In 2017 Apple one of the world's biggest companies admitted to intentionally slowing down phone batteries. Referred to as "Batterygate" this action opened up a string of lawsuits that Apple were intentionally using 'planned obsolescence' to encourage people to upgrade their phones or fork out to apple for replacement batteries. Apple always denied this by all reports stating it was actioned to preserve the device.
Moving forward 5 years and we have Citizen Sleeper, an indie game made by a one person studio Jump Over the Edge. In this game you play as a Sleeper, an emulated copy of a person with no rights as part of a Essen-Arp Megacorporation contract. Through design without the right treatment your body will decay over time making you reliant on them in a form of indentured servitude. Planned Obsolescence of a copied person. You escape however ending up on the Eye, a self run Space station surviving after the collapse of the Megacorporation Solheim it and many companies were once part of. Somewhat lawless but welcoming, it's a perfect place for a Sleeper trying to survive.
The lore and world created here is a fascinating one. The way the game takes examples of situations like that of Apple as a form of consumer control but exaggerated into the extreme Cyberpunk Megacorp world really stands out. The characters you meet on this independent space station are broken, struggling, running and surviving but are a great cast to interact with as further world building about the outside universe is dribbled to you through these events.
The game actually plays akin to a visual novel mixed with a dice placement tabletop board game with a few light sprinklings of RPG stats on top. Each turn or cycle (as there is no day and night on a space station) you get several dice rolls based on your Sleeper's physical health condition. Each dice can be used towards actions, some immediate some building up charges to complete. Depending on the number result of the roll will depend on it's chance for success with a positive (5-6), neutral (3-4) or negative (1-2) outcome. These numbers can be bolstered with + values depending on the skill involved and you level in it such as 'engineering +1' to increase your chance. All along the station are different locations with different characters and events that can feed you, repair you or push along character quest lines.
How you choose to progress is entirely up to you after the opening couple of quests. It's a fairly open ended adventure with multiple different endings depending on who you interact with and when. This is both a positive and negative in my view having seen them all. Citizen Sleeper despite it's grand ideas for the outside lore of the world feels more like a slice of life story so each character questline is personal and don't interconnect with each other in anyway leaving everything feeling a little directionless. Additionally though your circumstances are in many ways quite dire it never feels that way in the writing which at times is a little too matter a fact. What writing there is though outside of that small caveat is excellent. The characters, their problems and events are all really interesting, I got rather absorbed into their lives and personal struggles which is why I went out of my way to see all the endings on offer.
My only real issue with the game is actually if you are wanting to see all events there is a lot of downtime mechanically. Initially every dice you use has to be really thought out in regards to survival / story progress balance but it soon becomes extremely obsolete meaning you are mostly just burning down clock cycles to get to the next story beat sometimes doing nothing. The thing is I am a board gamer and this reminds me a lot of a game called Alien Frontiers where you place dice for resources to build colonies. What I hope Citizen Sleeper learns from this is to use the full range of numbers for actions rather than high = good and low = bad. Have certain actions only available on a 1 or 2 etc. and smaller ways of knocking them up and down would have made the turn based element more strategic and interactive throughout.
When all is said and done though I had a really good time with this and the fact that it was made by mostly one person is pretty nuts. The wonderful character art, somber music and writing pushing this along make for a wonderful experience and I do look forward to the announced sequel.
+ Fantastic art, music and atmosphere.
+ Citizen Sleepers universe and lore.
+ Mostly excellent writing and characters.
- Dice mechanic could have been more interesting.
- Sleepers personal situation often felt detached from events writing wise.
Moving forward 5 years and we have Citizen Sleeper, an indie game made by a one person studio Jump Over the Edge. In this game you play as a Sleeper, an emulated copy of a person with no rights as part of a Essen-Arp Megacorporation contract. Through design without the right treatment your body will decay over time making you reliant on them in a form of indentured servitude. Planned Obsolescence of a copied person. You escape however ending up on the Eye, a self run Space station surviving after the collapse of the Megacorporation Solheim it and many companies were once part of. Somewhat lawless but welcoming, it's a perfect place for a Sleeper trying to survive.
The lore and world created here is a fascinating one. The way the game takes examples of situations like that of Apple as a form of consumer control but exaggerated into the extreme Cyberpunk Megacorp world really stands out. The characters you meet on this independent space station are broken, struggling, running and surviving but are a great cast to interact with as further world building about the outside universe is dribbled to you through these events.
