How to Fish vs. PEAK vs. Lethal Company: Which Friendslop Game Should You and Your Friends Play?

TL;DR

• All three games cost under $10 and support up to 4 players in online co-op.
• How to Fish is the newest (August 2026), cheapest at launch, and best for groups who want fish, weapons, and chaotic progression.
• PEAK (June 2025) is the best all-rounder with proximity chat, daily-changing maps, and the most replayability.
• Lethal Company (October 2023) is the genre-defining original with 97% positive reviews and a huge mod scene.
• If you only buy one — PEAK for most groups, How to Fish if you want something fresh right now.

What Is a Friendslop Game?

The word “friendslop” started popping up on social media in early 2025. It describes a wave of cheap, chaotic co-op games on Steam that rely on your friend group to supply the comedy the game itself does not fully deliver on its own.

The term sounds a bit harsh. But many of the developers behind these games have actually embraced it. Caelan Pollock, one of the creators of PEAK, said in an interview that “friendslop” is something that assumes you and your friends will make up the difference in comedy and interaction in what the game is lacking. He added that his team loves the term.

These games share a few things in common. They are cheap (usually under $10), they work best with 2 to 4 friends, and they are designed to generate funny moments more than to tell a deep story. How to Fish is the latest entry in this wave, and it lands at just $4.95 during its launch discount on Steam — making it the perfect excuse to revisit this question: which friendslop game should you actually buy?

How to Fish vs. PEAK vs. Lethal Company: A Quick Overview

Before going deep on each game, here is a fast look at what each one actually is.

• How to Fish — Released August 20, 2026 by Dazed Games. A physics-based fishing game where you crash onto an island and must fish, fight bosses, and buy weapons to get home. 1 to 4 players. Priced at $4.95 on launch discount. Currently at Overwhelmingly Positive on Steam with 95% approval.
• PEAK — Released June 16, 2025 by Aggro Crab and Landfall. A co-op climbing game where you and up to 3 friends scale a mountain before a creeping fog catches you. Usually $7.99 but often discounted to $4.95. Overwhelmingly Positive on Steam with 95% approval across 140,000+ reviews.
• Lethal Company — Released October 23, 2023 by solo developer Zeekerss. A co-op horror game where you collect scrap from abandoned moons and sell it to meet a quota before monsters kill you. Priced at $9.99. 97% positive reviews across 276,000+ English reviews on Steam.

How to Fish: Physics Chaos with Guns and Fish

How to Fish is the newest game on this list and it came out swinging. Within 48 hours of launch, it hit over 1 million players and peaked at more than 268,000 concurrent players on Steam. It is made by Dazed Games — the same small Swedish studio behind the viral hit that preceded it. You can read more about How to Fish hitting 1 million sales on Steam to get a sense of just how fast this one blew up.

What Is How to Fish Actually About?

You and up to three friends go out drinking and boating. Things go wrong. You crash onto a small island with nothing. To get home, you have to learn how to fish — and by “fish,” the game means catch creatures from the water, kill them with knives, brass knuckles, guns, and eventually explosives, then sell the results for money to buy better gear.

As you progress, you take on boss fish, complete quests, unlock new islands, and find rare creature variants to collect. There is even an in-game slot machine and gambling mechanic for spending your fish money. It is ridiculous by design, and that is exactly the point.

How to Fish: The Good

• Physics-based comedy that constantly produces unexpected moments.
• Genuine progression system — you start weak and grow stronger through islands and boss fights.
• Works solo or with up to 4 friends in online co-op.
• Extremely cheap at its launch price of $4.95 — great value for the laughs per dollar.
• Fresh and actively supported, with the developers already committing to more content and bug fixes.

How to Fish: The Not-So-Good

• Some players have reported aiming issues, especially in boss encounters.
• The early game can feel a bit slow while you are building up money.
• Solo boss fights are harder and can feel unbalanced without a group.
• Launch build has some reported bugs, as is common with new releases.
• No horror element if that is what draws you to the genre.

Who Should Buy How to Fish?

If your group wants the newest thing on Steam right now, and you like the idea of fishing but also shooting fish with a sniper rifle for a trick-shot bonus — this is your game. It is the most purely silly option on this list. Check the How to Fish Steam page for the current price and reviews before buying.

PEAK: The Best All-Rounder in Friendslop

PEAK launched in June 2025 and became one of the biggest indie success stories of that year. It sold an estimated 3.1 million copies in its launch month alone and earned a Metascore of 82 from critics. For a game that costs less than $10, those are remarkable numbers.

What Is PEAK Actually About?

Your plane crashes on a mysterious island. The only way to get rescued is to climb the mountain at the island’s center and fire a flare at the top. Sounds simple. It is not. The mountain is dangerous, the terrain is procedurally generated and changes every 24 hours, and the fog creeping up from below will eventually catch you if you spend too long resting.

You can play alone or with up to 3 friends. The game has proximity voice chat built in, which means you can hear friends get quieter as they fall further behind — or louder as a monster chases them toward you. That feature alone generates more panic and laughter than most games manage with a full design team.

PEAK: The Good

• Daily-rotating maps mean every run is genuinely different, giving PEAK the best raw replayability of the three games.
• Proximity voice chat is one of the best social features in any friendslop game.
• Physics-based climbing creates genuine moments of teamwork — pulling a friend up a ledge feels satisfying.
• Multiple difficulty levels (called Ascents) add stacking challenges for groups that want more.
• Steam Deck verified, so it works on handheld without fuss.
• Made by two experienced studios (Aggro Crab and Landfall) who have strong records of community support.

