Citizen Sleeper Review – A Sleeper Hit

When I booted up Citizen Sleeper for the first time, it immediately enthralled me with its premise. Its dystopian transhumanist pitch – surviving as a digitized consciousness of a human body implanted into a robot designed to work for a mega-corporation – is refreshing in the cyberpunk genre of games. Its slick, clean, and unique art style, coupled with its score, a Tycho-esque take on sci-fi beats, told me I was in for a good time, assuming the gameplay would click. Its first hour is overwhelming and it has a lot of different mechanics. It was worth it, because I fell in love with Citizen Sleeper and its gameplay. I was able to use my credits seven hours later on one of the best gaming experiences of 2022. 

A Sleeper is a robotic robot that can be awakened from a mind of someone else. In this instance, it belongs to someone that owes mega-corp Essen-Arp money, and to repay that debt, their mind has been digitized and put inside a machine explicitly designed to work for them; that’s the typical life of a Sleeper. You, however, have escaped, and the narrative of Citizen Sleeper begins there, unfolding as you learn to survive and thrive. 

The story of Citizen Sleeper is simple: Evade Essen-Arp’s bounty hunters who want to reclaim you while securing a future for yourself. This is all set against the background of Erlin’s eye, which was my sanctuary before it became my new home. It was amazing to become intimately acquainted with this quasi-metropolis. Citizen Sleeper was a loving force that helped me learn to appreciate this station, both as a guide and as a place for deeper relationships with the residents. To achieve this, I needed to complete various objectives aboard Erlin’s Eye ranging from paying off one of these bounty hunters to live another day to affording medicine I desperately needed to heal my constantly degrading body. 

This objective is determined by the unique dice mechanic used and its relationship to your current physical condition. Citizen Sleeper has a primary gameplay loop that is easy to understand: Every cycle you get six pre-rolled dice. You get more dice the healthier you are. Six-dice rolls are more likely to result in a positive outcome if you want to earn money or repair a vessel. A lower dice count, like a two, comes with an increased likelihood of a negative outcome, which can be pretty detrimental in some cases. 

This mechanic was a great guy and I loved how often he put me on the spot. What six-dice roll should I be using to ensure a successful outcome to an objective that I have to accomplish? Or do I use it for a job that makes me lots of money to pay my medical bills and buy medicine to restore my health? And on that same note, should I use my one die on a safer task or risk it on something that could greatly reward me right now? These choices influenced my Citizen Sleeper experience. Some of these were extremely stressful and felt like death or life, so I had to stop the game for a while. Devilishly enjoyable was the way that the soundtrack amplifies stress levels in these scenarios. 

Citizen Sleeper makes use of these moments to guide me through capitalism’s throes, which are the real antagonist in Jump Over The Age. My first cycle was difficult. I felt completely lost and overwhelmed. I couldn’t make money, so I was unable to buy food, which was necessary to keep my energy up. As a result, my health quickly worsened, and because of this struggle, I couldn’t afford medicine. This built on itself until I hit rock bottom, which locked me out of one of my Sleeper’s core abilities displayed on a sleek skills screen. Only an upgrade point was required to unlock the ability, which can be earned by completing major objectives. But, to accomplish that, I needed some great dice or at least multiple dice. It was difficult to obtain either due to my poor health. 

These challenges were overcome over time. Little by little, I earned enough money that I could spend less time obtaining medicine and food and more on actually completing objectives on the horizon. After Citizen Sleeper ended, I had stopped worrying about money and was able to focus on the NPCs in Erlin’s Eye who were my friends, sometimes even my family. This narrative felt personal to me. It was because of how I used my dice throughout the many cycles that I went through. 

I had many options for narrative, so I might have become as horrible as the corpos. However, it didn’t happen. Citizen Sleeper was a great game because it allowed me to create my story. To have it tied into one ending would be disappointing. Failure in one story could have disastrous consequences for me. If I succeeded somewhere else, I might open up an entirely new storyline that affects not just one character but also others I met earlier. I was most impressed by my interactions with Citizen Sleeper’s themes. It is at its heart a game that focuses on trying to survive in capitalism while being outsider. 

In the end, though, Citizen Sleeper is less a critique of capitalism itself, which in its defense has been done countless times in the cyberpunk genre, and more an opportunity to showcase how those under its thumb persevere and succeed despite it. The game’s optimistic and inspirational message is supported by an engaging, branching narrative and a challenging gameplay loop that makes it difficult to put down. Citizen Sleeper has a rich visual style that is both inspiring and memorable, as well as my favourite musical score from 2022. It will be a game I remember for many years.