Sleep Awake Preview: Keep One Eye Open

Sleep Awake is a game that doesn’t want you to take your eyes off the screen, fitting for a game whose primary antagonist is a good night’s sleep.

From developer Cory Davis and Nine Inch Nails guitarist Robin Finck the game aims to deliver “psychedelic visuals, blurring boundaries between reality and imagination.”

After going hands-on with Sleep Awake I’m intrigued by its story and world-building, though the gameplay did leave me wanting a little more, at least for now.

The demo immediately thrusts you into the thick of it, on a high-rise building in the last populated city on Earth. The majority of human life mysteriously disappeared in their sleep, with those behind desperately searching for ways to beat their body clocks and stay awake.

Before I could learn more about the world though I first needed to learn how to stealth. There is no combat in Sleep Awake, only evasion, and my demo was a bit of a trial by fire. Ducking under tables and sticking to the shadows was integral to my survival as masked cultists patrolled the area.

There were also a few puzzles to impede my progress. Nothing too complex but I’d imagine that’ll change the further into the story you go.

Overall it was a bit touch and go and there was a lot of patience involved, but the same can be said about all stealth games so no harm done there. I’m looking forward to seeing what other mechanics are in place to spice up the gameplay later into the game.

In terms of story though Sleep Awake left me with several questions by the time I’d finished the demo. It fed me just enough breadcrumbs to follow what was happening without giving too much away. What I’m most excited to see are the other factions in the game. The enemies I dealt with were run-of-the-mill goons who were well-equipped but simply in their design. Apparently some of the other factions are more unhinged, like one that inflicts pain upon themselves to stay awake and others that are more supernatural and occult-like. It all sounded really interesting and added a lot to the overall world-design.

If you’re interested in trying the game out for yourself there’s a demo available on Steam right now, with the full game coming out soon.