Last updated on November 27th, 2025 at 03:55 pm
NO THING – Surreal Arcade Trip – Action Game Review
NO THING – Surreal Arcade Trip is a Action/Casual/Entertainment game from Michal Stalewski, first launched in 6th April 2016.
It’s rated 9+ and currently has 57+ ratings on the App Store.
What Makes NO THING – Surreal Arcade Trip Stand Out
The year is 1994 and it is the future.
NO THING is an indie minimalistic surreal action game set in totalitarian regime of future.
Tells the story of an office clerk who is sent with important message to the Queen of Ice.
Main features:
- unique, weird storyline
- retro surrealistic full 3D graphic
- glitches and post effects
- simple controls
- full voiceover and speech synthesis
- chiptune sounds
- original cold wave music with over ten unique music themes
- achievements
- leaderboard
- game center support
- portrait mode and landscape mode supported
- easy to play hard to master, very hard
Please use headphones for the best experience!
This Action game offers engaging gameplay and regular updates for mobile players.
Player Feedback
As a newer release, NO THING – Surreal Arcade Trip is building its player community. Early feedback suggests .
Recent Updates & Development
Latest Update: 10th January 2018
Recent improvements include:
This app has been updated by Apple to display the Apple Watch app icon.
- IPHONE X SUPPORT:
NO THING is now optimised for iPhone X! - IOS 11 SUPPORT:
Enjoy better performance of NO THING and great experience on IOS 11 devices. - APP PREVIEWS:
NO THING game app previews added to App Store! - [NEW!] IMESSAGE STICKERS:
NO THING IMessage Stickers added!
Download & Availability
NO THING – Surreal Arcade Trip is available through the official App Store for iOS devices.
Get NO THING – Surreal Arcade Trip on App Store
Requirements: Requires iPhone 5s / iPad Air / iPad Air (Cellular) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina) / iPad Mini 2 (Retina, Cellular) / iPhone 6 / iPhone 6 Plus / iPad Air 2 / iPad Air 2 (Cellular) / iPad Mini 3 or later.
Compatible with iPhone and iPad devices.
Player Experience Highlights
Community Insight:
We have this game on every platform we own. We are obsessed, and have been since like 2018/2019. We listen to the soundtrack daily, and the surrealist poetry of every level is intriguing, it really invites the player to take the story how they will. This game is more of an art piece above anything else. It wonderfully displays the monotony of being an office worker by the repetitiveness, while still being very out there. We LOVE NO THING.
Picked this up on Switch years back when it was on a good sale, never got around to beating it but we just bought it again on the app store so we could play on our phone! The aesthetics are fun, the robotic narration gets stuck in our head just as much as the music, and the gameplay is challenging enough to make us want to keep trying again and again. Controls are simple, we turn our phone sideways and just tap the left or right of the screen to turn the direction we want. Havent figured out how to pause on the iOS version but other than that, its a fantastic port of an enjoyable game.
The gameplay is simple and sounds and looks easy but is actually really hard it took us a while to just beat level 2, even though it is simple it actually has a story and the dialogue is interesting and does a good yet cryptic job of world building, and the visuals are also simple but complements the feeling of it very well and looks nice, highly recommended for such a small price.
It's a rather boring endless runner. We thought we were getting into something here… And all we had to do was beat level 1 of the storyline. But it seems to really just be as simple as some of the other low star reviews.
We usually do not write reviews, but we decided it was needed for this game. The graphics are amazing, it's very aesthetically pleasing to the eye. The music grabs you and tugs you back into simple 8-bit music, and it fits well with the gameplay, even we, who would turn on music while playing games instead of listening to the soundtracks, kept the sound on for this game. Some people might complain the gameplay is repetitive, but compared to other "free" war or matching games, it's pretty tame, and takes it's own spin on things. Some people will whine because they aren't open to games that take a different direction. We highly suggest this game for any looking for a nice time waster, this is with no doubt worth the 2 dollars.
Wierd art style and vibe, with dope semi basic glitched out designs. Gameplay is fast running and turning, but its crazy psychedelic and for tripping mad hatters.
It gameplay seems easy but the speed is the one trouble that make you game over a lot of time. The soundtrack is cool but the story is not rememberable. How could understand the story while being stressful for beating every level.
Right now, we're on level 6 and have been playing for a couple days. The visuals are amazing and the audio is good. It's kind of melancholic due to the robo-narration we recognize the gameplay comparisons to Super Hexagon, but the aesthetics set it apart. The levels are starting to differentiate themselves in terms of game mechanics, which is a nice surprise This was recognized as one of the App Store's "Best games you've never played". If you like the screenshots and want to be immersed in that world, give it a go.
This game is like our dream game. Simple to play but very challenging, trippy glitch effects and music. Really Really well done. The creativity factor is unreal. Buy the game if you like the way the graphics look.
