Ostranauts Review Summary

Last updated: 2026-05-26
  • Unique and enjoyable gameplay experience
  • Immersive and detailed gameplay mechanics
  • Excellent space simulation features
  • Frequent updates and active developers
  • Game plagued by bugs and issues
  • Poor UI and control design
Ostranauts header

Emotions

Archetypes

Hardware

Windows 12-15GB VRAMpositiveWindows 8-11GB VRAMnegative

What players like:

Common complaints:

Gameplay feedback:

Performance notes:

Recommendations:

Other player notes:

Review evidence

Why players say this

What players like

Unique and enjoyable game: The game is praised for its uniqueness and originality, offering a fun and interesting experience. Players find it enjoyable and amazing, with a fantastic and one-of-a-kind gameplay.

Immersive and detailed gameplay: The game offers a rich and immersive experience with detailed mechanics, deep lore, and an engaging atmosphere. Players appreciate the in-depth simulation and the unique, detailed setting.

Excellent space simulation: The game is highly regarded as a space simulation, offering a unique and satisfying experience for space and sandbox lovers. It features well-simulated spaceflight and high-detail space environments.

Deep and complex systems: The game features complex and deep systems, including ship building and various mechanics that provide a lot of depth and complexity. This makes the game mechanically complex and addictive.

Frequent updates and active developers: The game receives regular and frequent updates, with active developers who are constantly improving the game. This rapid development and frequent updates are appreciated by the players.

Common complaints

Game plagued by bugs: The game is frequently described as buggy, with numerous reports of critical and game-breaking bugs that significantly impact gameplay and stability.

Poor UI and controls: The UI design is criticized as poor, cluttered, and confusing. Controls are also noted as awkward and cumbersome, leading to a frustrating user experience.

Performance issues: The game suffers from various performance issues, including memory leaks, high memory consumption, stuttering, and frame drops.

Lacks content and tutorials: Players report a lack of sufficient content and tutorials, making it difficult for new players to understand and enjoy the game fully.

Needs more polish: The game is seen as rough around the edges and in need of significant polishing and refinement to improve overall quality and player experience.

Gameplay and performance

Shipbreaking and salvaging mechanics: The game includes shipbreaking and salvaging as primary activities. Players can disassemble ships, scavenge parts, and manage inventory.

Extensive ship customization and expansion: The game offers a wide range of options for building, upgrading, and customizing ships. Players can expand their ships and manage various aspects of ship maintenance.

Complex ship management and systems: Players can manage various spaceship systems like atmosphere, pressure, and electrical wiring. The game features complex mechanics and emergent storytelling.

Hardcore space survival simulation: The game is a hard sci-fi space-life simulator with a focus on survival elements. It includes managing survival needs such as hunger, health, atmosphere, and ship maintenance.

Top-down 2D space simulation: The game is a 2D top-down space sim with a focus on survival in space. It features a gritty and realistic space simulation.

Performance issues on various systems: The game has performance problems across different systems, including lower-end and modern hardware, leading to choppy gameplay and frame rate issues.

Frequent freezing and stuttering: Players experience frequent freezing, stuttering, and slowdowns during gameplay, which significantly impacts the gaming experience.

Poor optimization and high resource usage: The game suffers from significant optimization issues, including high CPU and RAM usage, which leads to long loading times and overall poor performance.

Bugs and jank: Players encounter various bugs and janky behavior, including minor stutters and occasional disappearing NPCs and items.

Game crashes and stability issues: The game has stability issues, including crashes and game-breaking bugs that can disrupt gameplay and cause frustration.

Recommendations

Recommended for specific fans: The game is recommended for fans of specific genres or themes, such as Space Station 13, hard sci-fi, space themes, realism, and deep simulation games.

Highly recommended game: The game is highly recommended by many players, with several giving it a perfect score of 10/10. It is considered worth buying and definitely recommended.

Wait for more polished state: Many players suggest waiting for the game to be in a more polished state unless you are very patient and love the genre. It is recommended to wait for more bug patches or until release for a smoother experience.

Suggestions for game improvements: Players have various suggestions for improvements, such as adding more ship parts, increasing tasks, enhancing playability, improving sleep mechanics, and redoing graphics.

Recommended for complex mechanics: The game is highly recommended for those who enjoy complex mechanics and detailed games.

Buying context

Community fair range: $20.00 - $30.00.

Game completion: 50.0h.

The game has a steep learning curve and can be tedious initially, but it becomes rewarding and fun after players invest significant time and overcome the early challenges.

Reported time to anchor: 5h.

Friction: Steep learning curve; Tedious micro-management; Confusing tutorials; Tedious inventory management; Poorly implemented hauling commands; Under-explained and overcomplicated docking process.

Unlock drivers: Rewarding atmosphere; Sense of progression; Overcoming initial challenges.

Player profiles

Hardcore Sim Enthusiast: Immersive, methodical, and patient. Enjoys figuring out complex systems and tolerates bugs and a steep learning curve. Motivation: Enjoyment of complex, realistic simulations and the challenge of mastering them. Stance: sale.

Sci-Fi Lore Enthusiast: Role-playing focused, enjoys the narrative and setting. Tolerates complexity for the sake of immersion in a beloved sci-fi world. Motivation: Immersion in a rich sci-fi universe and enjoyment of the narrative and role-playing aspects. Stance: buy.

Chill Grinder: Patient and persistent. Enjoys the slow burn of progression and the chill yet challenging experience. Motivation: Enjoyment of a challenging yet relaxing gameplay loop with slow, rewarding progression. Stance: deep sale.

Platform notes

The game generally performs well on higher-end hardware with 12-15GB VRAM, though some users report performance issues and occasional hiccups. Users with 8-11GB VRAM experience more noticeable performance problems and instability.

Windows 12-15GB VRAM: positive. The game runs well on higher-end hardware, though some users report occasional hiccups and performance issues.

Windows 8-11GB VRAM: negative. Users in this cohort experience noticeable performance problems and instability.

Steam Deck: The analysis of user feedback reveals several key issues with the Steam Deck experience. The most prominent concerns include the lack of cloud save support, control and UI issues, and performance and stability problems. These issues significantly impact the user experience, making the game less enjoyable and more cumbersome to play on the Steam Deck.

Linux and Proton: The game can run on Linux using Proton, but it requires specific launch options and performance tweaks to run smoothly. There are some performance issues, particularly during time dilation, but these can be mostly smoothed out with Proton Experimental. Overall, the game is playable on Linux with some initial setup and tweaking.

Extra review signals

External guides: The primary user complaints revolve around the complexity of game mechanics, which often require external resources like wikis and guides to understand. Additionally, technical issues and a steep learning curve are notable concerns. The complexity of mechanics is the most severe issue, impacting the user experience significantly.

Other review notes

Request for Steam Cloud Saves: Multiple players have expressed a desire for the game to support Steam Cloud Saves, which would allow them to access their game progress from any device.

Translation mod links: Players are sharing links to translation mods, indicating a demand for localized versions of the game.

Context menu haul option: Players have suggested adding a haul option to the context menu, likely to improve inventory management or item transportation.

Cameras in station corridors: There is a suggestion to add cameras in station corridors, which could enhance security or surveillance aspects of the game.

Add a strip club: Some players have suggested adding a strip club to the game, possibly for additional entertainment or gameplay mechanics.