Citizen Sleeper (2022)

There's a lot of reading to be done in Citizen Sleeper, and luckily the writing is very, very good. I really liked its takes on living within dehumanizing systems, be they capitalism, bureaucracy, imperialism. How do we keep being humans? We survive, build relations, labor (I don't know if it's intentional but there's a lot of Marx and Arendt in this game), help each other, build a home, feed the cat, maybe plot some revolutionary action (did I mention Marx already?).

The gameplay I found to be best at the very beginning, figuring out how to stay survive, discovering how others would help me. The stress of keeping all the meters spinning and within control. Unfortunately, at later stages of the game this cools down and the gameplay becomes mostly busywork inbetween reading. Still, cool mechanics.

I'm thinking it's a little bit ironic to make a computer game out of the human vs systems conflict though.

Platform - PC

Citizen Sleeper blends TTRPG mechanics with narrative driven gameplay. You take on the role of a Sleeper, an emulated consciousness housed in a decaying synthetic body, trying to survive on a space station filled with shady corporations, and fellow outcasts.

Gameplay

The core gameplay revolves around managing dice rolls, energy levels, and relationships with different NPCs. Each in-game cycle, you roll a set of dice, which determines your effectiveness in performing various tasks such as hacking, working odd jobs, or uncovering the station’s secrets.

Story

The narrative is the heart of Citizen Sleeper. It delivers a personal and reflective story about identity, capitalism, and survival in a crumbling dystopian future.

The writing and characters are very reminiscent of Becky Chambers' Wayfarer Series. So much so that sometimes I felt it was a homage, sometimes too much so. Characters, motivations and even fungus based diet all had echoes of Becky Chambers books. Though the story and writing were compelling the similarity to Becky Chambers made them feel over familiar and stopped it feeling like a wholly unique experience.

Graphics & Sound

The game features a minimalist art style with hand drawn character portraits. While the visuals are primarily static the fluid UI design and cyberpunk aesthetic keep it immersive.

The soundtrack is a standout element. Its electronic ambience perfectly complement the game's introspective atmosphere, reinforcing the sense of isolation of being on-board a run down space station.

Verdict

The game rewards player agency and careful decision making. The game is closer to a visual novel with TTRPG elements than a CRPG. But if slow-burning stories and a cyberpunk setting appeal this is worth your time.

If you like this though, do yourself a favour and read Becky Chambers' books if you haven't- you'll probably enjoy them.

Score: 9/10

I'm far from done with this game but since I've finally chosen one of its endings, I've decided its time to review it. I began Citizen Sleeper during my Christmas break last year when I had two weeks off from work. A friend, who's been recommending it for quite some time, convinced me to start it one night when I wasn't quite ready for bed and wanted to play a chill game before doing so. The fallout of this decision was staying up until 6am, nearly 24 hours since I last slept, due to how quickly I fell in love with the world, characters, and atmosphere in the Citizen Sleeper universe.

There is a lot of risk that players who go into this game after hearing so much hype may find disappointment in its minimalism. Visually there isn't much going on. Its strengths lie in its rich character designs, storytelling, and themes. When the quality and content of a game is strong enough, visuals can take a backseat. I'm sure many of us can think of a game that doesn't look incredible but stole our hearts regardless.

I went into this game blind, only knowing my friend had enjoyed it and it had dice-rolling decision-making mechanics. I think if that sounds interesting to you, then I don't think you need to know much more.

I highly recommend this game to everyone. It's not often a game can make me fall in love with gaming all over again, but this one sure did. I haven't purchased the sequel yet because I'm not done with this one but you bet I will once I'm ready.

I really like the writing and it's really good. But I hate the gameplay system so much, it's just not up my alley and I just feel confused and annoyed at it. I also found myself at my classic point of just playing and "wasting my time" not having fun for small glimpses of the written parts of the story. If this was a visual novel or a book I would be down 100% for sure.

I'm sure this is a hot take but it's also a very subjective view based on my playing style. The art, vibes, and writing is excellent, however, I just wish it wasn't a game.

Always a nice feeling when a game completely and unexpectedly knocks me on my ass.

Citizen Sleeper perhaps isn't the super deep TTRPG that it so desperately wants to be, but it IS a phenomenally well written story with some of the best characters in any Video Game ever. If you are currently writing a video game then you should just give up because Gareth Damian Martin has you beat. I've never been so desperate to read every single line of dialogue, to pick apart what each character insinuates, trying so hard to tell friend from foe. Genuinely had me on the edge of my seat and that's so damn rare, especially for a game with zero VA and minimal graphical representation.

That's not a knock against this game's style though. The character sketches are an absolute joy (if maybe a little misleading) and the visual representation of the Eye is remarkably good at conveying the atmosphere. Not that it needed this crutch, but the soundtrack also is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ amazing. Immerses you so deep into this cyberpunk world and the game cleverly places the music in exactly the right areas. That sense of direction is persistent from the opening to the ending credits, and despite being a game of choice it still felt as though my Sleeper had a well though out Arc and ending that fit the character I had built. You are definitely directed into playing a specific type of character, though I don't mind because the Sleeper is definitely the character I was least invested in, despite playing them. Instead, I found satisfying Arcs to pretty much all of my favorite characters, although the nature of the game's choices naturally mean that a handful may be cut off in an inorganic manner. Likewise, the credits would sometimes run after I had opted out of an ending, which often killed the pacing.

These are minor gripes in an otherwise riveting piece of science fiction writing. Don't go in expecting to shape every aspect of the narrative, but do go in expecting to have a lot more agency than most RPGs nowadays. Choices all felt like they had weight here, and that meaningless information gathering dialogue is replaced with writing that is far more intentional and detailed than what most developers could ever dream of. To have a game this well written and this fun to play is such an accomplishment these days that I'm willing to throw medals at this thing's mere existence. Simple gameplay is elevated tenfold by the amazing writing and dialogue, and the symbiotic relationship that gameplay and story have here makes each new line I get to read feel that much more earned.

