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InnerSpace

Available on Xbox One, PS4, PC, Nintendo Switch (version tested)
InnerSpace Game Cover
64%Game Brain Score
Most mentioned positive aspects:story, graphics
Most mentioned negative aspects:optimization, grinding
63% User Score Based on 210 reviews
Critic Score 64%Based on 26 reviews

Platforms

Nintendo SwitchLinuxXbox Series X|SPCPlaystation 5Mac OSPlaystation 4Xbox OneXboxSteam DeckWindowsPlayStation
InnerSpace Game Cover

About InnerSpace

InnerSpace is a single player open world simulation game with a fantasy theme. It was developed by PolyKnight Games and was released on January 16, 2018. It received mostly positive reviews from both critics and players.

InnerSpace is a game about exploration, about player-driven moments both small and grandiose. Take your time, soar through the skies and dive through the oceans, and the secrets of the Inverse will reveal themselves.

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Games Like InnerSpace

Looking for games like InnerSpace? Here are top open world simulation recommendations with a fantasy focus, selected from player-similarity data — start with AER Memories of Old, Flower or Aporia: Beyond The Valley.

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Reviews

63%Audience ScoreBased on 210 reviews
story24 positive mentions
optimization3 negative mentions

  • Beautiful, unique, and immersive art style with vibrant, pastel, and surreal environments.
  • Relaxing and calming atmosphere enhanced by soothing music and ambient sound design.
  • Innovative exploration gameplay involving flying and diving inside inverted spherical worlds with intriguing lore and collectibles.
  • Controls are unintuitive and frustrating on keyboard and mouse; game is best played with a controller.
  • Navigation can be disorienting due to inside-out worlds, lack of map or clear objectives, leading to confusion and aimless wandering.
  • Short length with limited depth; some puzzles obscure and progression unclear, making it a polarizing experience for many players.
  • story

    79 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    30% positive mentions, 64% neutral mentions, 6% negative mentions

    The story is generally described as light, poetic, and intriguing, with a calming, exploratory tone that blends well with the game’s visuals and music. While some appreciate its subtle, minimalist delivery and lore-rich artifact discoveries, others find it too abstract, vague, or abruptly ended, with occasional critiques about lack of direction and excessive text. Overall, it suits the game's relaxed exploration style but may not satisfy those expecting a structured or deeply engaging narrative.

    • “An intriguing plot that persuades the player to contemplate.”
    • “The minimalist storytelling leaves much to interpretation, but that ambiguity works in its favor, inviting players to reflect rather than simply absorb.”
    • “The story and lore of innerspace was surprisingly enticing and perhaps one of my favourite aspects of it.”
    • “For those expecting structured missions or conventional progression, the lack of direction can feel alienating.”
    • “Story, not much to say about it as I haven't a clue what I've just done; you're thrown into some world we're expected to care about, expected to want to "fix" without any explanation or drive to do so other than a few text boxes here and there.”
    • “The story had potential, but the ending is extremely inconclusive, it ends out of nowhere with no closure.”
  • graphics

    63 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    48% positive mentions, 47% neutral mentions, 5% negative mentions

    The game's graphics feature a unique, minimalist, and colorful art style that many find visually striking, atmospheric, and beautifully crafted, contributing significantly to its relaxing and poetic experience. While some praise the seamless blend of visuals and music and the creative 3D models, others criticize the simple, low-polygon aesthetic and occasional visual disorientation it causes during flight. Overall, the graphics are appreciated for their artistic charm and mood-setting, despite lacking high-detail textures or advanced graphical options.

