Astronauts has released LABYRINTHOS: The Depths Want You for Steam, and the game marks the first time the studio has put out a title localized into both English and Chinese. The move gives the gameplay-heavy bishojo brand a wider route into overseas markets at a moment when Steam has made that audience much easier to reach.
For Astronauts, the release is more than a platform update. The studio has been making games since 2012, when it debuted with DEMONION, and it has built a catalog that includes the dungeon management DEMONION series, the card-based VERETHRAGNA and the RPG-like DUNGEON OF REGALIAS and CHAOS DOMINAS. It has also said it does not limit itself to one style, mixing gameplay-heavy titles with story-driven visual novels.
The reason LABYRINTHOS drew so much attention is simple: Astronauts said that from the planning stage there was already talk that the game would play better overseas than in Japan. That matters because the studio is not just chasing translation for its own sake. It is aiming at a market that it believes will understand the game’s appeal more readily than its domestic one, and Steam gives that bet a far larger stage than the Japanese bishojo market.
There was also a practical reason the work ended up with Shiravune. Astronauts said it was a small development team and that it was extremely busy making new titles, so it could not handle localization on its own. After LABYRINTHOS was released, it had a chance to consult with Shiravune about localization, and Shiravune took on both the localization and distribution of the game. That division of labor lets the studio keep building games while relying on a partner to carry them into English and Chinese speaking markets.
The arrangement also highlights a broader shift in how niche Japanese games travel abroad. Astronauts said Steam is vastly larger than the domestic bishojo market, and that there is now an environment where many users who could not play such titles before can finally access them. In other words, the audience exists, but it needs the right pipeline, and LABYRINTHOS is the first time Astronauts has used that pipeline for two languages at once.
What comes next is already taking shape. Astronauts said it is discussing how to bring Kyokugen Chikan Tokuiten to overseas audiences, even as it acknowledges that the game’s themes make localization more complicated. The studio says the title has earned steady support in Japan. Whether it can convert that support into an overseas release will show how far Astronauts can push this model after its first English-and-Chinese Steam launch.
