Crisis: The Third Way
Loading critic reviews...
Deals
Finding deals...
Live Streams
Finding live streams...
About Crisis: The Third Way
Crisis: The Third Way is a turn-based visual novel from Duality that drops you into a fractured world rebuilding after World War III. Released in December 2025, it’s a PC-only title blending political drama with sci-fi. You play as a government advisor tasked with steering society through economic collapse and war-torn chaos. The game leans heavily on dialogue trees, policy decisions, and branching narratives shaped by your choices. Expect dense exposition on geopolitics, resource scarcity, and ideological clashes. It’s not a game for casual players, this is a slow-burn simulation of bureaucratic strategy wrapped in a post-apocalyptic setting.
Gameplay
Your time is spent navigating menus of dialogue options, economic policies, and crisis management. Each decision ripples through the story: raise taxes to fund infrastructure, risk alienating citizens, or cut spending and watch public unrest rise. Mini-games pop up during protests or diplomatic talks, like timing button presses to sway crowds. There’s no combat, just hours of reading reports, debating leaders, and monitoring a resource tracker. Sessions often feel like a political spreadsheet with flavor text. The lack of quick-time events or combat makes pacing feel glacial, but fans of systemic storytelling may appreciate the depth.
What Players Think
PlayPile community ratings average 82% with 68% completion. Metacritic scores 75, praising the “rigorous narrative design” but criticizing “unforgiving pacing.” Average playtime is 14 hours, though 32% quit before finishing. Moods are split: 45% call it “stimulating,” while 28% find it “dry.” Reviews highlight the 128 branching storylines but note the steep learning curve. One user wrote, “Feels like homework with better dialogue,” while another praised, “Every choice carries real weight.” Achievements are scarce, only 12 total, with 3 hidden endgame variants.
PlayPile's Take
At $19.99, Crisis: The Third Way is a niche pick for policy wonks and fans of slow-burn narratives. It’s a 14-hour commitment with minimal action, rewarding those who dig into systemic storytelling. If you’ve tolerated games like Democracy 2 or Europa Universalis, this might appeal. But if your patience for text walls is thin, skip it. The achievements are trivial, and the difficulty spikes in Act 3 with overlapping crises. Worth a try if you enjoy wrestling with real-world problems in a fictional setting.
Game Modes
Single player
Achievements
Loading achievements...
Similar Games
Finding similar games...
Buzzing on Bluesky
Checking Bluesky...