Obduction on Steam - User reviews, Price & Information
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A new sci-fi adventure from Cyan, the creators of Myst. Abducted far across the universe, you find yourself on a broken alien landscape with odd pieces of Earth. Explore, uncover, solve, and find a way to make it home.
Obduction is a adventure, puzzle and exploration game
developed and published by Cyan Inc..
Released on August 24th 2016 is available on Windows and MacOS
in 10 languages: English, French, Italian, German, Spanish - Spain, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Polish, Dutch and Portuguese - Brazil.
It has received 3,857 reviews of which 3,076 were positive and 781 were negative resulting in a rating of 7.7 out of 10. 😊
The game is currently priced at 28.99€ on Steam, but you can find it for 3.96€ on Gamivo.
The Steam community has classified Obduction into these genres:
Media & Screenshots
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System requirements
These are the minimum specifications needed to play the game. For the best experience, we recommend that you verify them.
Windows
- Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
- OS *: Windows 7 SP1 64 bit or newer
- Processor: CPU Intel i5-2500 equivalent or better
- Memory: 8 GB RAM
- Graphics: GeForce 660 GTX w/1GB / AMD 7700 series w/1GB equivalent or better
- Storage: 20 GB available space
- VR Support: SteamVR or Oculus PC
- Additional Notes: For VR: NVIDIA 970 or AMD 480 (equivalent or greater)
MacOS
- OS: Sierra 10.12.4
- Processor: Intel CPU capable of 4 or more threads
- Memory: 8 GB RAM
- Graphics: Intel HD Graphics 4000, Iris 5000 & 6000 family w/1 GB VRAM or better. Most Macs from 2012 on.
- Storage: 20 GB available space
- Additional Notes: MacOS 10.12.4 (or later) is required to play Obduction. Any MacOS versions prior to this may result in random crashes. Metal support is required to play Obduction.
User reviews & Ratings
Explore reviews from Steam users sharing their experiences and what they love about the game.
This review contains spoilers! I'd recommend this game with a few caveats. The first is that, if you don't enjoy the classics that Cyan Worlds developed (Myst and Riven), then you probably won't immediately see the appeal of Obduction. So, if you haven't played Myst or Riven, I highly recommend doing so. In addition to both of those games being classics in their own right, they also give helpful points of comparison for Obduction. Obduction immediately captured my imagination in a fashion similar to Myst and Riven. In those two classic games, you're transported into a strange fantasy universe by something called a linking book. The premise of Obduction really isn't that different: you're transported into a strange fantasy universe by some kind of alien seed. The atmosphere of an Arizona desert home (complete with white picket fence) contrasted with the purple alien landscape is captivating. The level design feels very well thought-out with respect to realism. Obviously, the idea of a sphere of the Arizona desert being transported to another world is fiction, but once you accept that premise, everything else feels like it belongs. Objects work as you'd expect them to, and you see things where you'd expect to see them. It would have been really tempting for the developers to place all of Farley's notes all around the world, sort of drip-feeding the lore of this world as you progress through things, but they're all in Farley's house instead. And, even though it breaks up the pace of the gameplay to have the player read through books of text all at once, it's worth the tradeoff because it makes the most sense for Farley's personal notes to be in her house - the internal consistency makes the world feel real. While the level design feels well thought-out from a realism perspective, there's a bit of a problem when it comes to backtracking. Many of Obduction's puzzles are rooted spatial awareness. Once you've mapped out what the area you're working in looks like and how things are connected, you've basically solved the puzzle. However, the gap between knowing how to solve the puzzle and actually executing your solution is often enormous. You often have to backtrack over several levels to circumvent small areas in the middle of a puzzle, and this wouldn't normally be a huge issue for me, but there's nothing interesting to do during that transit time (other than enjoy the backgrounds and set pieces), and the player's movement speed is painfully slow (even while running). Indeed, if the player just ran at a sprint instead of a light jog, I probably would have completed the game in 9 hours instead of 13. I don't think a faster run speed would have broken the immersion of the game at all, and it would have made things feel more fluid. I imagine a lot of people will leverage complaints about load times and performance. And, indeed, there are some performance issues here. There are rather long load