Good Boy – Barking Mad Heist Chaos in Suburbia

Niels Gys
Nov 17
4 min read

TL;DR

Like Payday in a parallel universe where everyone’s drunk, the dog’s possessed, and your crew thinks whispering counts as stealth.

A horror heist game so funny, you’ll die twice — once from laughter, once from the dog.

🎮 Play Good Boy (Early Access) Join the world’s loudest burglars and try not to die laughing. 👉 Buy Good Boy on Steam

PLAN, MASK, EXECUTE

Imagine a suburban neighborhood built entirely by people who failed their sanity checks, that’s Shifty Hills, the setting of Good Boy. The plan? Break in. Loot stuff. Don’t get eaten. It’s a horror-comedy co-op heist for up to six players, and every single session feels like being stuck in a badly organized group chat with burglars.

The first five minutes are glorious: a VHS menu, a warped neighborhood map, and that uneasy feeling that something awful is about to happen. The next ten minutes? Screaming, panic, betrayal, and one guy insisting he “didn’t hear the dog.” You’ll both laugh and question your friendships.

CREW DYNAMICS

Solo play is like robbing Ikea blindfolded while your vacuum cleaner tries to kill you. You can do it, but it’s miserable. The real joy comes in co-op, where you and your friends try to coordinate a stealth job and end up sounding like a bunch of panicked raccoons in a kitchen.

Someone always forgets to close the door. Someone always screams too loud. And someone always claims, “I didn’t think the dog could hear that.” Every. Single. Time.

It’s chaos. Beautiful, sweaty, friendship-ending chaos.

HEIST MECHANICS

“Good Boy” thrives on that razor-thin line between control and catastrophe. The heist loop, sneaking through houses, collecting loot, and managing noise, is genuinely thrilling. The more noise you make, the closer you are to being turned into a chew toy.

The looting itself is addictive. Sometimes you hit the jackpot and find gold, sometimes you raid a suburban nightmare that looks like someone’s gran exploded. That unpredictability is what keeps it fun, you never know whether you’ll make it out rich or running for your life while a mutant golden retriever howls in Dolby Surround.

STEALTH VS LOUD

Stealth technically works, like my diet plan. When it goes right, it’s tense and cinematic. When it doesn’t, you discover that your best mate apparently has the subtlety of a leaf blower. Once you go loud, it’s full panic: alarms blaring, monsters charging, everyone running in circles shouting things that would make sailors blush.

But that’s the fun. Every failed heist turns into a pub story.

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REWARDS & PROGRESSION

Your cash goes toward hideout upgrades, cosmetics, and pure ego inflation. It’s not a full payday yet, more of a “first burglary gone wrong” kind of income, but that’s Early Access for you.

Terrible Posture Games (the devs) are promising more levels, loot, and madness, and judging by their Discord activity, they’re listening. It’s still rough around the edges, but it’s got heart, and a disturbingly realistic dog growl that’ll haunt you for days.

LEVEL DESIGN & REPLAYABILITY

Shifty Hills feels like if “Desperate Housewives” was filmed on an alien planet. Perfect lawns, strange basements, and rooms that make you question who built them. After a few runs, the houses start to repeat — like burglars developing déjà vu, but there’s plenty of potential once the devs add more map sets.

Honestly, I could rob this place forever. It’s that perfect blend of domestic comfort and unholy dread.

WEAPONS & GEAR

There are no guns. Just gadgets, tools, and your crippling fear. And it’s refreshing, you can’t just shoot your problems. You have to outsmart them… or, more likely, scream and hide behind the fridge while your mate tries to “reason with the dog.”

TENSION & AI RESPONSE

That dog, the Good Boy , is a proper monster. Not the usual “oh no a jumpscare” nonsense. No, this thing hunts. It listens. It learns. It’s the kind of horror that makes you whisper into your mic even though you know full well the game can’t hear you.

When you hear the panting, it’s already too late. And yes, you’ll panic so hard you’ll forget how to open doors.

MULTIPLAYER & MATCHMAKING

Private lobbies? Excellent. Public ones? Like being stuck in an escape room with six toddlers and a bag of fireworks. But that’s part of the charm, it’s unpredictably hilarious. The matchmaking could use polish, sure, but when you’re mid-heist with your crew yelling obscenities, you won’t care.

🍿 Need more criminal carnage after gaming? Watch or rewatch the best crime & chaos films of the decade:

FAQ

Is Good Boy better solo or with friends? Only if your friends are idiots. Which makes it perfect.

Does stealth actually work? Yes — if you duct-tape everyone’s mouths shut.

Is Good Boy worth it in 2025? If you enjoy arguing, panicking, and accidentally summoning Satan’s Labrador, yes.