Ludeon Studios Moves RimWorld to In-House Waylith Engine With Update 1.7
For the first time in RimWorld's update history, a major patch brings no expansion DLC, and the studio's own engine plus a teased second project points to Ludeon repositioning as a multi-title studio rather than a one-game shop.
Key Facts
- Ludeon Studios announced RimWorld update 1.7 on October 13, 2026, moving the game from Unity to its in-house Waylith Engine.
- Ludeon Studios says RimWorld version 1.7 runs 2 to 4 times faster than version 1.6, with a late-game stress test measured at 2.2 times the speed.
- With a mod pack of 1,500 mods installed, RimWorld version 1.7 reduced load time from 14 minutes to 6 minutes, per Ludeon Studios' measurements.
- RimWorld version 1.7 is available now on Steam's unstable beta branch, and no date was given for the stable release.
- Ludeon Studios said a new title running on the Waylith Engine is in development, with details to be shared later.
Reporting from 4 sources: Denfaminicogamer, Automaton, GameBusiness.jp, Game Spark.
Ludeon Studios announced RimWorld update 1.7 on October 13, moving the colony sim from Unity to Waylith, an engine built in-house. The studio says startup, loading, map generation, and in-game processing are 2 to 4 times faster, and that a stress test of a late-game colony ran at 2.2 times the speed of version 1.6. With a mod pack of 1,500 mods, load time fell from 14 minutes to 6 minutes. Ludeon states that 1.6 saves load in 1.7, 1.7 saves run in 1.6, and most mods work without changes, though some may show an incompatibility warning and the build may not run on PCs more than 10 years old. Version 1.7 is playable now on Steam's unstable beta branch, with no stable release date given. The studio also said a new title is in development on Waylith, with details to come later.
Update 1.7 is the game's first major patch in over a year. The content itself is unchanged; the work went into the engine underneath it. Ludeon's tests covered startup, save loading with large mod counts, map and world generation, and in-game processing. The studio noted the figures are its own measurements and will vary by PC and mod list.
Engine changes reach mod authors too. According to the announcement, creators can use the latest C# language features, build complex mods without hurting performance, and handle large-scale visual changes and custom effects more easily.
The timing is unusual for RimWorld. Recent major updates shipped alongside expansion DLC: Update 1.5 arrived with the Anomaly expansion in March 2024, and Update 1.6 arrived with Odyssey in June 2025. The Update 1.7 announcement mentioned no expansion. The studio ended it with a "One more thing..." stating that RimWorld is not the only game running on Waylith and that a new title is in development. Ludeon said it will be some time before details can be shared, but that it simply could not help but tell people. Neither the genre nor the title is known.
RimWorld launched on Kickstarter in 2013 and entered Steam early access in July 2016, with a full release in 2018. It holds an "Overwhelmingly Positive" rating from about 97% of roughly 210,000 Steam user reviews, and sells for 3,900 yen.
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 4 cited sources below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.
Sources
- Denfaminicogamer 『RimWorld』のスタジオが新作を開発中と明かす。自社製の新エンジンが開発され、新作にも『RimWorld』にも採用
- Automaton 人気コロニー運営シム『RimWorld』ゲームエンジン刷新大型アプデ発表、パフォーマンス2～4倍に劇的改善へ。ぬるっと新作も匂わせ
- GameBusiness.jp 『RimWorld 2』くるか！？開発元が新たな自社製エンジンで動く新作を予告―『RimWorld』本編は同エンジン移行で2～4倍高速化、Mod環境でも早いアプデ1.7告知
- Game Spark 『RimWorld 2』くるか！？開発元が新たな自社製エンジンで動く新作を予告―『RimWorld』本編は同エンジン移行で2～4倍高速化、Mod環境でも早いアプデ1.7告知