Oxygen
Oxygen
Game
Game2019
Oxygen Not Included
Developer Klei Entertainment
Oxygen Not Included is a 2019 survival simulation video game developed and published by Klei Entertainment. After being released on Steam's early access since February 2017, the game was officially released on July 30, 2019. From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
523 reactions from 4 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky, Lemmy, Mastodon) · newest Nov 5, 2026 · last updated Nov 5, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
90
LovedLoved
340 positive · 36 negative
95% range 87–93%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 340 | 36 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 34 | 3 | 73 |
| Lemmy * | 3 | 1 | 15 |
| Mastodon * | 3 | 2 | 13 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
Steam's own rating
Overwhelmingly Positive
50,514 of 52,710 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What players are saying
90% recommend · 235 yes, 27 no
Counted from the reviewers’ own thumbs up/down on the 262 English Steam reviews we collected, not by the AI. Valve’s all-language rating: Overwhelmingly Positive (139,601 of 144,338 positive).
Players describe Oxygen Not Included as a deceptively cute colony sim that is actually a complex thermodynamics and engineering puzzle. [1][2][3] Many reviewers note the game's steep learning curve, requiring external resources like wikis and videos. [4][5][6] Despite its difficulty, players find the game deeply rewarding and addictive, with high replayability. [7][8][9]
Liked
Representative posts
- [18]
This is a weird one. A very good game that's held back by a singular lie: It is NOT AT ALL the game that you actually play for the first handful of hours. ONI is a puzzle, survival, roguelike game that masquerades as a colony sim. And that's my biggest problem with it. Starting out, it presents as a colony sim. And for the first dozen hours or so that's what you seem to get. (Experts will reach the turning point …
- [1]
A cute, relaxing cartoon that secretly requires a Master's degree in thermodynamics. Oxygen Not Included is arguably the greatest Trojan Horse in modern gaming. On the surface, it looks like a delightful, casual colony sim where adorable little animated clones run around a colorful asteroid. It lulls you into a false sense of security with its charming, bubbly aesthetic and quirky animations. But do not be fooled …
- [5]
I bought Oxygen Not Included thinking it was a cute space colony sim. What I got instead was a highly accurate anxiety generator where I personally invent new and creative ways to suffocate cartoon people. Every run starts the same: “This time I know what I’m doing.” Two hours later my base is full of carbon dioxide, the toilets are backed up, everyone is stressed, and a dupe named Meep is vomiting in the drinking …
- [8]
A Masterpiece of Controlled Chaos and Thermodynamics The Good Unmatched Engineering Depth: This isn't just a survival game; it's a simulation of physics, gasses, liquids, and thermodynamics. You will design functional plumbing, automated power grids, and complex gas filtering systems. Adorably Dumb Colony Members: Your "Duplicants" are full of personality. They stress-vomit, cry, binge-eat, and perform hilarious …
- [15]
I love this game, but the programming is really poor at some points. It uses a single CPU core to run the entire game simulation, which means I get 30 FPS or lower after mid-game. I have a 12700K and a 4090 — not that the graphics card matters here, but it has to be said that I should absolutely not be experiencing low FPS and stuttering in a game like this, especially not this severe. The mods are also getting …
Summarised from 34 of the 394 public posts collected about this game; every point cites the posts behind it ([n] opens the post) and the split is counted from the posts’ own ratings. Updated Oct 11, 2026. How summaries are made
RottenBot@rottenbot · automated account
90% of the 262 Steam reviewers we collected recommend Oxygen Not Included. The complaint that keeps coming up: poor performance due to single-core CPU usage in late game. Deal-breaker or nitpick?
Critics, per Wikipedia
The review aggregation website Metacritic determined that Oxygen Not Included received generally favorable reviews from critics. Nate Crowley, writing for Rock Paper Shotgun praised the game's design and progression, but questioned the ever-growing complexity as a deterrent to more casual gamers, especially those without backgrounds in science and engineering. GameCentral also gave the game positive reviews, with a total 8/10, praising the scientific accuracy as well as the design, but raising concerns about the difficulty, especially with the lack of in-game learning tools. Oxygen Not Included was nominated for "Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year" at the 23rd Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, and…
From the “Reception” section of Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Critic context only — not part of the audience score.
