DERELIKT Guide: Survival, Exploration, and Station Walkthrough

Overview

DERELIKT is a narrative retro FPS from solo developer Visuwyg, published by Hyperstrange (Blood of Mehran, Postal spin-offs), launching November 13, 2026 on Steam for Windows. You are a private contractor sent aboard Von Neumann Outpost, a research facility grafted onto an anomalous asteroid in Saturn's orbit. The assignment reads routine. The station disagrees. Something older than humanity's nostalgia for classic sci-fi horror is awake down there, and your contract did not include eldritch abominations in the break room.

The game wears its influences on its sleeve, and the developer names them: Alien Resurrection's clunky-in-a-good-way tank controls, System Shock's station narrative delivered through environmental storytelling and strange NPCs, and Doom 3's flashlight-in-the-dark tension. GamingOnLinux picked up on it in 2025, Splattercat's demo playthrough pulled 225K views, and Noclip produced a full documentary about how this game survived its own publisher's collapse. DERELIKT was originally an Embracer-owned project; when Embracer's restructuring killed it, Visuwyg refused to let it die, finished it solo, and Hyperstrange picked it up. That backstory matters for one practical reason: the game is a single focused vision, not a committee product.

A free demo covering three non-sequential chapters of the story is live now, and 5,000+ playtesters already put the full build through its paces in October 2026.

How to Play: Contractor Onboarding

The demo drops you into Von Neumann's calm before the storm, and how you spend that calm decides how the storm goes.

1. Talk to every crew member before the incident. The station's NPCs exist to be met before things get ugly. Their dialogue doubles as tutorial text and as the emotional ledger the story cashes in later.
2. Read every note and terminal. Access codes, lore, and puzzle hints live in documents. The game does not repeat them. If a door asks for a code you do not know, the answer is on a screen you walked past.
3. Loot rooms corner to corner. Ammunition and medpacks are scarce by design. The demo's economy trains you for the full game's: every fight should end with more resources than it started with, or you fought it wrong.
4. Map the station in your head, deck by deck. DERELIKT is built for backtracking. The vent you crawl through in chapter two is a shortcut you will sprint down in chapter four.
5. Give Dr. Goffart his carbs. The community's favorite side quest. It is exactly what it sounds like, and the playtest feedback forms would not shut up about it.

The first thirty minutes

Your opening routine visit covers the station's quiet decks: meet the crew, learn the interact prompt, grab the R4-21 Assault Rifle once the briefing ends. The R4-21 is your workhorse. Aim for center mass, burst fire, and never let the magazine run dry mid-fight. Reload after every engagement, not during the next one.

Core Mechanics Explained

Inventory discipline

Grid inventory, limited slots, everything weighs the same: a medpack takes the space a Satchel Charge needs. The rule that carries runs: carry two weapon types maximum, fill the rest with healing and utility. Ammo types are per-weapon, so a third gun is dead weight the moment its ammo pool runs dry.

Priority order for a full inventory: medpacks, current weapon ammo, puzzle items, lore documents, everything else. Documents can be read on pickup, so there is no reason to hoard them once read.

Backtracking as a design pillar

The developers framed it directly in a transmission titled "You Need to Go Back. Now!": damaged heavy doors, force fields, radiation zones, and tool-gated passages all block your first pass. New equipment reopens old space. The pattern to internalize:

• New tool acquired → revisit every locked thing you remember. Hidden supply rooms, alternate routes, and lore fragments wait behind them.
• Ammunition is the currency of curiosity. A detour that costs five bullets and returns ten is profit.
• The Satchel Charge is both weapon and key. It deletes abominations and security drones, but the smartest spend is blasting open a damaged door. Behind those doors: ammunition, medpacks, scattered notes, and fragments of a Glyph, the object of the game's running mystery.

Vent-crawling

Classic vent shortcuts return. Vents connect decks, skip fights, and hide supplies. Two habits: check vents for loot before crawling through, and listen. Something uses them too.

Glyphs and the deeper mystery

The demo scatters Glyph fragments without explaining them, and the next developer transmission promises answers. Collect every one you find regardless. Narrative FPS games in the System Shock lineage reward completionist document-reading with the only endings that make sense.

Combat: What Works Against What

The demo's Exo Labs chapter exists specifically to let you field-test weapons against specimens, and the playtest community's findings hold up:

• The R4-21 Assault Rifle handles standard abominations at mid-range. Burst fire conserves ammo; full auto wastes it.
• Heavy enemies respond to Satchel Charges. Landing one ends the fight before it starts, but charges are rare. Save them for what bullets cannot handle.
• Security drones go down fast to precise fire but punish spray. Short bursts, use cover, aim for the sensor cluster.
• Melee-range horrors in vents and corridors: backpedal while firing. Never let them share your tile. The PS1-era controls mean turning speed is slow; pre-aim corners instead of reacting.
• Every fight is optional if you are fast. Several demo encounters can be sprinted past. Your ammo pool decides which fights are worth taking. Running is a resource decision, not a cowardice.

