Sanatorium: A Mental Asylum Simulator

Zeitglas / Shoreline Games · 6 Nov 2025

About

Set in a fictionalized version of the 1920s where the lines between modern psychiatric treatment and pseudoscience are still muddy at best. Sanatorium is a 2D card-based workplace adventure where the player has to test, diagnose and treat patients. At its core, Sanatorium is a comment on the turbulent history of the practices and pseudoscience used to stigmatize mental illnesses.

“Sanatorium: A Mental Asylum Simulator Is One of the Most Unique Games I’ve Ever Seen” - VICE

It’s the roaring twenties, an age of technological progress and social upheaval. As the city around you expands, you feel left behind: a weary journalist burdened by debt and drifting purpose. Then, out of the blue, a cryptic message arrives from a childhood friend—perhaps the tip of a lifetime. It points to the infamous Castle Woods Sanatorium. A mystery waits there, and you can’t shake the urge to uncover it. It may be nothing more than a hunch, but it feels like a secret that could change everything. Even you. The decision is made: you pack your bags and set out for Castle Woods.

Test your wit and intuition. Every week, new patient files present new puzzles to be solved as you decide which tests to use to uncover symptoms and which treatments you prescribe to cure them. Decide whether you want to follow the rule book or try out experimental new treatments with unknown outcomes. Do you want to be kind or cruel? Business savvy or risk-taking?

Uncover dark secrets behind the squeaky-clean facade of Castle Woods' walls. Meet helpless patients, ruthless opportunists, and an array of other intriguing characters. Collect clues and piece together the shocking truth about the Sanatorium and your own past.

Card-driven workplace sim — step into the role of a doctor in 1923, where every action is bound by the outdated tools and beliefs of the era.
Diagnose, “treat,” or withhold — decide whether to follow harsh, archaic methods or act with compassion, knowing both choices carry consequences.
Every patient is a puzzle — files unfold as layered card sets, with symptoms hidden, revealed, and misinterpreted through limited knowledge.
A full campaign across 4 chapters — uncover the secrets of Castle Woods and the lives caught within its walls.
Branching paths, multiple endings — your decisions shape not only patients’ outcomes, but your own fate as an impostor.