
When the truth is buried, go underground. Step into this new take on text-based adventure from the award-winning team behind Thomas Was Alone and Volume. A short story that hands you the fate of the world above, as a detective looking for answers on the Subsurface Circular.
Modeled estimate, not a reported figure. How we estimate →
Prices
The United States storefront in every case, so this compares stores and not countries.
Discounts
Every price cut of more than 20% we have observed, in each market that quoted one, with this game's chart position on either side of it. These are episodes, not a model: a sale is one event, and one event cannot tell you what the next one will do.
Reviews, worldwide (the counter carries no country): 0.13/day in the week to Jul 21 → 0.4/day in the week after.
For scale, across Steam · Top Sellers · Brazil over the last 30 days: the 25 chart moves that followed a price cut of more than 20% went a median of 10 places towards #1, and the 2,413 moves with no price cut behind them went 2 away. One store, one chart, one country — it is the only place we have enough observations to say even that.
Prices outside the United States have been collected since 6 August 2026 and chart positions since 19 July 2026, so a cut older than that has no market to compare and a market that joined later has no history yet. Nothing here is converted between currencies.
About

MEET THE LOCALS, PICK UP THE LINGO
A detective stationed on the Subsurface Circular investigates a series of disappearances among the city’s robotic working class. Collect words and phrases, then use them in dialogue puzzles to uncover the world's secrets and determine its future.
This self-contained short story takes around two hours to complete and is split into several chapters. You can play the game in one sitting or, if you prefer, unfold the story in smaller pieces that can fit into a busier schedule.
Subsurface Circular is inspired by classic adventure games and modern dialogue systems, and developed by the award-winning team behind Thomas Was Alone and Volume.
Key FeaturesA polished, one-sitting game.
A graphical twist on the classic text-based adventure.
Uses 'Focus Points', a unique vocabulary-based inventory system.
Original soundtrack by Dan Le Sac.
Comprehensive art gallery featuring the detailed work that went into this world.
Unlockable ‘BithellBot’, our interactive take on a developer’s commentary.
If this game is ‘short’, what’s to stop me getting a refund when I’m done?
You’re browsing Steam, which means you understand the work that goes into games, and are in principle up for paying for ones that entertain you. We hope that after a bit of time with Subsurface Circular, you’ll feel good about the price you paid.
Why is the game only available in English?
As you can imagine, a text adventure game contains a terrifying amount of text, but more importantly, throughout the game we use the particular quirks of word ordering and double meaning in English to support the combination and recombination of threads. Put simply, other languages are going to be more than a straight translation: They’re going to need rewrites and changed design. Not impossible, but more than we could get done this time around.

Sums Steam only; Nintendo publishes no volume signal, so the true total is higher by an unknown amount.
| Store | Price | Audience | Score | Chart | Est. revenue |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
SteamYou are here | $5.99 | 1.9Kreviews | 94% | — | $184K |
| $2.99−50% | — | — | — | not modelled |
Matched by title — a reused name can pair the wrong games. * is a critic aggregate. Prices and positions are each store's United States storefront; Epic charts worldwide. Audience and Score too, except Steam's, which is worldwide.
Engagement
Reviews
Themes across 49 recent reviews and how positive each mention is. A keyword signal, not full sentiment analysis.
Reviews
one of the all-time greats. i would ♥♥♥♥ the ♥♥♥♥ out of that robot
I still think about this game sometimes. It's a lot like those classic movies that happen entirely in one place and yet, when thinking about it it seems like the story happened in so many other places that you neve actualy see, but never-the-less you remember them. This game is like that. It takes place entirely on a single train car but the story lets you draw a picture of the entire city you're travelling through; it's politics, society, architecture, daycares, factories, the people that live there, what their lives are like. It's all there, but you only ever see the train car. Big recommend if you like to fiction books or you adore movies like Locke and The Sunset Limited.
Media