The tank-control mindset

DERELIKT deliberately inherits Alien Resurrection's deliberate turning. Fighting the control scheme loses fights. Adopt these three habits instead of fighting it:

1. Aim with strafe, not with turn. Side-step onto the target line.
2. Check corners by pre-aiming the angle before you round it.
3. In open rooms, keep moving backward in circles. Turn speed matters less when the enemy does the chasing.

Chapter Flow: What the Demo Covers

The demo stitches three non-sequential chapters. Knowing the shape helps you route:

• Von Neumann Outpost arrival — the quiet decks, crew introductions, first loot, the incident. Fully linear; loot everything because the next two chapters assume you did.
• Exo Labs — the weapons playground. Specimen vats, environmental puzzles, vent networks. Your weapon mastery here transfers directly to the full game's mid-section.
• The deeper section — a slice of a later level the devs refuse to name, ending on something "much more incomprehensible." Treat it as a boss-rush preview with the tightest ammo economy of the three.

Demo progress does not carry to the full game, but your skills do. The full release starts over from the station's airlock with the story in sequence, so demo knowledge of codes and layouts pays off as familiarity rather than as progress.

Progression: What Actually Improves

No skill trees. No XP. Character growth in DERELIKT is external: weapons found, tools acquired, keys collected, knowledge learned. The progression checklist for any given deck:

1. All documents read.
2. All codes collected and tried on all locked doors.
3. All vents checked for loot.
4. All Glyph fragments grabbed.
5. Inventory optimized before moving on: full medpacks, two weapons max, puzzle items staged.

The station is a puzzle box and you are the key that walks. Walking past an unopened door is the only real loss condition in a game where death just reloads a save.

Advanced Tips

• Play the demo before release even if you plan to buy. The three chapters teach the entire control grammar in ninety minutes.
• Track which doors resisted the Satchel Charge. Not every obstacle breaks; the ones that do are placed by hand as reward routing.
• Listen to the station. Audio cues pre-announce ambushes in vents and around corners. Play with headphones; the mix is mixed for them.
• NPCs remember your dialogue choices. The station's survivors react differently based on how you handled their colleagues. Roleplay consistently for the cleanest narrative arc.
• Toaster Spec is real. A decade-old laptop runs this game. PS1-style low-poly rendering means the horror runs anywhere, and load times are near-zero.
• Wishlist before November 13. The launch window will have a Hyperstrange publisher sale around it; the developer's Discord signals discounts first.
• Avoid spoilers entirely. The story is the product. The Russian press coverage already leaked the broad arc; go in clean.
• Full controller support exists, but mouse aiming is kinder to the tank-turn design. Controllers shine for the vent-crawling sections.

FAQ

When does DERELIKT release? November 13, 2026 on Steam for Windows. The store page counts down to unlock, roughly three weeks from this guide's publication.

Is there a demo? Yes. A free demo with three non-sequential story chapters is live on the Steam page now. It covers the station arrival, Exo Labs, and a mystery third slice.

Do I need to play the demo first? No. The full game starts the story from the beginning. The demo is a preview, not a prologue.

Is it related to the game Derelict or other similarly named games? No relation. DERELIKT by Visuwyg is a distinct project. Capital spelling and the Saturn setting distinguish it.

What happened with Embracer? The project was caught in Embracer's 2023-2024 restructuring and shelved. Visuwyg continued development solo, and Noclip documented the whole story. Hyperstrange later signed the game. The version launching in November is the finished vision.

Is it scary or just action? Both, sequenced. The station's quiet decks build dread, Exo Labs delivers combat, and the deeper sections blend both. Players of System Shock and Alien Resurrection will recognize the rhythm.

How long is the game? Not officially stated. Demo pacing and the deck structure suggest a 6-10 hour narrative FPS, standard for the genre. Treat official runtime claims as unconfirmed until launch.

Does it run on Steam Deck? No native Linux build is listed and no Deck verification exists, but "Toaster Spec" minimum requirements plus PS1-style rendering make Proton compatibility very likely. Unverified until the community tests it.

Is there replay value? The Glyph mystery, dialogue-dependent NPC reactions, and collectible routing give a second run real differences from the first. Speedrun routes through the vent network are already forming around the demo.

What is the price? Unannounced. Expect an indie-standard figure with a launch-window discount inside the Hyperstrange publisher sale.

Final Tips

DERELIKT rewards the contractor who treats the station as a home to learn rather than a level to clear. Read everything, backtrack relentlessly, spend Satchel Charges on doors instead of monsters when the math favors it, and never let the R4-21's magazine drop below half in unexplored space. The station has been waiting for someone to listen to it. Arrive curious, leave alive, and give Dr. Goffart his carbs on the way out.