Smalland’s “The Underlands” Is Live — Here’s the Real Deal on the Biggest Update Yet

The update that finally makes Smalland feel bigger by going deeper

The Underlands dropped for Smalland: Survive the Wilds, and it immediately caught my attention for a simple reason: this game’s best moments come from feeling tiny in a giant world, and caves are the perfect pressure cooker for that fantasy. Maximum Entertainment is calling it the biggest content update yet, and for once, that label seems earned-subterranean exploration, new enemy types like whip spiders and an albino scorpion, crystal-based crafting systems, and legit base-building spots beneath existing biomes. It’s a free update on Steam, Epic, Xbox Series X|S, and PS5. That’s the headline. Here’s the gamer take.

Key Takeaways

• Underground caverns add meaningful exploration loops, not just more map sprawl.
• Crystal resources introduce a new crafting tier that could shake up mid-to-late game builds.
• New enemies look designed to punish sloppy combat-expect status effects and reach-heavy attacks.
• Base-building in caves is cool, but lighting, visibility, and pathing are the real tests.

Breaking down The Underlands

Smalland’s surface biomes already did the “Honey, I Shrunk the Player” thing with style-towering grass, hostile insects, and little pockets of civilization. The Underlands flips that scale again by tucking distinct caverns under those familiar zones, each with its own palette and quest hooks. That matters because it’s not a separate region bolted on the side; it deepens the areas you already know. If you’ve set up a Tree Encampment or built out a guild base since 2025’s crossplay and stables updates, your logistics network suddenly matters a lot more for getting in and out of these caves.

The new enemies are the warning sign that this isn’t just for sightseeing. Whip spiders are nasty in real life—long reach, skittery movement—and that design translates well to a game where parry windows and positioning actually matter. The headline albino scorpion screams late-game predator: high damage, likely a bleed or poison component, and an armor check you can’t cheese with early gear. If you were cruising on ranged builds after the 2025 rebalancing, don’t expect every cavern to be a safe kiting gallery. Tight tunnels compress the fight; you’ll have to learn patterns instead of circle-strafing a beetle in a field.

Then there’s crystal crafting. Whenever a survival game adds a new resource tier, my first question is, “Is this meaningful progression or more grind?” The Underlands pitches “new crafting systems,” which reads like more than “here’s a sword with bigger numbers.” If crystals unlock light sources, traversal tools, or resistances tailored to cave hazards, that’s an ecosystem shift worth the hunt. If it’s just ‘crystal gear that’s iron+1,’ that’s less exciting. We’ll need a few days with the blueprints to see if this is a Valheim Mistlands-level meta change or a linear stat bump.

What this actually changes for players

Base-building underground is the sleeper feature. The fantasy of carving out a safe, glowing hideout under a hostile biome is strong, and Smalland’s build pieces have quietly gotten more versatile over the last year. But practical questions matter: how punishing is darkness? Can you wire up enough light without turning your resource bins into glowstick depots? Will companion pathfinding and mount summoning behave in cramped geometry, or are we hoofing it on foot once we’re below ground?

If you play co-op or with a guild, caves are basically co-op dungeons by design—linear routes, clear roles (shield frontliner, ranged support, builder hauling lights and ladders), and high-risk material runs. With crossplay in place, I’m hoping matchmaking and friend-group coordination make these delves the new weekend activity. Also worth watching: server and console performance. Underground spaces can tank frame rates if lighting and particle effects aren’t tuned right, and nothing kills an ambush faster than a half-second hitch when a scorpion lunges. If Maximum nailed stability on Series X|S and PS5 alongside PC, that’s a win.

Quests anchoring each cavern are the right call, too. Survival games bleed motivation once you’ve stabilized; directed objectives in hostile spaces pull you back into the danger loop. The trick is avoiding fetch quests that trivialize the new enemies. If early reports trend toward “grab three shiny rocks, sprint past everything,” that’s a design miss. If quests force engagement—clear nests, craft specific crystal gear to progress, defend a build site in the dark—then The Underlands becomes a legit step up in Smalland’s progression curve.

How it stacks up in the survival scene

Grounded set the bar for tiny-scale polish, but Smalland’s strength has always been scope and community play—big co-op lobbies, shared encampments, and a sandbox that encourages sprawling projects. The Underlands leans into that by adding vertical density rather than just pushing the borders of the map. It’s more akin to when Valheim added Mistlands: same world, new layer, different rules. The fact it’s free also matters; too many survival games gate their best biomes behind paid DLC. Maximum making this a no-cost update feels like a statement to keep the player base together.

I’m still side-eyeing a couple of things. Crystal economies can turn into grind walls if drop rates are stingy, and underground navigation gets old fast if respawn timers force you to farm the same corner every session. Also, base-raid behavior—do cave nests counterattack your underground bases, or are they safe havens once built? Stress is fun when it’s opt-in; not so much when your lights go out because a random patrol clipped your generator while you were offline.

TL;DR

The Underlands is the right kind of “largest update”: deeper systems, new enemy pressure, and reasons to rebuild your kit without splitting the community. If crystal crafting meaningfully changes your loadouts and the caves run smoothly on all platforms, Smalland just earned a fresh loop for 2025. Grab a stack of torches, bring a friend, and don’t underestimate anything with pinchers.