Our hottest update before full release is here! With the new Lava & Logistics Update, Star Birds is getting a brand-new star system, official controller support, Mac compatibility, new leaderboards, and (drumroll...) the Resource Filter Building you've been waiting for!
Whether you want to dive deeper into the campaign and meet the Alien Trader, unlock achievements in Free Play Mode, or take the game with you on your Steam Deck, this update brings a huge number of new possibilities to Star Birds.
The Lava & Logistics Update is available now as a free update for all players.
Here’s a quick overview of what’s new:
New star system: Cinnakeet | Featuring campaign sectors 12, 13, and 14, new story content, and brand-new animated kurzgesagt cutscenes
Lava, heat, and cooling systems | Introducing fresh production challenges alongside new energy generation methods, including the Bio Energy Reactor and Geothermic Reactor
Mysterious Alien Trader | Offering unique trading goods and speaking an even more unique language
Resource Filter Building | Finally! It's here! A long-standing community request, arriving alongside 8 new buildings, 7 new resources, and 2 new alien plants
Official Free Play Mode rollout | Including 15 new Free Play challenges and achievements
In-game leaderboards | Integrated directly into the main menu for more competitive play
Mac support & controller support | Play Star Birds on your Steam Deck!
Geothermic Reactors & Cooling System
Cinnakeet Star Map (Improved UI)
The center of this update is Cinnakeet, a brand-new star system. It introduces three new campaign sectors (12, 13, and 14) continuing the journey of our bird crew with new story beats and hand-crafted kurzgesagt cutscenes.
Cinnakeet is also home to a major new environmental challenge: lava. Building factories around lava pools and in extreme heat is far more demanding than in earlier systems. Overheated buildings now need to be cooled, adding a fresh layer of logistical planning to your production chains.
To help you tackle these new conditions, the update adds new energy generation options, including the Bio Energy Reactor and the Geothermic Reactor, alongside 8 new buildings in total.
One of the standout additions is the Resource Filter Building. Advanced resource splitting was one of the most requested community features and gives you much more precise control over resource flow in larger factory setups.
Cinnakeet also introduces 7 new resources + 8 hidden resources with secret crafting recipes (🤫), 2 new alien plants, and a mysterious Alien Trader, who appears on the star map and speaks in an alien language created specifically for the game.
Alien Trader
Resource Filter Building
If you enjoy building beyond the campaign, this one is for you: Free Play Mode has received a major upgrade!
Free Play is now accessible directly from the main menu, and it includes a much wider set of gameplay options and environmental features. You can now generate your customized levels with elements such as Plateaus and Ice, Plants and Seedlings, Spider Ducks and Wigglers, Slime and Lava.
A new Kardashev Scale setting allows you to configure your advancement state, including available energy generators and production buildings. This makes it much easier to shape your very individual kind of sandbox experience.
We’ve also added 15 new Free Play challenges and achievements. Plus, you can now unlock all star systems, features, buildings, and crafting recipes in Free Play Mode, even without playing through the campaign.
Free Play Mode (Play Sandbox-Style!)
With the Lava & Logistics Update, Star Birds can now be fully played with a controller. And you know what this means: official Steam Deck support is here!
We also added several controller-specific improvements to make gameplay smoother:
Switching between UI and Game Layer with Y
D-Pad shortcuts for important UI sections
X button support to move or recall buildings
Shoulder buttons to switch directly between asteroids
... you'll figure out the rest. We hope it turned out quite intuitive.
As a plus, Star Birds is now also available on Mac. We hope this is good news for many of you. Little side note here: Star Birds is only available for Apple Silicon devices (M1 2020 and newer). As always, if you’re a Mac user, please send us your feedback!
Official Steam Deck Support
Controller Support
This update also introduces new ways to measure your progress and compete with other Star Birds players. We added in-game leaderboards to the main menu! Check your score in the worldwide ranking or toggle on the Friends Only filter if you want to keep it more personal.
In your main menu, you will now find a "Campaign Highscore" leaderboard, based on the combined highscores across all campaign levels. As well as a "Total Score" leaderboard, based on the sum of all stars collected across all levels.
Leaderboards
Keep a Cool Head When the Heat Is On
There is so much more we could tell you. We overhauled the Star Map and integrated new sound effects, fixed several save/load issues, polished rover movement, improved the performance during asteroid generation, finetuned the UI and the handling of the ramps. We even integrated an experimental resource crafting tree which you can access via the Wiki!
Crafting Tree (Still Experimental - Happy to Hear Your Feedback!)
But since Star Birds is all about exploration: Go check it out for yourself! And if you're looking for more detailed patch notes, you can find them here:
The Lava & Logistics Update is available now to download for all Star Birds players. If you haven’t joined the flock yet, Star Birds is available at 25% off until June 9, 2026.
Thank you so much for playing, sharing feedback, and helping us shape Star Birds during Early Access. We hope you enjoy exploring Cinnakeet, experimenting in the expanded Free Play Mode, and taking your space factories to the next level.
See you among the stars!
Star Birds is an indie project by Toukana Interactive and kurzgesagt. We are over the moon to have such an amazing community. You are the reason why this project exists.
If you want to support us, download the game here on Steam, and tell your friends about it.
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