The free-to-play game’s popularity has grown steadily since V from the K-pop group BTS — real name Kim Tae-hyung — played it on a live stream. He began streaming “Goose Goose Duck” on Nov. 27 on the social networking app Weverse, where he’s also played other popular multiplayer titles like the original “Among Us” and “Fall Guys.” (Weverse is owned and operated by Hybe, the company behind BTS.)
In “Goose Goose Duck,” players take on the role of geese and must work together to suss out the dastardly ducks hiding among them in disguise. It shares a similar premise and 2D visuals of “Among Us,” but with a more extensive list of game modes and possible roles for players, including other birds like the Dodo, who wins by getting voted off, or the Vulture, who wins by eating the remains of their less-fortunate crewmates.
“Goose Goose Duck” first released in October 2021 after a six-month early access period, and on average saw a few thousand players each day, based on data from Steam Charts. After Tae-hyung began streaming it, the number of concurrent players shot up almost immediately, from around 15,000 at the start of November to 160,000 by the end.
According to industry analyst Daniel Ahmad, “Goose Goose Duck” has been going viral in Asian markets over the past month, particularly in China and Korea. “We’ve been tracking the title since late November when it first started gaining traction. Interesting to see it’s only really starting to receive attention globally now,” he said in a Thursday tweet.
With that spotlight has comes its fair share of issues. Earlier this week, the flood of new players briefly overwhelmed developer Gaggle Studios’ servers, resulting in an outage.
“We appreciate all the love and support, we expected a large increase in players but not like this,” the indie studio wrote in an update on Steam. “250k increase of our already massive player base was too much. We’re working on increasing capacity as fast as we can and will keep everyone updated. We apologize for the inconvenience, we’re all working hard to make sure everyone can play.”
The outpouring is indicative of the sheer popularity of BTS, one of the world’s most successful recording artists with tens of millions of fans. The group, which is currently on hiatus, has previously made waves in the games industry with its collaborations with popular titles “Cookie Run: Kingdom” and “Fortnite.”
