Starting Guide
Welcome to Space Engineers!
Space Engineers is a block building sandbox game set in space. It is focused on engineering, constructing ships, maintaining a space station, and asteroid mining. The game may seem a bit complicated at first, but if you break all the key points down it’s just a basic Minecraft-style building ad mining game. This guide will show you the basics of Space Engineers.
Getting Started
To begin your game, click on the New World option in the main menu.
When you click on New World two options will appear: Quickstart and Custom World.
Quickstart option automatically places you in Creative and in the Easy Start 1 scenario. This mode is great for beginning payers who have no experience with Space Engineers.
Custom world option allows you to change scenarios and edit the world settings. From there, you cam change the mode option from Creative to Survival, edit difficulty settings, determine how many asteroids are in the world,, use mods, and much more. For this guide, we’ll play a Quickstart world. Clcik on Quickstart option.
Controls
You will spawn as an astronaut at your starter space station. Controls for this game are very simple.
1.Use the WASD keys to move your astronaut.. Pres SPACE to jump.
2. Press X to toggle the jetpack on or off (Controls for jetpack movement is ver simlar to walking. Press SPACE or F key to fly up, press C key to fly down, roll left by pressing Q key and roll right by pressing F key.)
3. Hold SHIFT key to sprint.
4. Crouch by pressing C.
5. Toggle the HUD on and off by pressing Tab.
6. Toggle lights on and off by pressing L.
7. Turn inertia dampeners on and off by pressing Z (Note that with inertia dampeners off, when you fly, you will be flying in one direction endlessly.)
8. Zoom in or out by scrolling the mouse wheel.
9. Interact with an object or ship by pressing T.
10. Press V key to toggle first person/third person view.
11. Hold Alt key and move the mouse to look around your astronaut. Note that thiis can only be dpne in third person mde. You cannot use free view (Alt+mouse movement while in first person view. Also, while you’re lookingat your astronaut at a certain angle in third person, when you press V to return to first person view, the angle will return to the default angle.
If you would like to view the controls again, simply press F1 key to bring up he Controls List.
Building a Space Station
You won’t be using your spawn area forever. Sooner or lter you are going to need to build another station so you can put in more ships.
To begin, press G to open your inventory. At the bottom right corner of thes screen are three options: New Small Ship, New Large Ship, and New Station. Click on New Station.
When you click on New Station, an outline of a block will appear in front of you. Use the Left Mouse Button to place it.
Add a block by clicking the Left Mouse Button. Delete it by clicking the Right Mouse Button.
Tip: To make things easier, you can hold the Ctrl key and hold down the Left Mouse Button to create a line of blocks in front of you. Adjust the number of blocks by moving the mouse, then when you are done, release the Left MMouse Button. You can also hold SHIFT+Ctrl keys to make a pile layer of blocks. That way, you don’t have to make rows and rows of blocks.
Note that when making a station, you always need a gravity generator and a medical room. Also, don’t forget to add an antenna or a beacon!
Building A Small Ship
You may think yor station is finished, but it isn’t. You cannot have a complete station without some ships.
The key components for a basic ship are a cockpit, some blocks, a landing gear, a gyroscope (to give energy for the ship to move), a reactor (to power the ship), and thrusters (to move the ship).
We’ll start with a basic small ship. To begin, press G to open your inventory and select New Small Ship.
A landing gear will be placed in front of you. Go back to your inventory and add a cockpit to your toolbar. To place objects into your toolbar, click a few times on the object and it will appear in your toolbar, To access it, just press the number key indicated on the top of the toolbar square.
Be careful when adding objects to your ship before placing a gyroscope. If you hit the ship by mistake, the ship will float away, and you will have to start over.
Place the cockpit on top of the landing gear and build around it, adding thrusters, reactors, and a gyroscope as you go.
Painting Your Ship
The ship in the picture looks a bit dull, doesn’t it? You can improve your ship by giving it a custom paint job. You can see that the color selection screen is already open. To access it, press P key.
To change a color, click on one of the color squares. To customize the colors, click on the line on the color bar and move it around ntil you are satisfied with the color.
Use the middle mouse wheel to paint parts of your ship. I recommend using multiple colors on the ship to make it look colorful.
Building A Large Ship
You have built a basic small ship for your station, now it’s time to complete your station by building a decent large ship. Large ships are almost the same as a small ship, but tthey move slower, hold other weapons, are larger in size, and use a different cockpit: a control station. Also, large ships are much stronger.
Let’s start building a large ship now. To begin, press G to open the inventory screen and in the lower right corner, click on New Large Ship
Then, start building. Constructing a large ship is similar to constructing a small ship, but with more thrusters and more gyroscopes, as well as a control station instead of a cockpit.
Remember to paint your ship!
Test Flying Your Ship
It;’s time for our first flight. Ship controls are very similar to movement controls.
1.WASD: Move Ship
2. SPACE or F: Fly up
3. C: Fly down
4. Q: Roll left
5. E: Roll right
6 LEFT MOUSE BUTTON: Fire weapons, if enabled.
Remember, your ship can move only if gyroscopes or reactors are inserted
Editing World Settings
You don’t have to choose Quicstart option for every world you create. If you like, you can choose from vvarious types of scenarios in the Custom World screen.
As explained earlier, you can edit the features of the world (e.g. number of asteroid clusters, enable/disable copy and paste), change the gamemode from Creative to Survival, and select one of seven scenarios (world starters) for you to play in:
1. Easy Start 1: The same world as the one used in Quickstart. Perfect for beginners as it helps you easily understand the game’s concept and mechanics. Recommended for both gamemodes.
2. Easy Start 2:This world scenario is similar to Easy Start 1, but with a decnt space station for you to work with, more space ships, and several asteroid clusters. Recommended for Survival Mode.
3. Lone Survivor: This scenario only has one basic station and has no ships. You must start from scratch. Recommended for both gamemodes.
4. Two platforms: This scenario is recommended for multiplayer games, and Player vs. Player battles are also recommended. As in Lone Survivor, there are no ships. Recommended for Creative Mode.
5. Crashed Red Ship: A survival-based scenario where the player controls an astronaut that survived a massive collision with an asteroid. Recommended for Survival Mode.
6. Asteroids: In this scenario, the player takes control of an astronaut who is on his way to a new asteroid cluster. Recommended for Survival Mode.
7. Empty World: An empty world, where there’s nothing but the player and sun. Recommended for Creative Mode.
