Substrate: Emergence Steam news

• Latest observed players15 · 26 September 2026 - 03:51:40 UTC
• SteamPulse tracked peak15
• Units sold (VGI)No data available
• Revenue (VGI)No data available
• Review scoreNot available
• Total reviewsNot available
• Release dateSep 24, 2026
• DeveloperPetri Dish Games LLC
• PublisherPetri Dish Games LLC

Genres: Indie, Simulation, Strategy

Company pages: Developer: Petri Dish Games LLCPublisher: Petri Dish Games LLC

No longer available on Steam Store. This app is no longer available for purchase on the Steam Store. SteamPulse keeps live player counts, media, metadata, and historical price snapshots where available.

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Substrate: Emergence Steam news

Substrate: Emergence news collects recent Steam feed items, update posts, and announcements that SteamPulse can associate with this app.

Latest Steam announcements

• v0.4.6a-11 - 26 September 2026

  Crashes should be greatly reduced now. Please see previous posts for full changelogs as -8/-9/-10 were all uploaded to the snapshot branch only. If you are still experiencing crashes, I have added some improved logging to help pinpoint the possible causes. v0.4.6a-11:* Caustic cilia now damage a plasmodium's branches as well as its bodies, so a plasmodium network can no longer refill a wounded body from the rest of the network forever* Fixed the LANGUAGE button on the title screen opening Settings without the language list open* Fixed two tutorial cards showing at once when a cell died during the Caustin lesson* The tutorial no longer explains twice that mutations make every cell look different* The tutorial now says your Act 1 cells are less independent while you learn* The Bionet card is smaller, with smaller text and symbols, and keeps one size from page to page* The Bionet voice is…

• v0.4.6a-10 - 25 September 2026

  v0.4.6a-10:* The Bionet voice is quieter* More of the game is translated in all 28 languages* Fixed your starting cells swimming away from each other at the start of a dish, so the tutorial's cells stay in view* Fixed the tutorial locking your controls, such as dosing, while the BIONET is talking* LANGUAGE now sits alone in the bottom-right corner of the main menu and opens Settings with the language list open* The tutorial's camera pan tip no longer says "Your current objective."* Fixed one of your cells flashing the attention pulse lesson after lesson in the tutorial; the pulse now marks only the one thing a message points at* Clicking the tutorial card now advances it, the same as NEXT* The caustic cilia lesson now pulses only cells that have caustic cilia, not ordinary cilia* Each stop of the organelle tour pulses only the part it is about, and the cytosol card no longer flashes the…

• v0.4.6a-9 - 25 September 2026

  v0.4.6a-9:* SPLICE now selects the specimen it makes instead of clearing the preview* Fixed TEST STRAIN, STORE and DESTROY acting on the wrong specimen when the base was selected from the LOADOUT* Fixed a spliced specimen showing the wrong picture* Fixed ABANDON DISH in a TEST STRAIN dish also abandoning the lab's unfinished BIONET dish and pulling out its specimens* Fixed a BIONET dish never ending when the LAB's cells were wiped out before you reached their GERMINAL ZONE* Fixed dragging on the BIONET moving the view the wrong way* Fixed gene chips such as CAU and CHM overlapping in INSPECT* LANGUAGE is now on the main menu; in the pause menu it is shown locked* Fixed switching language leaving parts of the game in the old language until a restart* Fixed long single words in menu buttons, such as the German ÜBERSPRINGEN, shrinking far below the words beside them* Fixed button text spil…

• v0.4.6a-8 - 25 September 2026

  v0.4.6a-8:* Fixed a long wait the first time a dish loads* Fixed BioExchange drawing behind the dish's chemical labels and the icons above cells* Fixed the win, wipe and welcome pages of the tutorial showing raw codes such as {hi:cells}* Fixed a lab made with NEW LAB starting in the tutorial* Added improved logging for hunting Intel/Linux crashes

• v0.4.6a-7 - 24 September 2026

  I have gotten a few crash reports from systems with outdated drivers. Please try updating your system drivers if you are experiencing crashes at launch. On Linux ensure that Steam launches the native Linux build. Proton is not supported! v0.4.6a-6:* Fixed the live cell previews in the Splicer being gone* Fixed the tutorial board camera orbiting below the plane, where the grid disappears* Fixed TUTORIAL framing the whole BIONET instead of focusing the next act* Fixed the dish temperature reading 0 on low-end GPUs, freezing every cell on spawn* Fixed nutrients reading 0 on low-end GPUs* The bug report success screen now shows the report's id and opens the defect ledger channel* Fixed both BUG REPORT tooltips v0.4.6a-7:* Fixed Act 2: cells mutate a lot, fast, out of the player's control* Fixed NEXT missing from some tutorial cards* Act 1: new steps have you zoom in, tour how energy enters…

