In Beyond These Stars, players build a sci-fi settlement atop Kewa, a colossal whale traveling through space. The game has reached version 1.0, and its launch trailer lasts roughly 90 seconds. It opens with modest farms on hex tiles, then shows warp jumps, scout ships, and trade with aliens. Balancing Monkey Games developed the game, while Beyond These Stars published it.
Quick answer: Beyond These Stars 1.0 launched on October 16, 2026 at 18:00 UTC. It is on Steam, Epic Games Store, GOG.com and Xbox on PC, and it is included with Xbox Game Pass.
Beyond These Stars 1.0 platforms and release time
The game is PC-only. You can buy it on several storefronts, and Game Pass subscribers get it as part of their membership. The trailer ends on a “NOW AVAILABLE” card showing all five store badges. No PlayStation or Xbox console version has been announced.
| Platform | How you get it |
|---|---|
| Steam | Purchase |
| Epic Games Store | Purchase |
| GOG.com | Purchase |
| Xbox on PC | Purchase |
| Xbox Game Pass | Included with subscription |
The game unlocked at 18:00 UTC on October 16, 2026. That was 11AM Pacific, 2PM Eastern, and 7PM in London. In Tokyo it was already the early hours of October 17. The launch moved one day from an earlier October 15 date. You can find the store listing on Steam and on the Epic Games Store. It is a single-player game with one standard edition. No deluxe tier has been announced.
Building a town on Kewa’s back
Your people are called Peeps. Their colony starts with a capsule landing on the grassy body of the whale. From there everything is built on a hex grid. The camera floats above the town, and you place buildings and manage menus rather than steering a single character. Green, red and blue outlines on the hexes show whether a building can go there and how far power reaches.
Farms, power and production
The trailer shows the first parts of a supply chain one building at a time. Placement matters. A Potato Patch shows adjacency effects that range from -20% Speed to +30% Speed, depending on what sits next to it.
| Building | Role in the footage |
|---|---|
| Potato Patch | Food, with adjacency bonuses and penalties |
| Burner Generator | Power with a range overlay; produces pollution |
| Battery Plant | Placed on a hex energy grid |
| Ore Smelter | Turns ore into Iron, Glass and Silicon |
| Elevator | Unlocked through the Technology Tree |
Technology Tree and Perks
Research is split into categories. They include Accommodation, Agriculture, Raw Resources, Construction, Power, Terraforming, Paths, Logistics, Hazardous, Advanced and Decoration. Unlocks are tied to real production goals. For example, the Elevator needs an Ore Smelter and 5 Iron produced in it. Each new unlock also gives a Perk Point. Those points go into a separate Perks map shaped like a constellation. One perk shown costs 100 and lets wooden bridges stretch to 5 tiles.
Terraforming the whale
The trailer’s first tagline is “Build a fragile home,” and the Landscaping tool shows what that means. You create terraforming jobs that raise terrain, lower it, or flatten an area to an equal level. The interface shows each tile’s height above water and how much debris the work will clear. The footage shows excavated pits and bridges built across the reshaped ground.
Kewa is more than scenery. A Whale Communicator building lets you talk to the whale through dialogue choices. In one exchange shown, Kewa is asked whether space whales are born into pods.
Star travel, scout ships and alien trade
Under the “Wander the stars” tagline, the trailer moves out to a sector map made of hex tiles. Each jump costs energy. One route into Neutral Sector BB-115 takes 56 seconds and uses 2 energy. That leaves 0 energy remaining on arrival, so you have to manage your fuel. The goals on screen give an idea of the campaign. They include exploring the galaxy, finding Ancestral Peep locations, landing the Settlement Spaceship back on Kewa, and finding another Ancestral Planet.
Once Kewa arrives somewhere new, a Landing Pad lets you launch ships such as the Scout 2 to explore nearby worlds. Some planets end up covered in domes and bases. In the solar system view, Unknown Objects and System Events appear on the orbit rings, including one labeled “Strange Satellite.”
You also meet aliens. In the trailer, a trader named N’Olva introduces the J’Rinn Gronk as the galaxy’s “premier traders.” Their Trade Station supports one-off manual trades and recurring automated trades. Goods on offer include Cold Salads, Batteries and Shells.
Beyond These Stars PC system requirements
The hardware requirements are modest. Both tiers need a 64-bit version of Windows 10 and 7 GB of storage, and an SSD is recommended.
| Spec | Minimum | Recommended |
|---|---|---|
| CPU | Core i5-6600 / Ryzen 3 3200G | Core i5-9600 / Ryzen 5 2600X |
| RAM | 8 GB | 16 GB |
| GPU | GTX 960 4 GB / RX 570 4 GB | RTX 2070 8 GB / RX 6600 XT 8 GB |
| DirectX | Version 11 | Version 12 |
Where Beyond These Stars fits for Balancing Monkey Games
Balancing Monkey Games is based in Dunedin, New Zealand. Beyond These Stars is its second game, after Before We Leave. The core idea carries over from that game, where a small population slowly rebuilds a damaged ecosystem. This time, though, the ground under the town is alive and moving. The trailer’s closing aerial shots show what a finished colony can look like.
The trailer ends on the line “And find where you belong.” That sums up the game’s plan. You build on Kewa, travel to find your Peeps’ ancestral worlds, and trade with aliens along the way. Version 1.0 is now out, so the full journey is available on every PC store listed above.
