Friendslop
Friendslop
Friendslop is a subgenre of cooperative video game that focus on a low barrier of entry and social interaction. Created as a portmanteau of "friend" and "slop", these social games tend to be low-budget, low-cost indie games intended to attract entire friend groups to purchase copies to play together online.
Friendslop
The friendslop genre is purported to have originated with the 2018 social deduction video game Among Us, though their popularity skyrocketed during the COVID-19 pandemic as a means of remotely connecting with friends and loved ones during the quarantine. Even after the pandemic, these games remained highly popular as a means for people to spend time together remotely. The term "friendslop" originated from a 2024 post by an X user as a satirical way to describe slice of life anime; however, its more common interpretation was coined in March 2025 by another X) user who also described these games as "friendfarming)." While intended as a joke, the post went viral and was taken seriously by many who mocked and derided these types of games. The popularity of the 2025 co-op survival video game Peak) led to a drastic increase in use of the term amongst gaming media and players, shifting to a more descriptive usage, though it continued to be used as a derogatory term to accuse similar games of being cash-ins.
Common elements
Core common elements of friendslop games include a low entry difficulty that allows people of any gaming skill to participate, and a focus on social interaction. Usually these games will feature a team working towards a common goal, such as hunting a ghost in Phasmophobia), or climbing a mountain in Peak.) Games with extraction gameplay elements like Lethal Company and R.E.P.O. are also often labeled as friendslop games. Proximity chat is common, giving a level of realism to the interactions between players, and allowing their character models' mouths to lip sync with their voices. Many friendslop games also have a focus on physics interactions and utilize low-fidelity 3D graphics. These games are typically considered to be more affordable, usually costing US$20 or less.
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