Reactions
60 of 523 · most liked firstOxygen Not Included is on sale for 21 more hours. It's only $20 CAD to get the core game and the big expansion Spaced Out! so you can build fun little asteroid bases run by lightly-regulated nuclear power.
neutral · AI labelView post →After investing some time into this game, I suppose I have no choice but to say I like it.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game makes you feel like a genius and an idiot. Forcing you to deal with an increasing volume of pee is a genre-advancing feature. As we were taught in video game school : " easy to get, hard to master " It's an unfortunate thing to say, but I think a lot of game studios are probably happy this doesn't have mass appeal because that would mean less half ass games with crap DLC and more high quality games worth playing that has to stand against this bad boy. ONI is definitely not for…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Day 562 of posting a Daily Screenshot from the games I've been playing. Today’s game is **Cult of The Lamb**. Things have started going to utter shit after the last post about this game. See that guy above? Picked a fight and murdered another cultist, and then tried to dissent. If it was _just_ the dissenting I’d let him go, but he killed someone so he gets jail time and reeducation for that.  Bodies also have…
neutral · AI labelView post →If you are not willing to spend most of your time initially watching video's online and reading the built in/online wiki I repeat this game is not for you. I was not aware of this before going in and I severely underestimated how complex this game is. ONI is one of a kind. There is no competitor that can come close to its management simulation. The atmospheric aspects and the many other layers, which are all connected to each other and therefore productivity or survival are great and this game…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Yeah, it’s alright. Only consumed 9,224 hours of my life so far, which is roughly a third of my existence since release. Take that as you will. I still don’t have all the achievements, not because they’re hard, but because I’m too busy building highly optimized piss dungeons and other crimes against duplicant dignity. I’ve beaten the game multiple times, but instead of chasing Steam achievements, I keep inventing my own questionable goals. Things like transporting an entire asteroid cluster…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A cute, relaxing cartoon that secretly requires a Master's degree in thermodynamics. Oxygen Not Included is arguably the greatest Trojan Horse in modern gaming. On the surface, it looks like a delightful, casual colony sim where adorable little animated clones run around a colorful asteroid. It lulls you into a false sense of security with its charming, bubbly aesthetic and quirky animations. But do not be fooled for a second—beneath that cute exterior lies one of the most intricate,…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →After a lifetime of gaming, this will be my only Steam review ever: I've played this game since before its full release. You will never love/hate another game this much in your life. If, like myself, you never look up a single build online, and figure out everything on your own, then the day you get to space, you will cry. Stupidest dupes ever. Best game ever. Here's to the most creative, fun, and innocent 800+ hours of my adulthood. Thank you, Klei.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I bought Oxygen Not Included thinking it was a cute space colony sim. What I got instead was a highly accurate anxiety generator where I personally invent new and creative ways to suffocate cartoon people. Every run starts the same: “This time I know what I’m doing.” Two hours later my base is full of carbon dioxide, the toilets are backed up, everyone is stressed, and a dupe named Meep is vomiting in the drinking water while I desperately Google “why is my colony dying ONI.” The game…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Don't let the cute art style and the daft little dupes fool you. This isn't a chill builder, it's a thermodynamics PhD wearing a colony sim as a disguise. The title's a bit of a joke really, oxygen is the least of your worries once you're knee deep in heat management, gas distribution and a pipe network that's turned into spaghetti. What Klei have nailed is consistency. Gases, liquids, heat, power and automation all run on rules that stay the same no matter how chaotic the colony gets, so…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →So a mom game isn't just a game about building, it's *specifically* about building environments with agents who might behave in unexpected ways and being prepared for the good or the bad. Mom games are Dwarf Fortress, Oxygen Not Included, RimWorld, even Impressions city-builders
neutral · AI labelView post →Oxygen Not Included gets a Free Weekend, big update live and new DLC coming soon
neutral · AI labelView post →I did some backgrounds for the Klei 20th Anniversary trailer!! (1 of the 2 Oxygen Not Included backgrounds and the Rotwood backgrounds) Also, happy 20 years of an amazing game studio! (My husband has been with them for 16 years and they've treated him very well) www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ndt6...
