Space exploration sandbox Rodina has been released to the public as an early access title. That's "early access" in lower-case, as the game is available through the developer's website rather than Steam's in-development holding cell. The benefit of this is a pay-what-you-want scale of purchase options, propped up by a generous hour-long demo. More than enough time to jet off into the vast unknown, explore a few asteroids, and - if you're anything like me - flail your ship around impotently as you try to find a flat surface to land upon.

While ostensibly being a pay-what-you-want title, there are varying tiers that offer different bonuses depending on how much you pay. The cheapest, Appetizer, is anything under $15, and gives full access to the current game, but not to future updates. At $15 or above, you'll be guaranteed all future updates. Alternatively, if you're really feeling confident about the developer's prospects, $100 buys all future games they make.

I've not yet played enough to offer any detailed impressions, but - once I'd familiarised myself with the controls - it was a fairly smooth transition into galactic resource gathering and occasional dogfighting heroics. It's definitely an early step, but there are already hints of an impressive sandbox RPG - particularly in how the plot and various side-stories have started to make themselves known. Of course, as mentioned above, I still can't smoothly land on an asteroid.

Head over to the Rodina site to download the demo, and check out our interview with the creator for more on the game and its development.