    • “The minimalistic art style blends smoothly with the game’s physics-defying architecture, creating an atmosphere that feels at once alien and serene.”
    • “This is an absolutely gorgeous game, with excellent visuals and music.”
    • “The visuals are truly stunning, and I found myself being pulled into the game time and time again.”
    • “The lack of textures is a method that lazy devs often use to disguise their lack of talent or interest in doing the graphics properly, trying to pass it off as 'art' or 'we made it look bad on purpose', which really isn't something gamers should have to put up with.”
    • “First the art-style: a 3D game with no graphical video options, a broken resolution option selector, and graphics that can only really be described as 'iffy' don't set the greatest stage for a title about exploration and experience.”
    • “The art style actually adds to this issue as the minimalist nature makes it even harder to tell up from down – even if those are loose terms in innerspace.”
  • gameplay

    58 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    29% positive mentions, 66% neutral mentions, 5% negative mentions

    The gameplay centers on casual, fluid flying and underwater exploration with a focus on drifting and maneuvering through unique, concave worlds. While the mechanics are simple and enjoyable for laid-back exploration, some players find controls imprecise or disorienting, and the progression somewhat limited. Overall, it offers a relaxing experience with varied airframes and puzzle-solving elements, though it may not appeal to those seeking more depth or innovation.

    • “The gameplay mechanics are casual and accessible: there are several craft to choose from, each with a different flying and handling style.”
    • “Smooth flight: the flying and submarine mechanics feel fluid and enjoyable.”
    • “The gameplay focuses on exploration and does not hold your hand, allowing you to figure out where to go next and solve each puzzle organically.”
    • “First and foremost; gameplay, this game has nothing that is going to blow you away, it consists of flying through some tunnels, or into an orb, or sometimes escort quests (because gamers just love those). In fact, the final boss consists of about seven escort quest-like objectives.”
    • “This game is not like Abzu, Journey, or Flower; you cannot relax while playing this unless you want to fly around for ten+ hours trying to find a gameplay mechanic that the developers didn't explain to you at all.”
    • “Unacceptable for a game where movement is a key element to the gameplay.”
  • music

    57 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    58% positive mentions, 37% neutral mentions, 5% negative mentions

    The music in the game is widely praised for its ethereal, ambient, and relaxing qualities that perfectly complement the visuals and atmosphere, creating a calming and immersive experience. While some find it repetitive or occasionally dropping out, most appreciate how well it integrates with gameplay and enhances the game's poetic, mysterious mood. Overall, the soundtrack is considered a standout feature that significantly enriches exploration and emotional engagement.

    • “The soundtrack complements this perfectly, using ethereal tones and ambient melodies to create a sense of both melancholy and wonder.”
    • “A beautifully made game centered around exploring a mix of simple and complex environments with very beautifully created music to fit each of the areas.”
    • “Chasing the flock through the mornsea was one of my favourite moments of the game and that was in majority down to the seamless blend of the animation and music, although the beautiful aesthetics certainly help.”
    • “Music and sounds are an important element in this game, and thus don't let monotone control sounds take over - which unfortunately it did.”
    • “Music also isn't the greatest branding, ranging from uninspired to weird to simply missing from the moment in terms of atmosphere across the board.”
    • “The music is also repetitive.”
  • atmosphere

    25 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    60% positive mentions, 32% neutral mentions, 8% negative mentions

    The game's atmosphere is widely praised for its peaceful, serene, and immersive qualities, enhanced by a unique, minimalist art style and calming ambient soundtrack that evoke mystery and introspection. While it excels in creating a tranquil, exploration-focused experience without combat, some players find navigation and control issues detract from the overall feel. Despite minor criticisms, the atmosphere stands out as a major strength, offering a soothing and visually captivating journey.

    • “The minimalistic art style blends smoothly with the game’s physics-defying architecture, creating an atmosphere that feels at once alien and serene.”
    • “Fantastic atmosphere: the art, music, and sense of exploring a fading, ancient world create a powerful, calming mood.”
    • “The variety of music is nice and the general atmosphere exudes mystery and wonder rather than stress or confusion thanks to the low level of challenge when flying around, although working out some of the puzzle solutions can take some time.”
    • “The music also isn't the greatest, ranging from uninspired to weird to simply missing from the moment in terms of atmosphere across the board.”
    • “I absolutely adore the art, the music, the sound design, and the warm fuzzy atmosphere of the game, so it's a huge shame playing the darn thing is so annoying.”
  • emotional

    4 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    100% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions

    Players find the game emotionally touching and heartwarming, with a memorable story and atmosphere that evokes genuine feelings. While not overly sad, it leaves a lasting impression, though some have noted it can cause physical discomfort quickly.

