The Among Us phenomenon is one of the defining events of the last year in gaming. A multiplayer game that came and went in 2018 became a blockbuster hit two years later when the world needed a distraction that doubled as a watercooler. Friends laughed together as they shot each other out of the airlock, and the small team at Innersloth ran with the sudden success. As with any gaming fad, bigger companies will want in on that action, but there hasn't been a Fortnite to Among Us' PUBG as of yet. Perhaps those who've tried to capture the essence of Innersloth's work have found that lightning of this type just doesn't strike twice.
Among Us is what's known as a social deduction game, with gameplay focused on literally sussing out the impostor in a group of colorful aliens. The genre goes back many years as a tabletop party game, but video game adaptions have popped up frequently as well. Some of the more well-known examples are Garry's Mod mod Trouble in Terrorist Town, Secret Neighbor, and Jackbox Party Pack inclusion Push The Button. Even before the unique global circumstances that made Among Us a smashing success, the genre was naturally picking up momentum. A retooled Among Us releasing a year later can't capitalize on that.
Speaking of, the COVID-19 pandemic was undoubtedly a factor in Among Us' sudden rise to prominence. Because players were stuck at home for intermittently long stretches, they sought out any way to connect with friends. For gamers, this meant finding a new multiplayer outlet, and Among Us basically won the lottery and gained popularity thanks to word of mouth among YouTubers and Twitch streamers. While bigger publishers could buy their way to a similar number of streams and videos, it's doubtful that they'd receive a similarly big player response as the world shifts to a post-pandemic state.
Among Us Feels Too Honest To Replicate
Even if a company at the scale of Ubisoft, EA, or Microsoft could somehow find a way to get their Among Us-like trending, there's something to Innersloth's presentation that just wouldn't work on a grander scale. Everything about Among Us looks handcrafted, and that's definitely on purpose. Innersloth's presentation speaks to a generation who love games like Fortnite and Roblox where graphics take a backseat to simplistic gameplay loops. It's more about hanging out with friends than it is mastering some complex or intricate strategy, and few publishers outside of Epic Games have really caught onto that.
AAA games put themselves at the center of a player's world, and games like Among Us do exactly the opposite. Innersloth's indie success is fun to play, but it's also a way to get friends together and hanging out. Among Us facilitates conversation and loosens everyone up even in its most tense movements. Any publisher looking to capture the success of Among Us should aim to capture that vibe and style instead of the social deduction gameplay. Innersloth has won that particular race, but players and content creators alike are always hungry for something new.