Unknown Worlds, developers of Natural Selection 2, have confirmed with Valve that their pre-orders will transfer properly to Steam.

Unknown Worlds has been funded largely by its community and preorders although many players have been waiting to hear if pre-ordering now would let them download and play the game on Steam later.

Pre-ordering now gives immediate access to NS2 mapping tools and artwork as well as early access to the alpha or beta when ready. Unknown Worlds is now testing its proprietary “Spark” engine with a small number of players and will expand that to everyone that has pre-ordered the Special Edition shortly.

Natural Selection 2 can be pre-ordered for at a special price of $19.95/€14.75 (Standard Edition) or for $39.95/€29.56 (Special Edition) at http://www.naturalselection2.com/buy. Over 10,000 players have pre-ordered to date. The tools and SDK are available now at http://www.naturalselection2.com/download.

Natural Selection 2
Natural Selection 2 is the sequel to the popular Half-life mod, Natural Selection, which was the most popular independent Half-life mod and was played by over 300,000 players for over 2 billion player-minutes. Natural Selection 2 is a online-only first-person shooter and real-time strategy hybrid. Players can play as marines, aliens or commanders and fight in atmospheric sci-fi environments. It features:

• Truly unique sides. Whether you play as one of the elite marine Frontiersmen or the vicious alien Kharaa, you must use unique strategies and your abilities to win. Marines form persistent squads to find and destroy alien hives. Aliens can choose a wall-running Skulk, pudgy Gorge, flying Lerk, murderous Fade or gigantic Onos that can smash through doors.

• Real-time strategy. Commanders play from overhead to lead their team to victory. Build structures anywhere, collect resources and research upgrades. Marines buy weapons at an Armory or build sentry turrets and siege cannons to assault the enemy. Aliens build chambers, evolve special abilities and plant traps.

• Dynamic environments. Spreading alien infestation deforms hallways and causes space station power failure, turning off lights and shutting down marine powered structures. Use a flamethrower to clear infestation or weld a bulkhead shut for a last defense. Every game is different.

• Unlimited variations. WYSIWYG graphical tools and powerful scripting allow you to create new weapons, scenarios or entirely new games. You’ll get all our tools and Lua source code we’re using to build NS2. Ongoing automatic updates keep the game fresh by adding new maps, weapons and abilities.