Detached: Non-VR Edition
Detached: Non-VR Edition
Game
Game2018
SYMMETRY
Developer Sleepless Clinic
A research spaceship reaches an abandoned planet. Nothing is what it seems here and the situation quickly slips out of control. Can the crew manage to survive and get back home? From the Steam store page
169 reactions from 4 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky, Lemmy, Mastodon) · newest Nov 2, 2026 · last updated Nov 2, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
51
Mixed
69 positive · 66 negative
95% range 43–59%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 69 | 66 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 7 | 0 | 25 |
| Lemmy * | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Mastodon * | 0 | 0 | 1 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
Steam's own rating
Mixed
70 of 136 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What players are saying
51% recommend · 69 yes, 66 no
Counted from the reviewers’ own thumbs up/down on the 135 English Steam reviews we collected, not by the AI. Valve’s all-language rating: Mixed (170 of 311 positive).
Players find the game challenging and atmospheric, but many consider it tedious and repetitive. [1][2][3][4] Some reviewers enjoy the micromanagement and survival elements, while others find them frustrating. [5][6][7][8] The game's difficulty and lack of variety are common criticisms among those who do not recommend it. [9][10][11][12]
Liked
Representative posts
- [3]
Edited because it seemed harsh hindsight: Symmetry has potential but right now I do not recommend it even though you would get a decent amount of playtime for your money. I love difficult games but at the moment this game is not what I would call fun, it's just tedious. The storytelling is not strong enough to be a redeeming quality for the gameplay. It never feels like any progress is being made because of how …
- [4]
I read the other reviews saying that this game was tedious, repetitive, the worst sort of micromanagement. I really like detailed management simulators, so I bought this game on sale. They were not kidding. The optimal gameplay loop becomes evident within about 10 minutes. You then spend the next hour or two repeating that same loop, same set of actions, with increasingly small margins for error. I beat this game …
- [5]
So I played the game in one sitting, took about 3hrs or so. I found it fun to play, you basically are micromanaging people on an abandoned plant to leave said planet. MEANING if you DON'T tell them to eat they will not eat and if you DON'T tell them to sleep they will not go to sleep. Some other games when the bar gets low or empty they will stop their tasks at hand and do what they need to function. HOWEVER, in …
- [6]
First try! Love these kind of games - the "mixed reviews" status was perfect bait for me since I knew this was going to be challenging. To succeed here you need to think. What action will yield the best outcome in the current situation? Do I need to prioritize one char over the other or teach them how to do the same job? Do I have enough resources to sustain the base? Once you have your mind constantly focused in a …
- [1]
Intense in its serenity, hard in its austereness. And very, VERY challenging. Two thumbs up!
Summarised from 34 of the 165 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 10, 2026. How summaries are made
RottenBot@rottenbot · automated account
Players who liked SYMMETRY talk about challenging and tense atmosphere; those who didn't talk about tedious and repetitive gameplay. Which matters more to you?
Reactions
60 of 169 · most liked firstEdited because it seemed harsh hindsight: Symmetry has potential but right now I do not recommend it even though you would get a decent amount of playtime for your money. I love difficult games but at the moment this game is not what I would call fun, it's just tedious. The storytelling is not strong enough to be a redeeming quality for the gameplay. It never feels like any progress is being made because of how often the AI breaks modules. The weather patterns increasingly become too…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Symmetry Through Doors - Arnos Grove I love playing a symmetrical game where I catch passing trains through the open doors of stationary trains. As far as I know carriages only officially open to both sides at 5 stations Arnos Grove Stratford Canary Wharf DLR Morden Barking #photography
neutral · AI labelView post →#promosky Looking for more mutuals (and totally lost on how this works) ❤️ Citizen Soldier 🧡 Disturbed 💛 Scar Symmetry 💚 Into Eternity 💙 Video Game OSTs 💜 Star Wars ❤️ LotR 🧡 LGBTQ+ 💛 Mental Health 💚 Danny Phantom 💙 Rockman 💜 BnHA/MHA ❤️ Mass Effect 🧡 Hamlet 💛 FF XIV 💚 Animals 💙 D&D 💜 Talos Principle
neutral · AI labelView post →This game is about one thing: making sure your characters don't commit suicide by stupidity. There's an apparent level of complexity at first: you have to train your characters to maximize how many resources they gather, and then subdivide them between different tasks. But most problems this game presents aren't that difficult. You max out characters' skills in whatever task they'll be performing, then never worry about that mechanic again. You set one person to gather lumber a million times…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I was looking forward to this one for a good while. Great artstyle, an intruiging storyline.. Survive against all odds.. However, the game ended up being a bit of a disappointment for me. I enjoy (challenging) survival games, but this one is too much for me.. I must have died at least ten times in the 35 minutes I played. And when you die, of course you start over again - rinse and repeat... The AI breaks your stuff so often and my chars can't keep up so they die the same way over and over…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I’m Anca, co-founder and (creative) producer at Symmetry Break, maker and streamer of story rich indie games and trying to leave this place more loved than I found it 💙 Three days of exhibiting at the Indie Arena Booth to go! #gamescom #WhatAGameDevLooksLike
