Getting Started

A player holding a hammer.

Image of the side menu.

Welcome to Waste Of Space! This is an open world massive multiplayer sandbox game, where the whole universe is your sandbox! The possibilities are endless, from building battleships in ocean worlds to constructing Dyson spheres around stars harvesting energy!

However, you must learn the basics first before diving deep into it. You will notice that when spawning for the first time, you spawn in an alien world with trees and oceans. This is called an Earth-like planet, and many players will spawn in Earth-like planets to be given a chance to progress through the game.

Basic Controls / Tools / GUI

On the bottom of your screen, you are given 4 tools to play with:

• The fist tool, a basic offense tool. It is able to damage other players, and break parts such as glass. You are able to block with F, which will negate any damage dealt to you by fists.
• The harvest tool, used to harvest natural resources from your surroundings.
• The hammer tool, used to drag, resize, surface, connect, paint, and configure certain parts and objects, and is a core component of the game's building system. Holding [CTRL] while dragging will cause the placed object not to weld to any touching surfaces.

On the left of your screen, you will notice a side menu which contains five buttons. Their keybindings, among other settings, may be changed in the options menu located on the top left of your screen. Listed in order from top to bottom, the buttons are:

• Help [X] - Serves as a reference for your game play, and gives you information on parts and tutorials for specific tasks, similar to the pages on this wiki. Remember: This wiki goes more in-depth on many parts and subjects, so it is wise to consult both! (similarly to the wiki all of the info is outdated there as well)
• Lock [C] - Allows you to interact with the locking system. In it, you will be able to manage locking and unlocking parts, as well as lock groups. Lock groups specify who, and in what way may interact with your locked parts; to select a lock group, simply click it. If you have just started, it is wise to create one. To lock parts, either use the Nearby Lock/Unlock option to lock/unlock all nearby parts, or click a specific part to toggle it's lock. Parts will be locked with the selected lock group.
• Craft [V] - Used to craft items in this game. It has search and filter (by category) functionality, which will allow you to find what you are looking for quicker. After selecting an item, it's recipe and a brief description will be displayed, along with a visual preview. If you have the necessary ingredients, you will be able to craft the selected item. You may also use the /c command to craft items (example: /c Boiler)

• Trash [B] - Irreversibly destroys unlocked parts after clicking on them.
• Model Loader [N] - Loads in models from the compiled output. To use it, simply paste in the model builder's output, or a website containing it (Github Gist, Ghostbin, etc.). For further information on the model loader, please consult the Model Loader page and it's associated tutorial page.

Constructing A Base

(NOTE: If you need additional help, or would like a more comprehensive guide, please go to Building A Base)

Picking the right spot

To begin constructing a base, you should first find a good spot for it. Try to find one with iron, copper, coal and mountains nearby.

After you have picked a spot, you should set up power generation. To do this, first go to the iron node and mine some iron.

-Although optional, it may not be a bad idea to craft some bins as to store mined iron and copper.

Power Generation

After you've done this, make an extractor, and place it on a coal node. You will also need to make burner generators, a bin for the coal, and a power cell. To get sulfur for the power cell, mine from the mountain until sulfur appears (long, bright yellow slate textured material).

Once you've crafted the necessary components, place the coal bin on the extractor (make sure the extracting side is placed correctly, and be sure to resize the bin! The surface to attach bins to is the one with a large black hole). After you've done this, connect burner generators to it, and connect them to the power cell. Finally, link the power cell to the extractor and drop a piece of coal into the coal bin.

If done correctly, the coal will be used by the burner generators to produce power, which will then be stored in the power cell. The power cell will in turn provide the extractor with power so it may mine more coal, continuing the loop.

Later on, you will be able to use other power generation methods, such as solar panels, combustion turbines or even boilers! Coal should be enough to get you off the starter, however.

Below, you are able to see visual examples of coal, solar, gasoline and steam based power generation setups:

• 
  A coal-based power generation setup
• 
  A solar-based power generation setup
• 
  A gasoline-based power generation setup
• 
  A steam-based (boilers) power generation setup

Now that you've set up power, it is time to start building the rest of the base. To get off of the starter, you will need to build a ship; this will require resources.

Since mining by hand would take too long, we will automate extraction by using extractors. The following section will guide you through setting up iron extraction, you should be able to figure out the other materials on your own.

Resource Extraction And Storage

To start, find a node of the resource you want to extract. In this case, we will give an example with iron.

First, place an extractor on the iron node, and configure it's MaterialToExtract property (set it to "Iron"). Once you are done with this, you will want to either attach a bin directly to the extractor, or use chutes to transport the resources to some location (recommended). Later in the game, you will be able to use transporters instead of chutes.

It is recommended to build a centralized storage system, and connect the extractor to that using chutes. Be sure to use filters!

• 
  Visual example of how to connect the extractor to a bin using chutes
• 
  A basic centralized storage system,

Now that storage is set up, you will have to power the extractor. Craft some wires (you may need to mine some copper, 3-4 pieces should be enough), and attach one to your power source. You will now need to connect your power source and the extractor using said wires. Use the hammer tool to resize them, and to add more wires by dragging them onto the previous one.

If you've done everything successfully, the extractor on the iron node should be emitting black smoke! This means it is powered, the only remaining step is to see if your iron bin is being filled.

All that's left to do now is to set up the extraction of other materials. Ensure you have enough power to do so, and keep an eye out on your temperature bar! You may need to use coolers, as extractors generate heat.

Where to go from here

Congratulations! You have built your first base! You should be proud of yourself, give yourself a pat on the back!

Unfortunately, as everyone spawns on starters, they are incredibly dangerous to live on due to griefers. Starters also don't have the necessary materials to build all of the items in this game, so you will need to reach out for the stars.

To escape the starter planet, you will need to build a spaceship. The help menu and Building A Ship will help you do this. Good luck!

Example starter base (built by roblor12). It is using coal and solar for it's power generation.