• Substrate: Emergence is now in Early Access! - 24 September 2026

  Hey everyone! Substrate: Emergence is now in Early Access. I can't believe the day is finally here. This is a huge milestone. I have literally never worked this hard on anything in my entire life. When I started this project almost a year ago, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Substrate: Emergence and the wonderful community that's formed around it mean so much to me and I can't believe what it's all become. Yet it also feels like this is just the beginning! The awesome Discord in question Early Access is launching with a 40% Founder's Week discount, and this will be the lowest price ever since you are buying the game at such an early time in development. After this week, it will be $12.99 until the next large content update, and it will always be a one-time purchase with no microtransactions. As the game grows, the price will increase to reflect quality. It's rough right no…

• v0.4.6a-5 - 24 September 2026

  v0.4.6a-5:* Fixed a move order sending cells to the far side of the map when the ordered cells divide* Fixed a large move order hanging the game* Fixed the BIONET floor flickering when the camera rotates, and its wells are now shallower* The Splicer VAL column is now headed DRIFT* The Next Idle Cell hint on the key strip now reads Cycle* Fixed TEST STRAIN using up the tested specimen; SAVE AND EXIT and SAVE CULTURE are no longer offered on a test dish* Fixed plasmodia near a barrier edge that ciliates could not reach to kill* Fixed ciliates stopping short of barriers* Fixed the LANGUAGE dropdown being cut off and unable to scroll, which could lock a player into a language* Bug reports now include the active language and whether it is machine translated* The credits now list each person once* Fixed the tutorial blocking clicks on the dish and HUD while an explanation is on screen

• v0.4.6a-4 - 24 September 2026

  v0.4.6a-2:* Edited the storylines of act 1 and act 2 of the tutorial* Tutorial now teaches death when the first cell dies* Tutorial lines, the glossary and the BIONET now use the word dish instead of node* Bionet voice and typing sounds are now quieter* Fixed small groups of 3 to 10 cells heating their area and dying quickly* Cells in a group move order now each plan their own route, so the group no longer packs tightly enough for mitochondria heat to kill it* Fixed queued move orders crossing paths between legs* Fixed player cells not seeking out trophin* Pheromone now shows as emerald on the dish so it no longer looks the same as azide* The BIONET now has a floor under its dishes for orientation* The BIONET Entity card now sits in a bottom corner beside the HUD, out of the way of what you are looking at* Fixed the BIONET showing dishes as open after rivals had already filled them* Opp…

• v0.4.6a-1 - 23 September 2026

  * Saving a cell to the Biobank from the dish now keeps the name you type * Cells moving in a group or freshly divided no longer die from pressure just by touching each other * Fixed cells pulsing ready to divide but stuck at 0% readiness until the game was paused

• v0.4.6a - 22 September 2026

  v0.4.6a:* Updated act 1 & act 2 of the tutorial with player feedback to improve clarity and pacing* Splicer surface moved to its own screen and reformatted. Extract allows for removing single genes without destroying specimens* Mutagenic compounds now produce more distinct mutations. There was a bug where they would mutate all genes at once rather than their targets* Plasmodia survivability buffed overall. Budding plasmodia no longer pay an extra starvation drain, and branches now respect pH damage* Pathfinding no longer sees walls through fog* Inspector layout reworked for clarityEarly Access:* Included map editor, accessed from the lab bench. Custom maps can be loaded into the BIONET. (The map editor is currently my rough internal tool and I will improve it over time)* Included LAB Arena where the Rival AI can play each other to train themselves

• v0.4.6: Watching over the BIONET - 20 September 2026

  Hey everyone! Early Access starts this Thursday, September 24th! I am excited and incredibly nervous. I have a bunch of cool stuff planned for Early Access; content updates will start right away and I'll have the development roadmap updated by Wednesday night. I know I said v0.4.5 would be the last demo version, but here we are with v0.4.6 of the demo! I decided not to have a specific cut-off date for the demo and instead it'll keep getting updates just at a slower and more limited pace than the full version. Due to a hiccup with Steam, v0.4.6 has to be on a separate Demo branch temporarily. Right-click in your library > properties > Versions & Betas > Select v0.4.6. This update is deserving of a major version bump because I've replaced the unfortunate tutorial with a story-driven mode instead. Writing these levels takes quite a bit more time so I am only including the first two in the…

• v0.4.5a-7 - 18 September 2026

  v0.4.5a-7:* Gene fragments and antibodies now carry a specific gene rather than abstract genetic signature* Extract gene fragments gives extracted genes that can be used in the splicer* Locked starter strains now show what unlocks them on the tooltip* Globulin pushes cells more towards antibody production with ER genes* Flagellate contract made available at the start of a new lab

• v0.4.5a-6 - 17 September 2026

  At the request of OMEGAcrab992 in Discord I've reenabled contaminants as an optional setting in the lab bench and creative lab, and some bionet nodes will have no rival lab AI and just contaminant cells. There are also some other bug fixes: v0.4.5a-6:* Re-enabled contaminants. Available as optional new culture settings from the lab bench/creative lab* Lab bench no longer shows bionet cultures in the CULTURE list* Lab bench cultures exit to the lab bench* Placing cells via seed is refused when the placement area isn't suitable* Newly placed cells have a 0.25s survival grace period* Splice correctly spends specimens from the cryobank* Preview cells that die on spawn are respawned automatically * UI fixes

• v0.4.5a-2 - 14 September 2026

  v0.4.5a-2:* Fixed delivery contracts never completing. Contracts now say the specimens come from the Cryobank.* Renaming a strain should now show the new name everywhere.* Fixed a spliced specimen being lost if you pressed RESUME soon after splicing.* Fixed enzyme shots hitting the cell that fired them.* A large cell with an Explosive enzyme no longer sets off its own shot.* Improved memory use during long runs.

