Planets

**Planets** are astronomical bodies in Astroneer that the player may travel to, explore and construct bases on. Moons exist as well, but they share the same characteristics as planets, and are treated as such.

There are currently five planets, with two moons. These are, starting from the one closest to the Sun,  Atrox,  Calidor,  Sylva,  Vesania, and  Glacio. The moons,  Desolo and  Novus, orbit Sylva and Vesania, respectively.

Planets are procedurally generated upon creation of a new save, each having unique characteristics, with different types of Flora, Biomes, and Resources. Planets share the same universal resources, while all but Atrox have a Primary and a Secondary resource, which each exists on only two planets. Atrox is unique in having four atmospheric resources, with one being unique to the planet, while Desolo, having no atmosphere, has no atmospheric resources. Research Items and Samples are also different per planet, with different colors, amounts of bytes, and research times.

Planets have unique day/night cycles and power generation, with some planets being better for solar power, and others for wind power. The five planets (Atrox, Calidor, Glacio, Sylva, and Vesania) share the same size and gravity. On the other hand, Desolo and Novus have 1/2 the diameter of a planet, meaning that they have 1/8th of the volume. Additionally, they have slightly lower gravity at their surface, due to the surface being closer to the core.

Each planet has the same basic layout of five main layers: the surface, caves, mantle, outer core and inner core. Due to the generation of terrain, some caves can stretch from the surface to the outer core on certain planets, as well as some layers blending together without much distinction, such as on Desolo.

## Planets

* Primary resources are found between the first underground layer and the mantle of the planet. Secondary resources are found in mountainous biomes on the surface and the layers under the mantle to the outer core.

## Planet Types

The Planets in Astroneer each have a type associated with them. Each type has varying differences, from the amount of sun to the types of resources that it may contain.

## Landing Zones

Landing zones are locations on each planet that a player may land on using a Shuttle. Landing zones are marked with either a sphere or a cylinder when viewed in orbit around the planet, depending on if it is natural or from a Landing Pad, allowing the player to select the zone to land in that location. Landing zones may only be occupied by one shuttle at a time. Moving a shuttle off of a landing zone can unlock it, allowing other shuttles to land there.

Spherical landing zones appear naturally at the start of the game, while cylindrical landing zones come from Landing Pads. In multiplayer, a passenger is also able to select a landing zone to land on, not only the person in the main seat. Some landing zones may also spawn very close to gateway chambers.

## Notes

* Planets have a very high terrain build limit, allowing players to create bases far above the surface. However, flight, both in Creative Mode and from Solid-Fuel Jump Jet or Hydrazine Jet Pack, will not operate until the player is below a certain height, just above the cloud layer. Above this layer, players should be careful, as there is no gravity when far enough from the planet's surface, where items could be lost and the player could die from suffocation. The moons operate differently than the planets, and allow you to build all the way to other planets (ex. Desolo to Glacio), although it is highly advised to use a rover equipped with a thruster instead, due to the aforementioned hazards.
* All Planets with the exception of the two moons will give you a specific suit after activating the core, such as Sylva giving you the Terran suit.

## Trivia

* Parallels could be drawn between the characteristics of some planets and planets within the Solar System. Sylva and Desolo are similar to the Earth and the Moon respectively, Atrox has an atmosphere similar to that of Venus, Calidor is similar to Mars. Glacio could be based on the fact that Uranus and Neptune both have icy cores, or one of their frozen moons, such as Neptune's Triton, or dwarf planet Pluto. Vesania and Novus could be loosely based on Jupiter or Saturn's moons.
* The Gateway Chambers, when activated, show the shape of the symbol of the planet.
* When hovering over a planet, a tooltip is displayed showing the planet type (:ex: Atrox is a Radiated planet.) This is a reference to the previous names of those planets (ex: Radiated) that were present during early access.

## Media

* Astroneer Solar System, not to scale
* Planetary and Solar System Orientation Guide, not to scale.
* Landing zones on Terran (Pre 1.0)