
A genealogical mystery straight out of 1998. Scour the early Internet for clues, uncover hidden connections, and piece together the family tree behind the secretive Roottree Corporation.
Modeled estimate, not a reported figure. How we estimate →
Media

About
The year is 1998. A private jet belonging to the Roottree Corporation has crashed. On it were the Roottree Sisters and their parents. Combined, they were worth over a billion dollars.
Now, due to the eccentricities of their great-great-grandfather Elias, their money must be redistributed to the rest of the family. But who's actually a BLOOD RELATIVE? That's where you come in.
Armed only with the power of your mighty dial-up modem, you'll scour for photos, books, articles and other evidence. Then, you'll make connections and deductions based on the family relationships you uncover. With every spot on the tree you fill in correctly, the names and photos left in your possession will have fewer and fewer places to go — but the evidence will also be harder and more obscure to find.
Can you put together the final pieces of the puzzle?
The Acclaimed Armchair Detective Game, Re-imagined on Steam
The Roottrees are Dead was originally created for the Global Game Jam 2023 and released as a free browser game. It was beloved by many for its clever puzzles, retro computing interface and novel world-building. The Steam version is the same great game, but enhanced in many ways:
Hand-drawn illustrations from acclaimed board game artist Henning Ludvigsen.
A 3D living-room perspective that ties together all the unique puzzle systems
An enhanced user interface with many quality of life improvements to make your mystery solving easier to use and more intuitive
Remastered music and sound effects, with fully voiced cinematics.
A handful of Easter eggs and little touches for those who can't get enough of the late ‘90s charm
Includes "Roottreemania", a brand new mystery
Find out what happens to the Roottree family following the events of the base game.
A whole new family tree to complete!
Discover the scandals, lies, and infidelities that took place behind the scenes of America's largest maple candy empire.
Genres
Stats
All-time low is the lowest price we've recorded for this game since we started tracking it.
Languages: English*, French, German, Spanish - Latin America, Simplified Chinese*, Portuguese - Brazil, Italian*languages with full audio support
Engagement
Hours played at review time, across 182 reviews with recorded playtime.
Reviews
Themes across 180 recent reviews and how positive each mention is. A keyword signal, not full sentiment analysis.
positive critical· bar length = how often the theme comes up
Reviews
