s&box update brings discovery overhaul, physics improvements and rendering optimisations

s&box has rolled out its October 2025 update introducing major engine-level improvements to discovery, physics, rendering and editor workflow. Full details were published on the official sbox.game – "October 2025 Update" (1 Oct 2025).

The update removes the previous launch options window so that the game now opens directly, with the editor distributed as a separate Steam tool. Developer matt explains that the change simplifies workflow and will eventually allow editor-specific files to be excluded from standard installations.

A redesigned shelf-based discovery system replaces the earlier popularity-ordered game list. In the same post, Garry describes introducing dynamic shelves inspired by Netflix to help community creations surface more easily and keep the in-game catalogue fresh. Players on Reddit – r/sandbox "October 2025 Update" welcomed the change, with one user writing that the discovery addition is "awesome and exactly what gmod needed all these years."

Prop interactions have been expanded so that objects can ignite and explode through ModelDoc configuration. The Duplicator tool now supports physics joints and additional unconnected objects when the Shift key is held, while duplicated ragdolls behave more consistently.

The physics engine has also been refined. The physgun now uses a control joint for smoother manipulation and ghost collision artefacts from rolling objects on mesh colliders have been eliminated. Crash-free sessions reportedly improved by 1.44 percent after fixes for texture-unload errors, hot-reload stability and RenderAttributes cleanup.

Rendering performance shows measurable gains. Screen-Space Reflections now run roughly four to eight times faster, while bloom effects render up to 14 times faster following pipeline refinements. The engine's asset verification process has also moved from CRC32 to xxHash3, a change developers claim delivers more than a hundredfold speed increase.

Additional graphics controls for volumetric fog, post-processing and motion-blur intensity are now accessible in-game. Editor and interface updates add multi-edit dropdowns, new Sprite Resources, infinite-scroll package lists and more resilient UI error handling. Early cloud entity functionality has also been activated, allowing limited persistence of objects across sessions.

The post closes with confirmation that work on standalone game exports is progressing. Garry writes that licensing discussions have resumed and that the team still plans to let developers export games built in s&box to Steam without royalty obligations once legal arrangements are in place.

According to the SteamDB – "s&box October Update" (Build 20207120) record, the release went live on 1 October 2025. A later internal build (20318110) appeared in the SteamDB – s&box Patchnotes Overview on 9 October 2025 without official notes.