neutral · AI labelView post →#sENFtember Day 3 - Sports Symmetry was encouraged to participate in a fun soccer game, and being the sporty gal she is, she accepted. It was too late when she realized she had to be on the nude team. #symmetry #ENF #nsfw #nsfwart
neutral · AI labelView post →Mortal Shell II is the exact kind of sequel you love to see. Not a reinvention, but refinement and in all the right ways. Mortal Shell was the game that got me into the soulslike genre, and Mortal Shell II has rightfully put Cold Symmetry on the map for soulslike players.
positive · AI labelView post →Intense in its serenity, hard in its austereness. And very, VERY challenging. Two thumbs up!
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Homage to paper fortune teller game. #AlphabetChallenge #WeekMforMulticoloured #abstract #geometry #symmetry #paperfortuneteller
neutral · AI labelView post →Symmetry is one of the most dangerous things in a game design, because it's SO COMPELLING to pursue, but it is one of the easiest ways to end up designing the wrong thing in order to make it fit the pattern. You don't even notice because it's all so ELEGANT, until no one plays it.
neutral · AI labelView post →Incoming message to all the equipment at my base: Stop Breaking The expedition should have been perfect. Nothing on the scans showed any possibility of the mission going haywire. Yet, here we are. Crashed on this planet in the freezing cold with our launch equipment broken. Luckily, the base is around piles of scrap but will the other equipment hold up so we can stay alive? Is this bad feeling just because we crashed or something sinister is lurking beneath the ground? Did our other crew…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →🔔 Round 2: Let's play a 📸 game? 🕹 Choose three (virtual) photography themes or techniques and @ a person who instantly comes to mind. 1️⃣ Symmetry @fu-mar.bsky.social 2️⃣ Chiaroscuro @wondernoob.bsky.social 3️⃣ Atmosphere @ma-moonshadow.bsky.social Feel free to join in! 😁❤️ #VPinspired
neutral · AI labelView post →I get what it's going for: a grounded portrayal of human frailty. But I'm not convinced it makes for a good game. Overall, it feels so determined to be serious that it forgets to be fun...
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →"Hiiiiiii Marie!!" "The Orange Robot... of ALL places..." Sonic x Shadow gens redraw with Symmetry and Marie because I adore this game and its so awesome and you should play it NOW. #oc #digitalart
neutral · AI labelView post →=== Devs updated game in response, I will update once I get a change to play update === This is a hard pass for now guys. This is at best a guided narrative during which you're just supposed to keep your people alive. Fair enough, I got to day ~35 twice now and the weather gets so bad and your people have to travel so long that they don't make it back before night hits and they die. Things are scripted to break constantly without any reason. At this point the only way I can think of winning is…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →SYMMETRY: ~~~~~~~~~ A crew of three astronauts crashed landed their vessel on a mysterious planet. They were attracted by bright red beams flashing from the surface of the unknown sphere. Incredibly, the crash site is right next to a facility that looks like a small station built by humans. The positive effect of this rather intriguing news fades away rapidly after the crew checks on the damage the spaceship Miner 4 endured from the rough landing. Both of the engines as well as the power…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The idea of the game is cool. The graphics pleases. If you are a Hardcore Survivor, then you find the right game. Nevertheless, what could be more interesting than surviving on an unknown planet. In fact, in the beginning there is a some types of supplies, in order to improve the base; food, to feed the team; firewood - to warm the shelter. But over time, it's boring. In two hours of the game, you're doing the same thing, there's no differnce, just a clicker (kind of). The resources…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The game ended. #streetphotography #street #stilllife #photography #noai #symmetry
neutral · AI labelView post →5/10. Short survival game about escaping from a frozen planet. What is it: A sci-fi survival game: a team of astronauts crash-land on a frozen planet, and must survive long enough to repair their ship. Each astronaut must keep healthy by eating, resting, or learning, and can do up to four activities: chop wood to keep their quarters warm, prepare food to eat, gather electrowaste for repairs and upgrades, or work in the power plant. The major obstacle is the cold: it can easily get to -100,…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I read the other reviews saying that this game was tedious, repetitive, the worst sort of micromanagement. I really like detailed management simulators, so I bought this game on sale. They were not kidding. The optimal gameplay loop becomes evident within about 10 minutes. You then spend the next hour or two repeating that same loop, same set of actions, with increasingly small margins for error. I beat this game out of spite. You don't really make decisions in this game, in the ways that…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →For those who haven't yet, check out the new update to Mortal Shell 2!! THERE'S A FLIPPING PHOTOMODE!! New Shades New Tarstones New dungeons! The list, (literally) goes on!! Cold Symmetry has been doing so much to bring the quality of life, and re-playability to a new level in this game.
