Terraforming Mars is bringing survival on the Red Planet to mobile and PC this year

After making a home for itself on the tabletop, Terraforming Mars is finding its way to the digital world.

Jacob Fryxelius’ heady simulation of adapting the Martian environment to support human life landed with a bang in 2016, quickly establishing itself as a strategically complex and thematically rich favourite – reflecting by its ascent to the number five spot in BoardGameGeek’s overall rankings.

In the game, players juggle managing the Red Planet’s temperature, oxygen levels and ocean coverage in an effort to establish their colony, developing projects to advance their technological prowess while throwing spanners (or asteroids) at their rival corporations’ plans as they plant forests, introduce animals to the world and build up cities.

The upcoming PC and mobile versions of Terraforming Mars will stick close to the original gameplay, featuring both single-player against AI and local and online multiplayer.

An early access version of the game will launch on Steam in the second quarter of 2018, with the Android and iPad mobile apps due to land at the same time ‘soon’ – there won’t be a phone version available.

The developers have confirmed that the game will receive more content after launch – but are yet to detail whether that means the app will be expanded with the Prelude, Hellas & Elysium and Venus Next packs released for the physical version.