Order of the Sinking Star Locks In October 8, Jonathan Blow's First Game in a Decade

Ten years is a long time to wait for anything, but puzzle fans have been waiting on this one with unusual patience. Order of the Sinking Star, the new puzzle adventure from Jonathan Blow, the designer behind Braid and The Witness, now has a firm release date: October 8, 2026, on PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch 2 and PC via Steam, with Steam Deck support confirmed.

The date arrived this week through publisher Arc Games, alongside a new trailer that shows what happens when the game's separate worlds start colliding. The project was first revealed at The Game Awards last December with a vague 2026 window, and developer Thekla has been quietly building it since The Witness shipped back in 2016.

Video: Order of the Sinking Star official channel on YouTube

More than a thousand puzzles across four colliding worlds

The scale here is honestly a little absurd. The official Steam page promises over one thousand hand-crafted puzzles spread across four distinct worlds whose mechanics gradually interweave, and Thekla estimates hundreds of hours of gameplay for anyone who wants to see everything. You play as a rotating cast that includes a queen, a thief, a warrior, a wizard and, delightfully, a talking boat, exploring a magical realm at your own pace. The structure is openly nonlinear, so if a puzzle stumps you, you wander off and chew on something else.

Blow did not build this mountain alone. The announcement credits a roster of respected puzzle designers who contributed over the years, including Alan Hazelden, Sean Barrett and Jonah Ostroff, and Blow himself said the game simply would not exist without them. If you loved how The Witness taught you its rules without a single word of tutorial, that pedigree is the strongest signal yet that this one is aiming for the same standard.

Play a slice of it today

You do not have to take anyone's word for it, and that is the part we like most about this announcement. A free demo is live on Steam right now, held over after its Next Fest appearance earlier this summer, and any progress you make carries straight into the full game on October 8. No price has been announced yet for the full release, so we would keep an eye on the store pages before pre-ordering anything.

Early October is already crowded, and a puzzle game that may swallow two hundred hours is a big commitment. But games like this come along about once a decade, and the demo costs you nothing but an evening. That feels like the right place to start.