Space Goblin is coming in hot with what is coming up next in development for ASTROBOTANICA, their upcoming botany-centric survival game set in a prehistoric version of Earth that has been generating significant buzz since its official reveal back in August. The 2025 roadmap includes details about their plans to launch a Kickstarter funding campaign, a Closed Alpha testing period for supporters, and plans for a public demo further into 2025.
ASTROBOTANICA is a relaxed survival set on open-world prehistoric Earth. You are a highly educated extra-terrestrial named Xel, who crashed the spaceship when traversing the galaxy looking for precious seeds to bring them back home and feed your species. Now, you have the chance to find varieties that would thrive on your planet, but first, you need to focus on surviving in the challenging Pleistocene environment of Earth, inhabited by wild animals and primal humans.
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The game is presented in first-person perspective. As an alien botanist, you engage in exploration, cultivation, and farming. Once figuring out the basics of survival on Pleistocene Earth, you will be crafting tonics for various uses, solving mystery puzzles to access hidden locations, and developing your base to stand against natural challenges and invasions of creatures hungry for your crops.
You’ll also meet cavemen populating the game’s open world and will have to earn their trust via feeding and healing, as their collaboration and tool-crafting skills will be essential for your progress. This survival adventure will debut in Early Access in early 2026 for single player, and co-op is planned as one of the key features to co-develop with the gamers community ahead of the final release.
Early buzz is promising
Early previews applauded the game’s innovative setting, as ASTROBOTANICA takes us back 300,000 years to Earth’s Pleistocene era. It will welcome players into a lush open-world environment full of primal flora and fauna, and memorable landscapes. Visiting the planet as an alien botanist named Xel, you will navigate survival challenges and engage in:
- Cultivation: Nurturing plant species and learning how to manage farming in Earth’s environments.
- Plant research: Experimenting with fruit to discover their unique qualities and effects on living organisms and the environment.
- Exploration: Travelling between islands and exploring different biomes to discover new plants while learning to tackle dangerous wildlife and solve hidden mysteries.
- Tonics Crafting: Mixing ingredients obtained from local plant life to manufacture mixtures for various uses, and developing recipes for later.
- Human Interaction: Breaking the ice and connecting with primal humans inhabiting the islands to foster relationships that can lead to trading and mutual assistance.
Kickstarter Campaign Launching with Sweet Perks
After the overwhelmingly positive reception at the reveal, the dev team decided to enhance the initial design to make the game bigger, longer, and even more convoluted. To make this happen, Space Goblin will ask gamers for help by launching the Kickstarter campaign for ASTROBOTANICA in Spring 2025.
As part of the campaign, Kickstarter backers will have the opportunity to play a closed Alpha build of ASTROBOTANICA via Steam ahead of anyone else, share their feedback, ideas, and reactions, and engage with Space Goblin directly. More details, including the exact starting date, pledges, goals, reward tiers, and exclusive perks available only for Kickstarter backers, will be revealed in the coming months.
Plan for Autumn Public Demos
In the second half of 2025, ASTROBOTANICA will follow through with a new demo, made publicly available via Steam. The team will implement feedback from players who participated in the initial Alpha testing stage into the demo while also incorporating planned features.
The intention is to gather a large sample of feedback from the general audience that Space Goblin can address ahead of the game’s Early Access launch. This includes tech tweaks based on testing on a wide variety of hardware and software setups via Steam users’ feedback. More details about timing, demo contents, and scale will be made available after the Alpha testing phase closes.
To stay in the loop on the latest developments for ASTROBOTANICA, follow the game on X (formerly Twitter), Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, and visit the official website. ASTROBOTANICA is currently in development for Windows PC via Steam. Join the conversation on the game’s official Discord community.