times, especially when swapping between parallel worlds. I'm not terribly frustrated with it, personally, because as time goes on, there will be optimizations that will likely fix this issue (there have already been some in patches of the game since its release). The only time it became irritating was in the Villein world, where a few of the puzzles involve swapping between worlds in short succession. It killed the pacing. And, while the visuals of the game look nice, it's not really worth the performance cost, in my opinion. The puzzles themselves are generally quite good. As I mentioned, spatial awareness is key for most of the puzzles, but Obduction takes this concept to the next level with the concept of the interlinking worlds. It's not enough for you to have spatial awareness of the level you're standing in. You also sometimes have to have awareness of how the space you're standing in relates to the parallel worlds you swap between. The fact that you spend the game not only in Hunrath, but in the other three linked worlds was a very pleasant surprise that I'll likely never forget. I was a bit disappointed that the Mofang world was devoid of any puzzle solving or mechanical content, but it makes sense logically for that world to be barren as you uncover the story of Obduction, so it's not really a major complaint of mine. The biggest disappointment for me were the puzzles that relied on logic rather than spatial awareness. When I discovered that the Villein use a base-4 number system, I was excited to learn all about it. Indeed, it brought me back to my first time playing through Riven. Learning the Rivenese number system was one of my favorite experiences in my time playing video games. It's a captivating moment where everything just kind of clicks and the entire world of Riven starts to make sense. There wasn't really any analog with the Villein number system. The problem with the Villein number system is that the player is given a tool for brute-forcing the puzzles in the garage in Hunrath. The cash register takes all the fun out of learning the Villein number system and using it in the various solution panels across the game. It's especially disappointing because, if you explore the basement in the Mayor's office, you can find a worksheet where he was learning the Villein number system. It would have been a lot more rewarding for the player to learn these numbers on their own instead of having a tool that translates everything for them (overreliance on the tool also led to a lot of backtracking, which I already explained was an issue in this game). The best example of a puzzle which disappointed me was one of the last ones the player is likely to solve: the pod vault in the Villein world. The goal is to find Farley's pod. There's actually a very interesting system for organizing the pods. You need to take the pod position (which can be 0-15), multiply it by sixteen, and then add the floor number you want to access. I actually took the time to figure this out by experimenting with the number panel and observing the results, and it was a joy to figure that out. It would have been so cool if the log book had just given the floor number and pod position for each entry. But, the logbook unfortunately reveals the exact number as well (which wasn't necessary information to solve the puzzle). The player can easily figure out which pod is Farley's by plugging the pod number into the register in the garage in Hunrath, even if they don't understand the Villein number system at all. It was really disappointing to find that learning the Villein number system wasn't really required to solve any of the puzzles in the Villein world. But, I suppose the counterpoint is that you can learn how the number system works entirely within the game's logic, which is pretty cool. And, if you're looking for a good challenge, I recommend learning it! One could argue that the register in the garage makes the game's progression more accessible to players who don't want to learn a base-4 number system. But, I have a counterargument: The story and progression really isn't anything that special. It's fine, and I don't have any complaints about it, but it doesn't justify handicapping the puzzles - and, if you ask me, the puzzles are what we're really here for. Cyan Worlds' strengths are in the world-building and puzzle construction, not the story and plot. Overall, I would recommend Obduction. It makes for a memorable experience, and the world-building is fantastic. This is especially so if you're already a fan of Myst and Riven, and if you don't mind some of the clunkiness that comes with those games. Even though this game was made with more modern software development tools, it still feels reminiscent of the point-and-click era (many who are already interested in Obduction will see this as a positive). However, if you're looking for an immersive first-person puzzler game that takes place in an alien world that feels more modern, play Outer Wilds.
