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- Image of Surviving Mars, Courtesy of Paradox Interactive

Surviving Mars Breaks Free from Earthly Chains in Surprising Relaunch

Originally posted on Total Apex Gaming | By David Gilbert | Last updated Oct 19, 2025 10:54 PM ET

The news of a Surviving Mars remaster has left fans confused, as it’s just too new for a fresh coat of paint. Although the game had just been released, this startling realization hits that its initial launch was a full seven years ago. Players were hit with this fact with the force of a misplaced meteor, proving their internal clocks have been hopelessly broken since the year 2020; the pandemic era. How does time manage to move so fast and yet so infrequently at the same time?

Your Colony Just Got More Interesting

This new version is titled Surviving Mars: Relaunched, and it promises to be more than just shinier domes and redder rocks. While the game includes the expected technical and interface upgrades, a potent new ingredient is injected into the colonial simulation, none other than the chaotic thrill of politics. According to the developer, Haemimont Games, this system reveals a surprisingly layered approach.

Intriguingly, the political maneuvering begins on the overpopulated, blue marble of Earth instead of on the rust-colored plains of Mars. A single colony in Surviving Mars is only a few struggling domes, with a council on Earth calling the shots by convening periodically to pass laws that directly impact Martian life. This group, for instance, may vote on deregulating rocket speed limits to get supplies to a location faster. With the development of faster rockets, does this mean a more spectacular crash could happen if something goes wrong?

Choose Your Martian Adventure

Image of Surviving Mars, Courtesy of Paradox Interactive

The Martian populations continue to grow, driving the colonists can finally tell Earth to stop micromanaging their home. Consequently, these citizens decide to form their own government by constructing a Martian Assembly. Following this action, players are allowed to choose their flavor of administration, picking from various options, including:

a theocracy
a liberal democracy
an anarchist commune

This critical choice not only dictates how the assembly functions, but how it handles political dissent. So, what happens to opponents: will they be tolerated, outlawed, or given a one-way ticket out of the airlock? Whichever government type players choose also influences the type of political factions that emerge within the assembly. Although dozens of potential factions exist in Surviving Mars, players will only see a handful appear in any single playthrough.

Surviving Mars and the Art of Bureaucracy

While these groups aren’t static, they can evolve and become more radical. Alternatively, the colony could even fall apart as the story unfolds. So, what’s the ultimate objective? Players must achieve total independence for Mars, breaking free from both Earth’s control and the private sponsor who funded the initial mission. Who knew that managing interplanetary red tape sounds could be more fun than managing a simple oxygen leak?

Given the genuine impressiveness of this whole package, the Relaunched edition bundles every piece of DLC from the past seven years. Moreover, Surviving Mars added massive features like terraforming, animal husbandry, and rival colonies. As Haemimont’s plans extend beyond the November 10th release date, future updates are already slated to expand food production and introduce a robot population. After all, when there are obedient robots to work with, who needs complicated humans?

This article first appeared on Total Apex Gaming and was syndicated with permission.

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