Halloween: The Game Review: Banned Before It Launched

This Halloween: The Game review starts with the strangest fact first: it's Mostly Positive at 5,111 Steam reviews, and the game hasn't technically released yet. IllFonic's asymmetric horror take on Michael Myers has been live for Deluxe Edition buyers for about a week ahead of the September 8 wide release, and in that week it's picked up a hotfix, a country-wide ban, and a quietly deleted minigame. Here's what's actually in the build right now, not what the marketing promised.

Key Takeaways

• Base edition releases September 8, 2026 at $39.99. The $59.99 Deluxe Edition already granted early access, which is why review data exists before the wide launch.
• Mostly Positive at 5,111 Steam reviews (70.9%), a real signal of engagement, not just hype.
• 1v4 asymmetric multiplayer (Michael Myers vs. Heroes of Haddonfield) plus a free singleplayer mode retelling the 1978 film from Michael's perspective.
• Banned in Australia over a drug-use depiction, confirmed directly by IllFonic and covered by PC Gamer.
• A closet hide-together minigame was removed from the Deluxe build days after launch without an official explanation.

Overview

IllFonic knows this genre. This is the studio behind Friday the 13th: The Game and Predator: Hunting Grounds, both built on the same 1-vs-many asymmetric formula, and Halloween is a direct continuation of that playbook with a different license. One player becomes Michael Myers, hunting the quiet suburban streets of 1978 Haddonfield. Up to four others play Heroes of Haddonfield, arming themselves with household items, alerting neighbors, and trying to survive the night. Built on Unreal Engine 5, the pitch is a "living, breathing" sandbox where NPCs react, call the police, and can be armed to fight back.

Fans weighing whether this beats other recent horror-adjacent multiplayer picks should also see our Frog Sqwad co-op extraction platformer coverage for a lighter, less bloody alternative built around a similar tension-and-teamwork idea. The most genuinely interesting addition over Friday the 13th is "The Night He Came Home," a free standalone singleplayer mode retelling the original 1978 film's events through Michael's own eyes. It's the first time this specific angle has been playable rather than just watched, and it's a smart way to give solo players something real instead of leaving singleplayer as an afterthought bolted onto a multiplayer-first game.

GODEEPER: For a different horror sandbox built around NPC-driven emergent systems, our Abiotic Factor coverage breaks down a very different genre doing something structurally similar. Abiotic Factor Beginner Guide: Tips for New Players →

What's actually in the build right now

The core chase loop works the way you'd hope. Michael doesn't run, he walks, and the game leans hard into that: watching him approach at a fixed, unhurried pace while your own character can't quite get the door open in time is the exact tension the 1978 film built its reputation on. When it clicks, it clicks.

The slow, unhurried approach is the one thing the game consistently gets right: no sprint button, no jump scares needed, just the dread of watching him close the distance.

What doesn't work yet is largely systemic. Steam reviews posted in the last week describe Michael turning invisible for the rest of a match after being shot, players getting physically stuck inside fridge doors, and NPCs that freeze, ignore commands, or fail to follow basic pathing. One recent review put it bluntly: NPCs are "basically everything you need to do in this game," which makes their current unreliability a bigger problem than a cosmetic bug list would suggest, since the Hero side's entire strategic layer depends on convincing and coordinating with them. Another reviewer, generally positive on the concept, called the $59.99 Deluxe price "$20 extra to playtest a beta" given the state of the build.

IllFonic has been responsive at least: an "Early Access - Hotfix 1" patch shipped within days specifically targeting the most common crashes, with the studio's own post promising a larger patch addressing player-reported issues is already in progress. That's a faster cadence than a lot of Early Access launches manage in their first week, closer to the pace our Abiotic Factor Tarasque boss guide documents for a survival game that also leaned on rapid post-launch patching to fix a rough system.

The Rabbit in Red Lounge, a location pulled straight from the original film, rendered with a deliberately grainy, VHS-adjacent color treatment throughout the game's visual style.

The controversy nobody was expecting

Two separate stories broke around Halloween: The Game before its wide release, and neither is the kind of thing a licensed slasher game usually generates. First: the game is banned outright in Australia. The country's classification board flagged a drug-use depiction as the disqualifying element, a call that reads as strange given the game's premise is built entirely around a masked killer stabbing people, which passed classification without issue. IllFonic confirmed the ban directly, and PC Gamer's coverage frames it accurately as an inconsistency in how different classification boards weigh violence against other content categories, not a decision IllFonic had any control over.

