Red Dust

About the Game

Red Dust Colony is a Mars colony simulation where the machines break, the dust gets into everything, and your colonists have opinions about it. You'll guide a small crew from a hard landing to a working base, managing oxygen, power, food, research, and the people who make it all run. Each system interacts with every other, usually in ways you'll only fully appreciate the first time something goes wrong.

Everything your colony runs on starts as rock or ice. Mine regolith, iron, copper, and ice from the Martian surface, then turn it into building parts through a chain of specialised workshops including rock crushers, smelters, concrete mixers, fabricators, assembly stations and more. Recipes queue up. Bottlenecks shift. The list of things you need to make grows a little faster than the list of things you have. This, for some reason, is the fun part.

If you like solving a base the way an engineer solves a building, Red Dust Colony has a lot for you. A cell-based atmosphere simulates oxygen, carbon dioxide, toxins, heat, and pressure per tile. A circuit-based power grid routes electricity through wires, batteries, solar panels, and wind turbines. Liquid pipes handle plumbing, hydroponics, and aquaponics; when they carry hot water, they double as a heating system. Light matters - rooms without it are grim and unproductive. None of these systems are cosmetic. They interact, they conflict, and they reward the kind of player who enjoys reading a floor plan and thinking about flow.

Running a farm on Mars is mostly the same as running a farm anywhere else, except with higher stakes and fewer bees. Red Dust Colony gives you a wide variety of crops to grow - microgreens, kale, tomatoes, quinoa, peanuts, avocados, mycelium, medicinal plants, and more - each in plots that track water, fertilizer, and growth quality.

Botany research at the Botany Station unlocks new species and improves existing ones. Hunger is tracked by macronutrient - carbs, proteins, fats, fiber, vitamins - so feeding your crew means balancing a real diet. Grow one crop forever and your colonists will let you know.

Progression in Red Dust Colony follows the same arc your colony does: life support first, industry next, comfort eventually. A branching research tree covers everything from oxygen regulation and temperature control to hydroponics, medicine, and interior decor. Early research keeps people alive. Later research lets them live well.

Your colonists have opinions, and when those opinions aren't managed, they break. Red Dust Colony simulates mental health in distinct ways - some colonists rage, some cry, some vent on the nearest wall, some go catatonic and need to be rescued. Which break they have depends on who they are, because every colonist is shaped by traits: Rockbreaker, Claustrophobic, Homesick, Suit Junkie, Night Owl, Snorer.

They eat, sleep, socialize, and form real relationships. Some of them will die. You'll decide whether the colony can spare the time to hold a funeral.

Red Dust Colony isn't our day job, but it's our real work. We're two people, one programmer-designer, one artist, and we've been building this in our spare time for over five years. Evenings, weekends, and plenty of late nights.

If RimWorld, Oxygen Not Included, or Surviving Mars are your kind of game, we think Red Dust Colony might be too. Wishlist it, follow along, and thanks for reading.