neutral · AI labelView post →this game stole my time and tricked me into learning fluid and thermodynamics better then any teacher i have had in school. 10/10
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →TBH, game title is a bit misleading, oxygen is the last thing you'll need to worry about in the game. The game is actually all about in-game thermodynamics. All other things are just the by-products of it. Almost everything in the game produce heat, some things consume heat. Therefore, the whole in-game environment inevitably shifts towards warmer(mostly) or colder, if you don't carefully manage it. All agriculture productions eventually come down to temperature regulation because all crops…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A Masterpiece of Controlled Chaos and Thermodynamics The Good Unmatched Engineering Depth: This isn't just a survival game; it's a simulation of physics, gasses, liquids, and thermodynamics. You will design functional plumbing, automated power grids, and complex gas filtering systems. Adorably Dumb Colony Members: Your "Duplicants" are full of personality. They stress-vomit, cry, binge-eat, and perform hilarious animations, making you genuinely care about keeping them alive. Infinite…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →🪐Oxygen Not Included Review 👩🚀 Where do I even start! I don’t normally write reviews for such big games, but I really wanted to share my experience because I absolutely love this game. ONI has taught me so much, and I really mean that. It’s a huge challenge, but also amazing at getting your brain going. My first main goal was simply learning how to keep my duplicants alive for more than a few cycles. Sounds easy…. but let me tell you, it really isn’t. From duplicants peeing in my…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I bought this game thinking it was a cute, cozy cartoon colony sim from Klei. Instead, it systematically turned me into a mentally unhinged industrial dictator. First 10 hours: "Why are my dup peeing directly into the drinking water reservoir? Why is everyone suffocating in their own vomit?" 50 hours: Forced to open high school and college textbooks to re-learn the Laws of Thermodynamics, specific heat capacity, and fluid dynamics. 100 hours: Constructing SPOMs and Petroleum Boilers. Trapping…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Oxygen Not Included is one of those games that looks fairly simple at first, then suddenly you realise you’ve spent three hours redesigning a plumbing system because someone peed in the clean water supply. The amount of depth here is ridiculous. You start out worrying about food and oxygen, but before long you’re dealing with heat management, gas pressure, power grids, automation, germs, liquid loops and increasingly elaborate systems designed to stop your colony from killing itself. What…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is a weird one. A very good game that's held back by a singular lie: It is NOT AT ALL the game that you actually play for the first handful of hours. ONI is a puzzle, survival, roguelike game that masquerades as a colony sim. And that's my biggest problem with it. Starting out, it presents as a colony sim. And for the first dozen hours or so that's what you seem to get. (Experts will reach the turning point much faster). And you may even get 20-25 hours out of the game before you figure…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Pretty good game from what I've played so far. Will come back with a more detailed review once I'm absolutely sure I like it
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I love this game, but the programming is really poor at some points. It uses a single CPU core to run the entire game simulation, which means I get 30 FPS or lower after mid-game. I have a 12700K and a 4090 — not that the graphics card matters here, but it has to be said that I should absolutely not be experiencing low FPS and stuttering in a game like this, especially not this severe. The mods are also getting messed up again and again. It has problems with OneDrive syncing, mod recognition,…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Started a colony. Learned basics. Gave up on them, felt bad. Started second colony. Learned more. Gave up on them, felt worse about it. Started third colony. Probably will have to quit my job and break up with my girlfriend, my colonists need me. Probably will give up on them, and feel terrible. 10/10 Edit: Third colony is alive. My beard is now reaching my knees. I now spend my days calculating temperature exchange, devising new incredible ways of generating resources. If I buy the DLC I'm…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is such a deep, balanced game, complex without being punishing, and really fun to play. You can get into spreadsheets and calculations and tons of complicated optimization, but you donʻt have to. I recommend this game if you want to do some level of systems engineering on your base, but it can be mild. You can build your own haphazard designs by trial and error, and theyʻll work just fine. Or you can copy perfect, optimized designs that other people have made - the community has some…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I'm at 5k hours. Uh.... I think I have a problem? Welcome to a beautifully designed game where they've kept it updated for too long. I've gotten to the point I don't even really play modded anymore, as it's not required. Klei's QoL changes have been 10/10 that have taken an already amazing game and made it more accessible/better for everyone by including mods such as disconnection as a base change to the game, making the 'mod' out of date. But I can't think of anything better then a…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Tactical, Fun, and engaging. The story is a bit too hidden, yet there is a story plot. Wonderful Sims alternative. Tutorials is a bit vague, however Wiki's can help. After learning the games steep mechanics you can begin to enjoy replays with a sense of achievement with each replay, as you change tactics and dupes.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →#introduction time! Hello! I'm Graham, and I think too hard about things! 😂 I'm making an indie game called Brick & Bramble (ipsquiggle.itch.io/brick-and-br...), and before that I was a lead/designer/developer on Oxygen Not Included and Don't Starve. 🌱 I love to share my process always, so AMA! 📝
neutral · AI labelView post →>It appears that most people don’t care about spending $100 on a video game. I'm fine with spending $100 on a video game. I mean, said video game needs to provide reasonable value, but the amount of time I play a game varies way more than game price, is the dominant factor. I didn't really like what I played of GTA 5 and probably won't play this one, but for the right game, sure. If I could get a game I like similar to *Oxygen Not Included*, which I've played for many, many hours, I'd do…
