Oceaneers, a new survival-crafting colony sim, will launch in Early Access in 2026

A new survival-crafting colony sim, Oceaneers, will launch on Steam in Early Access in 2026. In Oceaneers players will participate in all aspects of building a colony, including scavenging, crafting, and training survivors.

Melbourne, Australia - July 24, 2025 | Melbourne-based Barrel Smash Studios has announced their upcoming survival crafting colony-sim Oceaneers for PC (via Steam), with an Early Access launch slated for 2026.

Oceaneers is a survival-crafting colony sim set in a flooded world of unstable islands. Build your colony, scavenge debris, craft equipment, and train your survivors. Construct a raft and fend off sharks as you explore island bunkers and uncover lost Float-Tech from an old-world corporation.

Island life is not all sunshine and coconuts. With sparse resources and limited island space, planning will be essential as you construct workstations, manage food production and secure drinkable water—all while making sure your island refuge stays above water.

There will also be a public playtest via the Steam page taking place on August 5th. Steam users can register via the Oceaneers Steam page and can provide feedback via the developer's Discord or through Steam forums.

“After first concepting the idea back in January 2023, it’s exciting to be launching a second PC title on Steam”, shared Oceaneers developer James Thomas. “As huge fans of colony sims and crafting survival games, it’s been a fun challenge figuring out how to smoothly integrate story and objectives into these very sandboxy genres while still keeping replayability high. We grew up in the golden age of Sierra and LucasArts games, and we hope players enjoy this extra layer of quirkiness on top of the mechanics they already love.”

Oceaneers is launching on PC (via Steam), with an Early Access launch slated for 2026. To keep up to date, be sure to join their Discord. 

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