Screenshots & trailers
How this score was computed
The VGC Score is a weighted blend on a press-comparable 0-100 quality scale. Steam approval rates are first calibrated (95% positive on Steam ≈ 89.5 quality, since Steam approval skews high). Press and tracked creator reviews each count ~2x a player review and share one cap against player evidence (creator buy/skip calls pool into an approval rate, calibrated like Steam approval); all-time sentiment is capped and halved (it's context, not verdict); reviews of the current build carry the most weight when a fresh patch anchors the window; and a 'typical game' prior keeps small samples from pegging the scale. Because press reviews and Metacritic user aggregates describe the launch build, their weight decays as the game ages (3-year half-life after a 1-year grace). That's how a game that launched rough can outgrow its old reception once updates win players over. Reviews under 2h playtime (the refund window), non-Steam activations, and free copies are downweighted.
| Component | Positive | Quality (0-100) | Weight (pseudo-reviews) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Press reviews (Metacritic) | – | 78 | 20 |
| Creator reviews (1 tracked) | – | 97 | 1 |
| All-time Steam reviews | – | – | 0 |
| Metacritic user ratings | – | 78 | 174 |
| Backloggd ratings | – | 66 | 750 |
| Xbox store ratings | – | 70 | 246 |
| Post-patch Steam reviews (trust-weighted) | – | – | 0 |
| Calibration prior (typical game) | – | 72 | 50 |
Scoring window: last 30 days (no significant patch detected) · 0 reviews sampled · 0 total reviews in window · weighted 0 up / 0 down · computed 2h ago · full methodology →
Press & Creators reviews (44)
Individual verdicts from outlets we track: scored reviews first, most trusted outlets first among them. The small badge is each outlet's trust score: how well its scoring history aligns with players.
- 60
“Whether or not you suffer from simulator sickness, Observer will make you queasy. For better and worse, that's the point of the game, which uses a cyberpunk detective framework to meditate on augmented reality and consciousness. ”
read full review ↗ - 80
“Bloober Team’s >observer_ marries cyberpunk and body horror tropes into an intense, disturbing sensory feast, for the most part successfully.”
read full review ↗ - 80
“Observer is a must buy for cyberpunk fans. Bloober Team's ambitions grow and this game is a good example. An interesting idea, well designed visions, pretty graphics and superb soundtrack are worth the price of admission. It's still a "walking simulator", but a very good one.”
read full review ↗ - 91
“A dark, unforgiving descent into one family’s darkest secrets, brilliantly stylized and exquisitely paced and acted. Hauer is in top form as the cynical, tired, end-of-the-road Detective Lazarski and Observer lives to subvert any possible genre expectations you might approach it with.”
read full review ↗ - 80
- 90
“Cyberpunk is a reflection of where we’re headed as a society, an oddly alluring reality where we've allowed impressive technology into our lives at the cost of our humanity. This is a niche genre that needs new revisions and new pioneers so it can keep evolving as we inch closer to seeing its fictional warnings play out in real life, and Observer adds to the familiar parables in fascinating and unexpected ways. In that respect, and on so many other levels, Observer is a haunting and remarkable achievement.”
read full review ↗ - 80
“Observer is filled with alarming images, sounds en conversations, elements that come together as a mystery which is bound to get under your skin. Let the raw voice of Rutger Hauer guide you through a nasty world, in which the game-within-a-game With Fire and Sword: Spiders forms a nice diversion of all the somber misery. But be forewarned that this is more of a walking simulator than a Outlast-like horror game.”
read full review ↗ - 70
“Before it resorts to some rather cliched horror tropes, Observer is a gritty, oppressive cyberpunk nightmare. [Issue#266, p.60]”
- 45
“Brainhacking will blow your mind, but you'll want to get the cop out of your head by the end.”
read full review ↗ - 65
“Overall Observer is good at what it does, but it’s not the sort of place I overly enjoyed being in. Rather than pelting headlong down the horror route, it straddles an awkward thriller line that didn’t overly entice me. At no point was I desperate to boot it up and find out what happened next, no doubt partly due to the busy, often dizzying art style that made me feel like I was sat in the back of a hot car on a long journey. For those after a narrative driven, cyberpunk fix Observer certainly fills a hole though, provided you can deal with yet another take on technologies potential impact on humanity.”
read full review ↗ - 100
“The game is visually stunning and sets a new bar for the genre of Cyberpunk games. The voice acting from Rutger Hauer is perfectly casted, and he delivers the role spectacularly. Observer is overall pretty short, but it will have you playing until you push on to uncover the truth, it truly is a captivating game. The sound design is fantastic, too, from the impressive soundtrack, written and composer by Arkadiusz Reikowski, to the noise of creaky doors, all lends itself to a truly great psychological horror game.”
read full review ↗ - 90
“An audio and visual tour de force, Observer doesn’t pull any punches. It would appear that Layers of Fear was simply foreplay for Bloober Team; a warm up for the full-on fuckfest that Observer is. Combining investigation, exploration, stealth, puzzles, and a near constant barrage of horror, Observer is a meticulously created game that rarely puts a foot wrong. If you think you have the stomach for it, this could be one of the biggest surprises of the year.”
read full review ↗
Slant Magazine
GRYOnline.pl
Eurogamer
GameSpot
Power Unlimited
PC Gamer
Game Debate
DarkZero
GameSpew…and 32 more tracked reviews.