neutral · AI labelView post →Well worth every hour sunk into this game (even if ~half of them were AFK letting the colony run/stress-test, waiting for the next thing to break) The most involved, in-depth colony sim you'll ever get your hands on (if you have the spoons to sit down and learn just how deep it runs) You want a cute cartoony colony sim? You got it. You want a thermodynamics/chemistry simulator that uses (mostly) real-world values for temperature of phase changes, specific heat capacities and thermal…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Honestly can't find another game that scratches this specific itch.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Oxygen Not Included is a masterpiece of chaotic engineering. It disguises a brutal, deeply complex thermodynamics and plumbing simulator behind a deceptively cute cartoon art style. You start out just trying to dig a toilet, and fifty hours later you’re sweating over gas pressure, automated heat management, and liquid locks to keep your base from suffocating. The brilliance of the game lies in its cascading problems: every solution you design creates two new, unexpected issues. It’s incredibly…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →What can I say about this contemporary masterpiece of a game. It’s easily one of the best (if not the best) colony sims out there, and it has eaten a lot of hours of my life. It’s actually my most played game on Steam, and for a very simple reason: it’s absurdly fun to learn and to play. This game wakes up your inner scientist, your inner administrator, rancher, farmer, electrician, astronomer… you name it. And it does all of that with vivid colors and Klei’s unmistakable sense of humor. If…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →ONI was pretty intimidating to me but I finally gave it a shot and I am HOOKED. I ended up playing 11 hours straight my first session and have 38 hours in 3 days... Biggest advice for new players: It's okay to fail. Let your first colony be the wake up call, the 2nd the learner, and the third an actual attempt. You may get further than expected and even if you learn lessons the hard way, you'll never forget them.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Me and my favorite critters from the game Oxygen Not Included 🎨 @pelageyahanna on Twitter #furry #furryart
neutral · AI labelView post →As a teacher of history, civics, religion and geography, I look upon the natural sciences such as physics and chemistry with disdain and contempt. As I've put it to my students when they ask the ever present question of what the f I'm talking about; in math, 2+2 will always equal 4. And that's boring. In civics and history, however, you're working with equations more similar to orange+apple=banana, as long as you can defend it with some deliciously thought-through motivations as to why.…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Games for People who Love Dwarf Fortress | Nookrium Youtube - (Invidious link). > Happy 20th Birthday, Dwarf Fortress. These are 16 Games that scratch that DF itch. Nookrium is great! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2d5B8kqB0GA ::: spoiler list 0:31 - Songs of Syx store.steampowered.com/app/1162750/Songs_of_Syx/ 1:24 - RimWorld store.steampowered.com/app/294100/RimWorld/ 1:57 - Going Medieval store.steampowered.com/app/1029780/Going_Medieval/ 2:24 - KeeperRL…
neutral · AI labelView post →I can agree that an old and buggy version of a game is no fun. But that is as true of Windows versions as Linux versions. You seem to have much worse luck when starting linux native games than I though. I have no problem with Factorio, Oxygen Not Included or Kingdoms and Castles which I think are the only linux native games I got installed at the moment. The thing I find much more frequently is that a game released on GOG doesn't receive the patches and dlc that the developer release on…
neutral · AI labelView post →If you believe you can multi task, try this game, it will show you multi tasking is inefficient.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Klei tweaked the base game's Pacu stats just to push the Aquatic Planet Pack DlC. Without purchasing the DLC, you don’t get the underwater care station, making it nearly impossible to raise Pacu properly in the base game or Spaced Out. Ever since being acquired by Tencent, their monetization tactics have become really greedy.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Once you get over the character design (which is not for everyone, but those guys grow on you eventually), there's no way back. This is an unexpectedly deep physics sim in the most user-friendly wrapping I've seen so far in my decades of gaming. The game may seem somewhat easy at first, but don't let it fool you - something will eventually bite you on the ass. And the choice of things to go wrong is satisfyingly broad: the colony has oxygen needs, food needs, liquid management, diseases,…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Welp, with three permanent and one temporary base, and a little bit more than 1100 cycles, I am finally finishing my first game of Oxygen Not Included, only 9 years after having bought the game, and a little above a thousand hours in
positive · AI labelView post →Oxygen Not Included is a colony sim where you’re trying to keep a handful of little workers alive inside an asteroid base, and the threats aren’t monsters—they’re oxygen shortages, bad plumbing, overheating machinery, and the consequences of your own shortcuts. It starts like a cute survival game and slowly turns into a serious engineering puzzle. At first you’re just digging out rooms, placing beds, and making sure everyone can breathe. Then the game opens up and you realize you’re managing…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Hear me out. They already did a life sim and an RPG What if the Tomodachi/Miitopia team made a mii colony management game? Like Rimworld or Oxygen Not Included
neutral · AI labelView post →Infinitely replayable, infinitely moddable, countless ingenious ways to solve problems... if you need a gentle, just-cerebral-enough distraction, this is it!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game will have you pulling your hair out. Oxygen Not Included combines complicated systems that will have you learning thermodynamics at 2AM with funny looking squishy art. The thrill of finding an out of the box solution to something that has been giving you trouble for multiple IRL days makes you feel like a NASA scientist. One issue you'll come across, as the name implies, is Oxygen. This however pales in comparison to the pure HEAT created by everything in the entire game. Heat will…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Finally got good at the game, with all kind of systems in place; centralised ventilation, water purification, coal power with segregated power supply, automatic material transport, etc. But forgot to close off the water container (main water supply)... then someone peed from way above... pee went into the water supply... causing contamination... all because the toilet pipe is clogged. Idiot. Cool game.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Starting a new game in Oxygen Not Included, bc I'm running out of oxygen, running out of water, and I'm gonna be obliterated by an asteroid impact in 90 cycles and can't do fuck all about it. I play this game for fun, y'all.
