Trover Saves the Universe

Trover Saves the Universe
Information
VR/AR	VR
Developer	Squanch Games
Publisher	Squanch Games
Platform	PlayStation VR, SteamVR, Oculus Rift (Platform)
Device	PlayStation VR, Oculus Rift, Oculus Quest
Operating System	Microsoft Windows
Type	Game
Genre	Action, Adventure, Platformer, Comedy
Input Device	Gamepad, Tracked Motion Controllers
Game Mode	Single-player
Release Date	31 May 2019 (PlayStation 4), 4 June 2019 (Windows)
Price	US$29.99 (Steam)
App Store	PlayStation Store, Steam, Oculus Store, Epic Games Store

See also: VR Apps and VR Games

Trover Saves the Universe is a 2019 comedy action-platformer developed and published by Squanch Games, the studio co-founded by Rick and Morty co-creator Justin Roiland. It was designed primarily for virtual reality but can also be played on a television or monitor. The game launched on PlayStation 4 with optional PlayStation VR support on 31 May 2019 and on Windows PC, with support for SteamVR and Oculus PC headsets, on 4 June 2019. Versions for Nintendo Switch and Xbox One followed in late 2019, and a standalone Oculus Quest version was released on 18 June 2020.

The player is a chair-bound alien who teleports between fixed points while steering Trover, a purple creature, through third-person platforming and combat. The game was nominated for Best VR/AR Game at The Game Awards 2019 and for Immersive Reality Game of the Year at the 23rd D.I.C.E. Awards. On 22 September 2026 it was removed from sale on the major digital storefronts; Squanch Games did not announce the removal or give a reason.

Reviewed 4 October 2026. Release dates and platforms, Steam store details, development quotes from the Unreal Engine, Meta, Newsweek, Shacknews and Tom's Guide interviews, IGN and UploadVR reviews, Metacritic and OpenCritic scores, award nominations and the September 2026 delisting reports. About review dates.

Gameplay

In the story, a villain named Glorkon has kidnapped the player's two dogs, put them in his eye sockets, and is using their life essence to destroy the universe. The player teams up with Trover, a purple "eye-hole monster", to stop him. The player character never leaves a floating chair whose controls look like a PlayStation 4 controller. With a gamepad, the player moves Trover directly, making him run, jump and fight with a laser sword, while the chair itself can only teleport between specific nodes that Trover runs to. The player can also raise the chair to see the level from a higher vantage point. IGN found that some collectibles are only visible from certain chair heights or viewing angles.

Squanch Games lead designer Erich Meyr said the studio chose this setup because a VR game needed a fixed camera for player comfort. Instead of a floating camera, the player sits in a fixed chair in first person, and abilities were split between Trover in third person and the player in the chair, which Meyr said lets the player "sort of play co-op with yourself". The player can pick up enemy weapons and throw them, a ranged attack Meyr compared to an alley-oop set up by Trover. In VR, characters sometimes ask the player to look at things, nod or crane their head. Meyr said playtesters often assumed the game was aware of them even when it was not, and the non-VR version keeps more conventional on-screen feedback for these moments.

Collectible Green Power Babies are hidden in the levels and unlock health upgrades for Trover. The game also has a censored mode for players who do not want its profanity. In IGN's playthrough the campaign took about four to five hours across roughly five major levels. Meyr said Squanch's playtests averaged seven to eight hours for the main path, not counting collectibles and optional interactions.

The content is the same with or without a headset. PlayStation 4 players can switch between the TV and PlayStation VR at any time, and PC players can use a monitor or a PC VR headset. The Steam version lists support for SteamVR and Oculus PC headsets and for tracked controllers.

Development

Squanch Games was founded in July 2016 by Roiland and Tanya Watson, who had previously worked at Epic Games for four years. Roiland has said that trying an Oculus Rift DK2 development kit made him excited about using VR for comedy combined with gameplay. He combined that interest with an older idea about a villain who kidnaps a character's dogs and stuffs them into his eye holes. According to Meyr, Roiland wanted to pitch the idea at GDC and E3. After meeting with Sony, Squanch partnered with the company on the game, and Sony helped it build a studio.

Meyr called Rick and Morty a big touchstone for the game's tone and setting, along with The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, Portal 2 and Psychonauts. The team also looked at existing VR games and demos, including the Astro Bot demo in The Playroom. The core platforming and camera controls were built before any dialogue was written or recorded, and the studio chose Unreal Engine 4 because members of the team already had years of experience with it. To prevent motion sickness, the team used what Roiland called "the warp node technique".