Of course if you love Obra Dinn, this game's style is up your alley. I do also think the setting should be highlighted as well, though, for those who'd find value in looking behind the facade of retro Americana. That's not to say it's a particularly strong critique of that time, but it highlights the differences in truth between personal and public narratives, and how truth shifts over time, in a way that allows it to stand out in the genre. I also really appreciate the experience of trawling the early internet, replicated with just enough QOL improvements to remind you why you spent your childhood on a computer.
令人惊讶的不仅仅是关键词谜题与多样的信息源编织而成的奇思妙想的信息之网,还有本地化大佬对措辞的精心推敲与翻译(尤其是歌词韵脚和大量谐音翻译都非常),设计师对解谜以外游戏节奏与引导结构的精心设计: 鲁特里三姐妹起步的家族树规则和资料里的关键词挑战,一小步一小步诱导玩家学会多途径查询以及借助文章关键词进行链式与网式搜索。 从新手阶段推广到标记的核心人物,再外推到整棵大树,以及最终谜题的信封,整个游戏长线目标切割得清晰而不令人生畏。 每3-5个成功结果就上一次锁和收集若干结果后局外故事逐步推进,又给了玩家鲜明的小节点和阶段节点,提供推理正确的情绪反馈与收益反馈(缩小可选项,带来新线索)。大约每40分钟有1节点,现有的整个节奏调到了一个相对舒适的地步。 此外,设计师提供了复制,快速创建与整理笔记,笔记超链,快速检索等功能非常完善的笔记系统,使用舒适且可靠,契合了玩家对大量线索进行整合的基本需要。 我想这种温和的解谜并不会适合所有人的胃口,但它确实是一部解谜游戏的精品之作。
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i love this game my bf bought me it
3.5/5。 和奥伯拉丁差异还是很大的,填名字和图片是很类似,但实际体验就差很多。 笔记的功能还是不错的,如果笔记本身可以搜索就更好了。 推理的手法比较单一,果然推理少了凶杀案矛盾冲突就少了很多,吸引力也低很多。
适合焦虑且无聊的时候玩,可以一坐一下午的时候玩,因为烧脑的时候就没心情想别的了。很讲究连贯性,上手也很轻松。 我是二周目花了大概五个小时,在电竞酒店玩完的。喜欢推理类的真的可以玩玩,因为信息量比较大,而且比较琐碎,所以比较考验记忆力和理解能力(比如家族姓氏........确实因为文化差异 说明书写的跟绕口令一样) 我自己推理的结局是比较阴暗的,因为小说原文是“扭曲的双胞胎”,以为其中牵扯了埃利亚斯家族男性对萨姆的x侵害之类,包括ak工人和小埃利一起住在农场养育萨姆,原文描述他们是“铁杆单身汉”。起初我以为是他们“共享”萨姆,后来结局委托人解释是一对同性恋夫夫。可能其中也有文化差异吧,或者是为了过审?因为似乎游戏里小说和人物对白显得更加严肃沉郁。 鲁特里狂热我最近还没时间玩,听说也非常混乱啊,期待下一个无所事事的下午!XD
八卦版奥博拉丁,有意思,最喜欢格温和加兰德了,他们都做了一般人都做不到的事,夯爆了 就是有一些联想真的很跳出框架,很不容易想到,比如那个什么全美XX,要想到迈阿密XX,说是很合理毕竟全美肯定包含迈阿密,但一般谁会往这里想唉
Definitely scratches the Obra Dinn urge, and the keyboard sounds are great imo.
神作无需多言。我这两天睁眼闭眼全是鲁特里家的事儿,找完血亲找婚外情,简直了。剧情其实简单就是找人,找亲属,但是这线索环环相扣啊,文字量巨大,给我读爽了,翻译组牛牛牛!这么多名字这么多名词啥的,翻译的毫无违和感,这游戏得给翻译组磕一个。游戏里头笔记功能太重要了,而且我笔记记老些了,都能写篇论文。游戏里标黄功能、查找功能都非常方便。太好玩儿了,非常喜欢这种慢慢找线索记笔记的游戏!
⭐⭐⭐⭐ 一场精心设计的家族考古,汉化更是神来之笔 通关了《鲁特里一家死了》,最震撼我的不是谜题设计(虽然也很棒),而是汉化的质量。 这游戏文本量巨大——报纸剪报、日记碎片、人物证词、广告标语……几乎每句话都藏着线索或暗示。汉化组不仅准确传达了信息,更难得的是把原文的时代感、讽刺味、黑色幽默全部还原了。 印象最深的是那些歌词和广告词的翻译,原文押韵的地方中文也押韵,原文玩双关的地方中文也找了对应的双关,甚至比原文更有味道。能看出译者是真正理解了游戏的气质,而不是机械对照。 这种"信达雅"在独立游戏汉化里太罕见了。很多游戏汉化能做到"通顺"就不错了,但 Roottrees 的汉化是有文学追求的——它让你忘记这是翻译过来的游戏。 玩法上,这游戏没有任何手把手教学,开场就是一堆零散档案甩你脸上。 你需要在网页浏览器里翻报纸、查家谱、比对照片,像真正的私家侦探那样从零开始拼凑真相。没有"任务标记",没有"线索高亮",甚至连"正确答案"的反馈都很克制——对了就 silently 锁定,错了也不告诉你。这种近乎冷酷的设计反而让人上瘾,每解开一个名字都像考古挖到宝。 家族树的可视化设计很妙,把复杂的人物关系理得清晰又不剥夺推理乐趣。后期线索交叉验证时,那种"原来这人是他叔叔""难怪她姓这个"的顿悟感,比任何动作游戏的处决动画都爽。 游戏本身也值得夸:真相不吓人,真相的沉默才吓人。建议搭配纸笔玩,体验更佳。 最后再次感谢汉化组,你们让这款游戏有了中文灵魂。
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Trends
Modeled estimate over time, reconstructed from Steam's monthly review histogram.
Engagement
DAU/MAU are modeled from peak concurrent players (≈×8 and ×28) — Steam publishes no active-user counts, so treat these as rough estimates, not reported figures.
Audience
Estimated from the language of this game's reviews — a proxy for where players are, not official Steam demographics.
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