PEAK: The Not-So-Good

• The core gameplay loop — climb until you fall or succeed — can feel thin if your group burns through it in a weekend.
• Multiplayer is friends-only (no public matchmaking), so you need at least one friend who owns the game to join a session.
• Less content depth compared to something like Lethal Company’s modding scene.

Who Should Buy PEAK?

PEAK is the safest recommendation for most groups. It is funny without being horror, it has the best moment-to-moment social gameplay of the three, and the daily map rotation means you can come back a week later and have a genuinely fresh experience. It is the closest this genre gets to a “perfect” casual co-op game.

Lethal Company: The Genre-Defining Original

Lethal Company is the game that many people credit with kickstarting the modern friendslop wave. It launched in October 2023 as an early access title made by a single developer — Zeekerss — and reached over 240,000 concurrent players within two months. It also won the Golden Joystick Award for Best Early Access Game in 2024.

Three years later, it still holds 97% positive reviews across more than 276,000 English reviews on Steam. That kind of staying power is almost unheard of in this genre.

What Is Lethal Company Actually About?

You are a contracted worker for a mysterious corporation simply called The Company. Your job is to fly to abandoned moons, collect scrap — old furniture, toy robots, discarded machinery — and bring it back to the ship before the deadline. The quota rises after every cycle, so you always need to do more.

The problem is that the moons are full of monsters. Some are blind and react to sound. Some charge you in the dark. One just watches you from a distance. None of them want you to make it back to the ship. One player can stay behind to monitor radar and call out traps using the ship’s terminal while the others go in. Roles form naturally from how your group behaves under pressure — and that is where most of the game’s best moments come from.

Lethal Company: The Good

• The best horror atmosphere of the three, with genuine tension even after many hours of play.
• Natural role creation — the ship monitor, the brave explorer, the nervous scrap carrier — without menus or class systems.
• Massive and active modding community that adds new monsters, moons, items, and entire game modes.
• Overwhelmingly Positive reviews across three years — that staying power proves it is not just a launch hype game.
• Strong price-to-content ratio at $9.99 given how many hours you can get out of the base game.

Lethal Company: The Not-So-Good

• Solo play is very poorly balanced — this game truly requires friends to work properly.
• The base game can feel repetitive without mods once your group has exhausted the main moons.
• Public lobbies can include toxic players or incompatible mods that only the host can control.
• It is still technically an early access title, though it has received major updates over time.
• More expensive than the other two, which matters when asking four friends to all buy in at once.

Who Should Buy Lethal Company?

If you want the deepest experience, the most content to discover, and you enjoy co-op horror over silly physics comedy, Lethal Company is still the gold standard. It is especially worth it if your group is into modding, because the Thunderstore mod manager gives the game near-infinite extra life.

How to Fish vs. PEAK vs. Lethal Company: Side-by-Side Breakdown

Here is how the three games stack up across the things that matter most when choosing a friendslop game for your group.

Price

How to Fish launched at $4.95 (with a 38% launch discount until August 27, 2026). PEAK normally sits at $7.99 but has been discounted to $4.95 in sales. Lethal Company is $9.99 with occasional sale discounts to around $6.49. All three are very affordable — but if your whole group of four needs to buy in, $4.95 per person is a much easier sell than $9.99.

Replayability

PEAK wins this category. Its daily-rotating maps mean the mountain layout changes every 24 hours, and difficulty ascents add more challenge. How to Fish has island progression and boss fights but is ultimately a fixed campaign. Lethal Company has strong base replayability improved massively by mods.

Social Fun Factor

All three are built to generate funny moments. PEAK’s proximity chat makes it the most naturally social experience moment to moment. How to Fish’s physics and weapon chaos creates the most instantly silly content. Lethal Company’s horror atmosphere creates the most tension — which turns into the most relief and laughter when things go wrong.

Depth and Content

Lethal Company is the deepest, especially with mods. How to Fish has the most structured progression of the three, with actual boss fights and island unlocks. PEAK is the most focused and minimal — you climb the mountain, you win or fail, and you try again tomorrow.

Horror or No Horror?

If your group does not enjoy horror or jump scares, avoid Lethal Company. PEAK has some survival tension but nothing scary. How to Fish has no horror elements at all — it is pure comedy chaos.

Solo Playability

How to Fish is the friendliest for solo players, though boss fights are harder alone. PEAK works solo but loses most of its charm without friends. Lethal Company is actively badly balanced for solo — do not buy it if you do not have friends to play with.

Which Friendslop Game Should You Buy?

Buy How to Fish if: You want something brand new, you have $4.95 to spare right now, and your group wants fish + guns + physics chaos with actual progression through boss fights and islands. It is also the best pick if your group has already played PEAK and Lethal Company and needs something fresh. You can see just how big this launch was in our coverage of How to Fish hitting 341K concurrent players on Steam.

Buy PEAK if: You want the best all-around friendslop experience with the most replayability and the best social features. It is the safest first friendslop game for any group, and the daily map rotation means you can return to it weeks later and still have fun.

Buy Lethal Company if: Your group enjoys co-op horror, you want the deepest content, and you are willing to spend a little more at $9.99. It is especially worth it if you plan to explore mods, which essentially turn it into a different game with each new modpack.

Honestly? All three are cheap enough that a group of four can buy PEAK and How to Fish together for under $20 total and have genuinely different experiences with each. That is better value than a single AAA game that one person plays alone.

Frequently Asked Questions