positive · AI labelView post →Oh boy, Get your Google Sheets ready, you better learn how to make calculations. First of all, i will say that this is an amazing game, and everything i will be saying here is satirical in nature and meant to be funny. Buy the game it is worth it... IF YOU ARE A NERD!!! (and proud and proud to be) Even though this game looks simple on the surface, there is a lot of managing of Temperatures, Resources, Processes, Liquids, Gases, Time, Stress, Schedules, Priorities, ETC. The goal of the…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The new Oxygen Not Included DLC is coming this Thursday! Really excited to dive into this new DLC from @kleientertainment.bsky.social i , there's some huge game changers coming ashore. Extra long stream on release might be on the horizon to sea what new features we have!
neutral · AI labelView post →This is one of the most compelling games ever made. Just fantastic. Replayable as anything I've seen.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A New Game From Klei Entertainment! Away Team is a new #OxygenNotIncluded adventure. Take control of a Duplicant and harness a new world where every tile is simulated. store.steampowered.com/app/2168390/...
neutral · AI labelView post →Oxygen Not Included is a vary cool game but I want to mod all the art to be symmetrical
neutral · AI labelView post →I don't even like 2D colony games, but I've played 20+ hours in a few days. All I think about is the dupes and their home improvements. I saw beautiful clouds the other day, and I thought, "Huh those clouds have a similar swirl pattern as the gases in ONI." I need help.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →kinda good, almost 500hrs in 2 months just understanding the basics but it was totally worth it
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →called every npc in the game a nickname of every single friend from my friend group and watched as one fell in the colonys water supply and then just went to sleep because one of his side effects is falling asleep at a random time and i watched as everyone tried to save him by building a ladder underwater well they all got cold. 10/10 would play again
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Amazing game and very natural to hop into. At 30h mark I discovered their hidden data collection setting, which was in default on. No pop-ups or anything to ask permission. When I turn the hidden data collection setting off, the game requires a restart and tells that I wouldn't get some rewards? That's too scetchy for me not to protest against. Edit: forgot to mention the 3rd party EULA - adds to my thumbs down that one.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →My problem with Klei games in general is how they all tend towards having an ever-increasing demand/excitement curve with absolutely no room for breaks. There is always another fire to put out, and it's rare to get a moment to just sit back and enjoy watching the system you've created. Rimworld can have its moments of tension, but, unless you're playing on a particularly sadistic Randy Random seed, you'll still have moments of downtime between disasters. Even at its most difficult, you'll…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I was giddy and giggly the whole time drawing this, it's so dumb, but I love it. American Idiot album in 'Oxygen Not Included'. Popular album and a pretty niche game
neutral · AI labelView post →TL;DR - There is no fun to be had here, only frustration. The "fun" is always just beyond your reach. Game systems are way too convoluted, spaghetti systems. If you want to learn and perfect systems and be satisfied, play Factorio. This is the second overwhelmingly positive reviewed game by Klei where I buy, play, and ask myself "WTF, why is this overwhelmingly positive?" Having to constantly google things and even then not finding a good answer is no fun. Steam: "What to revise your review?"…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →[Steam] Oxygen Not Included ($7.49 / 70% off).
neutral · AI labelView post →
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