Order of the Sinking Star Demo Review Summary

Sokoban-style puzzles with excellent design and visuals, but unresponsive movement and poor optimization cause performance issues.

Excellent puzzle design: The puzzles are widely acclaimed as clever, well-designed, and satisfying. Reviewers note that they introduce new concepts, are varied, and provide a rewarding challenge.

Stunning visual presentation: Players consistently praise the game's visual presentation, describing it as gorgeous, stunning, and top-notch. The graphics and art style are a major highlight.

Exceptional overall experience: Many reviews describe the game as exceptional, fun, and a masterclass in its genre. The overall experience is highly praised.

Best Sokoban game: The game is considered the finest Sokoban-style game, with innovative twists that replace the need for traditional Sokoban.

Great voice acting: The voice acting is highlighted as amazing and top-tier, contributing to the story's quality.

Movement and controls feel unresponsive: Players report that the movement feels jerky, jittery, and unnatural, with grid-based movement making controller input sluggish and awkward. Additionally, input lag and sticky controls with pre-input issues contribute to an unresponsive feel.

Translation quality is poor: Multiple reviews mention translation errors and misleading translations, indicating that the localization quality is poor and needs improvement.

Voice acting is incomplete or annoying: Voice acting is incomplete or annoying, with some reviews noting that voiceovers are not yet finished and others finding them irritating.

AI voices feel jarring: The use of AI-generated voices is jarring and feels out of touch, detracting from the game's immersion.

Dialogue distracts from puzzles: Players find it hard to follow character conversations while solving puzzles, as the dialogue is distracting and creates tension between puzzle solving and story progression.

Sokoban-style puzzle mechanics: The game is frequently described as a Sokoban-style puzzle game, featuring box-pushing mechanics, strict order of operations, and backtracking. It combines multiple Sokoban mechanics across various areas like Mirror Islands, Box Hero, and Promise.

Narrative-driven puzzle experience: The game is a puzzle game with a strong narrative component, including story dialogues, voice acting, and lore. It features an open world, characters, and a progressive difficulty curve, providing an immersive experience.

Gradual mechanic introduction: The game gradually introduces mechanics, teaching players through self-discovery and creative application of simple rules. Each puzzle builds on previous knowledge, allowing deep exploration of the mechanics.

Multiple worlds and sub-games: The game features multiple worlds and sub-games, allowing players to switch between puzzles. It includes an overworld and four distinct worlds, each introducing new ideas per puzzle.

Time manipulation mechanics: The game includes time manipulation mechanics such as undo, fast-forward, slow-down, and time reversal. These are integrated into single-screen Sokoban-style puzzles, adding a unique twist.

Good performance on many systems: A significant number of users report smooth performance, stable high FPS (120-180), fast loading, and no issues on various PC setups, including older hardware and 4K resolutions.

Poor optimization and high GPU usage: Many users report poor optimization leading to high GPU usage, loud fans, overheating, and frame drops even on high-end hardware like RTX 5070, 4080 Super, and 5080. Issues include stuttering, severe frame drops, and high power consumption.

Steam Deck performance issues: Steam Deck performance is inconsistent: some find it smooth, but many report low FPS (20-30), blurry textures, startup crashes, and need for optimization. Users expect 90 FPS but get 30 FPS or less.

Crashes and visual glitches: Various bugs include crashes on startup, black screens, flickering, visual glitches, shader compilation lag, and freezing, affecting stability.

Mixed Linux compatibility: Linux compatibility varies: some users report smooth performance via Proton or native, while others face startup failures with Proton 9 or specific versions. Overall, many find it runs well on Linux.

Not recommended by some: Some players do not recommend the game, citing better alternatives like Jelly no Puzzle or other Sokoban games. Others mention lack of credits for original creators or poor optimization.

Strong recommendation for puzzle fans: The game is highly recommended for puzzle game enthusiasts, including both casual and hardcore fans. It is seen as a great entry point for newcomers and appeals to those who enjoy artsy or board-based puzzle mechanics.

Day one purchase for many: Many players are committed to buying the game on day one or pre-ordering, indicating strong confidence in the product. Some even call it a Game of the Year candidate.

Demo is worth trying: The demo is well-received and considered worth trying. Players encourage others to check it out, as it costs nothing and provides a good experience.

Performance and control issues: Several players report poor controls, lag, jerky movement, and optimization issues, especially on low-end PCs and Steam Deck. These problems lead to not recommending the current demo.

Game completion: 7.0h.

Session length: 2.0h.

The game has a slow start with a brief tutorial, but opens up into an overworld with varied puzzles and multiple sub-games. Most players find fun within the first hour, though some find the pacing tedious.

Friction: slow start; unengaging tutorial; non-intuitive mechanics; lack of handholding; poor dialogue pacing and quality; repetitive puzzles for some.

Unlock drivers: variety of mechanics introduced early; multiple sub-games; non-linear progression between worlds; addictive exploration; good difficulty progression and pacing.

Blow-Fan Puzzle Purist: Methodical exploration of puzzle rules, looking for aha moments and meta-puzzles. Motivation: Seeking deep, emergent puzzle mechanics that lead to epiphany moments. Stance: buy.

Sokoban Enthusiast: Systematic, methodical pushing and planning, appreciates board-based puzzle design. Motivation: Enjoying grid-based logic puzzles with clever mechanics and multi-character control. Stance: buy.

Newcomer Immersion Seeker: Casual exploration, willing to get stuck but enjoys the journey. Motivation: Finding an engaging and immersive puzzle experience that doesn't frustrate. Stance: buy.

Performance is generally positive for mid-to-high VRAM Windows and Linux configurations, but low-VRAM Windows (<8GB) shows a mixed split where some players report smooth operation while others face severe lag and crashes.

Windows <8GB VRAM: mixed. Half of the reports praise smooth performance even on older hardware, but the other half describe severe lag, shader compilation hitches, and very low FPS (<10 fps), making the experience inconsistent.

Windows 8-11GB VRAM: positive. Most players recommend the game despite noting optimization problems like high VRAM usage or fan speed; two reports describe crashes and unplayability, but they are a minority.

Windows 12-15GB VRAM: positive. Players report great performance, often with high or locked framerates, though one user notes performance drops and another reports high GPU usage on a 4080 Super.

Steam Deck: The game suffers from frequent startup crashes, very low frame rates even on minimal settings, and requires manual Proton version selection to run at all. Controller input is sluggish and imprecise, and the visuals become blurry when resolution is lowered. While some users report success with specific Proton versions, the overall experience on Steam Deck is broken for many, with significant tinkering required and poor performance.

Linux and Proton: The game shows mixed Linux/Proton compatibility. While some users achieve flawless out-of-box performance, many others require specific Proton versions (Experimental, Hotfix, GE-Proton) to run, and a few encounter launch failures or poor frame rates. Overall, tinkering is often needed, placing the experience in the 'Tinkering Required' category.