At Unknown Worlds, Natural Selection 2 is king. Five months since launch, we have not moved on to any new projects and everyone is cranking on NS2 full time. Here’s a video talking about some of the stuff happening in the office at the moment:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jom2-U3986w

In the long term, Biodome is going to be drop dead-gorgeous. It’s not yet near completion, but Cory’s gorgeous artwork should give you a taste of what is to come. Here it is in medium-resolution glory (Silly WordPress not letting us upload files >1mb!).

If there is one theme that characterises NS2 development right now, it is ‘thinking.’ Thinking about gameplay, about engine technology, and about the best way to spend our limited …

On February 28th, Natural Selection 2 Build 240: ‘Gorgeous’ was released. This free DLC added a boatload of new stuff to the game. Unknown Worlds is going to continue working on updates like Gorgeous, to consistently improve your Natural Selection 2 experience. Today, the second DLC update was released – Build 244: ‘Electric.’

Electric follows in the footsteps of Gorgeous, adding new content and improving on what is in the game already. For example, the new Stun Gun allows you to disable your fellow marines when they piss you off. The new Gardening system will allow those seeking a more relaxed gaming experience to enjoy Natural Selection 2.

Balance is a particular focus for Electric: We have carefully listened to …

Admit it, it just wouldn’t be an Unknown Worlds product if we didn’t push the release date right down to the wire. The Gorgeous release date is February 28th! We were originally aiming for the week of 19 – 22 February, but decided to give the update an extra week to scrub more bugs and fine tune the new content.

Gorgeous is free, and will be automatically delivered by Steam as Build 240. If you own NS2, you won’t have to do anything to get it. It includes Railguns, Gorge Tunnels, Descent, and quite a few fun surprises. Alongside the 13 previous ‘maintenance’ builds, Gorgeous is what the entire UWE team has been working on for the …

A free new addition to existing Natural Selection 2 maps, Descent, is scheduled for late February. This new map, a space station, will take pride of place amongst all the shiny new stuff. Descent Station orbits the planet upon which every other NS2 map is located. Last week, we showed off that view. This week, a little more is revealed:

This is the Shuttle Bay. The TSF Dropship sits ensconced between structural supports, with a control room looking down on the space. This part of the map is very important, because it ties it into existing NS2 maps. In times of peace this bay would have provided harbour for all manner of human spacecraft. At war with the Kharaa, …

It has now been three months since Natural Selection 2 v1.0. Since launch, there have been ten updates, and today we present the eleventh! Build 238 is a ‘maintenance build.’ It is focused on improving what is already in the game, rather than adding lots of new content. We are planning a huge ‘content build’ for mid/late February, which will contain lots of goodies such as the new map Descent. However, several small features have snuck in! Check out this video for some of the highlights:

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09Q72rJToY8

Games will no longer start until both sides have a commander. This eliminates a common problem in public games, where one team would be thirty seconds or so behind the other. You …