Ever since the dawn of the original Natural Selection, itself a Half-Life mod, people have been modding Natural Selection. One of the most enduring and compelling mods ever made for Natural Selection is Combat: A game in which alien and human face off in an arena, leveling up abilities and fighting to destroy each others’ bases.

When Natural Selection 2 was released as stand alone game, it represented a modding idea becoming a commercial success. That success allowed an entire development studio to thrive: Today, the success of Natural Selection 2 has allowed Unknown Worlds to grow and reveal a new game, Subnautica.

Combat is now about to have that same chance. Some time this year, Combat will be …

Shh, we have a secret for you. Just moments ago, a Steam Beta version of Build 263 was released. We are not promoting this release anywhere but here on the blog (Edit: Ok, and a tweet!) – Because we only want you, our most committed players, to find out about it.

Build 263 has been gestating for quite some time. Hard work from Andi, Lukas, community volunteer Brian ‘SamusDroid,’ and many others has combined to produce an update that could change the way you play NS2. For the first time, there is an organised play option available in game.

This system is not a ‘beta,’ and if you must use a term to describe it, ‘alpha’ might …

Back in 2002, Natural Selection was released…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJbR7wUoNBg

Since then, lots has happened. Unknown Worlds was formed and NS2 was released, reaching multiple times the number of players the original mod did. Charlie, the creator of NS, has come so far that he’s now working on a new game: Subnautica.

But we will never forget what started it all. Today, we are proud to announce that Natural Selection Source Code is now available to anyone, free of charge. Head on over to GitHub to get it. It’s not ‘open source’ – There is some legal hoo-ha that prevents that. But it is all there.

You can use the NS source code to make your own …

The last few months have seen the release of Reinforced – The second major free expansion for Natural Selection 2. Here is an update on what has been going on since Reinforced, and what you can expect from NS2 development in the future.

Reinforcement Program

The Reinforcement Program has been a great success. Your generous support has raised over $150,000 over the past month – A very significant sum for a studio of our size. We always knew we were setting an extremely high bar with the $550,000 target. While we do not think we will ever hit it, the money raised will fund further NS2 development that will deliver some sweet improvements to the game (Which you can …

The world of game development is diverse and full of studios big and small. It turns out that Torn Banner Studios, the creators of Chivalry: Medieval Warfare, are about the same size. They are also an awesome bunch of people. So we thought it might be fun to throw a little joint party…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YV2g13wutmE

This weekend, you can get both NS2 and Chivalry for 66% off on Steam, by visiting this page: http://store.steampowered.com/sale/ns2_chivalry_weekend

Cory commissioned a fantastic piece of art to represent this coming together, and you can download high-resolution, text free, wall-paper ready versions of it right here: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/or0z035o8a9k9jk/7rJFYzStgN

But wait, there’s more! Our studios paid visits to each other this week, and there are not a …

Following on from the March and April entries, it is time to update Planet Earth on what is going on with Natural Selection 2. This is a retrospective look at development in May. To keep the length under control, (April’s entry was a bit overboard!) this post will stick to three topics: Environments, Technical, and Game. Let’s start with Biodome!

Environments

Michael, (‘Olmy’) has been cranking on Biodome. The map is striking, thanks to its new art set and ‘flora’ focus. The accompanying images show some of the stages environments go through, from idea (1, above), to rough 3d layouts (2, below), to texturing, lighting, detailing and prop placement (3, two below).

Biodome will be an absolute blast, but …

Time flies by faster than you can read a terrible metaphor at the start of a video-game-development blog post. In just six days, it will be the six month anniversary of the release of Natural Selection 2. Half a year of leg-chomping glory – Just the beginning. April was a mad month: So much happened since the March State of the Game. Here is a look inside it from the perspective Unknown Worlds.

Natural Selection 2 remains in full time development. With half a year since launch, this feels slightly odd but very good. Everyone who owns the game has continued to receive updates: With the imminent launch of Build 247, we are going to crack 19 …