Maia alpha showcase demos base-building in the face of tremors, meteorite strikes, chickens

Simon Roth's sci-fi survival game Maia continues to astound; in this showcase for the latest alpha version (0.32), Roth demonstrates base building, a process that promises to be regularly interrupted/made better by the addition of meteorite strikes and tremors. In a later update this will cause your colony's staff to temporarily cease working (wusses) in order to shield themselves against the planet Maia's primal rumblings. It's a terrifically atmospheric, beautifully lens flary video, and another sign that Roth's game is headed down the right track.

Things of note in the above: the psychology of your colonists is affected by the availability of light, and even the colour of that light; lens flares are cool again, just so long as they're not obscuring Spock's face; colonist death will be included in the next update, so Roth can show the after-effects of being traumatised by the colour orange. (Or, alternatively, succumbing to hypothermia.)

Maia, you might recall, was recently greenlit . It's also available for pre-order , which will give you access to the ongoing alpha.

Tom Sykes

Tom loves exploring in games, whether it’s going the wrong way in a platformer or burgling an apartment in Deus Ex. His favourite game worlds—Stalker, Dark Souls, Thief—have an atmosphere you could wallop with a blackjack. He enjoys horror, adventure, puzzle games and RPGs, and played the Japanese version of Final Fantasy VIII with a translated script he printed off from the internet. Tom has been writing about free games for PC Gamer since 2012. If he were packing for a desert island, he’d take his giant Columbo boxset and a laptop stuffed with PuzzleScript games.