    • “The level with the bird made me cry, but I saw some great gameplay videos and got through it. I came back for a second playthrough maybe two or three years after my last run.”
    • “I really love the vibe and the story of this game. It's genuinely heartwarming and pleasant.”
    • “It's not exactly sad, but it's just touching enough that I was sad to finish the game.”
  • optimization

    4 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    25% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 75% negative mentions

    Optimization received mixed feedback: some users experienced smooth, flawless performance on various devices including handhelds and PCs, even at 4K resolution, while others reported frequent crashes, severe frame rate drops, and instability that hindered gameplay.

    • “Solid performance: played flawlessly on both my Steam Deck OLED (Linux/SteamOS, the game installed on a microSD card) and my Windows 11 Lenovo ThinkPad (the game also installed on a microSD card).”
    • “Beautiful views, crappy performance. I've literally lost count of how many times this game has crashed on the first world. I honestly had to delete several saves and reinstall the whole game twice. Seriously, I thought the first world was unplayable. When I got to world 2, the framerate tanks and then the game crashes.”
    • “While I appreciated its artistry and the smooth performance on handheld/PC, I personally got stuck a few times and found the core loop didn't quite hold my interest enough to finish.”
    • “Performance-wise, Innerspace was an entirely smooth experience and it scaled perfectly to 4K resolution.”
  • grinding

    4 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    0% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 100% negative mentions

    Grinding in the game is generally seen as tedious and repetitive, with players finding activities like item gathering and exploration to become monotonous over time. While there are moments of enjoyment, the overall experience of grinding can feel frustrating and stale.

    • “Flying around the sunchamber to find that last accordion bloom for an hour was tedious.”
    • “Unfortunately, this meditative journey becomes stale and tedious after too long.”
    • “From the exploration to the item gathering, everything quickly became rather tedious.”
  • stability

    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    0% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 100% negative mentions

    The game's stability is mixed, with controls often feeling buggy and jittery, even on controllers. However, the stabilizer mechanic effectively freezes the ship, enhancing the experience by allowing free movement and adding a 6DoF flight sim feel.

    • “The controls feel buggy, jittery, and random (even on controller).”
  • replayability

    2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    100% positive mentions, -100% neutral mentions, 100% negative mentions

    Replayability largely depends on the player's interest in exploration and completion, with limited value beyond thoroughly discovering all content. The game's length and longevity vary based on how much time is invested in exploring each world.

    • “The longevity and replayability heavily depend on you and how much time you spend exploring each world.”
    • “There is not much replay value unless you want to try and find everything.”
    • “Not much replay value unless you want to try and find everything.”
    • “Longevity/replayability: the length heavily depends on you and how much time you spend exploring each world.”
  • humor

    1 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
    100% positive mentions, 0% neutral mentions, 0% negative mentions

    The humor in the game is quirky and self-aware, though some of its analogies can feel a bit convoluted or forced. It leans into playful, offbeat jokes that may not resonate with everyone.

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Play Times

5h Median play time
5h Average play time
3-6h Spent by most gamers
*Based on 2 analyzed playthroughs
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Frequently Asked Questions

InnerSpace is a open world simulation game with fantasy theme. Common tags for InnerSpace include indie, trading, exploration, family friendly, relaxing and others.

InnerSpace is available on Nintendo Switch, Xbox Series X|S, PC, PlayStation 5 and others.

On average players spend around 5 hours playing InnerSpace.

InnerSpace was released on January 16, 2018.

InnerSpace was developed by PolyKnight Games.

InnerSpace has received mostly positive reviews from both players and critics. Most players liked InnerSpace for its story but disliked it for its optimization.

InnerSpace is a single player game.

Similar games include AER Memories of Old, Flower, Aporia: Beyond The Valley, ABZÛ, Spirit of the North and others.