Second, and more directly IllFonic's own call: a minigame that let two survivors hide together in a closet for a gameplay buff existed in the Deluxe Edition's early access build, then disappeared a few days in without a changelog entry explaining why. PC Gamer picked up the removal, and it shows up in Steam reviews too, with at least one player calling the quiet removal itself "a huge red flag" independent of whether the feature belonged in the game at all. Removing content is a normal part of live development. Removing it without saying so, in a build people already paid a $20 premium to access early, is the part players are reacting to.

GODEEPER: For another asymmetric multiplayer horror game handling its Early Access period very differently, our WARDOGS coverage breaks down how transparent, even self-deprecating communication can shape early reception before launch. WARDOGS Early Access: 100 Players, $10K Cash Start →

Rubric assessment

Chase tension: strong. The slow-walk pursuit and the moment-to-moment dread of a Michael encounter are the game's clearest success, and they're the part most directly inherited from IllFonic's Friday the 13th experience.

Technical stability: weak. Invisible-Michael bugs, fridge softlocks, and unreliable NPCs aren't minor jank, they're the kind of issues that can end a match outright, and they're common enough in recent reviews to read as systemic rather than isolated.

Trust and communication: mixed. A fast hotfix is a good sign. A quietly removed feature in a paid early-access tier is not, and it's the kind of decision that costs more goodwill than the feature itself was probably worth.

Value at current price: depends on the edition. $39.99 for the base edition, once it's live and further patched, is a reasonable ask for this genre. $59.99 for Deluxe, based on what reviewers are describing right now, is asking full price for beta access.

Readers weighing this against other licensed horror multiplayer picks should also see our Ground Branch 1.0 coverage for how a different tactical multiplayer game handled its own rocky full-release transition, and our How to Fish review if a lighter, less bug-prone co-op experience is what you're actually after this week. For a different flavor of dread entirely, our Static Dread: The Submarine launch coverage covers a horror game trading a masked killer for claustrophobic isolation, and our Cthulhu: The Cosmic Abyss review is worth a look if puzzle-driven horror interests you more than an asymmetric chase.

Verdict

If genre pedigree matters more to you than IP recognition, our MOUSE: P.I. For Hire review and Blood Dungeon review both cover recent releases from teams with a track record worth knowing about, the same kind of studio-history context that matters here given IllFonic's own Friday the 13th history.

Buy the base edition once it's live on September 8, and only after checking for a patch beyond Hotfix 1. The chase fantasy genuinely works when the game isn't fighting you with a bug, and "The Night He Came Home" is a real, free addition worth trying regardless of how you feel about the multiplayer side. Skip the Deluxe Edition specifically: paying a $20 premium for a build reviewers are actively describing as beta-quality, on top of a content removal IllFonic hasn't explained, is a worse trade than waiting two weeks for the dust to settle.

Rating: 6.5/10

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Halloween: The Game worth buying? It's Mostly Positive at 5,111 Steam reviews (70.9%), which reflects a genuinely fun asymmetric horror premise undercut by real bugs and a content-removal controversy. Wait for a patch or two unless you specifically want in during Early Access.

Why is Halloween: The Game banned in Australia? The Australian Classification Board flagged a drug-use depiction in the game, which under Australia's guidelines is treated more strictly than graphic violence. The game cannot be legally sold in Australia as a result, confirmed by IllFonic's own Steam post and PC Gamer's coverage.

What happened to the closet minigame in Halloween: The Game? A minigame letting two survivors hide together in a closet for a gameplay buff was present in the Deluxe Edition's early access build, then quietly removed days later without an official changelog explanation. PC Gamer confirmed the removal; IllFonic has not issued a public statement on why.

When does Halloween: The Game release? The base $39.99 edition releases September 8, 2026. The $59.99 Deluxe Edition has already granted early access, which is why the game already has thousands of Steam reviews ahead of the wider release.

Is Halloween: The Game multiplayer only? No. Alongside the 1v4 asymmetric multiplayer (one player as Michael Myers, four as Heroes of Haddonfield), there's a free singleplayer story mode, "The Night He Came Home," retelling the 1978 film's events from Michael's point of view.

References

• Halloween: The Game on Steam: official store page, editions, and current reviews.
• Launch Trailer | Halloween: The Game: official trailer, IllFonic YouTube channel.
• Halloween: The Game is banned in Australia because incentivized drug use is bad but incentivized ultra-violence isn't: PC Gamer, on the Australian classification ban.
• The Halloween game has a sex minigame in it, except no it doesn't, because it was apparently removed: PC Gamer, on the removed closet minigame.