Routine finally has a release date. After 13 years of delays, restarts, financial struggles, and periods of complete radio silence, the first-person sci-fi horror game from tiny UK studio Lunar Software launches December 4, 2025, on Xbox and PC. It will arrive day one on Game Pass, giving the tiny three-person team their biggest audience yet for a project that nearly died multiple times during more than a decade of development hell.
The 13-Year Journey
Lunar Software announced Routine at Gamescom 2012 with a haunting trailer showing an abandoned lunar base, flickering lights, and menacing robots stalking empty corridors. The aesthetic pulled directly from 80s sci-fi classics like Alien, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Space: 1999, creating a retrofuturistic vision of the future that looked simultaneously dated and timeless. The team promised a spring 2013 release, and the gaming community took notice.
Then 2013 came and went. Updates became less frequent. Years passed with minimal communication. The game fell off the radar entirely between 2017 and 2022 as fans wondered if Routine had been quietly cancelled. What actually happened behind the scenes was far more complicated than simple abandonment.
Lunar Software, consisting of just three core developers working from a flat in Preston, Lancashire, funded Routine entirely through personal savings in its early years. They used their living room as an office and hired freelance artists when they could afford it. Financial constraints forced the team to take contract work just to keep the studio afloat, relegating Routine to part-time development during whatever hours they could spare.
But the bigger problem was creative dissatisfaction. After five years of development, Lunar Software realized they weren’t happy with what they’d built. The game worked mechanically but didn’t deliver the experience they envisioned. Rather than shipping something that would haunt them forever, they made the difficult decision to pause development entirely and reassess the project from scratch.
The Raw Fury Lifeline
Routine resurfaced at Summer Game Fest 2022 with publisher Raw Fury backing the project. The indie publisher known for championing unconventional art-driven titles provided the financial security and development support Lunar Software desperately needed. The team announced they had completely remade the game for current-generation hardware, transitioning through multiple versions of Unreal Engine before settling on Unreal Engine 5.
Raw Fury’s involvement provided more than just money. The publisher offered art direction support, narrative assistance, and the breathing room for Lunar Software to finish the project properly without constant financial panic. For a three-person team juggling contract work with their passion project, that stability made all the difference between Routine shipping eventually versus dying permanently.
The team also brought on Mick Gordon, the legendary composer behind Doom (2016), Doom Eternal, and Wolfenstein: The New Order, to create Routine’s soundtrack. Gordon departed the project in 2024, but Lunar Software confirmed they’re still using audio assets he provided, ensuring his distinctive sound design influences the final game.
What Actually Is Routine
You arrive at a lunar research and tourism complex to repair faults in the automated security network. The station that should be bustling with activity is completely silent. Empty corridors stretch in every direction. Personal belongings sit abandoned at workstations. Something went catastrophically wrong, and everyone disappeared before you arrived.
As you explore deeper into the facility, you discover you’re not alone. An unknown artificial intelligence now controls the station, and it views you as a threat. Hostile robots patrol the corridors, forcing you to sneak, hide, and run for survival while piecing together what happened through environmental storytelling and terminal access.
Routine emphasizes exploration and investigation over combat. Your primary tool is the Cosmonaut Assistance Tool (C.A.T.), a multipurpose device that interacts with the environment, accesses terminals, navigates systems, and serves as a last-resort weapon against mechanical threats. The game discourages fighting through encounters, instead rewarding careful observation, strategic hiding, and smart use of the base’s layout to avoid confrontation.
The horror philosophy centers on dread and atmosphere rather than jump scares. Minimal UI, full body awareness when looking down, and diegetic audio (all sound sources exist within the game world) create immersion that makes players feel genuinely present on the abandoned lunar base. Every mechanical hum, electrical buzz, and structural creak carries significance in the unsettling silence.
The 80s Retrofuturistic Vision
Routine’s distinctive aesthetic imagines how people in the 1980s believed the future would look. The lunar base features chunky analog technology, physical switches and dials, CRT monitors displaying green text, and lo-fi tactile sounds that evoke outdated equipment. It’s the kind of lived-in sci-fi that Alien perfected where advanced technology still feels mechanical and breakable.
The base itself tells stories through environmental design. This was a thriving tourist attraction and research facility where hundreds of people lived and worked for decades. Now it’s abandoned and uncomfortably still. Mess halls sit empty with food half-eaten. Living quarters show signs of rushed evacuation. Boardrooms and engine rooms mix sterile corporate spaces with grimy industrial areas where maintenance crews kept systems running.
Founder Aaron Foster described the setting as taking really high-tech sci-fi design and cramming a hundred people in a small condensed area to live there for 20 or 30 years. The result is dirt stains everywhere, people lived in corners of the floor, garbage left around. It’s the shining idealism of Star Trek aged by decades of use and thrown into disrepair by catastrophe.
Inspired by Horror Classics
IGN’s November IGN First preview highlighted how Routine channels classic survival horror structure. Players solve environmental puzzles while horrifying machines stalk through corridors. The design philosophy pulls from games like Amnesia: The Dark Descent that popularized the helpless protagonist approach where running and hiding replace combat as primary survival mechanics.
The moon base setting occupies fertile middle ground between the familiar and unknowable. We’ve seen lunar landings in archive footage. We understand NASA’s utilitarian architecture. Films like Alien, 2001, and Space: 1999 established the claustrophobic corridors and cluttered mess halls of space facilities. Routine builds on that cultural familiarity while introducing terrifying unknowns that transform curiosity into desperate survival.