We enjoy this game, we recommend watching a gameplay video to understand the art direction of the game. The art aesthetic is the game's main selling point, we are not sure if we will ever be able to beat it, and we are pretty sure there isn't a real narrative to the story. The game play is endless runner, but very quick, it feels a lot like Super Hexagon in how quickly you have to react. The levels are not randomly generated so we guess a person might be able to beat the game by sheer brute force.
It's unique, it's got it's aesthetic, it's borderline soothing to play. It's a little eerie and we love it. The controls are super responsive, you just need to tap on the corresponding side of the screen. Im excited to see what comes next in the story. A+.
If you like the graphics just get it. The gameplay is good.
Idk why Apple have deleted our old review, but don't just listen to those "noobs" who just don't know the fun of exploring a new experience, controls. Etc. We mean, we haven't had this much tension( in an exciting way)and fun in a game for a long time. Please go watch some game plays before buying this game, because as you can see, some ppl bought this game knowing nothing about it, which gives them no expectations. For us, always trying to find an arcade old school game that dosent look outdated, this game is perfect for that. Apple, please don't delete more comments(since this game isn't spamming any 5star reviews) we reviewed this game( which we barely do on any paid games we bought)because we had tons of fun playing it, and we want the developer to make more! Know who's really spamming 5star reviews is important, Apple. From a gamer.
This game is a singular experience – play with headphones. We also suggest you get it from Steam and play it alone in the dark.
Fine game. Endless runner with a creepy theme.
We played this game time and time again and every single time it never lets us turn the way we want to and we can't even get past level one because of that we don't get it.
We're going to try and get our money back, having been tricked into buying this thing. This thing seems to have been designed by an AI with the barest understanding of what constitutes a game. Either that or it was a level one exercise in graphics programming at a coding institute in an East Asian country. It really is simply a few basic programming elements slapped haphazardly together and that's it. Basically you tap left and right to guide a first-person perspective "runner" down platforms in a 3D monochrome maze as an 8-bit theme, around five notes booping up and down a major scale, loops in the background and a voice narrates nonsense phrases: "Your shoes are shiny. Now is not the time for your inner fight. We are not with you." Like that. The eye-hurting monochrome colors change randomly. There are a few random objects floating in space between the platforms: woman heads, Ben Franklin heads, arms, buildings. They serve no purpose. The screen glitches randomly. Sometimes your runner runs into a cube that chimes and changes the monochrome background once more. If you fall off the platform you start over. As you progress down the maze the runner's speed increases, and the runner's base starting speed also increases a little each time you are "killed" and restart, unless you force quit the game and restart the app entirely to bring your runner back to the beginning base speed so probably the game designers gain some advantage every time a player logs out of Game Center and logs back in again, maybe something involving ranking. Anyhow, there are no clues to the mazes, and most of the challenge of running through them involves poor control response or being visually unable to see what's happening, either by having the screen blocked by glitches or by being blinded by a particularly bright monochrome background, lime on canary, for example, or orange against tangerine. Finishing a level brings up a new one that's slightly different from the last, for no particular reason, as there is no storyline, no plot, no interaction other than tapping left and right and hoping the runner responds, and the random objects don't change, they just cycle. Seriously, this is a coding exercise someone decided to sell as an overpriced app. Imagine you were demonstrating 3D technology for the first time, and you just looped visuals of a first-person perspective going over a set of ramps, turning left and right around an Atari 2600 representation of a city comprising nine office blocks, three woman heads, a Ben Franklin head and seven up-stretched arms. To demonstrate voice synthesis you program in some phrases from a phrase book: "Your shoes are shiny. The city is alive tonight." Because you're limited to 8-bit color for this 101 class exercise you choose monochromes of lime green against emerald green. And that's it. But to drum up excitement you shell out one eighth of a Bitcoin to bored Russian youths on whatever the current version of Hansa Market is to buy 250 good reviews from them. And there you have the game's gameplay and business model. Enjoy? Seriously, don't buy this thing. Just don't. Get a level-1 programming book and code in the first exercise of the first page of the first chapter into Eclipse yourself and you will get pretty much the same result, for cheaper, and you'll have learned a new skill to boot. But don't reward the lazy failing student who cribbed this from a beginner's guide to 8-bit color and 3D vector plane graphics.
The pictures give you a look at the game and they are deceiving. There is NO narrative to the story at ALL. It's merely an endless runner that will make you angry. We though it would've been an aesthetically pleasing adventure game with a narrative, but no.
We got this app because we thought it looked interesting. But then we played it and it was just creepy and stupid.
User feedback from Apple App Store
App Details
- Version: 1.1
- Size: 130.58 MB
- iOS: 6.0 or later
- Languages: EN
- Content Advisory: Infrequent/Mild Horror/Fear Themes
- Developer: Michal Stalewski
Last updated: 10th January 2018 | Genre: Action, Casual | Developer: Michal Stalewski