Submachine – every game in order

Start in the basement

Submachine began in 2005 as a simple escape game: you wake up in a dim basement and have to find a way out. Submachine 1: The Basement played like many escape games of the time, but its quiet mood, its looping rooms and the feeling that something much larger lay behind the walls made people wait for the next one. Over the following ten years Mateusz Skutnik turned it into one of the deepest stories ever told in a Flash game.

The order

1. The Basement (2005)
2. The Lighthouse (2006)
3. The Loop (2006)
4. The Lab (2007)
5. The Root (2008)
6. The Edge (2009)
7. The Core (2010)
8. The Plan (2011)
9. The Temple (2013)
10. The Exit (2015)

Where to start

Start with episode 1 even if you have played later ones: it is short, and it introduces the series' habit of hiding notes and symbols that pay off much later. The early games are compact escape rooms; from around The Lab the episodes open up into larger worlds you explore with a map, so keep a notebook for codes. FlashAttic marks every episode you have played on this device, so the "up next" button beside the player always takes you to the next one.