Why Among Us Took 2 Years to Take Over The World // Among Us, The Most Popular Game

Among Us is the hot new game of 2020. Except, it isn't. English-speaking audiences are discovering Innersloth's answer to Mafia or Werewolf a little late - gamers in South Korea and Brazil have been enjoying this game for several years already.

The prevailing narrative surrounding Among Us is that the game released in 2018, then sat, ignored, on Steam for two years before big name Twitch streamers such as Sodapoppin and xQc brought it out of obscurity.

This isn't the full story. The game didn't suddenly become popular overnight; it was actually the result of a slow burn, as it grew over time.

Had Among Us really gone from a handful of players to millions overnight, there's no way the process would have been this smooth. Even the challenge of scaling up the game's online multiplayer aspect from dozens to thousands of consecutive players proved difficult back in 2018.

Thankfully, Among Us grew slowly enough that Innersloth were able to fully rise to meet player needs bit by bit. Perhaps that's why the game has grown so well over this time - the developers have (sometimes begrudgingly) added new features and elements when requested by players. The game's success is thanks to an open dialogue between its fans and its creators, as the player base grew slowly from nobody to millions of people.

This is a nice story. We always like to learn about indie games that go big. It's particularly unusual to hear of a game that doesn't exactly take off at launch, but that grows slowly over time to top Steam and Twitch charts.

It's nice to remember that even if you don't achieve your dreams first try, it's worth continuing to work at them. You never know where you'll end up, so long as you don't give up.