The Headliners

About

In "The Headliners" , you and your team of 1-4 journalists investigate mysterious creatures attacking New York. Armed with cameras, you explore dangerous environments, take photos of destruction and alien invaders, and hope your shots make headlines to earn more press cards and continue your journey. Each expedition uses one press card, and only headline-worthy photos ensure your survival.

Genres & Tags

Play Modes

91%

Audience ScoreBased on 3,440 reviews

humor396 positive mentions

stability72 negative mentions

The Headliners is a hilarious and chaotic game that provides endless entertainment, especially when played with friends.
The mix of horror and dark humor keeps every session unpredictable, leading to memorable moments and laughter.
The game has a solid foundation with unique mechanics, and players appreciate the potential for future updates and content.

The game suffers from bugs and performance issues, including audio glitches and inconsistent frame rates.
Many players find the gameplay repetitive after a few sessions, with limited variety in maps and monsters.
The lack of audio settings and the inability to see friends' photos in the results can detract from the overall experience.

humor
398 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
99%
1%
The humor in the game is a standout feature, blending horror and dark comedy to create unpredictable and chaotic moments that leave players in stitches. Many reviews highlight the hilarious interactions, especially through proximity chat and the game's quirky mechanics, which lead to memorable and often absurd situations, particularly when playing with friends. Overall, the game is praised for its ability to evoke laughter while maintaining a spooky atmosphere, making it a fun experience for groups.
- “The mix of horror and dark humor keeps every session unpredictable, and the way the game forces you to take risks for the best shots makes for some chaotic moments that will have you in tears laughing.”
- “This game is hilarious, fun, and a good time with friends.”
- “I was laughing my head off at all the situations we got ourselves into, and there is so much scope for chaos and crazy moments.”
- “Taking photos instead of filming is way more boring and not funny at all.”
gameplay
208 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
37%
60%
4%
The gameplay is characterized by simple yet effective mechanics that enhance immersion, particularly through proximity chat and cooperative elements. While the core gameplay loop is engaging and offers potential for fun with friends, many players note that it feels somewhat repetitive and lacks polish, with some bugs and a need for additional content. Overall, the game shows promise but requires further development to fully realize its potential.
- “Amazing and engaging gameplay.”
- “The gameplay masterfully blends creativity and survival, rewarding daring and well-timed shots.”
- “It's a small and cheap game with funny mechanics and engaging gameplay.”
- “The potential of the game is phenomenal, I love the idea of it, I liked the look of it, but the actual execution is just a mess of bland gameplay and bugs.”
- “The gameplay loop itself is a bit shallow compared to something like Phasmophobia or Demonologist, so it's not something I can see myself spending a ton of time in outside of the laughs.”
- “The game lacks potential, and its gameplay feels stale and repetitive.”
graphics
98 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
31%
65%
4%
The graphics of the game have received mixed feedback, with many players appreciating the unique art style and vibrant aesthetics, while others criticize the limited graphics settings and optimization issues, particularly for lower-end systems. Some users noted the graphics as fun and engaging, with a cartoonish charm, but highlighted the need for more customization options to enhance performance. Overall, while the visuals are generally well-received, there are calls for improvements in settings and optimization to accommodate a wider range of hardware.
- “I love the graphics and art style of this game (especially compared to the two others I mentioned above) - it's bright, colorful, and interesting - yet still manages to feel menacing.”
- “The 'dessert' of graphics and sound design was decadent, with lush visuals and an immersive soundtrack that really made the game feel like a 'full-course meal'.”
- “I loved the neon city feel; the grey sci-fi art style is really overdone in similar games, so this feels super fresh.”
- “There are hardly any graphics settings, and due to that the game is unplayable for a friend of mine that's on a lower-end laptop.”
- “The settings could use a bit more refinement in my opinion, especially graphics settings; currently, there's just a preset of high and lowest.”
- “The lack of some graphical settings is a bit less enticing for people with a lower-end system, such as one of my friends, but these are all things which can be fixed and added in time, I'm sure.”
story
80 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
8%
89%
4%
The game's story is described as minimal, with players primarily focused on completing missions and capturing photos of chaotic events, often leading to humorous situations. While some players express a desire for a more developed narrative or career mode, the current experience is characterized by immersive gameplay and the thrill of surviving encounters with various monsters. Overall, the story aspect is seen as lacking depth, with suggestions for additional quests and side missions to enhance engagement.
- “It’s one of those experiences where you feel completely immersed in its world and can’t help but be captivated by the unique blend of storytelling and gameplay.”
- “This is such a fun game, especially taking selfies with your partners while they get ripped apart by otherworldly creatures, and... get to the choppa for that headlining story.”
- “☐ no story”
- “Very little enemy variety means the game gets stale after the second mission.”
- “I would love to see a story mode for this game just to see how things go and how it ends.”
stability
76 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
3%
3%
95%
The game is currently experiencing significant stability issues, with numerous bugs, glitches, and audio problems reported by players. While many find it enjoyable and fun to play with friends, the frequency of crashes and gameplay interruptions detracts from the overall experience. Players acknowledge that these issues are expected in a newly released title and express hope for future patches and improvements from the developers.
- “It runs great and plays great for day one... can't wait to see what happens in a week or even a month.”