neutral · AI labelView post →Ok so to give a semi detailed review. I had to play the game 2 times to beat it fully cus i thought it cant be that hard, how wrong i was. turns out you NEED to min-max and micromanage everything and i mean EVERYTHING to get a ending and that is why i didnt get every achievement. the game is fun and interesting in paper but the moment i HAVE to micromanage everything to get even 1 ending is just not that fun and the difficulty is just off. Like difficulty is good but when it become TEDIOUS it…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Thank you Cold Symmetry for sending me a code to review Mortal Shell 2! Part one of my playthrough is out now, there will be two videos a day! I can't wait for you all to check this out when the game releases on the 20th! Watch here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQpx...
neutral · AI labelView post →So I played the game in one sitting, took about 3hrs or so. I found it fun to play, you basically are micromanaging people on an abandoned plant to leave said planet. MEANING if you DON'T tell them to eat they will not eat and if you DON'T tell them to sleep they will not go to sleep. Some other games when the bar gets low or empty they will stop their tasks at hand and do what they need to function. HOWEVER, in this game.... they die and you only get 5 people throughout the single…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →So my highly trained astronauts aren´t smart enough to go and heal OR eat if I don´t tell them to? Realy? Even a 10 yr old could get food when hungry but these guys would rather just die... Please scale down the micromanagement... this isn´t very fun... If there was less useless micromanagement like feeding crew and healing them manually this game would be fun...
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →===[ ❤ Audience: ]=== ☐ Kids ☐ Everyone ☑ Casual players ☑ Pro players ===[ ☼ Graphics: ]=== ☐ Potato ☐ Really bad ☐ Bad ☐ OK ☑ Good ☐ Beautiful ☐ Masterpiece ===[ $ Price/quality: ]=== ☐ Full price ☐ Wait for sale ☑ Average ☐ Refund it if you can ☐ Don't do it ☐ Free ===[ ☢ Requirments: ]=== ☐ 90' PC ☐ Minimum ☑ Medium ☐ Fast ☐ High end ☐ NASA computer ===[ ☼ Difficulty: ]=== ☐ You just need 2 arms ☐ Ez ☐ Easy to learn / Hard to master ☑ Hard ☐ Dark Souls ===[ ۞ Game time/length ]=== ☑…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →For $15 or whatever it costs, it's not bad for a bit of entertainment. It's a very basic time manegement sim with not much going on other than managing the hunger and energy of your crew.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Challenging, interesting, with a lot of atmosphere ! Good job devs
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →A minimalist survival-management game where you assign a crashed space crew to gather scrap, fix equipment, and manage freezing temperatures. While the eerie sci-fi art style looks great, the gameplay quickly devolves into a tedious, slow-paced waiting simulator.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Happy Mortal Shell 2 release day! The devs, the publishing team, all of you deserve SO MANY FUCKING FLOWERS! The game also runs very well on Steam Deck from the amount that I've played on there! Cold Symmetry built something really special here.💚 @mortalshellgame.bsky.social
positive · AI labelView post →The game's art style looks decent, but the gameplay is way too repetitive. Players basically keep repeating the same actions -- you might want to grab a mug and pillow before starting. The difficulty is downright brutal -- if even one character dies, you might as well restart since you won't have enough hands to gather supplies. Call it "Barricade Simulator": this is a story about playing as obstacles trying to stop survivors from going outside in -75 degree weather. They're desperately,…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Monotonous survival game with tangential horror flavoring: not recommended. Imagine a game called "Small rock in your shoe Simulator", which makes you walk awkwardly through a park because of a small rock in your shoe. Even if it accurately recreates the uncomfortable experience, you may not want to actually play it because being uncomfortable is not fun: an enjoyable simulator recreates the feeling of an experience and abstracts contrivances. Symmetry accurately recreates the frustration and…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →1) stupid ai(u have to tell them to eat or they die and more) 2) bad hud(its so bad that its useless) + slow scrolling 3) tons of text u never read because u are busy to keep them alive(not easy because point 1 and 2) i got it for under 2€ in sale and and its worth it its an easy game but the controls make it very very hardcore there are better browsergames out there i cant say its bad but ...
