A new frontier: Avorion, the space sandbox game by Boxelware, has been sold more than 250,000 times since launching in Early Access on Steam in January of 2017. The game is available for Windows, MacOS and Linux for 17.99€ with a user review aggregate of “very positive”.
Boxelware is a development studio from Erlangen founded in 2016 by five space game fans. Konstantin Kronfeldner (31), the head of the studio, has realized a life-long dream with this project:
I have always been a massive fan of space games and always wanted to make my own version, a game where spaceships break in the exact spot where they are hit by projectiles. Inspired by Minecraft and X3, I started developing it myself as a passion project in 2011. I was already focusing on a procedurally generated sandbox world, but without the typical voxel look. I wanted to give players blocks that could scale up all the way from small ships to massive stations, I wanted players to have a dynamic universe they could shape how they pleased.
In order to finance the professional development of Konstantin’s ambitious plan, he launched a Kickstarter campaign that secured a funding of 17,000€.
What is Avorion about?
In Avorion, players design their own spaceships with the help of a powerful but intuitive editor, which lends itself just as easily to whipping up a simple ship in two minutes as it does to perfecting a huge spacecraft over the course of days, and then sharing it with the community. Players go on to explore the procedurally generated galaxy from their cockpit by mining resources, transporting goods and building space stations. But that’s not all: players can engage in massive space battles that rival the scale of any real-time strategy game, wage war against each other or build an empire along with their friends, all to save the galaxy from being destroyed by an unknown foe.
Avorion combines the sandbox elements of games like Space Engineers and the immersive gameplay of space sims like the X series into a unique mix.
The full release of Avorion is planned for spring of 2020. You can find additional information on the game’s website: avorion.net.
Update History
These are the key milestones since the Early Access launch in January of 2017. Boxelware is continually working on Avorion alongside their community. The scale and feature set of the game have increased massively since the Steam launch.
- July 2017 – Alliances Update: Players can now create their own factions (alliances).
- September 2017 – Fighter Update: Players can now design their own fighter craft.
- December 2017 – Economy Update: Players can now build a wide range of different stations and buy cargo shuttles in order to automate shipments between them.
- April 2018 – Combat Update I: Players can now install torpedoes as well as point defense systems on their ships.
- September 2018 – Combat Update II: Players can now design their own turrets.
- February 2019 – AI & Map Commands: Players can now give orders to their ships and move them around the galaxy map.
- April 2019 – Mining Update: Players can now mine ore from asteroids, collect it, transport it and refine it. Previously, simply shooting asteroids would give you money.
- May 2019 – Permadeath Rework: Instead of paying for insurance, players can now buy reconstruction tokens that can be used to restore a ship with a single click.
- July 2019 – Mod support on Steam Workshop
- July 2019 – Boarding Update: Players can now enter and conquer enemy ships and stations.
- August 2019 – Ingame Encyclopedia: Players can now access an ingame encyclopedia, which has been requested by players due to the increasing complexity of the game.
- September 2019 – Diplomacy Update: The relationship between factions has been formalized into a set of four distinct states: neutral, war, ceasefire and allies.
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