The Mycelarium upgrade tree is one screen headed UPGRADES with a POINTS counter at the top, and the root node splits into three labelled branches: HYPHAE, FRUITING BODIES and ENZYMES. Points come from growing hyphae, and each node has to be unlocked through its parent before it can be bought.
Mycelarium upgrade tree guide: the three branches
| Branch | What it is about | Entry node |
|---|---|---|
| HYPHAE | The network itself: how far, how wide, how cheap | Shot Range |
| FRUITING BODIES | The mushrooms that grow above the soil | Spore Mushroom |
| ENZYMES | Taking nutrients in, including from trees | Absorption |
Six of these attributes are the ones the game names as upgradeable: range, width, water efficiency, node cost, budding chance and soil penetration. The rest of the tree is the mushrooms and the enzyme branches built on top of them.
No one has published a priority order for buying them, so the order you buy them in is a decision you make. The reasoning behind that decision is in the best upgrade order.
The HYPHAE branch
- Shot Range (2 points) → opens Budding Chance (2 points), Shot Width and Water Efficiency.
- Budding Chance → Node Efficiency.
- Water Efficiency → Soil Penetration.
Shot Range stretches how far a dragged shot reaches and Shot Width thickens the thread it leaves, which is what makes the aiming gesture in the controls worth learning. Water Efficiency lowers the water price of every shot, and Soil Penetration is the node that lets hyphae push through the harder layers of soil.
The FRUITING BODIES branch
- Spore Mushroom → Spore Count, Spore Quality and Repeller Mushroom.
- Spore Quality → Spore Lightness.
- Repeller Mushroom → Repeller Charges and Repeller Regen Cost.
- Predator Mushroom (3 points) → Tree Mushroom, Digestion Speed and Predator Yield.
- Tree Mushroom → Tree Water Yield and Tree Drop Rate.
This is the branch that produces food and the branch that protects what you produce. The Predator Mushroom and its descendants are the food-producing line, the Repeller handles the hedgehog, and the Tree Mushroom pair is how a tree starts giving something back. What each mushroom actually does in play is in the mushroom mutation list.
The ENZYMES branch
- Absorption → Absorption Speed and Absorption Yield (2 points).
- Absorption Yield → Parasitism.
- Parasitism → Parasitism Speed and Parasitism Yield.
- Absorption Yield → Parasitism.
- Symbiosis sits alongside Absorption at the top of the branch.
The enzymes are how the colony takes in nutrients and works on the trees above it. Parasitism is the line that feeds on trees, and Symbiosis is the other relationship with the forest. The full parasite path is in how to parasitize trees.
How the tree reads on screen
Purchased nodes are drawn in gold, nodes still locked behind their parent show a padlock, and the point price is printed in red next to the node. The same points counter you see in the HUD sits at the top of the screen, so you can open the tree mid-run without losing track of what you have banked.
The whole tree can be completed inside the demo, but it takes a long time — one playthrough reported about four and a half hours to reach every available upgrade.