Gaming: Grounded 2's First Major Content Update Delivers A New Biome, Bugs,...

The first major content update for the backyard survival sim Grounded 2 went live today with a new Garden Patch biome, new creatures (friendly and otherwise), and "the mysterious Tang effect," the result of an experiment gone wrong at Ominent Practical Technologies that's corrupting the soil, water, and unsuspecting creatures alike.

Toxic Tangle adds a new vine-choked Garden biome, "ripe for exploration, stacked with vertical climbs, secret stashes, and probably a bug or two you didn’t see coming." And of course danger, as Obsidian warned players to "bring your best gear—and maybe a backup plan."

New creatures include black ants, fireflies, wasps, rust and potato beetles, earwigs, crickets, wooly aphids, "and something much bigger"—the Snake Colossus, I presume? There's also a sweet new mount, the Ladybug Buggy, "a heavy-duty, tank-style mount equipped with a pressurized water cannon" that can blast enemies and rinse away Tang. The Ladybug Buggy also has a powerful charge and slowly regenerates health over time.

Mutations have been divided into actives and passives, and the builder toolkit has been expanded with new kits. The Garden MIX.R and O.R.C. wave challenges are also now live.

"Alongside this update, we’re preparing for the return of Playgrounds Mode, entering PTB (Public Test Beta) in February with all the core tools from the first Grounded," Obsidian wrote. "Whether you’re building mini-games, boss arenas, or custom gauntlets, Playgrounds will give creators the tools they need to thrive."

The Toxic Tangle update is live now—check out the full patch notes below.

2026 games: All the upcoming gamesBest PC games: Our all-time favoritesFree PC games: Freebie festBest FPS games: Finest gunplayBest RPGs: Grand adventuresBest co-op games: Better together

Keep up to date with the most important stories and the best deals, as picked by the PC Gamer team.

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to leg

Source: PC Gamer