The game actually plays akin to a visual novel mixed with a dice placement tabletop board game with a few light sprinklings of RPG stats on top. Each turn or cycle (as there is no day and night on a space station) you get several dice rolls based on your Sleeper's physical health condition. Each dice can be used towards actions, some immediate some building up charges to complete. Depending on the number result of the roll will depend on it's chance for success with a positive (5-6), neutral (3-4) or negative (1-2) outcome. These numbers can be bolstered with + values depending on the skill involved and you level in it such as 'engineering +1' to increase your chance. All along the station are different locations with different characters and events that can feed you, repair you or push along character quest lines.
How you choose to progress is entirely up to you after the opening couple of quests. It's a fairly open ended adventure with multiple different endings depending on who you interact with and when. This is both a positive and negative in my view having seen them all. Citizen Sleeper despite it's grand ideas for the outside lore of the world feels more like a slice of life story so each character questline is personal and don't interconnect with each other in anyway leaving everything feeling a little directionless. Additionally though your circumstances are in many ways quite dire it never feels that way in the writing which at times is a little too matter a fact. What writing there is though outside of that small caveat is excellent. The characters, their problems and events are all really interesting, I got rather absorbed into their lives and personal struggles which is why I went out of my way to see all the endings on offer.
My only real issue with the game is actually if you are wanting to see all events there is a lot of downtime mechanically. Initially every dice you use has to be really thought out in regards to survival / story progress balance but it soon becomes extremely obsolete meaning you are mostly just burning down clock cycles to get to the next story beat sometimes doing nothing. The thing is I am a board gamer and this reminds me a lot of a game called Alien Frontiers where you place dice for resources to build colonies. What I hope Citizen Sleeper learns from this is to use the full range of numbers for actions rather than high = good and low = bad. Have certain actions only available on a 1 or 2 etc. and smaller ways of knocking them up and down would have made the turn based element more strategic and interactive throughout.
When all is said and done though I had a really good time with this and the fact that it was made by mostly one person is pretty nuts. The wonderful character art, somber music and writing pushing this along make for a wonderful experience and I do look forward to the announced sequel.
+ Fantastic art, music and atmosphere.
+ Citizen Sleepers universe and lore.
+ Mostly excellent writing and characters.
- Dice mechanic could have been more interesting.
- Sleepers personal situation often felt detached from events writing wise.
11 Comments
@DeemonAndGames - The animated one with Mel Brooks? Dam! Wish I'd remembered that, would have been a much better reference than the Apple situation I went for! lol!
@FallenGrace I think the Apple comparasion was on point tho, I just remememered the movie habing a similar premise to both the game and the batterygate scandal. I honestly should re-wach it, I remember the satire being on point.
Ooo wonderful review! Been wanting to play this down the road. Didn't know it was made by one person. That's seriously impressive, since you have to pretty much do everything. And did not expect Batterygate to come up, but now I'm more interested lol. Hope the sequel does well. It looks real interesting from the trailer's I've seen.
Great review! I'm really stoked for the sequel.
@Detectivefail - To be fair I didn't when playing it and wouldn't have guessed either though art etc was contracted out I think so technically not entirely a solo project as we think of it. Extremely impressive nonetheless. I watched some interviews with the guy and he seems really interesting. I had bought his first game 'In Other Waters' on steam not long ago without realising it was the same developer.
@cowboyjosh - Me too now! :D
@cowboyjosh - Me too now! :D
Not one of your best reviews Fallen, but you're too talented to not include some interesting components. I really loved the tie-in to Apple and the explanation of the dice roll mechanic, but the lack of in-depth paragraphs for the graphics or sound design was disappointing. I would've also done another proofread as some sentences were a little bit confusing to read like:
"Similar to the allegations that Apple intentionally making their products worse as a form of consumer control to the extreme of a cyberpunk world with a copied consciousness in the same situation really resonates with me."
"Depending on the number of the roll will depend on it's chance for success with a positive, neutral or negative outcome."
"Similar to the allegations that Apple intentionally making their products worse as a form of consumer control to the extreme of a cyberpunk world with a copied consciousness in the same situation really resonates with me."
"Depending on the number of the roll will depend on it's chance for success with a positive, neutral or negative outcome."
@Redbackloggd - Thanks, I tend to write just what I'm feeling about a game so don't always go to in depth into every component I must admit as I'm not trying to be a critic. You're spot on regarding the phrasing there though, I will go back and edit those.
Ah okay copy, that makes sense. Yeah, you always want to do these for yourself first and foremost, otherwise you'll experience writer's burnout.
@Redlogged - Indeed. There are people here with a lot more talent at writing and patience for breaking down games going deep into their components than I. I love reading those reviews by people, I watch several and I find them fascinating, but my own tend to swing and sway depending on how I'm feeling, the time, the game etc. I use backlogged more of a record of what I played looking back. Always appreciate advice though 👍
Extractor chads rise upppp
DeemonAndGames
7 months ago
Fantastic review, the game sounds hella interesting, I'll keep an eye on it for sure.