Backpack



The Backpack is an Astroneer's all-purpose storage and small item fabrication solution. It features 8 inventory slots, 2 small attachment points, a small printer, and storage for both oxygen for the Astroneer and power for their Terrain Tool.

The various features of the backpack can be accessed by "opening" it, making it larger and easier to interact with. To open the backpack, simply press on your keyboard or on your Xbox controller, or press Y to select it directly using the cursor.

Inventory Slots
The backpack has 8 slots dedicated to resource and small item storage. Items can be placed into, removed from, and rearranged within these slots manually, but as long as there is an inventory slot available, resource stacks collected with the deform tool or items created using the backpack's printer will be automatically placed there. If all inventory slots are full, newly created or collected items will drop to the ground nearby.

It should be noted that while the backpack's inventory slots resemble attachment points, they do not behave as such. Only a few select items truly "connect" to the backpack through the inventory, such as Tanks, Batteries, and Power Stacks.

Attachment Slots
There are 2 additional slots in the top corner of the backpack, which can be equipped with any Widgets. These are commonly used to host power sources such as the Solar Panel or Wind Vane, allowing an Astroneer to recharge their backpack's internal battery in the field. Like other attachment points, however, they can also be fitted with resource stacks or other small items for additional storage.

Research Catalog
Pressing will open the research catalog, where player can purchase Schematics using accumulated Bytes. The catalog is separated into 4 different size categories, corresponding to the four sizes of objects created by the corresponding printers. The catalog includes a pad with buttons that can be used to navigate around it, which also hints which controller buttons are used to navigate around the catalog.

You can use your movement keys to move around a category, and the Context Left/Right keys to change categories. Alternatively, you can click the buttons and schematics on the catalog itself.

Backpack Printer
Using the small printer on the Backpack, simple items can be crafted on the go at the cost of Power. As you cycle through the various printable items, the appropriate resource will automatically move down to the printer's input slot if it is already in your backpack. This input slot can be used to deliberately store a specific extra resource, if so desired, but be forewarned that changing the item to be printed will eject the contents of the input slot from the backpack if the rest of its inventory slots are already full. It costs the player 2.5 Units of Power to print an object.

Larger objects can be printed using the Small Printer, Medium Printer, and Large Printer.

Oxygen and Power Storage

 * Prominently displayed on the backpack are two gauges: the horizontal oxygen gauge in light blue, and the vertical power gauge in bright yellow.
 * Enough oxygen is stored for 72.5 seconds of untethered field work. Running consumes a little more oxygen, making the tank empty in 50 seconds instead.
 * You get a notification when the tank is 50% and then 25% full. When you run out of oxygen, you are suffocating. Within 5 seconds of starting to suffocate, you cannot run anymore and then you have 10 more seconds to reach a source of oxygen before dying.
 * Power is only drained when using an Augment on the Terrain Tool, or when using the printer.
 * A small battery stores enough power to use a single augmented deform tool continuously for about 64 seconds, depending on whether power-generating widgets are being used.
 * As an internal battery, the backpack will not transfer its charge to other batteries.

Trivia

 * Technically the backpack has a total of 14 available slots (8 backpack inventory slots, 2 attachment slots, 1 printer inventory slot, and 3 more slots on the terrain tool as of the latest update)
 * A broken version of the Research Catalog can rarely be found, and was added to tease the working counterpart's addition in a later update.
 * A total of 125,550 bytes are need to research every Schematic in the game.

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