Top 15 Video Games About Sleeping and Dreaming

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Ignacio Weil

Gaming - November 1st 2025, 13:00 GMT+1

Cropped Pokémon Sleep 2023 — Pokémon Sleep (2023)

It’s not often that a video game tells you to close your eyes and do absolutely nothing, but *Pokémon Sleep* turns bedtime into gameplay. You don’t catch Pikachu by battling – you do it by snoring next to your phone. It’s a strange mix of wellness app and collection game that sounds like parody but is, in fact, very real. Players are rewarded for how long and how well they sleep, which makes it one of the few games where oversleeping counts as grinding. As bizarre as it sounds, it’s also kind of genius – Pokémon meets Fitbit, with dreams as your battleground. | © The Pokémon Company

Cropped Sonic Dream Team 2023 — Sonic Dream Team (2023)

Just when you thought Sonic had done it all – from Olympic sports to questionable werewolf transformations – he’s now leaping through surreal dreamscapes. *Sonic Dream Team* turns sleep into another speedrun, with gravity-defying levels and trippy environments that feel like a lucid dream gone haywire. The game embraces the series’ chaotic energy, blending platforming nostalgia with a surreal twist that only Sonic could pull off. It's fast, colorful, and slightly confusing in the best possible way – like a fever dream of loops and chaos emeralds. | © SEGA

Insomnia Theater in the Head — Insomnia: Theater in the Head (2022)

Sleep doesn’t come easy in *Insomnia: Theater in the Head*, a hand-drawn indie gem that turns restlessness into art. Every thought, worry, and stray memory comes alive in dreamlike vignettes, blurring the line between consciousness and delusion. The game captures that strange limbo between being awake and asleep – a personal stage where anxiety takes the lead role. It’s intimate, unsettling, and oddly relatable for anyone who’s stared at a ceiling at 3 a.m. wondering if sleep will ever arrive. | © Perfect Day Studio

Melatonin (2022)

Forget violent boss fights – *Melatonin* pits you against your own subconscious in rhythm-based dream battles. Each level mirrors a facet of modern life: scrolling through your phone, online shopping, or daydreaming about pizza. The pastel visuals and lo-fi beats make it feel like a self-care session disguised as a game. But under the cozy surface lies sharp commentary on burnout and overstimulation, wrapped in candy colors. *Melatonin* doesn’t just lull you to sleep – it quietly asks why you can’t stop thinking even when you do. | © Half Asleep

Omori (2020)

Beneath its adorable RPG surface, *Omori* hides a psychological labyrinth of dreams, trauma, and guilt. Players shift between bright, whimsical dreamscapes and stark reality, each blending in ways that feel both nostalgic and nightmarish. The game doesn’t hand out answers – it makes you live through the emotional noise of its characters. Every dream feels like a confession, every nightmare a truth too heavy to wake from. It’s not just a game about sleep – it’s about the things we bury there. | © Omocat

The Legend of Zelda Links Awakening 2019 — The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening (2019)

Not every hero’s journey needs to be real — sometimes it’s just a strangely beautiful dream. *The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening* takes the classic *Zelda* formula and immerses it in surrealism: the secrets of Koholint Island slowly unfold for the player, making the talking animals, uncharacteristic figures, and absurd scenarios gradually fall into place. What begins as an ordinary adventure soon becomes a melancholic reflection on the nature of existence. You don’t even have to have played the Game Boy original to feel nostalgic along the way. | © Nintendo

Dream 2015 — Dream (2015)

Exploration becomes introspection in *Dream*, an indie adventure that trades enemies and objectives for quiet wandering through a man’s subconscious. Instead of combat, you get corridors of memory and vast surreal landscapes where reality melts away like a half-remembered thought. The game doesn’t hold your hand – it wants you to get lost, both physically and emotionally. There’s a strange comfort in its stillness, a sense that the real story happens between the dreams. It’s a slow burn, but if you surrender to its pace, *Dream* feels like therapy disguised as exploration. | © HyperSloth

Cropped Mario Luigi Dream Team 2013 — Mario & Luigi: Dream Team (2013)

Apparently, it only takes a magical species of pillow creatures to turn Luigi’s dreams into a full-blown playground of adventure. Filled with puzzles, platforming antics, and slapstick chaos, *Mario & Luigi: Dream Team* channels the series’ humor and action-RPG gameplay through Luigi’s subconscious — with the “real” plumber on the lower screen being messed with to influence the dream world above. This silly yet inventive premise ties into a story where both familiar and new faces take center stage. | © Nintendo

Cropped Kingdom Hearts 3 D Dream Drop Distance 2012 — Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance (2012)