Amazing stuff, can't wait for the sequel and the inevitable banger of an album that will be attached to it.

I don't know why exactly, but when I woke up at 3:30 in the morning and couldn't get back to sleep, I decided the best way to spend this time was to start up Citizen Sleeper. And you know what? It kind of was. The darkness outside, the darkness of space. The chill, electronic swirls and pings of the soundtrack. The (mostly) relaxed gameplay loop, essentially a visual novel with light RPG mechanics. A game you can sink into, like a dream. Perfect for the wee hours of the morning when the world outside is still largely theoretical.

So then when I woke up at 3am the next day, I figured why not? After which point, the idea of playing it during any other time of day felt...wrong, somehow? Like the spell the game had me under would break in the sun and I'd never be able to put it back together.

Now, I can't really recommend only playing this game between the hours of 3am and 6am. But having done exactly that, I can say that if you find yourself regularly being awake during that time, Citizen Sleeper is a pretty good fit for it.

Let see, what else. Art: beautiful. Music: immaculate vibes. World: Fascinating. Characters: richly-developed. Story: all heart, no filler. And the premise is so much more interesting than what I thought it was going to be. In short, if you have any interest at all in text-driven sci-fi about defending (or, indeed, redefining) your humanity against greed and exploitation, this is the perfect game for you.

p.s. Some advice for the late game: Once you've dealt with the main countdown clock by either getting protection or destroying your tracker, try to avoiding doing to many missions at once going forward. Several of the missions can affect what resources you have access to, and a lot of them will have timed clocks at some point, and having too many of those going at once can be incredibly stressful. And when the game says the flotilla missions are intended for late game, they really mean it. I'd suggest completing everything else before even starting those, because they require a lot of focus, and narratively will assume that you've completed most of the main character arcs.

p.p.s. I think beyond just the chill vibes and the sprinkle of pre-dawn magic, there's something about the fact that, depending on how you play, you can go pretty much the entire game without doing any work that you don't want to do. Whether it's paying back the scrapper who rescued you, or tending bar for one of the first people to show you real kindness, or working the land of the commune because it feels good to take care of others and be taken care of in turn. There are very few jobs in the game that you do simply to survive. I think some of the magic of the game comes from being given the opportunity to devote all of yourself, not just a fraction, to living a meaningful life, and to have that devotion still yield the resources you need to keep living.

When I first started playing this game, I found it to be quite challenging. The sheer number of quests seemed overwhelming, and I assumed that I needed to complete each one to progress. However, after playing through the game around 40 times, I discovered that there were only two main quests that needed to be completed in a specific order. Once I had this knowledge, the game became considerably easier - almost too easy, in fact.

If I were to replay the game now, I'm sure it wouldn't take me nearly as long as it did during my first playthrough. The game world itself is diverse and filled with a variety of side-quests that add to the overall experience. That said, I would recommend this game specifically to those who enjoy reading. If you don't enjoy spending a lot of time reading in-game text, this may not be the best game for you.

At times, the amount of text in the game can be overwhelming, and it's possible to become bored with the excessive amount of reading required. Despite this, I still recommend this game to those who enjoy a good story and are looking for a unique gaming experience.

I played this game without looking anything up, just making decisions the way I thought I might and loved it. The characters, the threads, the goodbyes were beautiful written and carefully matched to an immersive soundscape. I'm giving it 5 stars for the type of game it tried to be, not as a comparison to other games.

I also really enjoyed the tabletop mechanic, personally I never found my character lacking any resources or time and was able to very comfortably complete any task just by managing how I invested my points and how I used my rolls. I'm not sure if I would've enjoyed it more had I felt any pressure to not do what I thought was right because I couldn't be sure I would survive or if it would've hurt my experience but either way I loved it. Also I finished the whole thing in one sitting which I never do, it is quite short.

This is a text adventure with board games mechanics based on rolling dice. I know a lot of people ran away just by reading that, but that's their loss because this is an amazing story that understand cyberpunk themes much better than a lot of big movies, prestige TV an neon soaked AAA video games.

This is an amazing game about surviving in (space) capitalism. Everything seems to be against you, but with the help of good people, a lot of luck and the will to fight the system, you can have a life.

You can read my review in spanish in GamerFocus.

I haven't played the free DLC yet, but I hope to do it soon.

Citizen Sleeper is a game that already impressed me with its visuals. The UI is sleek, clean and easy to understand while the characters brought to life by Guillaume Singelin are beautiful in their colorfulness, their diversity and their personnality. Gameplay-wise, it's the traditional roleplaying game affair with its stats, its bonuses and penalties, but it almost plays like a tabletop game with dices and clocks that will be advanced sometimes on their own, sometimes by the player's input, but at the end of which a story will always be moved forward.

I'd like to emphasize on "a story" here. Because as much as Citizen Sleeper is about your protagonist, a Sleeper (a human mind emulated inside of a machine), and their quest to find a meaning to their life, a place to belong, and a way to survive, it's also a game about the people you meet. Throughout your adventure, you'll come to meet in no particular order : a quiet food stand owner, a cynical, down on his luck mercenary, or even a talking vending machine. And through your actions, you'll be told the stories of these people. Citizen Sleeper is as much a roleplaying game as it is a compilation of short SF stories, and I loved every single one of them.

The game is overall fantastic : it plays great, is pretty well-paced (up until the very end), and is also amazingly written, playing with themes of existentialism, corporate ownership, and the way life shapes itself in a place that functions on its own.

Please play it if you can, especially since it's on Gamepass.