Citizen Sleeper 2: Starward Vector

Genre: Visual Novel / RPG

Players: 1

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Review:

(Note: This game is included in Citizen Sleeper: Helion Collection, along with the original Citizen Sleeper.)

When the original Citizen Sleeper released in 2022, I felt it was a game rich with worldbuilding, unique in its blend of Visual Novel and RPG elements, but cold and detached in its presentation. All of this remains true in Citizen Sleeper 2, released in 2025 on PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch. What this game adds are a few new core mechanics, and a different sort of story.

The first game put players in the role of a Sleeper, an artificial person, trying to escape from your corporate masters. Here, the situation is similar, except this time you’re trying to escape from a malicious individual, Laine, trying to exert control over you. And… okay, that may not seem too different, but it does add more character to your antagonist. However, more to the point, you’ll also be joined by Serafin, who clearly has some prior connection to your character, but one you can’t place since the method to free you from Laine damaged your memory.

This ties into one of the things that distinguishes Citizen Sleeper 2 from its predecessor, a stronger focus on managing character relationships. And it’s not just Serafin who you’ll be concerned with, as you’ll recruit other crew members to assist you, and you’ll even be able to assign them to tasks based on their individual skills, and need to manage this along with your resources to succeed.

Beyond this, the gameplay is very similar to the first game, boiled down to dice you assign to tasks with each affecting your chances of success, interspersed with “Choose Your Own Adventure”-style Visual Novel choices that can affect how the story plays out, who you can recruit to your crew, and so on. Depending on the class you choose at the game’s start, you may have skills better-suited to some options than others, and the inclusion of dice rolls to affect chance means that there’s a risk-reward factor in what choices you make and which dice you choose to wager on those choices.

There are also a lot of different mechanics at play here, and the game isn’t always clear about where you can get information about these mechanics or how they affect the gameplay. Stress is a mechanic this game adds in place of the first game’s condition system, and there’s the aforementioned crew recruitment, though the game’s tutorial takes its time showing players where they can find information regarding these things.

And despite this game putting more of a focus on characters, it still does come across as cold and dispassionate in its presentation, with information largely conveyed through menu screens. The various hand-drawn 2D character portraits and a rotating 3D model of your current location are the most noteworthy visual elements here, but mostly you’ll spend the game looking at text. This is backed by a similarly minimalist atmospheric soundtrack that I suppose emphasized the cold feeling of the game, though it’s a matter of personal preference whether or not that appeals to you.

All of this is to say… if you liked the original Citizen Sleeper, you will almost certainly like Citizen Sleeper 2. And if you didn’t like the first game, this sequel isn’t likely to change your mind. And while you don’t need to have played the first game to understand the plot of this sequel, I do feel like you might as well start at the beginning if you’ve never tried out this series before.

tl;dr – Citizen Sleeper 2, like its predecessor, is a game that combines elements of Visual Novels, Graphic Adventure games, and tabletop RPGs, telling a story set in a dystopian future and putting players in the role of a Sleeper, an artificial person fleeing from someone seeking to control them. This game’s presentation is cold and detached, and the majority of your interaction with its world will be through text (and through dice rolls). If you’re not turned off by these elements, you’ll find this game to have an interesting story with rich worldbuilding, and fairly unique gameplay. This is not a game for everyone, but I suspect those who like this game will really like it.

Grade: B-

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