- Let Me Cook: Your Galaxy, Your Rules - 21 September 2026
What if you could add a new item to Zenith Expanse, change a recipe, or write an event that surprises your colonists? That’s what Let Me Cook is for. It’s the content framework I use to build much of the game, and it lets you tinker with the galaxy too. Okay, but what can I actually change?Quite a lot. Let Me Cook uses readable .lmc files to define things like items, crafting recipes, quests, story events, lifeforms, status effects, ship modules, and points of interest. You can adjust existing definitions or add your own content using the same format the game uses. You don’t need to open Unity or compile C# to change a description, tweak a value, or write a new encounter. The files describe what should happen; the game handles the rest through its built-in systems. Here’s a tiny peek at what that looks like.An itemThis is the kind of file that defines an object you might find, use, or t…
- Demo Update Out Now! Early Access Launches September 30 - 15 September 2026
Hey everyone! It's been a little quiet here lately because I've been working on a demo update ahead of Zenith Expanse's Early Access launch. The update is now available and addresses many of the issues you raised after Steam Next Fest. I won't pretend the demo's reception was easy to take. Your reviews, Discord messages, and a video covering the game helped me understand what was getting in the way of your experience. I rolled up my sleeves and got to work on the fixes. Thank you to everyone who took the time to share their experiences. Here are the biggest changes in this update: Clearer UI and easier order assignment. I've changed the heading font and fixed overlapping panels and clipped text at larger UI scales. The game also remembers your most recently selected crew members when assigning orders during the current session. Improved expeditions and crew recovery. I've reworked route…
- Demo Patch 0.1.4 - Demo Feedback, Trading, Fuel, and Economy Tuning - 8 June 2026
This update is focused heavily on feedback from recent demo playtests. The big goal was to make the early game less brittle, make different playstyles more viable, clean up some rough UI/economy issues that were making trading and settlement play feel confusing or too easy to exploit.Onboarding no longer pushes players into founding a settlement as the only “real” path forward. You can now progress through alternate objectives such as trading or exploration, so merchant-style and scout-style runs should feel more natural.Fuel also got an important fallback loop: colonists now generate biowaste, and biowaste can be converted into emergency Helion. Combined with better fuel hints and more reliable early-game fuel access, getting stranded should be less sudden and less dependent on pure RNG.Trading received a larger pass. The trading screen now has a Buy/Sell switch, category filtering, se…
- Demo update #3 is live! - 3 June 2026
Hey folks! Big one this time. I've been heads-down on making your first hours smoother and giving you actual reasons to fly around the galaxy. Here's the rundown.Escort missions are a real thing nowThis was the headliner. When you take an escort contract, you're now protecting an actual ship that flies with you, warps with you, and can absolutely get blown up if you slack off. Pirates will ambush your convoy mid-jump (with a sane cap, I'm not a monster :D), prioritize the ship you're guarding, and warp out gracefully instead of magically vanishing. Lose the escort and the mission fails - you'll know about it. Get it home safe and you get paid.Missions & contracts overhaul- New Contracts panel with clearer requirements and decision hooks, so you actually understand what you're signing up for.- Mission deadlines now scale with distance. Long-haul delivery across multiple warp jumps? You g…
- Demo Update #2: clearer first minutes, better planet markers, and more - 22 May 2026
Hey, Explorers! I’ve just pushed another demo update. This one is not a “big new content” patch. It is mostly a “the demo should stop fighting you while you’re trying to learn it” patch. :D After the first release I got a lot of useful feedback about the opening minutes being confusing, especially around scanning, finding resources, landing, understanding what the planet actually contains, and coming back to a save without losing the thread. So this update focuses heavily on that. What changedThe first steps should be easier to follow now. Early onboarding now does a better job of pointing you toward the actual next target instead of just telling you what to do in text. Water and fauna objectives now have clearer targeting. The game can now guide you toward specific planet/sub-hex locations for early survival objectives, which should make “find animals” and “secure water” much less vagu…
- Demo Update #1 is live - 19 May 2026
Hey Explorers! After the demo went live, I got a pretty solid dose of feedback about things that felt confusing, frustrating, unclear, or just not quite right yet. I’ve been watching Steam, Reddit, Discord, and reviews, and I put together a very concrete list of things to improve. Today I released a new version of the demo focused on the issues that came up most often. Here’s the high-level changelog compared to the first public demo build. What changed Removed the real-time demo timer. The demo is now limited by in-game Sols instead of real-world time.Hardened a bunch of save/load edge cases. Improved the first minutes of onboarding so the opening flow is clearer and less overwhelming.Reworked early quest guidance, the current mission pill, quest tooltips, and next-target markers.Improved the starter system and starter planet rules.Added a more natural starter ecosystem setup.Added a p…
