King of Meat crashed hard. The multiplayer party platformer published by Amazon Games and developed by UK studio Glowmade had an internal launch target of around 100,000 concurrent players. During a free weekend promotion on Steam‘s front page, it peaked at 320 concurrent players. Player counts later dropped to single digits.
The game launched in October 2025 as a premium title priced at $30. It’s an online-only co-op party platformer with melee combat and user-generated obstacle courses. The catch? No couch co-op. Each player needs their own copy to play together.
Amazon poured money into marketing. The game appeared at Gamescom 2024’s Opening Night Live with a trailer featuring Geoff Keighley. MrBeast produced a special video with a $250,000 prize that racked up 6 million views. Amazon sponsored Twitch streamers to play it, ran multiple Discord Quest promotions, and pushed ads on Prime Video and YouTube.
One promotional push included a full-length animated cartoon pilot on YouTube, effectively pitching a transmedia universe around the game. Another featured a chocolate sculptor making King of Meat-themed creations. The game got front-page visibility on both Steam and the PlayStation Store.
The marketing didn’t translate to players. Within a month of launch, the game was discounted by 75%. Players who tried the free weekend reported mediocre movement mechanics, unsatisfying combat, and repetitive gameplay. The core platforming felt clunky rather than responsive. Since the fundamental gameplay didn’t click, features like the level editor couldn’t save it.
The 100,000 concurrent player target was unrealistic from the start. On any given day, fewer than ten games on Steam hit that number. They’re usually established giants like Counter-Strike 2, Dota 2, or PUBG. Even successful mid-tier multiplayer games typically sit between 10,000 and 40,000 concurrent players.
For comparison, Fall Guys peaked at around 172,000 concurrent players on Steam during the pandemic. It launched at a low price point and was free for PlayStation Plus subscribers before eventually going fully free-to-play. King of Meat tried to charge premium prices for a similar concept in a saturated market.
The business model worked against it. Party games need critical mass. They rely on quick matchmaking and full lobbies. When player counts drop, the experience collapses. An online-only game with no single-player or local co-op fallback becomes unplayable when the servers are empty.
The inevitable end
Amazon Games has struggled to land a sustained hit. New World peaked at 900,000 concurrent players in 2021 but shed most of its audience within a year. Lost Ark hit 1.3 million concurrent players at launch but faced similar retention issues. Despite owning Twitch and Prime Video, Amazon hasn’t cracked the code on long-term gaming success.
King of Meat now faces an online-only game’s worst fate: no players means no game. With matchmaking essentially dead, the experience it was designed around is impossible to access. Players are already speculating about an end-of-service announcement.
