Update for the people who don't keep up to date on this stuff.
Starbound is supposed to be going into beta "sometime" which includes early access. However,
they also released a sort of progress road map site the other day. It looks good, but it gives the impression that Starbound is still probably a bit of a ways off.
However, the good news is that Terraria's new PC update is said to be
bigger than when 1.1 doubled the size of the game. It's looking to be having a release around the end of May. Which is roughly when the game released two years ago if I recall.
He's made a point of not really talking much about the update so people don't get excited about things that may not make the cut, but here's some stuff that is either confirmed or hinted at to be in said update:
- Hard mode revamped (re-balancing of corruption vs. hallow specifically)
- Half-blocks
- You can run up/down half-blocks (and full blocks with a height of 1) without stopping. World-gen now makes smoother worlds to accommodate.
- Health bars
- Lots of new biomes.
- Lots of new enemies and bosses.
- Several new ore tiers (Platinum & Tungsten?)
- Waterfalls (and Lavafalls if you're so inclined)
- At least 250 items added (so far)
- Wiring more useful (can use different colors to overlap wires)
- Working stairs.
- New NPCs. Possibly random "civilians"?
- Clouds. including Rainclouds. These are tiles so you can place them.
And lots of other things that are only vaguely hinted at such as the PC update containing some of the things from the recently released console version such as the in-game map.
And some teaser shots:
Again, we're looking at possibly around the end of May, by the sounds of things. Can't wait to finally dive in to Terraria again.