Chapter I is complete. That's the honest summary — but what "complete" actually means here took considerably longer to get right than expected.
The biggest technical overhaul this chapter received was to the telekinesis system. The previous implementation relied on Unreal Engine's built-in PhysicsHandle grab — it worked, but it never felt right. Objects didn't respond naturally to momentum, collisions felt floaty, and fine placement was frustrating. The entire system has been replaced with a custom physics-based implementation written from scratch in C++. Every object interaction is now driven by a PD controller — proportional-derivative force calculations that account for position error, velocity error, angular damping, ramp-up curves, and force limits in real time. Light cubes feel weighted. Heavy cubes resist and push back. Throwing something now has actual momentum behind it. It's a foundational mechanic, and it finally feels like one.
The character movement system received a similarly complete replacement. The project had been using ALS — Advanced Locomotion System — a widely used Unreal plugin that had been the backbone of the character since early development. ALS is a capable system, but it's dated, carries significant overhead, and wasn't built with Project Enceladus's specific needs in mind. It's gone. In its place is a fully custom movement feel component, also written in C++, that handles everything from procedural camera tilt during strafes and landing states to looping shake transitions between idle, walking, running, dashing, and mantling. The movement now responds to the game's gravity system directly — which matters more than it might sound, because Chapter II is going to need it.
Beyond the two major rewrites, Chapter I received a thorough pass on everything that had been left imperfect since the Megagrant demo push earlier in the year. A significant number of bugs were hunted down and fixed — some of them had been present since very early builds. Lighting was reworked across the chapter's levels, with adjusted light sources, improved atmosphere, and new VFX passes added in several areas. The visual identity of the station is sharper now: the sterile blues and oranges of the research environment, the oppressive reds of restricted sections, the glowing blue data columns that appear throughout the facility. The screenshots below show some of what changed.
The narrative layer of Chapter I is also now fully in place. Every Audio Log, Data Card, and Memory Fragment intended for this chapter has been written and implemented. The ID cards of all 15 scientists are collectible. Players who take the time to explore every corner will leave Chapter I with a real picture of who these people were — their relationships, their tensions, what they believed they were working toward. The core mystery is solvable without any of it. But the full story is in there for those who look.
One structural change worth mentioning: hidden story content used to be locked behind quick-time event doors, a system that never quite fit the game's rhythm. It's been redesigned entirely. Lore-rich areas are now accessed through hidden keys tucked into puzzles and off-path spaces. It's a small change on paper, but it makes exploration feel rewarding rather than gated.
A playable demo of Project Enceladus now exists. It's currently private — it won't be publicly released until closer to launch — but it's stable, it's complete, and it's a real slice of the game.
The demo covers the Prologue and the first three levels of Chapter I, which translates to roughly two to two and a half hours of play time depending on how thoroughly a player explores. It introduces the core mechanics — telekinesis, the drone, the cable logic system, the visor HUD — and opens the story just enough to establish what Darren is doing inside Noah's mind and why. It doesn't give the story away. It sets the table.
The decision to keep it private for now is deliberate. The demo will be available to everyone for free before the base game launches. When it goes live, it'll be the first real opportunity for players to get their hands on the game — and at this point, that experience is ready to deliver.
If you haven't wishlisted Project Enceladus on Steam yet, now is a good time. Wishlisting is the most direct way to get notified when the demo goes public and when the release date is announced.
Chapter II takes place aboard the shuttle — the vessel that carried the Enceladus expedition team to the moon's surface and back. It's a different environment from the station: narrower in some places, more open in others, industrial where the station was clinical. And it introduces the mechanic that defines this chapter entirely: gravity manipulation.
This required rebuilding a significant portion of how the character and physics-dependent systems work at a fundamental level. The entire character system has been refactored to be custom gravity-compatible — forces, movement, the heavy box interaction system, collision responses — everything that assumed a fixed down direction had to be rethought. That work is done.
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Gravity in Chapter II comes in two distinct forms. The first is a full gravity direction switch: the direction of gravity changes relative to a fixed axis, and the character physically reorients to match — what was a wall becomes a floor, what was a ceiling becomes ground. This variant will appear in the Void sections of the game. The second is a gravity zone — a defined area that pulls the player in a configurable direction, switchable mid-puzzle. Anyone who has played Portal 2 will recognise the concept. Both systems are mechanically complete, though polish and bug fixing are ongoing.
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The first level of Chapter II is around 70% built. Puzzles are taking shape. The screenshots included here show some of what the environment currently looks like — the shuttle's aesthetic is distinct from the station, and the gravity systems are already changing how spaces are designed and how the player has to think about them.
Some WIP shots here:
There's no release window to share for Chapter II yet. But the foundation is solid, and the direction is clear.
That's the state of Project Enceladus heading into the second half of 2026. One chapter finished, one in progress, a demo waiting in the wings. More updates as things develop — and if you want to follow along, the Steam page is the best place to do it.
Thanks for reading.