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A unique story, played out in absolutely gorgeous, immersive environments with organically developed puzzles that are part of the story, not just contrived obstacles. What you'd expect from Cyan after all the Myst titles, a great addition to the collection. I've played it several times (with plenty of time in between to forget the details) and still love it every time. The whole thing makes me smile, go "hmmm...." and "say what?!?!?" Truly entertaining in every way.
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Great puzzles, with enough hints for you to figure it out if you take a second to think and explore the world
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I'm 68 and the only games I was ever interested in were the Cyan games. I found MYST a few years after it's release, but all the others I literally had to get when they were actually first released. I have to admit I had to have hint help on all of them, being old and no computer experience previously. I have to give kudos to the gamers that actually beat these games on their own, my guess they started as young children. On my first attempt at Obduction I was pretty lost, as basically a novice at critical game thinking. I barely made it halfway before I got so stuck back in 2016, that I couldn't fine the hint/answer to a puzzle, so I quit the game. then this year we decided to go through all the games again for brain training to keep sharp. We did pretty well, but still needed some help, but not as bad as the first time around. With Obduction it really kicked out butts, and it was disheartening to see some had gotten through in 8 to 12 hours. Even with help we were at it for 95 hours! Yes, 95! but most of it was my tenacity in trying to figure things out, and being hampered by missing many small details, that real gamers learned to look for long ago. I highly recommend Obduction! Totally a thinking game, one does need a lot of patience if you aren't a big gamer.
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Look, you might need to use a walkthrough on a point or two, especially if taking long breaks between playing. Some clues and paths are... not obvious. But this game is beautiful and worth the effort.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Obduction is currently priced at 28.99€ on Steam.
Obduction is currently not on sale. You can purchase it for 28.99€ on Steam.
Obduction received 3,076 positive votes out of a total of 3,857 achieving a rating of 7.73.
😊
Obduction was developed and published by Cyan Inc..
Obduction is playable and fully supported on Windows.
Obduction is playable and fully supported on MacOS.
Obduction is not playable on Linux.
Obduction is a single-player game.
There are 2 DLCs available for Obduction. Explore additional content available for Obduction on Steam.
Obduction does not support mods via Steam Workshop.
Obduction does not support Steam Remote Play.
Obduction is enabled for Steam Family Sharing. This means you can share the game with authorized users from your Steam Library, allowing them to play it on their own accounts. For more details on how the feature works, you can read the original Steam Family Sharing announcement or visit the Steam Family Sharing user guide and FAQ page.
You can find solutions or submit a support ticket by visiting the Steam Support page for Obduction.
Data sources
The information presented on this page is sourced from reliable APIs to ensure accuracy and relevance. We utilize the Steam API to gather data on game details, including titles, descriptions, prices, and user reviews. This allows us to provide you with the most up-to-date information directly from the Steam platform.
Additionally, we incorporate data from the SteamSpy API, which offers insights into game sales and player statistics. This helps us present a comprehensive view of each game's popularity and performance within the gaming community.
Last Updates| Steam data | 15 March 2026 06:29 |
|---|---|
| SteamSpy data | 09 March 2026 18:42 |
| Steam price | 15 March 2026 04:43 |
| Steam reviews | 13 March 2026 18:08 |
If you'd like to dive deeper into the details about Obduction, we invite you to check out a few dedicated websites that offer extensive information and insights. These platforms provide valuable data, analysis, and user-generated reports to enhance your understanding of the game and its performance.
- SteamDB - A comprehensive database of everything on Steam about Obduction
- SteamCharts - Analysis of Obduction concurrent players on Steam
- ProtonDB - Crowdsourced reports on Linux and Steam Deck Obduction compatibility
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Game modes
Features
Online players
13
Developer
Cyan Inc.
Publisher
Cyan Inc.
Release
24 Aug 2016
VR
VR Supported
Platforms
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