• v0.4.5a-1 - 12 September 2026

  v0.4.5a:* Fixed various tutorial hard locks. - Some locking bugs may still occur. When encountering a game locking bug during the tutorial, you may skip it. - The tutorial is being worked on and will be replaced. Added a notice in-game.* Fixed cells stalling before division and daughters shrinking each generation. Daughters now regrow to full size; the parent pays for the division.* Fixed deaths reporting the wrong cause or no cause at all.* Fixed cells taking acid damage in neutral dishes, and adaptation firing on tiny temperature changes.* Lysocysts should no longer conflict with digestive enzymes. Enzyme firing is now driven by the cell's ATTACK behaviour.* Crystal consistency improvements* Rival labs retrained: all four play differently and deploy their full tray. Fixed contested dishes that never resolved or auto-won.* Fixed Bionet board panning, doubled card hexagons, missing port…

• v0.4.5 - 9 September 2026

  Hey everyone! I uploaded v0.4.5 and it has some major improvements, especially around the game flow and UI consistency. I took a risk and removed zones as the main game mode, replacing it with biomass-based scoring. I'm still working out the kinks but I think this will end up feeling better and more natural; however, I will wait for feedback to make a final decision. This will be the last major Demo version, although I will continue to patch it and make tweaks where necessary. I will continue addressing any feedback in sub-version patches as always. I expect to have a patch ready in the next few days that will improve the rival AI further, that will be in v0.4.5a. I'm not sure exactly what I'm going to do with the demo yet but I plan to leave it up so its available permanently, and I won't leave anything broken. Thank you so much to everyone who has played the demo so far and left feedb…

• v0.4.4a/b/c - 2 September 2026

  v0.4.4a:* Added skip button to tutorial section* Fixed various tutorial hard-lock bugs* UI layout bug fixes* UI navigation improvementsv0.4.4b:* Improvements to the first Bionet map: - Improved balance (the rival side had a major advantage) - Fixed bug where victory condition would be met without ever encountering the rival germinal zone* Cryobank behavior fixes. Strains are now deducted from the Cryobank immediately when deployed in a culture* Improved plasmodia branch behavior and greatly reduced crawl speed (should be nearly stationary)* Fixed various tutorial hard locks* Fixed various cryobank hard and soft locks* UI fixes and consistency improvements* Other various bug fixesNOTE: The current rival AIs are dumb prototypes. More advanced opponents will be trained. v0.4.4c:* Added maps: METAMORPH-I and METAMORPH-II (Note: while I am updating the bionet, they won't be easy to find; one…

• v0.4.4: Divide & Conquer pt. 2! - 29 August 2026

  Hey everyone! I am here once again to share a new update for the demo. I have been focusing a lot on improving the onboarding and accessibility of the game and in that spirit I have fleshed out the tutorial much more with dedicated tutorial levels for each mechanic. I am still adding levels, but the core lessons should be enough to teach the foundations of the game. I think it will be a massive improvement over the last version. I also have been finding areas where the mechanics have gotten a little bit bloated and confusing. I decided to cut nutrient completely because they added complexity without much benefit. I also clarified the core game loop in career mode to be an arena-style RTS where you capture your opponent's germinal zone to win. A player must hold a germinal zone or will be eliminated after 30 seconds. The compound system is still being built but it's already functional as…

• v0.4.3a - 11 August 2026

  * Mutations reworks: - Background mutation rate is lowered - Increased magnitude and prominence of rare, large single gene mutation "divergence events" - Divergence events are named* Cryobank strain cap can be increased via biomark unlocks, converted to list instead of honeycomb display* Cells with no mitochondria now produce much more heat from metabolism* Plasmodia growth buffed so they no longer stall after just a few division* Added more spawn guards to protect against specimens being dropped

• v0.4.3: Divide and Conquer! - 9 August 2026

  Hey everyone! I am very excited to share another Alpha build, this time built around territorial domination! A lot has changed, and some things will be a bit rough while I patch the holes.The biggest challenge that I have been facing is that the game is confusing. Previously, I thought this was just an issue with the tutorial and onboarding, but over time I have realized that the tutorial is confusing because the game is pretty disjointed right now. I have been trying out lots of different ideas, and that means that there hasn't been a single coherent direction. I am changing that now. I have pushed back the Early Access release date to September 17th since I want to take my time getting these changes right.The Substrate is rich in precious trophin. Cells spread zone to zone to extract it. Feed your cells trophin and they will rapidly mutate.Territorial domination helps focus the game a…

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