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Sunless Skies Sunless Skies

Sail the stars. Betray your Queen. Murder a sun. Sunless Skies is a Gothic Horror roleplay game with a focus on exploration and exquisite storytelling.

Key facts

Release dateJanuary 31st 2019
DeveloperFailbetter Games
GenreExploration, Indie, RPG
PlatformsWindows, macOS, SteamOS, Linux, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4
Enquiriespress@failbettergames.com
Use of Alcohol, Use of Tobacco, Blood, Violence, Language, Sexual Themes,

Overview

Captain a spacefaring steam locomotive, as a new Victorian empire takes to the stars! Lead your hapless crew into trouble – and out of their minds. Barter for barrels of time. Smuggle souls. Pause for cricket and a cup of tea.

Unfettered by gravity, the Victorian Empire reaches across the skies. The stars are the Judgements: vast intelligences that govern all things. But they are dying.

Create your past. Choose who you were before you became a skyfarer. Most of your captains will die. Each will leave their mark on the world.

Explore a beautiful, hostile world. This is a standalone story set in the Fallen London universe, as seen in Sunless Sea.

Improve your locomotive. It is all that stands between you and the Heavens.

Populate your ship with officers. Fight marauders. Survive starvation, madness and terror.

Will you support Her Majesty's empire, or the rebels who mean to dismantle London’s rule? Pick your side wisely, for you might be the one to tip the balance of power…

Features:

  • 800,000+ words of intertwining stories, inspired by CS Lewis, Jules Verne, HP Lovecraft and HG Wells
  • Four regions to explore: celestial wilderness, impossible industrial empire, pagan midnight expanse, and the domain of the dead
  • Real-time combat against horrifying celestial foes and merciless pirates
  • Upgrade your engine with bizarre equipment and powerful weaponry
  • Build a lineage of captains as each dies, or reload your most recent captain
  • Collect pets: the Useless Cat, Perfect Pangolin and more

Screenshots

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Videos

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Praise

This is a game about stories that has a knack of producing really good ones – when you’re doing well, and especially when you’re doing badly.

EDGE9/10

A glimpse of the heavens from master storytellers. Failbetter outdoes itself… [and] continues to revolutionise the RPG.

PCGamesN9/10

All the verbal artistry of Sunless Sea scattered across a gorgeous steampunk cosmos.

EurogamerESSENTIAL

Failbetter’s finest hour.

PC Gamer90

Support

Hello! If you’re reading this, you’ve probably found a bug and want to report it to us. Sunless Skies now has an in-game feedback and bug reporting tool which is accessible by pressing F8, or via the Give Feedback button on the Main Menu (press Esc or click the Cog icon on the HUD).

Once open you should select an appropriate category from the dropdown list (Feedback, Narrative Issue, or Other Issue) before entering a description. The more information you can give us about the steps you took before encountering an issue the better.

If you cannot launch the game in order to access the bug reporter, then please see our official Troubleshooting Guide. This comprehensive guide covers crashes, black screens, and all manner of start-up issues, including details on how to repair your save files if they become corrupt.