You’re a Janitor. Specifically, an "Anti-Adventure" protagonist. You spend your days picking up discarded snack wrappers and glowing medical waste in a sprawling, Technicolor spaceport. It’s loud. It’s overwhelming. And honestly, it’s one of the most honest depictions of poverty ever put into a video game.
Developed by Sundae Month and released back in 2016, Diaries of a Spaceport Janitor isn't about saving the galaxy. You aren't the Chosen One. You're barely even a background character. Most people play games to escape the mundane reality of labor, but this game leans so far into the "grind" that it becomes a surrealist masterpiece. It’s a "trash-em-up," as the developers called it. You wake up in a cramped shipping container, check your gender (which shifts daily like a flickering neon sign), and head out to burn trash.
It’s gross. It’s beautiful.
The Brutal Reality of the Spaceport Grind
Most games give you a power fantasy. This gives you a debt fantasy.
The core loop of Diaries of a Spaceport Janitor is intentionally tedious. You wander through Xabran's Rock, a dense, crowded space station, looking for piles of refuse. You have a laser incinerator. You zap the trash. You get credits. But the credits are never enough. You have to buy food so you don't starve. You have to buy "Luv" to keep your spirits up. Then there’s the "Gender" mechanic. Your character's gender is a literal status effect that changes every day, often requiring you to buy expensive "Gender-Shifters" to stop the screen from glitching or your character from feeling distressed.
It's a metaphor, sure, but it's also a mechanical hurdle.
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The game forces you to navigate a world that wasn't built for you. The walkways are crowded with tourists and heroes who look like they belong in a "real" RPG—warriors in gleaming armor, wizards, alien diplomats. They bump into you. They don't care. To them, you're part of the scenery. You’re the person who cleans up the loot they drop because it wasn't legendary enough to keep.
That Cursed Skull and the Meaning of Luck
Early in the game, you get cursed. A floating, screaming skull starts following you everywhere.
It’s annoying. It makes a horrific noise. It follows you into your sleep. Most games would make this a quest: "Find the Three Gems to Break the Curse." In Diaries of a Spaceport Janitor, the curse is just another thing you have to live with. It’s a chronic condition. It represents the way bad luck piles onto the poor. When you're already struggling to afford a meal, a screaming skull is just the universe’s way of saying, "And another thing!"
You can try to get rid of it. You can pray at various shrines to the many gods of the spaceport. But the gods are fickle. Sometimes they take your money and give you nothing back. Sometimes they give you a blessing that lasts five minutes. It’s a cynical, yet deeply human, look at how we try to find meaning in a system that is fundamentally rigged against us.
Why the Art Style is Actually a Gameplay Mechanic
Look at a screenshot of this game and your eyes might hurt.
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It uses a mix of flat 2D sprites in a 3D environment, smothered in low-res textures and high-contrast colors. It’s "Vaporwave" meets a dumpster fire. But the visual clutter is essential. It simulates the sensory overload of a bustling port. You’re supposed to feel lost. You’re supposed to struggle to find the "good" trash among the decorative plants and the feet of giant aliens.
- Low-Fi Aesthetics: The 32-bit inspired graphics make everything feel disposable.
- The UI: It’s clunky. It takes up space. It feels like old tech.
- The Soundscape: A constant drone of alien chatter, electronic beeps, and that God-forsaken skull.
There's no map. You have to learn the streets of Xabran's Rock by heart. You learn where the cheap food is. You learn which alleys have the best trash. You learn which shrines are most likely to help you. It’s environmental storytelling in its purest form—not through lore notes, but through the lived experience of navigating a slum.
The Subtle Narrative of the Diary
Every day ends with a diary entry. You get to pick a few words to describe how your day went.
"I felt... tired."
"I felt... hopeful."
It’s a small moment of agency in a world where you have none. These entries don't change the ending of the game—there isn't really a traditional "ending" anyway—but they track your emotional journey. It turns a repetitive labor simulator into a personal story. You aren't just a janitor; you’re a person with a history.
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Honestly, the game is a masterclass in empathy. By the third hour, you stop looking at the aliens as cool sci-fi designs and start looking at them as obstacles or potential sources of income. You start to resent the "adventurers." You see the discarded swords and think, "I can't even burn that, it's too big for my incinerator."
Challenging the Concept of "Play"
Is it fun? That’s the wrong question.
Diaries of a Spaceport Janitor is engaging. It’s evocative. It’s frustrating. If you’re looking for a dopamine hit from leveling up, you won’t find it here. The "leveling up" is just getting a slightly better bag so you can carry more garbage. It’s a subversion of the entire RPG genre.
Think about the games you usually play. You kill a monster, it drops gold. Where did that gold come from? Who has to clean up the blood? This game is the answer to the questions no one asks in Skyrim or Final Fantasy. It’s the "After" of every epic battle.
Actionable Steps for New Janitors
If you're going to dive into Xabran's Rock, don't go in expecting a standard game. You have to shift your mindset.
- Embrace the wandering. Don't try to "win." There is no win state. Just try to survive the week. Explore the sewers. Check the back alleys.
- Manage your "Luv" and Hunger carefully. Eating the cheapest food might save money, but it won't help your mood. Balance is everything.
- Talk to the NPCs. Even if they ignore you or insult you, the dialogue in this game is sharp and hilarious. It builds a world that feels much bigger than the few blocks you're allowed to sweep.
- Pay attention to the music. The soundtrack by Michael "Moneyshot" Bell is incredible and changes based on where you are and how you’re feeling.
- Don't rush to get rid of the skull. It’s part of the experience. Let it scream. It’s your only real companion for a long time.
Diaries of a Spaceport Janitor is a reminder that video games can be more than just power fantasies. They can be reflections of the struggle to exist in a world that doesn't care about you. It’s a punk-rock masterpiece disguised as a chore simulator. Go buy a stim-pack, zap some trash, and try not to let the cosmic horror get you down.
The most important thing to remember is that Xabran’s Rock is indifferent to your existence. Once you accept that, the game actually becomes quite meditative. You stop worrying about the "main quest" because there isn't one. You just exist. In a medium obsessed with making the player the center of the universe, being a nobody is the most radical thing you can be.