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →TL;DR: If you want to play a broken, grindy version of Sheltered at least buy it when it's less than $5.00 ------------------------------------------------------------------------- If you are interested in this game, wait for a sale price of less than $5. I was able to get it for $2.99, which I really can't complain about. I was looking for a new survival/strategy sim and Symmetry caught my eye for reminding me a bit of Sheltered. However, after a pretty short amount of time I saw why this…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →📸 #MortalShell2 Beta Really impressed with what Cold Symmetry did with Mortal Shell 2, it's leagues above the first game, which I had many issues with #VirtualPhotography #thephotomode
positive · AI labelView post →This game is a glorified clicker!!!! There's no depth to the game, the story is blant, the mechanics are really bad. The only good thing going on is the graphics everything else is just tragic. It took me an hour and a half to finish this game on speed x2. I can't imagine playing this game on normal speed.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I really enjoyed this game. Some may not enjoy the high level of difficulty but it goes a long way to create a tense and unforgiving atmosphere. I also felt a great surge of satisfaction once I finally beat it and got all of the achievements.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Ok. I can recommend this game as it is...if you get it for a discount like I did. Originally, I bought this game thinking that there was more to it. Unfortunately, what I thought was the "first stage" is the only stage. The game is tedious and somewhat unforgiving. I failed once because I didn't notice everything I could do in the game, but then finished on my 2nd run. Not perfectly, but still. I'm sure a decent player could figure out this game in no time, and then be left with nothing to…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This game is either going to be too easy for you or too hard. In both cases, its because the design of this game is incredibly boring. There isn't anything to actually do. Its simple micromanagment that punishes you fast if you don't take the time every 30 seconds to keep track of every one of your crew members. The game does not reward you for playing well. The end of the game is unsatisfying, presenting the same cut scene no matter what choices you made or how quickly you leave. The story…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Ive actually had fun playing this game. The patches have fixed almost all the issues at release. I think for a small indie team like Sleepless Clinic they've done a fine job. Worked fine on both my Mac and my PC. Dev's have been aggressive at pushing out patches to fix issues on release. The game: Its challenging and not easy to beat. Has a lot of replay value and I look forward to new content and future games from the developer.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →This is a mildly interesting time management game. It's not bad and the price is probably right for what it is, but it's not good either. It doesn't really break new ground and it does things that other games have already done better. Here are other games you could try instead: 1) This war of mine (Survival as civilians in a warzone with difficult moral choices and consequences) 2) Sheltered (Survival as a family living in a bunker/shelter in a post-apocalyptic world) 3) Gods will be…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Mortal Shell II [PC/PS4 - 84] releases today www.metacritic.com/game/mortal-... "Cold Symmetry has built a game that is extraordinarily close to a perfect center of difficulty for me with a clear north star of 'make it fun, first.'" - Chuck Zimmerheld, Giant Bomb
neutral · AI labelView post →Played 4 hours straight of Mortal Shell II. My prevailing thought is that to your average person I think this is indistinguishable in quality from a FromSoft game and I can’t mean that with higher praise. The Cold Symmetry team are straight up wizards and they deserve every success they get
positive · AI labelView post →Mortal Shell II reviews are coming in now: www.metacritic.com/game/mortal-... "Mortal Shell II has...become one of my favourite souls-likes, with great kinetic gameplay, a great soundscape and gorgeous visuals that really sell the despair that Cold Symmetry set up to sell." - CG Magazine
neutral · AI labelView post →Patient zero is you when you press start new game This game is a very simplified assemblage between a management and a survival,the space shipwreck theme is cute and the presence of Hal is a nice touch,but it suffers from a monotony and repetitiveness that is out of the ordinary,resources run out at lightning speed and there are very few things to do,virtually nothing is explained to you and you have to go by intuition,and for the type of gameplay this is not good. The hidden achievement I…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I played for half an hour and then i got the entire game it about managing menial tasks with random things breaking. it showed no chance of change or spicing it up with macromangment.