The game began as a VR-only project. A traditional non-VR mode was added partway through development. In a 2018 interview, Roiland told Tom's Guide that solving the design problems of a VR game had produced "a weird and shockingly fun traditional game".

Writing and voice work

A script was written with Portal 2 writers Jay Pinkerton and Erik Wolpaw. Roiland, who voices many of the characters, mostly improvised from a list of story beats and re-recorded lines until he was satisfied. Meyr said the team first recorded a temporary improvised "scratch" pass of the whole game from a list of level beats, and kept much of it because it was funny, and wrote scripts only where a scene needed specific lines. Squanch built tools that let developers edit scenes and swap lines quickly to fit this process. Sources give different totals for the amount of recorded dialogue: Newsweek reported more than 20 hours, while Meyr gave a figure of approximately 30 hours.

Roiland resigned from Squanch Games in January 2023; the studio said it had received his resignation on 16 January.

Release

Squanch Games revealed the game during Sony's E3 2018 press conference on 11 June 2018, for PlayStation 4 and PlayStation VR, with an early 2019 release window. At PAX West 2018 the studio showed both a VR demo and a new non-VR demo. The 31 May 2019 PlayStation 4 date was announced on 26 March 2019. Gearbox Publishing handled the physical retail release, which launched on the same day as the digital version.

The studio's plan was to release new content for free and keep the game at full price for longer, instead of cutting the price and selling DLC. The free Important Cosmic Jobs expansion came out on 8 October 2019. It is set in Trover's workplace and adds new characters, quests, Power Babies, unlockable comedy sketches and an arcade game called Space Slam. The Steam store page also lists a free Jopo Mode, described only as "A new way to play!"

Platform	Release date	Notes
PlayStation 4 / PlayStation VR	31 May 2019	VR optional; physical edition through Gearbox Publishing
Microsoft Windows	4 June 2019	SteamVR and Oculus PC headsets supported; also sold on the Oculus Rift store
Nintendo Switch	28 November 2019	No VR; included Important Cosmic Jobs
Xbox One	3 December 2019	No VR; included Important Cosmic Jobs
Oculus Quest	18 June 2020	Standalone VR; Important Cosmic Jobs available from launch

In July 2020 Limited Run Games announced a physical Nintendo Switch edition that included Jopo Mode and Important Cosmic Jobs. For the Quest release, Roiland said he wanted players to be able to play it "the way it was originally intended. As a VR title."

Delisting

On 22 September 2026, the game disappeared from Steam, the Epic Games Store, the Meta store, and the Xbox, PlayStation and Nintendo digital stores. SteamDB recorded an "app_retired_publisher_request" flag, which Dork described as a designation used when a publisher or developer retires a game from sale. Squanch Games did not announce the removal or give a reason. Nintendo Everything reported that players who had already bought the game digitally could still play and redownload it. Nintendo Everything noted that delistings are often caused by expiring rights but said the cause in this case was unclear. PSX Extreme noted that Squanch's later game High on Life remained on sale.

Reception

On Metacritic, the PlayStation 4 version has a score of 76 from 35 critic reviews and the PC version a score of 80 from 7 reviews. OpenCritic lists a top critic average of 76, with 64% of critics recommending the game.

IGN's Tom Marks gave it 8.7 out of 10 and called it "a short and sweet VR platformer wrapped in one of the most ridiculous video game stories you'll ever see". He said the game "loses something when played in 2D". Marks praised the way the third-person platforming of games such as Astro Bot: Rescue Mission and Lucky's Tale was combined with first-person teleport movement, but criticized moments where the improvised dialogue fell back on "pointless profanity". In UploadVR's review, which scored it 7 out of 10, David Jagneaux called it one of the funniest games he had played, while noting "some generic core gameplay, repetition, and an overall grating comedic tone" that would not suit everyone.

Award	Category	Result
The Game Awards 2019	Best VR/AR Game	Nominated
23rd Annual D.I.C.E. Awards	Immersive Reality Game of the Year	Nominated
UploadVR Best VR of 2019	Best PSVR Game/Experience	Nominated

See also

• Rick and Morty: Virtual Rick-ality
• Lucky's Tale
• Astro Bot Rescue Mission