Halloween: The Game Is Playable Now for Deluxe Buyers, and Everyone Else Gets Michael Myers on September 8

We have been watching this one for about a year, ever since IllFonic announced it was taking on John Carpenter's 1978 slasher, and as of yesterday it is real. Halloween: The Game opened its advance access window on September 4 at 9 AM PT for anyone who bought the $59.99 Digital Deluxe Edition. The rest of us get in on September 8, also at 9 AM PT, when the $39.99 standard edition unlocks on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC through Steam and the Epic Games Store.

The pitch is simple. One player wears the mask and stalks the quiet suburb of Haddonfield on Halloween night, 1978. Four players try to stop him. The twist that separates this from the studio's earlier licensed horror games is that the town itself is populated with civilians who react to what is happening, and protecting them matters as much as saving yourself.

Video: IllFonic on YouTube

What ships on day one

IllFonic and publisher Gun Interactive laid out the launch content on the official site, and it is more than we expected from a game in this genre. The headline addition is a standalone single player story mode that plays through "The Night He Came Home" from Michael Myers' perspective. That has never been done in a Halloween game before, and it gives people who have no interest in online matches a reason to look.

The multiplayer is a 1v4 asymmetrical mode with four maps at launch: Haddonfield Town Center, Haddonfield Heights, Orange Grove Estates and East Haddonfield. Ten civilian characters are playable in the base game, with two more, Richard and Alexis, reserved for the Digital Deluxe Edition. Civilians build a deck through a Perk Card system and arm themselves with household items and weapons, and they can also convince neighbors to call the police, which brings increasingly heavy patrols onto the map and forces Michael to stay hidden. On his side of the fence, Michael unlocks skins, tints, starting weapons, weapon executions and new abilities as he progresses, and the studio says there are hundreds of cosmetic items across both roles.

One detail worth knowing before you buy: Michael cannot be killed. Survivors can knock him down and buy time, but the match is about escape and rescue, not a kill. That is faithful to the films and it changes how a round feels compared to other games in the space. If you already spend your evenings in asymmetrical horror, our Dead by Daylight codes page is the natural companion while you decide whether to add a second one.

Reviews and the early verdict

Critics got their copies ahead of the advance access window, and the consensus is positive but not glowing. The Metascore on PC sits at 75 from eight reviews as we write this, split evenly between positive and mixed with no negative scores. The praise centers on the atmosphere, the faithful recreation of Haddonfield, and the fact that both playing Michael and playing a hero feel good. The recurring criticisms are unreliable civilian AI, matches that run long, and open questions about how much variety four maps will hold up over months of play.

Preorder bonuses stay available through the advance access period. Anyone who buys the Deluxe Edition before September 8 at 9 AM PT still gets the Phantom Michael Myers skin and the rest of the preorder set, so the deadline for that is the full launch, not the start of early access.

Our take: a 75 for a licensed asymmetrical horror game at $39.99 is a decent result, and the single player story is the part we are most curious about. The multiplayer will live or die on how quickly IllFonic adds maps and fixes the AI. We would wait for the standard edition on September 8 rather than pay $20 extra for four days, unless the two bonus civilians matter to you.