If there were ever a series built to dive into dream logic, it’s *Kingdom Hearts*. *Dream Drop Distance* doubles down on that idea, sending Sora and Riku through layered dream worlds that make Inception look straightforward. Every setting feels like a mirage – familiar Disney landscapes warped by subconscious memory. It’s ambitious, occasionally confusing, and exactly what fans expect from a franchise where Mickey Mouse discusses the nature of existence. Beneath the chaos, it’s a story about growth, fear, and learning to let go – told through the hazy filter of a dream you don’t want to end. | © Square Enix

Cropped Catherine — Catherine (2011)

Sleep is the most dangerous place in *Catherine*, a psychological puzzle game where nightmares are literal life-or-death climbing trials. By day, Vincent wrestles with commitment and infidelity; by night, he’s scrambling up collapsing towers chased by monsters shaped like his guilt. The game’s brilliance lies in how it makes anxiety tangible – every block you move feels like a moral decision. Stylish, sexy, and relentlessly stressful, *Catherine* turns the act of falling asleep into something you might want to avoid entirely. | © Atlus

Cropped Yume Nikki — Yume Nikki (2004)

If dreams are windows to the subconscious, *Yume Nikki* is the equivalent of smashing the glass and walking barefoot through the shards. This cult indie classic lets players wander through the dreamscapes of a reclusive girl named Madotsuki, encountering everything from serene fields to pixelated horror. There’s no dialogue, no clear objective, just the uneasy freedom of exploring someone else’s sleeping mind. It’s equal parts eerie and hypnotic, with an atmosphere that lingers long after you close the game. *Yume Nikki* doesn’t tell you what it means – it just dares you to keep dreaming. | © Kikiyama

Cropped Kirby Nightmare in Dreamland 2002 — Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland (2002)

Sweet dreams can still pack a punch when Kirby’s involved. *Kirby: Nightmare in Dreamland* takes the series’ trademark cuteness and folds it into a sleep-themed adventure that’s deceptively intense. What starts as another lighthearted romp through Dream Land quickly turns cosmic, as Kirby battles literal embodiments of nightmares. Its soft visuals hide a sharp sense of design and pacing, reminding players that beneath Kirby’s pink squishiness lies a surprisingly formidable hero. It’s bedtime storytelling at its most action-packed. | © HAL Laboratory / Nintendo

Klonoa Door to Phantomile 1997 — Klonoa: Door to Phantomile (1997)

At first glance, *Klonoa: Door to Phantomile* looks like a colorful platformer lost in the 90s crowd – until it quietly breaks your heart. The dreamlike setting, with its floating landscapes and strange languages, lulls you into comfort before revealing its bittersweet edge. Klonoa’s journey through Phantomile isn’t just about saving the world; it’s about the pain of waking up from something beautiful. The result is one of gaming’s most quietly emotional dreamscapes, blending nostalgia with melancholy in perfect balance. | © Namco

Cropped Ni GHTS into Dreams 1996 — NiGHTS into Dreams (1996)

Fluid motion, flying through dreamscapes, and a surreal score – *NiGHTS into Dreams* was Sega’s attempt to turn the act of dreaming into pure gameplay. The game’s acrobatic movement system felt revolutionary, and its kaleidoscopic world made every stage feel like a lucid dream you could steer. Beneath its whimsy lies an emotional core about overcoming fear, a theme wrapped in abstract storytelling and mesmerizing visuals. Even decades later, *NiGHTS* remains one of the most unique interpretations of what dreaming feels like when you’re truly free. | © Sega

Cropped Super Mario Bros 2 1988 — Super Mario Bros. 2 (1988)

Mario’s most surreal outing was, fittingly, all a dream. *Super Mario Bros. 2* broke away from the usual formula: instead of the Mushroom Kingdom, the game takes place in the memorable world of Subcon — no Bowser, no Goombas, but plenty of turnips and flying carpets. Combined with its strange development history, the game’s quirky mechanics and offbeat style suddenly make perfect sense. Weird, experimental, and surprisingly refreshing — proof that some timeless games are born when logic decides to take a nap. | © Nintendo

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Dreams have always been a playground for imagination – so it’s no surprise that video games, already halfway between fantasy and reality, love to wander there too. From peaceful naps that hide emotional revelations to labyrinthine nightmares filled with glitchy monsters, games have explored the unconscious in ways Freud could only dream of (pun intended).

These titles don’t just use sleep as a metaphor – they make it the whole mechanic, world, or mood. Sometimes, they’re cozy and hypnotic; other times, they twist comfort into pure unease. Either way, they remind us that when you press “Start,” you might just be falling asleep somewhere else.