Prop Hunt-style Game ‘Mannequin’ Goes Free-to-Play on Quest as Freemium Multiplayer Games Thrive

Mannequin (2024), the VR game that brings a unique twist to prop hunt, is going free-to-play on Quest starting today—which could point to more developers opting to go the freemium route.

Launched last June on Quest and SteamVR headsets, Mannequin isn’t your typical shooter, nor is it your typical game of prop hunt, which usually involves a team of hunters shooting everything that moves, and their prey evading them by morphing into everyday objects.

Instead, two gun-toting Agents hunt three shape-shifting aliens, aka Mannequins, who can evade capture by blending into crowds of frozen NPCs. Agents can track down a Mannequin to a general area, but can only fire their gun once before a cool down period, giving aliens the perfect moment to leap out and strike down the hunter.

Now, developer Fast Travel Games is making Mannequin free-to-play on Quest, which includes the base game and a variety of maps. A $10 in-app purchase adds in progression-locked character skins, custom games, rotating game types, more maps, and mod support. The studio hasn’t mentioned any other microtransactions beyond that $10 paywall.

Much like Gorilla Tag, Mannequin will still be a paid app on Steam, albeit with a new price of $10 (originally $20). While the studio hasn’t said as much, Another Axiom says Gorilla Tag does this to keep away griefers, who can more easily hack the game on PC and clog servers with unwanted behavior.

The free-to-play launch also comes with a new update, which includes a new map, called ‘Towers’, which introduces portals to the game for the first time. You can find Mannequin over on the Horizon Store for Quest 2 and above for free, and over on Steam for PC VR headsets, priced at $10.

But why free-to-play, and why now? While generally well-received, Mannequin isn’t the most popular multiplayer game out there; we haven’t seen concurrent player numbers on Quest, its most popular platform, although on Steam it only counted an all-time peak of 26 PC players following launch, according to SteamDB data. Making the game free-to-play will undoubtedly boost those numbers across both platforms, although there seems to be something bigger at play.

While freemium games like Gorilla Tag, Population: One, Rec Room, and Animal Company have fared well on Quest in the past, the free-to-play trend appears to be growing on the standalone platform.

Meta’s VP of Metaverse Content, Samantha Ryan, recently confirmed that Quest has seen an influx of younger users with the launch of Quest 3S, which is contributing to the rise of free-to-play titles. Younger players tend to spend more time in social games—and while Ryan doesn’t explicitly state this—they also spend more money on in-app purchases.

So, while Mannequin certainly isn’t the first, we expect it won’t be the last ‘premium’ Quest game to jump on the free-to-play bandwagon following Meta’s announcement, as developers are undoubtedly looking to nab even a fraction of the virality Gorilla Tag saw, which led it to topping $100 million in gross revenue last summer.