Steam Curator: Strange and Beautiful

Recommended July 7, 2021

“Graphite drawing presents a paper-thin facade of normality, easily smudged and blurred under the slightest touch. The folksy hand-drawn textures feel personal and crude, intimate and desperate.”

$16.99

Recommended July 2, 2021

“This PapersPlease-alike's pixel art pallets are just the right amount of weird, on a knife's edge of satisfying + sickening. Tubes and panels made of thick, solid colors build a slick sense of stress.”

Recommended July 2, 2021

“Sharp neon color palettes strike one as humorous and light, but NUTS weaves a startling atmosphere. Isolated, hazy forests seem at once funny and ominous; laugh at the juxtaposed beauty and paranoia.”

-45%

$11.99

$6.59

Recommended May 7, 2021

“A strange and beautiful vision animated by stop-motion papercraft. The warm, papery environments play with texture and dramatic light to create something eerie, playful and organic.”

$13.99

Recommended April 18, 2021

“Playful, atmospheric environments provide the awestriking beauty of walking through nature, combined with the supreme unsettling chill of noticing a face staring directly at you from a distance.”

$2.99

Recommended April 18, 2021

“At first glance what seems like classic retro pixel art gives way to this strangely detailed unique oddity. Modern digital effects and an unexpectedly creepy, inhuman style make this a sci-fi gem.”

Recommended April 18, 2021

“The splintery subterranean scenes of Creaks provide such a rich, scratchy tapestry of texture that your eyes can't help but search out every last worn and weathered detail.”

Recommended April 18, 2021

“This game is a slow kiss in the dark. Improvisational 2D style that slides, unhurriedly, from 40's neon to abstract impressions, to complete nonrepresentational imagery. Jazzy, seductive, smooth.”

Recommended January 31, 2021

“A striking cultish management sim. Let darkness blossom in your heart as the game turns your world sickly yellow and bleak grey. Does the slash of blood red mean victory or sin? It's up to you.”

Recommended January 31, 2021

“Quirky and somewhat janky, exists as a simulator and a creative fidget spinner, letting us create for ourselves some beautiful astral oddities. Simple but fun. A toy and a tool. Art in a vacuum.”

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Vibrant

VR Supported

$59.99

Recommended June 3, 2020

“Bizarre alien worlds that come in seemingly infinite color palettes, with flora and fauna in odd and hilarious shapes, weird scenery, vivid landscapes. The ultimate engine for alien exploration.”

$3.99

Recommended August 6, 2018

“Morphopolis is art in motion: guide bees, intimidate beetles, help the flowers and caterpillars grow, all to the relaxing tunes and stunning environmental art, drawn in vibrant colors and patterns.”

Recommended August 13, 2018

“Liminal vignettes told in stylish, minimal, colorful visuals. Interactive exhibits unfold at your gentle, curious clicks. Experience, rather than play, these odd, carefully constructed happenings.”

Recommended September 16, 2018

“This is a vibrant universe of LOVE which you must defend, in all its neon rainbow glory, from the HATERS. The bright & silly graphics are a sweet treat to the eyes like candy is a treat to the tongue.”

Free To Play

Recommended March 14, 2020

“Short wiggly experiment in movement and progression made with what looks like sculpey clay. Fingerprints & creases give a very satisfying, tactile feeling. Touchy and psychedelic, a nice little trip.”

Free

Recommended August 13, 2018

“A small journey- creative, playful and somewhat humorous- through a collection of items of significance. Its art direction is impeccable, the environments well crafted, subject matter thoughtful.”

Recommended April 18, 2020

“The art is as sharp as your character's blade. Neon and electric hues are melded perfectly with lush green foliage. Visual themes combine the natural and animal with a cool cyberpunk finish.”

Recommended July 2, 2021

Recommended February 9, 2019

“The journey through grief is isolated, but GRIS also makes it beautiful. Serene and haunting animation and illustrations guide you through thoughtful environments as you learn to live in color again.”

Recommended July 31, 2018

“Pulsating neon color wafts like waves of heat out of the screen and into your retinas. The perpetual movement of player and environment swirls into a trippy and challenging experience.”

Free to Play

Recommended July 31, 2018

“A quirky, casual point n' click with bold, messy scribbles and vibrant globs of color. The busy scenes are chock full of colorful details and humor, giving it an wacky, childlike visual style.”

Free to Play

Recommended June 3, 2020

“Audacious neon colors glow against uncompromising black in this short free puzzle game. The electric, tribal portraits all at once invoke memories of bygone computer graphics and sacred haloed saints.”

Recommended July 6, 2018

“Post-human pixelated underwater world that has lasso'd together near-cartoonish color and somber grossness. Does a great job of showing just how strange real life sea creatures are.”

