The setting and aesthetics and dice-based decision-making all remind me a lot of Tharsis, except swapping out that game’s challenging roguelike puzzles for open-ended storytelling. It results in a narrative with clear consequences that never felt like punishments for “choosing the wrong thing.” There’s a lot of compelling characters along the way and I appreciated being able to pursue only the story threads I was interested in, towards many different conclusions. My initial playthrough was an operator who exhausted the social links and quests available and ended up torn between many equally interesting options for their next stage of life; in contrast, I played a much quicker second run as a brusque mechanic looking to get off the station as fast as possible and who didn’t waste time with anyone lacking an obvious transactional benefit. It was an equally valid story with a much lonelier and colder tone.

The electronic soundtrack is also fantastic. Lots of Boards of Canada influence throughout while still being its own thing.