UPDATE (Feb 13): Renaissance PR has officially responded to our report. Read the latest here.

Starsand Island has attracted attention about a surge of positive Steam reviews. The game garnered significant traction, with hundreds of thousands of wishlist additions prior to its launch. Critics have generally praised it, although it remains rough around the edges.

Currently, fan communities are actively discussing the latest user reviews on Steam. A number of new reviews have sparked debate about whether some are unusual or suspicious. Similar patterns have been observed in other games.

Starsand Island Fans Are Noticing Positive Reviews From Susceptible Accounts

On Steam, Starsand Island displays a “Very Positive” rating from early user reviews at launch. At the time of writing, official store data shows the game’s rating at around 91 percent positive. However, multiple concerns are emerging about recent positive reviews in communities like Reddit. Many of these reviews seem inconsistent with actual playtime, achievements, and game features. This doesn’t mean all of the new reviews are suspicious, some have really consistent content.

There are independent critic reviews that reflect a mixed but generally positive impression. The developers intended to use this Early Access period to refine systems and gather community feedback, with players contributing to future updates.

Some of these Steam accounts have minimal gameplay time or no achievements, and mention features not in the Early Access, such as the multiplayer mode. This has led to the narrative of inauthentic reviews, although no official investigation or statement has been made.

Since the game has bugs and quality inconsistencies typical of Early Access releases, fans doubt that these reviews reflect actual gameplay. New positive reviews are appearing every few minutes in the Starsand Island Steam community.

These concerns are shared widely in forum posts as reasons to suspect review inflation or paid reviews. Steam’s public policies prohibit manipulative review practices, but there is no confirmed evidence yet.

After a few hours, the Starsand Island developers have responded and here is the follow up on it.