Related
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Price dynamics, follower growth, revenue and sales trajectories with interactive tooltips
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Genres
Stats
All-time low is the lowest price we've recorded for this game since we started tracking it.
Languages: English
Hours played at review time, across 49 reviews with recorded playtime.
positive critical· bar length = how often the theme comes up
The story and writing of the game is not terrible; I did enjoy the conversations with the various robot characters. The game's story does present some interesting ideas. My issue with the game is that your choices (despite the game implying it) do not seem to matter much. You are ultimately on a one track path. There's no real ending, you simply cut to black. It feels a bit disappointing. I was expecting more of a "pick your own adventure" type of thing with meaningful consequences and endings; this game is not that.
Usually, almost all visual novels and even some text-based RPGs (yes, Disco Elysium, I am talking about you) are self-indulgent endless streams of yapping and flapping. They get boring and tiresome practice in the author's graphomania way before they reach the end. Subsurface Circular is different, and that's why it's good. It is focused, it has one straight cohesive narrative, and it doesn't indulge itself in an endless stream of words. If you ever wanted to try the visual novel genre but are too afraid of wasting your time on useless word-jerking, you should try Subsurface Circular.
Fantastic, short little visual novel. I truly enjoyed my time with it and would easily recommend it to anyone looking for a light little game with a deep, interesting story. Whole thing takes maybe 3 hours to beat, slightly more if you want to 100% the game, so keep that in mind. But the price point is very reasonable and the writing and music are top notch, so yeah, give it a go if you're interested.
This was an okay game. I did enjoy the concept of an android "priest", and the puzzle revolving around emotions was fun. However, as somebody who consumes a lot of sci-fi, this game didn't push any boundaries or ask any questions that haven't been asked before (or at least ask them in a fresh way).
I've been fascinated by short, experimental games lately. Nowadays, the art of gaming demands more and more of your time: sprawling RPGs with quests in every nook and cranny, live-service games with battle passes beckoning you to their depths. More ephemeral, lunch-break titles, in this case, Mike Bithell's Subsurface Circular, developed by Bithell Games, serve to captivate instantly while serving as a somewhat complete package in that time period. A tough challenge, though not insurmountable. In this case, Bithell finds smaller yet imaginative ways to intrigue. Our protagonist never leaves the titular subway; he cannot, by his own programming. Everything told to you is a matter of dislocated perspective; you cannot participate or act as your own witness. Thus, solving a mystery is less about the main scenario itself and rather about understanding Subsurface Circular's world setting. Much of the narrative and themes are prescient: what place do humans have in a world entirely automated? Some positions, factory workers, for example, are more justifiable, but artisan cooking is less defensible. That is, regardless, a theme explored by science fiction since the onset; I am more interested in how Bithell's script deconstructs the human condition through the cast of Tek robots. Some are deliberately programmed to have lesser intelligence; some are of remarkable foresight and intellect, but are ideologically primed to be subservient to the Management and whims of upper-class humanity. Violence against Teks is considered, legally, destruction of property; thus, many Teks cannot fathom why humans would raise a hand against them. Others' individual experience says otherwise. Teks are discriminated against, with hate groups formed around them, yet many are entirely content with their position, conditioned to know nothing else. I will not spoil the direction the narrative heads, but ultimately it aligned with philosophical and political ruminations I have already been mulling. Subsurface Circular remains shockingly nuanced, although with a hand of restraint. Subsurface Circular's narrative design, then, is compelling as well. While there isn't much in the way of conventional game design, there are emergent moments of progression that I found imaginative and unexpected: changing a companion robot's temperament to reveal answers from the one bound to him. Checking the map to accurately answer navigational questions, non-essential but friendly, an implication that you exist within the world proper. A dialog system that rewards you for being adventurous and thorough. It all comes together to feel shockingly engrossing considering you are incapable of getting up from your seat. Subsurface Circular is one of those great nuggets of experimental storytelling and game design. Perhaps not an immediate classic, but memorable, and the type that makes one want to deep-dive into a creator's gameography. Not for everyone, sure, but the open-minded, as well as fans of visual novels or adventure games, should strongly consider.
I enjoyed this short story but the ending is bad. If you make me choose my dialogue, I'm going to role play. If I'm role playing and you give me a choice, you better make sure the set of options contains at least the most obvious I might want to take. - What would you like to eat, dear, dinner or dessert? - Thanks, grandma, I'm not hungry. - THAT WAS NEVER AN OPTION, YOU LITTLE ♥♥♥♥. Overall my experience was positive, but overwhelmingly positive? Nah.
les robots sont trop sexy par contre
cool bite-sized narrative experience with an ending choice that actually made me sit down and think real hard for a minute
Selling now
See how fast this game is selling right now — estimated copies and revenue per day from recent review growth.
Players by region
Where this game's players are, estimated from review languages.
Related
| Game | Estimated lifetime revenue | Reviews | Review score | Price |
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| $43.6K | 432 | 88% | $5.99 | |
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| — | 0 | — | — | |
| $0 | 0 | — | Free |
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| Game | Estimated lifetime revenue | Reviews | Review score | Price |
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| $184K | 4.4K | 97% | $2.99 | |
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| $184.1K | 1.9K | 82% | $4.99 | |
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| $184.1K | 776 | 85% | $8.99 | |
| $183.8K | 697 | 69% | $9.99 |