Is Citizen Sleeper 2 Worth Playing? A Story-Driven Dice RPG That Stays With You
Overall rating: 8/10
Citizen Sleeper 2 is a modest title with a captivating and immersive sci-fi story in a dice-rolling RPG format. I have not played the prequel to this game but after spending the last few days engrossed in this title I feel myself wanting more.
Gameplay
The mechanics are so simple that someone who has never played a game before could figure it out. It plays almost like a table-top board game in that every action you make is determined by the number you roll on your dice. It is made more complex by adding dice durability as well as your character skills which modify the numbers rolled (for example, if your character has more skill points in “intuition”, every dice rolled for an action requiring intuition will add at least +1 to the value rolled.)
Do not be fooled by its simplicity, there are three different difficulty settings and I found the middle setting to be quite challenging, especially at the beginning. A few unlucky rolls can be brutal but it makes the story more realistic. It’s not meant to be easy for a runaway robot in space!
While the gameplay is simple it’s NOT for everyone. It is a great game if you value the story, and immersiveness and don’t mind reading, but you cannot go into this expecting quick-time events or any fast-paced gameplay. It plays similar to a visual novel, in that you have to make decisions which may affect how the story progresses.
Story
In my opinion this is its strongest selling point. It stays true to the sci-fi theme and is not shy in incorporating abstract, complicated ideas to the worldbuilding. While I generally stay away from the sci-fi genre, I think this title can appeal to wider audiences as well as sci-fi aficionados because it has a compelling story that many can relate to. On the surface, it is about learning to face your problems directly instead of running from them. However, as you progress through the story it becomes more about enjoying the journey and accepting the inevitable.
I don’t want to spoil the story too much as I think it is best to go into this game with no context, but I will say there are some parts that are truly thought-provoking.
The majority of the characters are well-written, each with their own ambitions and problems. In addition, they each have a skill set that can help or hinder your missions. The downside is that if your character has a similar skillset to your favourite side character (in my case, Juni), you’ll end up not taking them with you on quests. It’s generally better to take characters that cover your weaknesses as some missions can be quite tricky with the wrong skillset.
Worth mentioning…
The developers will NOT be creating a sequel to this game, and instead will be focusing on a table-top board game within the same world of the Citizen Sleeper series.
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