Starmancer
Early access since Aug 2021
From a small 2-man team comes a unique space station management sim. Take on the role of an A.I commanding a lost space ark. Try not to let your crew run amok and wreck the place.
61% positive · 1,053 reviews
Not yet
In early access, active development but status unclear
Low confidence
Active Development
Development Uncertain
Not yet
In early access, active development but status unclear
Low confidence
Active Development
Development Uncertain
Where to buy
Steam $14.99
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Evaluation
Starmancer entered Steam Early Access on August 5, 2021 and has been developed by a small two-person team (Ominux Games) published by Chucklefish. Over its Early Access period, the game has received a consistent stream of major content updates, with particularly significant releases in March 2023 (The Wilderness Update), May 2023 (The Starship Update), August 2023 (The Galaxy Map Update), March 2024 (The Pirate Incursion Update), June 2024 (The Sounds of the Void), and most recently March 12, 2025 (Patch 0.4.0, adding NPC villagers, random events, and performance improvements). This establishes a cadence of roughly every 3–9 months for major updates. The March 2025 patch notes explicitly reference end-game goals as the target for the next patch, indicating development was ongoing at that time. However, the developer opened that post with an apology for "radio silence" due to going through a divorce — a personal circumstance that had already caused delays. As of June 26, 2026, there has been no further developer communication in over 15 months, which significantly exceeds the historical update cadence. The game still carries the Early Access flag, no 1.0 release date has been announced, and the promised next patch (targeting end-game content) has not appeared. The extended silence without explanation leaves the current development status uncertain.
Evidence
Last official developer communication was March 12, 2025. As of June 26, 2026, over 15 months have passed with no follow-up post, patch, or announcement — far beyond the established update cadence of 3–9 months.
Patch 0.4.0 released, developer apologized for radio silence due to going through a divorce. Patch adds NPC villagers, random events, and performance improvements. Developer references end-game goals as the target for the next patch.
Content
1 of 1 released · no outstanding content
Media
Details
Developer
Publisher
Chucklefish
Achievements
—
Platform
Windows, macOS, Linux
Controller
—
Steam Deck
Playable
Players
Single-player
About this game
Humanity launches the Starmancer Initiative – in a desperate attempt to escape from a dying home planet and seek refuge among the stars.
Millions of people upload their consciousness into your memory banks – entrusting their minds and their future to an Artificial Intelligence, a Starmancer. To you.
Now – you find yourself alone and stranded in a strange star system, your task as a Starmancer is to construct and manage a space station capable of sustaining human life.
Starmancer offers gameplay with consequences in a living sandbox environment as you warp from star to star, scavenging resources from derelict stations while fending off space monsters, zombies and pirates!
There are many ways to manage your space station — Don’t be afraid to experiment with unconventional or morally questionable strategies..
- Sustain Life - Cater to the needs of your colonist, by building farms for food, providing beds for rest and bathrooms to prevent unsanitary accidents.
- Express Yourself - Customize your station with walling, floors, furniture, and collect unique decorations. Place cheerful paintings to remind the colonists how friendly and relatable you are, and motivational posters to let them know just how much you value their productivity.
- Power, Water, and Atmosphere - Build treadmills and batteries to provide power to your machines. Hook them up to the grid with wires!
Place pipes and water purifiers to provide clean water for your farms and oxygen creators.
Airlocks can be used to separate the atmosphere of two rooms, while wall vents do the opposite.- Grow Colonists - Colonists are grown in your core’s incubator. Pick and choose from a virtually endless supply of different minds, stored in your data banks.
If they should meet a tragic end, you can always harvest their head and regrow them. - Unique Colonists - Unique Personalities – Colonists have random starting skills, personality perks and job preferences that makes them uniquely suited to different roles.
A colonist with Morbid Curiosity makes an excellent doctor to clean up violent mishaps. - Jobs - Assign tasks like farming, mining, and security. Each with an associated skill.
Watch as your rookie explorer levels up and becomes a deadly pirate killing machine. - Skills - Colonists have skills like strength, health, researching, and speed. As your colonists perform these tasks, they get better and better. Colonists with high strength skill can defeat monsters in a single punch (they can also drag unconscious colonists)!
- Memories - Colonists remember the good (and bad) things that happen to them.
Ensure their needs are met, and keep traumatic incidents to a minimum.
Unhappy colonists will eventually snap and freak out, and can develop crazy personality traits after having snapped one time too many.

Beyond your station’s borders lies the vast darkness of space—filled with wildlife, abandoned stations, and rare loot!
- Draft - Draft and send your bravest colonists out into the wilderness to defeat hostile wildlife — creating a safe environment for your gentler colonists to harvest resources and bring back all the precious loot!
- Hostile Wildlife - Slimes, space zombies, and malfunctioning robots are just a few of the enemies inhabiting the nearby asteroids and derelict stations.
Equip your colonists with medkits and weapons to give them a fighting chance! - Relics - Special items with unique properties. An ordinary pen that erases all memories. An encyclopedia that increases all experience earned. C4 for blowing up monsters and clearing paths in stations.
- Derelict Stations - A Medilab where you can find medkits and antivirals. A waste station to scavenge for scrap. An asteroid mining outpost with sulfur veins. Explore them all. Collect their cosmetic objects like sewage pools and morgue drawers. Your crew can even live in the abandoned stations!
- Procedurally Generated - he asteroids and stations beyond your borders are generated every time you warp to a new star system, but the resources, wildlife, and stations are consistent in a star biome. This helps you find basic resources, but you’ll never know exactly what to expect when you arrive in a new system.

Key Features
- Build a thriving space station, with tons of customization.
- Manage the lives of colonists aboard your station.
- Explore and loot derelict stations, avoiding traps and fighting monsters.
- Tinker with the sandbox using cheats: spawn monsters, build instantly, give yourself all the money, and more.
- Modding support
- Active Development — Check out our weekly developer stream!
- Build a thriving space station, with tons of customization.
- Grow Colonists - Colonists are grown in your core’s incubator. Pick and choose from a virtually endless supply of different minds, stored in your data banks.
Last evaluated Jun 26, 2026
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