PAX West 2025 Spotlight: Starseeker: Astroneer Expeditions
System Era Softworks Starseeker: Astroneer Expeditions had a huge showing at PAX West this year, with a large, beautiful booth that was always packed with players checking out the game. I briefly demoed the game with the studio’s marketing director and was impressed with what I saw.
Starseeker: Astroneer Expeditions. Credit: System Era Softworks / Devolver Digital
Starseeker is a multiplayer-only game with a strong co-op focus, a change from the open-world sandbox of the first game. Similar to Helldivers 2, players form teams of four to go down to a planet’s surface to achieve mission objectives within a fixed time limit. However, your team doesn’t have its own instance; all players share the fully explorable planet, so you can help or hinder other squads you meet.
Starseeker: Astroneer Expeditions. Credit: System Era Softworks / Devolver Digital
Team members have access to different tools based on their roles. My favorite was a terraforming ray that allowed players to burrow and modify the land as they saw fit. There’s a ton of room for emergent gameplay chaos as the environment and creatures react to your actions. I watched as a player picked up a hopping alien that spits out goop that slows movement, and it kept spewing the stuff uncontrollably. I can already see how fun things will get with three other teammates in the same space.
Starseeker: Astroneer Expeditions. Credit: System Era Softworks / Devolver Digital
I was also pleased to learn how well things are going at System Era Softworks since their acquisition by Devolver Digital. The studio is free to do what they do best and create, while Devolver provides everything they need to succeed, including the huge convention presence for the game. Devolver’s games are overwhelmingly winners, and after what I saw, there’s definitely reason to be excited about Starseeker. The publisher really knows how to pick them.
Starseeker: Astroneer Expeditions doesn’t yet have a fixed release date, but it is expected to be in 2026.
