Order of the Sinking Star

Order of the Sinking Star is a narrative puzzle adventure from Thekla, Inc., led by Jonathan Blow. The game combines more than 1,000 handcrafted, interconnected puzzles with a freely explorable world, several playable characters and a story that develops from the relationships between four initially separate puzzle worlds.

The project came together over nearly a decade after The Witness. Instead of a single core mechanic, Thekla combines ideas from several puzzle designers into a deliberately combinatorial structure: the individual systems work on their own at first and gradually interlock more and more.

Order of the Sinking Star was released on Oct 8, 2026. The full version is available for PC via Steam, PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch 2.

Windows PC (Steam), PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch 2 are released as native platforms. According to the manufacturer, Steam Deck is verified for the PC version and does not count as an additional native platform.

The PC version has a German user interface and German subtitles. Voice audio is listed on Steam for English only. An Xbox version has not been announced so far.

The central overworld serves as a freely explorable hub. From there, four directions lead into standalone puzzle worlds, each with its own characters, rules and hazards. If you get stuck on a task, you can leave the area and carry on elsewhere; there is no fixed order.

The systems range from Sokoban-style tasks with multiple hero classes, through magic mirrors and position-dependent swapping, to colored light beams, teleportation, water paths and skipping stones. The game relies on known rules returning later in new combinations.

According to Steam, the Windows version requires DirectX 12 and 14 GB of free storage. The minimum configuration requires 8 GB RAM, an Intel Core i5-6600K or Ryzen 5 1600, and a GTX 1050 Ti, Radeon RX 580 or Intel Arc A380. Recommended are 16 GB RAM, a Core i5-9600K or Ryzen 5 3600, and a GTX 2070 Ti, Radeon RX 5700 or Arc B570.

In the north, you control a group of fantasy adventurers with different abilities for pushing, pulling and teleporting objects. The east revolves around a merchant and magic mirrors that swap figures and objects with their reflections. In the west, an explorer uses colored light beams to pass through walls, destroy rocks and activate teleporters. In the south, a stranded sailor crosses island chains using skipping stones, waterways and movable lily pads.

These four areas are based on ideas from Heroes of Sokoban, Mirror Isles, Promesst and Skipping Stones to Lonely Homes. Thekla builds them out into larger systems and later connects them.

The four worlds do not remain separate for long. Later on, the so-called Gold Rooms each join two areas. This creates six large combination zones in which characters and rules from different worlds are used at the same time.

For example, the Explorer's light beams can be combined with the Merchant's mirror mechanics, or the Fantasy group's abilities with the Sailor's water and stone puzzles. Bringing these systems together is the game's central structural twist.