A game jam game about pudgy chainsmoking dads seems to be Steam's latest co-op hit, hitting 100,000 concurrent players on its first weekend
It's a landmark year for the proximity-based voice chat party game. Mage Arena and R.E.P.O. have joined the likes of Lethal Company and Content Warning as wildly successful entrants into the nascent style—and genre superlative Peak made it comfortably into PC Gamer's Top 100 this year. Players are clearly itching for more, as evidenced by new kid on the block RV There Yet?'s rapid rise to 100,000 concurrent players. It's just started to dip as I write this, according to SteamDB. PC Gamer features producer Mollie Taylor was among that player count earlier this week, and in her impressions said "things are a little janky right now" but "the whole thing is darn fun." It's a physics-based adventure game where a bunch of pudgy dads haul a camper through perilous crags with a remote-operated winch, avoid getting eaten by bears, and exhale enough cigarette smoke to conceal a marching army. It's released to warm reception on Steam, with user reviews stabilizing at a "Very Positive" rating. The store page's top-rated review, by user LeGrandOptimist, reads "Fix RV. Smoke cig. Get mauled. Peak gaming." Another review by Steam user Bulldoge noted "Great game, especially the part where I can smoke and drink while driving an RV and not be jailed by the police." It looks like a goofy game, to be sure, but the screenshots showing an RV suspended between two cliff ledges by physics-based ropes has me curious about how involved the puzzles get. Developer Nuggets Entertainment has already put out multiple blog posts thanking the burgeoning community for its support and rolling out fixes. "First of all, we want to thank everyone for the enormous support. Our 8-week game jam game exceeded all expectations," reads a Steam update post from Thursday. Another from Friday said, "It's amazing to see everyone playing the game, and we are trying to sort through the issues as fast as we can." "We have been investigating the crashes, and even if we haven't solved them yet, we have gotten some progress. We haven't forgotten those of you that are crashing." If you're keen to give the game a shot, it's available on Steam.