- Publisher: Blumhouse Games
- Release Date: Dec 2, 2025
- Also On: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X
- Summary:
- Developer: Eyes Out
- Genre(s): Action Adventure, Survival
- # of players: No Online Multiplayer
- Cheats: On GameFAQs
- More Details and Credits »
Score distribution:
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Positive: 4 out of 12
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Mixed: 7 out of 12
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Negative: 1 out of 12
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Dec 2, 2025My favorite thing about Sleep Awake is how it plays with its form as a video game to portray a conflict that isn’t a bad guy or a monster. You can’t just hit “falling asleep will kill you” with a pipe and move on to the next slobbering, gory metaphor for crimes you’ve committed, or zombie, or whatever. This is an internal fight for most of the story, and one that has no visible end. You and Katja start the game fully prepared to just kick the can down the road as long as possible, until the runway’s out and there’s nothing else you can do. That’s no way to live, but at the same time, what can you do in that scenario but live? The death cults are silly, but at the same time, ruminations on how humanity’s self-perceived resilience could work against it. That’s where Sleep Awake really hits. When the monsters do show up it stumbles, and feels more like a normal video game the longer it wades into the Whys and Hows. Not bad for a five-hour rollercoaster.
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Dec 2, 2025SLEEP AWAKE is a game I saw in my email, having never heard of it. I redeemed the key on a whim, and dear lord, am I happy that I did. The four hours I spent in The Crawl as Katja were full of intrigue, some genuine scares, and a hell of a lot of enjoyment.
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Dec 2, 2025Cliché as it may sound, Sleep Awake is not meant for everybody. EYES OUT's deliberate obscure approach to this psychedelic walking sim was meant to draw in the curious and open-minded crowd, treating those who dare to stay awake to mindboggling lore and hallucinogenic FMV sequences. Just make sure to pay attention to the details, since skipping on that might leave you with more questions than answers.
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Dec 2, 2025SLEEP AWAKE is an experience that doesn’t allow itself enough time to become the piece of art it desperately wants to be. It features all the elements of a beautifully intense and unique audio and visual experience, and has a decent story it’s trying to tell, but feels diluted overall by its short runtime. It almost feels like a game that was playing it a bit too safe, even in its experimental style, and it would have benefited from heavier auditory exploration and more content to properly develop its intriguing narrative.
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Jan 5, 2026Blumhouse Games continues to drag great ideas down to mediocrity, just as they do in the film industry. If they ever allocate a solid budget for games one day, then we can play something truly great.
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Edge MagazineDec 24, 2025The story, meanwhile, is weighed down by needless convolution and stilted dialogue, even if its meditations on breaking the boundaries of human consciousness are admirably ambitious - and novel given that Huxleyian mysticism is well suited to the intimate and changeable perspective of a firstperson videogame. [Issue#419, p.120]
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Dec 3, 2025The death screen is a rare moment when Sleep Awake summons something between dream logic and the strange hazy moments between sleep states that can feel like dreaming. The rest of the time, this narcoleptic nightmare merely wears its psychedelic aesthetics – floating Numan included – without interrogating them interactively. It’s too straightforward, too legible, and not actually illogical enough where it matters. You may want to sleep on this one.