- The Zenith Expanse demo is out now - 16 May 2026
Hi everyone, This is a strange and very good sentence to finally type: The Zenith Expanse demo is now available on Steam. You can start a colony on the edge of known space, scan nearby stars, land on alien planets, gather resources, build your first settlement, send colonists into questionable situations, and discover how quickly a reasonable plan can become a small administrative disaster. The demo is a focused slice of the game. It is about the opening stretch: exploration, survival, first colony setup, early decisions, and the first signs that the frontier is not especially interested in being convenient. It is also still a demo. There will be rough edges. Some systems are still growing into themselves. Some colonists may make choices that suggest the training program was more optimistic than effective. But the heart of the game is there: build a fragile colony, explore strange plane…
- Dev log #3 - Public playtest is finally here - 1 May 2026
Hey, explorers! Long time no see.I was supposed to release the public playtest earlier. Then I made the dangerous mistake of letting real humans play the game.First, Łucja Marczyńska, the illustrator I’m working with, tested the build and sent me a very useful - and very painful - list of UI/UX issues. Then my son played it too and confirmed many of the same problems.The verdict was basically:“The game looks great, but I have no idea what I’m doing.”Which is not exactly the dream onboarding experience. :DSo I delayed the playtest and spent the last few weeks reworking the early game.The old tutorial was a quest-chain system. I still like the idea on paper, but in practice it was too vague for the first minutes of gameplay. I replaced it with something much more direct:Do this. Then do that. This is why it matters.Less elegant? Maybe. More useful? Definitely.I also gave the UI a much-nee…
- Dev log #2 - The One Where Everything Clicked - 26 March 2026
The game stopped being a collection of features and started being a living thing - where systems talk to each other, decisions ripple forward in time, and the world pushes back.Here's what happened.Shipyard & Ship ModulesThe flagship feature (pun intended). A complete ship customization pipeline - from data models to marketplace UI.- 26 ship modules defined in LetMeCook (PZE's modding framework) - from Laser Turret Mk1 and Plasma Cannon Mk1 through Quantum Fuel Cell to Luxury Staterooms. Each with unique stats, weight, price, and slot category (weapon, defense, utility, cargo, passenger).- Modules define the ship. Damage, fire rate, shields, hull, cargo capacity, scan range, passenger slots - everything is now calculated from installed modules. No more magic numbers on ship classes.- Shipyard as a settlement type - generates randomized ship offers with class-based pricing. Buy, sell, sw…
- Steam Integration Complete - Demo Coming Soon - 8 March 2026
I've been quiet. Building. Testing. Breaking things and putting them back together at 3 AM with too much coffee and not enough sleep. Today I'm happy to announce that Project: Zenith Expanse is now fully integrated with Steam - achievements, stats, rich presence, Workshop mod support, the whole package. What does this mean for you? - Your journey, tracked. Planets explored, colonies founded, battles won, trades completed - Steam tracks your progress across the stars. Unlock achievements as you carve your path through the galaxy. - Your friends will know. Steam Rich Presence shows what you're up to - whether you're managing a thriving colony on Hynstrixus IV, navigating the galaxy map with 12 settlements under your belt, or getting into trouble you probably deserve. - Mods from day one. Steam Workshop integration is built in. Every piece of content in Zenith Expanse is data-driven - new…
- Dev log #1 - Official Gameplay Trailer + Dev Introduction - 1 March 2026
Hi!Today is a special day - Project: Zenith Expanse finally has its official gameplay trailer. You can find it on the Steam page or on the YouTube: I thought this would be a good moment to introduce myself a bit more - and the project as well.My name is Szymon. I was born and still live in Bytom - in New Le… well - Poland. :)I have been involved in game development for around 20 years - professionally speaking. I wrote my first tiny game at about 8 years old on a Commodore 64 - I definitely do not count that as professional experience, but that is where the obsession probably started.Somewhere back then, little Szymon told himself he would one day make a game about being a celebrity - and about space.So in a way, I guess I always wanted to make a game about stars.Some of you might know me from Wonderlife - a Polish project launched in 2008 that has been running for 18 years and is even…
- The frontier is now open. (Store page live!) - 16 February 2026
Captain's log, day one.After months of building, testing, rewriting, and drinking way too much coffee – Project: Zenith Expanse has a store page.What is PZE? A space colony sim about the people who didn't make it into history books. Build settlements on planets that don't want you there. Manage crews who have opinions about everything. Try not to starve on day three.What happens now?Wishlist if you want to follow the journey.Join our Discord - https://discord.gg/CV7FGd9UTx - I'm there, I read everything, I'm a solo dev with no corporate filter.Early Access is planned for September 30, 2026.This is just the beginning. The store page is live. The game is coming. The frontier is yours.Try not to blow it.- Szymon
