTANT: After testing the game with an AMD Radeon GPU, I found there were some graphical issues I couldn't solve without breaking the game for Nvidia GPUs. This is because I was using an old OpenGL version for rendering the game. This decision was make having in mind that the game should be compatible with very old computers also. But, I didn't expect that because of this I was breaking compatibility for some modern PCs! This is why I decided to replace the default rendering method from OpenGL to Vulkan, which fixed all issues (I think so) and also allows me to improve graphics futher. I'm not leaving back those with old computers, so you wi…
- Planetary Life in The Steam Awards! - 24 November 2025
Perhaps it's too bold to do this in a year full of great games, but... why not?Planetary Life will participate in the Steam Awards in the category Sit back and relax.The chances are slim, but it will be fun to participate :-)
- Release notes v0.7.6.7 - 1 November 2025
I know that releasing an update on Friday afternoon is never a good idea, which is why I am now releasing a patch to fix some bugs introduced in the previous update... as well as others that had been there for a while. Changes Decreased dead body size. Bug fixes Fixed minimap not updating when paused. Fixed bug causing flying creatures not showing in terrain. Fixed bug causing bigger creatures to float over terrain. Fixed artifacts not showing after loading game.
