S&box, the successor to Facepunch's Garry's Mod, has been released to select developers for alpha testing.
Lead developer Garry Newman previously stated in February that we could probably give dev access to a few modders now
, but didn't want to disrupt the game's development pace.
Preview keys of the game were given to a handful of developers to test the tools given with the game.
Newman says that releasing the game to a select few has been really beneficial
, as it's made it really obvious where we needed to focus energy [and] found a bunch of bugs too.
The game is in a very early state, however – there's nothing to play yet
says Newman, as the game is currently janky and has very little content
.
S&box comes shipped with a build of Valve's new Source 2 engine, which is set to completely overhaul mod creation. Source 2 has been privately used by Valve in games for several years, but it has not yet had a full release for users.
Source 2 was meant to release alongside Half-Life: Alyx last year, however while Workshop tools were released it contains only some of the game-making tools included with Source 2.
S&box has received monthly development blogs on its website, showcasing various new features that have been added to the game.