What is REPO? The viral horror video game explained

If you’ve been on the gaming side of YouTube, Twitch, or just about any social media platform in the past week, you might have seen a brand-new game pop up in your feed: REPO. This viral video game sensation blew up seemingly overnight, and has had a massive response from players, streamers, and content creators alike.

But what, exactly, is REPO? What do you do in it, who made it, and where can you play it? Most importantly, why is it so popular? We’ve got the answers to all of those questions and more, in this guide going over everything you need to know about REPO, the viral video game sensation.

What is REPO?

REPO is a co-op multiplayer horror game in which players have to team up to deliver valuable objects to an extraction point while avoiding horrific creatures. Players have to communicate to achieve their goals, and the whole thing has a big focus on exaggerated physics simulation, much like Goat Simulator and many other games like it.

Up to six players can play together in a private lobby – there are no public lobbies in the game just yet – and the game features proximity voice chat. This means that you can hear other players that are close to you, but you probably can’t hear players that are far away. You can also purchase upgrades and weapons to make your time transporting valuables easier.

REPO was developed by indie developer Semiwork, a small team based in Uppsala, Sweden. Prior to REPO, Semiwork had only developed one other game, a “vividly animated action roguelite” called Voidigo. It, too, saw a decent amount of success, with a few thousand positive reviews on Steam, but it’s nowhere near on the level of REPO.

Why is REPO Popular?

This is a harder question to answer, but it’s followed a pretty similar trajectory to other viral games in recent years. REPO was released on Steam on February 27, 2025, but for its first week or so, it didn’t really see much success. Then, the internet did what it does best, and streamers from Twitch and YouTube stumbled upon it and played it on their streams. These streams were then turned into videos, hosted on YouTube, and clips of those videos were subsequently shared on Twitter, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts, where they went viral and ultimately fed back into the popularity of the game.

Now, there are hundreds of videos of the game on YouTube, some of which have racked up millions of views, and it’s pretty consistently in the top trending games on Twitch and YouTube streams. It also has over 30,000 reviews on Steam – a huge amount for a small game like this – and over 95% of those reviews are positive.

If we had to guess as to why it’s so popular, we’d put it down to three key factors. The first is that it’s a horror game, which leads to some bombastic reactions from popular streamers when a spooky creature pops up and ruins their day. The second is that it’s primarily a multiplayer experience, so the word of mouth grows exponentially because people – streamers and players alike – are playing and talking about it with friends. Finally, its focus on physics means that things get silly pretty quickly, which makes for very shareable moments and clips.

Is REPO Kid-Friendly?

REPO is ostensibly a horror game, so it could be a little bit too scary for younger children. No age rating is listed on the game’s Steam page, but based on what we’ve seen of the game, we’d recommend it for people aged 13 or above. Blood and gore is largely nonexistent, and most of the “horror” comes from jump scares and a spooky atmosphere.

Where Can You Play REPO?

At the moment, REPO is available exclusively on Steam, where it’ll set you back $9.99. It’s currently in Early Access, which means it’s not considered “finished,” but it is very playable in its current form, and content updates are coming very soon. Semiwork says REPO will be in Early Access for 6-12 months, and in that time, it plans to add “player customization, meta progression, more story elements, more upgrades, more equipment, more levels and enemies.” The price tag for REPO will increase when it hits its 1.0 release, so interested players should consider buying sooner rather than later.

At the time of writing, no plans have been announced to bring the game over to other platforms, so players hoping to play REPO on Nintendo Switch, PS5, or Xbox Series X|S are out of luck. Some listings appearing to show the game have appeared on storefronts like the PlayStation Store, but these do not appear to be legitimate. The only official version of REPO is on the Steam store on PC.