Recommended March 6, 2016

“"Cinematic" describes this charming and emotive walking sim both in its quick cutting visual style as well as its distinctive and intentional vision, marking it as the work of an autuer.”

Recommended March 6, 2016

“A candy-colored psychadelic alien innerspace treats you to wonderful rainbows, patterns, and lights, which are balanced out by the incredibly simple single button controls.”

Recommended March 9, 2016

“Cartoonlike illustrations of very organic, almost psychadelic aliens, planets, and space ships lends Out There a truly fantastical, brilliantly saturated and well-lit vision of outer space.”

Recommended July 30, 2018

“This dark fantasy game bleeds with rich, deep color and burns with metalhead attitude. It goes hard in theme and difficulty, so it can be a challenge to see its stunning gothic visuals in entirety.”

Recommended December 25, 2020

“Marvelously crafted areas of sand and ribbon, from hot desert to frigid mountain. Let your emotions flow as you traverse thru shimmering gold, deep ominous blue, curious pink, icy desperate white.”

Recommended April 11, 2020

“A treasure. The crisp UI works in cool teal topography and a splash of energetic yellow stokes the imagination. With rich soundscape and story, the cold AI template becomes intimate and revealing.”

$3.99

Recommended March 6, 2016

“Hand-drawn art as energetic as the shoot-em-up gameplay. The use of shape and color to express humor, draw up visual puns, and convey beautiful imaginative locations is unparalleled.”

Recommended March 8, 2020

“Ultra-certain of its own style, neon has never been so tastefully utilized as in Sayonara Wild Hearts. The visuals are sleek, colorful, electrically animated, with music to match.”

Recommended July 29, 2018

“Style flows with theme flawlessly; you are the wolf god of creation (in this lifetime), the world is a wash of ink, and your brush is your greatest weapon in this grand mythological adventure.”

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Horror

The dark, gothic, horrific, terrifying, or simply quite grim. Horror is a varied genre, driven by many different themes: fear, bleakness, isolation, disturbia, literal and figurative darkness...

Recommended August 8, 2018

“Play a construction paper squid conducting a train in a bleak steampunk world. Floating through space as if it was water gives you a unique freedom to explore the beautiful Gotham-esque scenery.”

Recommended August 8, 2018

“Combines slick machinery & organics into twisted, Giger-like imagery in a retro-pixel wrapper. Levels are masses of pixel blocks spread like cancerous growth leading to beautiful, alien bosses.”

Recommended July 30, 2018

$11.99

Recommended August 2, 2018

“The point n' click game of my dark, twisted dreams. Each new area is a joy and terror to experience. A labor love; a gallery of inspired, surreal, dark horror that truly takes ones breath away.”

Recommended March 14, 2020

“Horror noir that maintains a delectable sense of dread through stark, bleak high contrast. The tone is exquisite, each scene more cinematic than it has any right to be as darkness endlessly surrounds.”

Recommended August 3, 2018

“A standard horror game in many ways, Bendy sets itself apart by its bold, high contrast visuals. Both about and in the style of vintage cartoons, it is a creepy, unique hybrid of 2D and 3D space.”

Recommended May 14, 2020

“Darkwood makes the overwhelming blackness of most horror games feel spine-tinglingly fresh. The spindly, twiggy texture of every shadow unsettles, the detail upsettingly rich and beautifully cursed.”

$5.99

Recommended July 9, 2018

“A snowy nightmare pieced together in a modern construction paper style. Soft textures muffle the haunting imagery as you trudge through one pretty, fuzzy, eerie winter night. A+ Sound design.”

$10.99

Recommended August 18, 2018

“Be a strange doctor in a strange world and heal strange patients of strange diseases. Charming 2D visual style pushes the absurdity to an almost cute place, as your patients get more & more horrific.”

$6.99

Recommended August 8, 2018

“Clunky but inspired, Apocalipsis is a uniquely dark, plague-ridden limb of the point n click/hidden object genre. The macabre, disturbing, & monstrous impress in the style of old European engravings.”

$24.99

Recommended January 6, 2021

“Blasphemous is all about execution. Each scene and character is deliberately, quietly, unflinchingly sculpted. Bizarre and graphic, it disturbs, but it never denies itself both beauty and sobriety.”

Free

Recommended February 23, 2020

“A little free game that looks like it was constructed from the sketchy, depressed scribblings of a madman, and yet still scrapes together a surprising amount of visual and narrative cohesion.”

$24.99

Recommended July 6, 2018

“Still images can't capture the beauty of Rain World. Rolling clouds and darkening weather, glitchy popping static blackouts, a living environment both lush and rusted. Rain, rain, rain, rain, rain...”

VR Supported

Recommended August 12, 2018

“Beautiful to witness in motion. Curling, writhing, fractal, liquid metal, with shiny chrome reflecting the chaotic colors as you race, speed-of-light-fast, directly into the mouth of madness.”