- “Definitely feels like a buggy 'content warning' cash grab.”
- “This game is so buggy it's unplayable.”
- “Bit too glitchy and buggy to fully enjoy, helicopter getting trapped by car and trees, can't complete mission, getting glitched in ceiling, camera going off map when dying.”
optimization
64 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
25%
53%
22%
The game currently faces significant optimization issues, particularly on mid-range PCs, leading to unpredictable performance and frame drops. While some players report that it runs fine on their systems, many express a desire for improvements, especially given its early access status. Overall, there is a consensus that with further optimization and bug fixes, the game has great potential.
- “I do hope that the game will be optimized further as this game itself is still new.”
- “With further optimization, bug fixes, and the introduction of new features, there is certainly potential for this to be a party game I could recommend on more than a once-or-twice-off experience.”
- “The game has good potential if they get the performance issues down.”
- “Game with bad optimization on mid-range PC; occurrences are very predictable, 'aliens' or whatever this is do not interact with players at all.”
- “However, the game's performance is all over the place and the early game is not fun.”
- “Cannot recommend, so badly optimized; I get stuck in a corner or my movement is taken away from me... it'll chug like hell too.”
atmosphere
30 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
67%
23%
10%
The game's atmosphere is widely praised for its immersive and chilling qualities, characterized by a chaotic city environment filled with grotesque creatures and eerie audio. Players enjoy the blend of creepy moments and frantic gameplay, often highlighting the fun of experiencing it with friends. While some noted occasional lulls in monster activity, the overall ambiance is considered engaging and well-designed, contributing significantly to the game's appeal.
- “The eerie city and grotesque creatures create a tense, immersive atmosphere.”
- “Creepy atmosphere and occasional frantic moments combined with hilarious shenanigans and morally questionable choices.”
- “The atmosphere is crazy and the audio is chilling.”
- “It really gives vibes of lethal company and content warning while still managing to give its own atmosphere.”
replayability
28 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
36%
54%
11%
The game's replayability is a mixed bag, with some players praising its potential for co-op fun and unique moments, while others feel it currently lacks depth and longevity. Many hope for future content updates to enhance replayability, as the game is still new and has room for growth in maps and features. Overall, while there are enjoyable aspects that encourage replay, the current experience may lead to long breaks between play sessions.
- “Extremely hilarious, good replayability, amazing world building, love the physics.”
- “Another great addition to the co-op horror genre, the emphasis on capturing moments really makes the game infinitely replayable.”
- “While there’s room for growth, like more maps and progression features, the game’s unique concept and replayability make it a standout.”
- “The game needs to be expanded for more replayability.”
- “Replayability is strictly based on your group's ability to screw around, but even then it's likely that you'll put the game down for months until a new content drop comes out, then you'll play it again for an hour or two, then repeat until the devs feel they're finished with the game and move on to something else.”
- “There is no real replayability.”
grinding
10 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
10%
10%
80%
Players find the grinding aspect of the game to be tedious and repetitive, often requiring excessive time investment without a meaningful leveling system to justify it. While the experience can be enjoyable with friends, it tends to become monotonous after a few hours, especially when faced with artificially inflated difficulty through increased score requirements and monster spawns.
- “You'll need a second life for grinding.”
- “Likewise, it becomes tedious when you and your friends have to keep doing the same thing over and over again, with the difficulty artificially padded by increasing the score requirement and number of spawning monsters.”
- “Headliners is one of the games I'd group under 'streamer bait,' fun with everyone watching, tedious if it's just you and your friends.”
- “Tedious with no real leveling system to make it worthwhile.”
music
10 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
40%
30%
30%
The music in the game has received mixed feedback; while some players appreciate the immersive soundtrack that enhances the overall experience, others find it lacking in quantity and volume control options. Many users express disappointment over the limited music presence and the inability to adjust audio levels for music, sound effects, and voice chat individually, which can hinder communication during multiplayer sessions. Overall, the sound design is praised for its quality, but the lack of customization and balance detracts from the experience.
- “The 'dessert' of graphics and sound design was decadent, with lush visuals and an immersive soundtrack that really made the game feel like a 'full-course meal'.”
- “A fun little game in the same vein as Lethal Company, and multiplayer works very well. The proxy chat was a bit quiet compared to the music, making it hard to hear friends, but overall a good game; I would recommend it.”
- “There's also very little music, which is also disappointing.”
- “I would like to see individual volume sliders for SFX, music, ambiance, and for each person in your group.”
- “The proxy chat was a bit quiet compared to the music, making it hard to hear friends.”
monetization
8 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The monetization aspect of the game is widely criticized as a "cash grab," with users noting its unpolished nature and buggy performance. Despite hopes for improvements through updates, many feel that the game primarily capitalizes on trends rather than delivering quality content.
- “Definitely feels like a buggy 'content warning' cash grab.”
- “Updates may make it better, but definitely feels like a cash grab.”
- “Really unpolished cash grab on the trend that Lethal Company started.”
emotional
2 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The emotional aspect of the game is described as profoundly heartbreaking, evoking strong feelings of sadness and empathy in players.
- “Heartbreaking.”
- “Heartbreaking.”