You fight to stay alive in Icarus, a survival game set on a fictional planet about four light years from Earth, which was meant to be a second home for humanity until its terraforming project failed. You can play alone or in co-op, and the game has three modes: Open World, Missions, and Outposts. Open World is one ongoing world where you claim land, build a base, and keep coming back while you survive the elements and apex predators. Missions are timed drops with an objective and an extraction back to orbit, and Outposts are creative regions with regenerating resources and safe conditions.
Each mission starts at the space station in orbit, where you accept a contract and drop to the surface in a dropship. You start with nothing, so you spend the run gathering materials, hunting, and crafting what you need to keep your oxygen, water, and food up and your body temperature steady. The timer matters most, since you have to be back at the dropship before it runs out. If you miss it, your character is left behind with their gear and progress, though some early missions offer insurance that rescues them for lower rewards.
Exotics are the rare mineral you are after, and you trade them at the Orbital Workshop for advanced tech and gear that can go back down on later drops. Olympus comes with the base game, and Styx, Prometheus, and Elysium come through expansions. PC has all four regions and up to eight co-op players, while the Console Edition, which launched on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S in March 2026, includes Prometheus, sells Styx separately, and supports up to four co-op players.
- Developer
- RocketWerkz
- Publisher
- RocketWerkz (PC), Grip Studios (Console Edition)
- Release
- PC (Steam): 2021-12-03 · Console Edition: 2026-03-26
- Platforms
- Windows, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S
Game data
Creatures
Creatures in Icarus are the native animals of the planet and the ones brought from Earth during terraforming. Many of them run from prospectors, some like wolves only fight when pushed, and others, like the polar bear, come after you. Some can be tamed as mounts or pets, a handful are bosses that roam or appear in missions, and most yield meat, leather and bone when hunted. Each one has its own Bestiary entry that fills as you hunt, scan and tame it.
Weapons
Icarus weapons fall into several groups: knives and spears for close fights, throwing knives and javelins for thrown attacks, bows and crossbows for hunting from a distance, firearms for tougher targets, and heavy weapons such as grenades, flamethrowers and launchers for crowds and bosses. Most of them unlock as you move up the five-tier Tech Tree. Workshop weapons are a separate line, researched and crafted at the Orbital Workshop with Ren or Exotics.
Armor Sets
Armor sets are the gear that protects your prospector from cold, heat, radiation and wildlife in Icarus. They come in five tiers, from basic Cloth up to Tier 5 gear, and a full set is five pieces from head to feet. Some sets add a bonus when every piece is worn together, and the sets are spread across the base game and each expansion, with some bought in the Workshop instead of crafted.
Maps
The Icarus maps are Olympus, which comes with the base game, plus Styx, Prometheus and Elysium, which come with the Styx Expansion, New Frontiers and Dangerous Horizons. Each map has its own climate, wildlife and resources, and each one is harder than the last. Prometheus is the only place to find volatile raw exotics, while Elysium is the most challenging map and home to Eden, the first permanent NPC settlement on Icarus.
Icarus gameplay tips
- Note where your dropship is before you wander off. You leave a mission by returning to it before the timer runs out, and a missed return leaves your character behind.
- Mark the nearest water on your map as soon as you land. Your water runs down over time, and a spot you already know saves you from searching when you are already thirsty.
- Build a shelter over your gear before the first storm. Wind and rain wear down anything left outside, and standing in bad weather drains your stamina and speed, so a shelter protects both your gear and you.
- Send your exotics up in the dropship before it leaves. Exotics only count toward your Orbital Workshop if they are in the dropship's cargo when it departs, otherwise they are gone for good.