The AI-driven enemy reacting to player movements creates unpredictable encounters rather than scripted sequences. Each playthrough potentially unfolds differently as the intelligence adapts to how you navigate the facility. This emergent approach to horror means players can’t memorize set pieces or predict when threats appear, maintaining tension throughout multiple sessions.
Technical Ambitions
Lunar Software’s decision to rebuild Routine multiple times using progressively newer technology demonstrates their commitment to delivering a modern experience despite the decade-long development. The game started in Unreal Engine 3, moved to Unreal Engine 4, and ultimately landed on Unreal Engine 5 for the final version.
That technical evolution means Routine should compete visually with contemporary horror games despite originating from 2012. The latest gameplay footage shows detailed environments, sophisticated lighting that creates oppressive darkness broken by flickering fluorescents, and smooth performance. The retrofuturistic aesthetic works in Lunar Software’s favor because chunky analog equipment ages better visually than attempts at cutting-edge futurism.
Early plans for PlayStation 4 and Oculus Rift versions were abandoned as development priorities shifted. The December 4 release focuses exclusively on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC via Steam and Microsoft Store. Game Pass day-one availability gives Routine immediate access to millions of subscribers who might not have followed the game’s troubled development history.
Can It Live Up to Expectations
Routine faces unique challenges as a game first revealed in 2012 launching in 2025. The horror landscape evolved dramatically during those 13 years. Amnesia pioneered helpless protagonist horror in 2010, but by 2025, that approach feels familiar rather than revolutionary. Alien: Isolation perfected survival horror in space stations back in 2014. Routine needs to differentiate itself beyond aesthetics to justify the wait.
The lunar base setting provides natural distinction from the space station and spaceship environments of most sci-fi horror. The moon’s proximity to Earth creates different thematic weight compared to deep space isolation. The retrofuturistic 80s vision offers visual identity that separates Routine from slick modern sci-fi or grimy industrial horror.
Whether the environmental storytelling, puzzle design, and AI-driven scares deliver fresh experiences will determine if Routine becomes a cult classic or a cautionary tale about extended development cycles. The tiny team’s passion and perfectionism brought the game this far. Now they need to prove those 13 years of struggle produced something worth the extraordinary wait.
The Indie Development Reality
Routine’s development story illuminates harsh realities facing small independent studios attempting ambitious projects. Three people working from a flat with personal savings can prototype interesting ideas, but shipping complete games requires resources most indie teams lack. The choice between compromising your vision and delaying indefinitely has no easy answer.
Lunar Software chose delay over compromise, accepting years of uncertainty and financial hardship rather than releasing work they’d regret. That decision cost them nearly everything but preserved their artistic integrity. The Raw Fury partnership arriving when it did likely saved Routine from permanent cancellation.
For every Routine that eventually ships, dozens of ambitious indie projects die quietly when funding runs out or developers burn out from years of struggle. The game serves as both inspiration that passion projects can survive development hell and warning that indie development demands extraordinary sacrifice most creators can’t sustain indefinitely.
FAQs
When does Routine release?
Routine launches December 4, 2025, on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC via Steam and Microsoft Store. It will be available day one on Xbox Game Pass.
What is Routine about?
Routine is a first-person sci-fi horror game set on an abandoned lunar base featuring an 80s retrofuturistic aesthetic. You investigate why the station went silent while evading hostile AI-controlled robots.
Why did Routine take 13 years to develop?
The three-person team at Lunar Software faced financial constraints, creative dissatisfaction with early versions, and had to work contract jobs while developing Routine part-time. They restarted development multiple times before publisher Raw Fury provided support in 2022.
Who is developing Routine?
Lunar Software, a tiny UK studio of three core developers based in Preston, Lancashire, is developing Routine with publishing support from Raw Fury.
Can you fight enemies in Routine?
Routine emphasizes stealth, evasion, and hiding over combat. Your Cosmonaut Assistance Tool can be used as a last-resort weapon, but the game discourages fighting and rewards careful avoidance of threats.
What platforms is Routine coming to?
Routine launches on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC via Steam and Microsoft Store. Early plans for PlayStation 4 and Oculus Rift versions were abandoned.
Who composed the music for Routine?
Mick Gordon, known for Doom (2016), Doom Eternal, and Wolfenstein: The New Order, created music for Routine. He departed the project in 2024, but his audio assets remain in the final game.
Is Routine like Alien: Isolation?
Both are sci-fi horror games emphasizing survival over combat, but Routine features an abandoned lunar base with 80s retrofuturistic aesthetics rather than the Alien universe’s industrial space environments.
Will Routine have VR support?
No, early plans for Oculus Rift support were abandoned during development. The December 4 release focuses exclusively on traditional PC and Xbox platforms.
Conclusion
Routine’s December 4 launch represents one of indie gaming’s most remarkable survival stories. For 13 years, three developers refused to let their passion project die despite financial ruin, creative setbacks, and periods where the game seemed permanently lost. The Raw Fury partnership and eventual Game Pass inclusion give Routine the audience and visibility Lunar Software could never have achieved independently.
Whether the final product justifies the extraordinary development time will be judged by players in December. But regardless of critical reception, Routine already succeeded simply by shipping. In an industry where most ambitious indie projects collapse under their own weight long before completion, Lunar Software proved that stubborn dedication and refusal to compromise can occasionally overcome seemingly impossible odds. The abandoned lunar base you’ll explore represents more than just a horror setting. It’s a monument to what small teams can achieve when they refuse to give up, even when giving up would have been completely understandable. That alone makes Routine worth experiencing.