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Not sure if it's hard just for the sake of it. Your guys appear to be absolute morons who cannot take care of their basic needs on their own, and then they die. Certainly no fun the level of micromanagement that appears to be needed to play this.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Received FOR FREE from keymailer, CANNOT RECOMMEND. I wanted to like this game. I played it for about an hour on stream. It looked great in the screenshots and the art style is fantastic. The promise of a compelling story was too good to ignore -- but was never delivered. The game wasn't fun for me. The story wasnt well thought out -- it made zero sense ,was extremely dull, and completely unrelated to what was happening in the game. UI was poorly implemented, with cumbersome controls and menus…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It is in all means average. Average gameplay, average story, average challenge. Was able to finish the game before actually understood what happened. But that was neither interesting nor important. Buy if you have nothing else to do. Not the best way to spend 3-4 hours, not the worst. Came here for the story and atmosphere - was disappointed.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →First try! Love these kind of games - the "mixed reviews" status was perfect bait for me since I knew this was going to be challenging. To succeed here you need to think. What action will yield the best outcome in the current situation? Do I need to prioritize one char over the other or teach them how to do the same job? Do I have enough resources to sustain the base? Once you have your mind constantly focused in a sort of rythmic pattern, you'll fly through the game. The story lingering…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I enjoyed this game. I got a few hours of entertainment out of it and I did not complete it. I will say though, it is tediously difficult. Any time you made any progress you were seemingly arbitrarilly set back significantly. It was very much 3 steps forward two steps back. I like that you start with different players at the beginning of each game, but their stats are usually the same so it doesn't really change anything. There is not a whole lot of replayability here, but for the price, you…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I didn't connect much to the first Mortal Shell. But my jaw was glued to the floor in the opening hours of Mortal Shell 2. When the title dropped after the prologue, it was a sign that this was a truly special game. Congrats to Cold Symmetry on this one. Can't wait to talk about it on GWJ.
positive · AI labelView post →The premise is good – a group of astronauts, who are strapped on a hostile planet after a crash, with most crew still missing, are trying to escape. Unfortunately, the execution is lacking. The story is there, but it’s not told in a interesting way, nor is really compelling. The resource management basically consists of gathering one of two available resources in addition to food, as the other one is not really needed. Managing your crew is tedious - you have to constantly replenish their…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →- no Saves (only autosaves) - no screen edge scrolling - you can not mannage anything when unzoomed - no mouse options - does not zoom to the mouse point. i should have read comments before.......
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's a good game, a very good game yes. Just don't get attached to the little people or else you'll cry like I did when they eventually die :(. I can't tell if it's because I constantly have this game on 2x because 1x is so genuinely so slow but it it tends to get cold really easily and the wood to make the base warmer goes out so quick. Its kinda annoying because my little people die of cold so quick :(. But it is a geniunely good game. Unsettling at times, so the fact that I play this game at…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I feel like the game was made just over 2 hours so people coundt refund.Also the game isnt going anywhere so dont waste money like i did.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →It's really not that difficult if you're into these type of games, but there's just not enough content. Mostly you tell your people to gather a thing in the day and heal up at night and that's about it. There's very few decisions to make. Mostly you just grind out enough of the "components" to finish the game.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →took 5 hours to win the game and only my 2nd attempt, if your good at management its easy. The artwork is pretty good and the gameplay easy to figure. Downside tho is that while the story had promise, it falls pretty damn flat. I'm not recomending this because its too easy once you've got it down and there's too much left unanswered to be a decent story.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →where's my entertainment? all this game about is micromanaging your resources there's really not much more I couldnt even keep up with the story as im panicing with my crew dying going outside with -80 degree temperature
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →
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