Recommended July 31, 2018

“Memorable for its beautiful hand-drawn graphics: boasting emotive insect denizens in a gloomy kingdom, with unique level themes both lush and melancholy. A masterclass in cohesive atmosphere.”

Recommended March 21, 2020

“The clean, sharply-drawn manga style pleases while the terrible and eerie imagery repulses. A plain & stark beauty with horror festering beneath. Your love is thick, and it swallows me whole...”

$13.99

Recommended April 18, 2021

Recommended December 25, 2020

“A simple concept rendered in satisfying, bleak B&W pixel art, injecting grim humor and a dark occult aesthetic in a minimalist style. Gouges out a spot for itself in the casual RTS genre. Metal af.”

Recommended March 12, 2016

“An eerie version of hell made of a plain dark room, where perpetual movement and endless demonic spawn construct a stunning, beautiful dance of death. Play late at night on a big screen.”

Recommended July 7, 2021

“Graphite drawing presents a paper-thin facade of normality, easily smudged and blurred under the slightest touch. The folksy hand-drawn textures feel personal and crude, intimate and desperate.”

Recommended March 9, 2016

“A patient lucid dream of a puzzle game, made of soft bright light and fuzzy, obscuring shadow, retraining your eyes and brain to differentiate what is solid and what is the abyss.”

Recommended December 28, 2020

“A funky audio-visual exploration of light and texture, from the odd gritty sound to the pulsing waves of pixels and blinking strobe lights. The physical space is clearly created by an artistic mind.”

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Minimal

The belief that "small is beautiful." A reveling in sparseness, devoid of detail, embrace of the beauty of simplicity. Visually, less occupied space. Concept/function reduced to the smallest form.

Recommended July 6, 2018

“Experience bold symbolic imagery in the trippy balancing act/roller coaster called OVIVO. Mandala-like visuals and rolling, dizzying gameplay lead the player on a high-contrast spiritual journey.”

Recommended March 7, 2020

“A meditative sandbox to experiment with time, growth, nature. Tend twisted, flowery trees whose branches are both beautiful and alien. Plant blooms and buds and shape your creation to your whim.”

Recommended July 6, 2018

“Playfully abstract and joyfully kinetic; themes of mindfulness, growth, and presence accentuated by spreading colors and satisfying textures. Find peace through the path of bondage.”

Recommended August 13, 2018

$2.99

Recommended March 7, 2020

“A good intro to the Sokpop style. Klym's minimal warm browns and oranges imply a sweltering summer day perfect for napping, and its use of atmospheric perspective adds a dizzying sense of height.”

$2.99

Recommended March 21, 2020

“Another Sokpop gem. Simply rendered, meditative experience. Clean. Sit. Relax. Hat. Repeat. The atmosphere is lonely and silly. Take the trash within you. You where human once. You help the world.”

Recommended August 13, 2018

“Giggly gooey physics add to the atmosphere as you solve mitochondrial puzzles. Watch bacterial cultures as if through a microscope, with simple graphics and smooth UI converging for a chill time.”

$3.99

Recommended February 23, 2020

“Experimental interactive animation, with simple yet evocative B&W figures, reminiscent of Keith Haring and yet more unsettling. Full of meaning or a hollow sensation simulator? Up to you.”

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Monochrome

Less color can be more striking. Black and white compositions can confuse the eye or focus it. They can simplify, soften, sharpen, or complicate. To what effect do these games use their binary colors?

Recommended December 28, 2020

Recommended July 6, 2018

Recommended December 25, 2020

Recommended July 7, 2021

“Graphite drawing presents a paper-thin facade of normality, easily smudged and blurred under the slightest touch. The folksy hand-drawn textures feel personal and crude, intimate and desperate.”

Recommended March 9, 2016

“A patient lucid dream of a puzzle game, made of soft bright light and fuzzy, obscuring shadow, retraining your eyes and brain to differentiate what is solid and what is the abyss.”

Recommended March 14, 2020

Free

Recommended February 23, 2020

“A little free game that looks like it was constructed from the sketchy, depressed scribblings of a madman, and yet still scrapes together a surprising amount of visual and narrative cohesion.”

Recommended April 24, 2020

“Unrefined and careful, the childlike imagery reflects the player-character's struggling state of mind. Moving forward in this game has a mind-bending zoom effect. Progress is a visual & auditory trip.”

Recommended August 22, 2018

“Hand-drawn doodles with a preposterous amount of detail and hilarious sound effects give a sense of cheerful, dedicated amateurism, and make it hard not to smile the whole time you're playing.”

Recommended August 6, 2018

“A comedic lawyer visual novel populated by a quirky animal cast. Already a memorable concept, it leaves a lasting impression with its charming use of vintage art and music.”