Goose Goose Duck

1. Summary

Players treat Goose Goose Duck as Among Us with more of everything. 41% of the longer reviews bring up Among Us, and the comparison usually favours this game: dozens of roles, several maps and modes, proximity voice chat that needs no mods or Discord, and a price of nothing. The other strong thread is who you play with. 31% of longer reviews mention friends, and the warmest of them describe regular game nights, betrayals that end in laughter and groups that formed inside the game.

Public lobbies draw the main frustration. 15% of longer reviews describe strangers who scream into mics, throw slurs, troll or kick newcomers, and some players who recommend the game advise sticking to friends and skipping random lobbies. The second complaint hits before play starts: a mandatory account with email verification that some people never get through. Long-time players add a third, the move of cosmetics behind a claw-machine gacha.

2. What keeps coming up

What players praise

Far more roles, maps and modes than Among UsHigh

27% of longer reviews talk about the roles and 18% about maps or game modes, usually as the reason the game beats its obvious inspiration. Players name the neutral roles: the Pelican that swallows other players, the Dodo that wins by being voted out, the Pigeon that infects everyone. Draft mode, where you pick from offered roles, has its own fans. One player put it as "Honestly better than Among Us to me, the roles make the game way more chaotic." A few long-time players push back, saying many goose roles are dull in practice and some roles go unused because of meta play.

Best with your own groupHigh

31% of longer reviews mention friends, more than any other topic except the Among Us comparison. Groups describe weekly game nights, birthday traditions, remote-team socials and families playing together, and there is a whole run of joke reviews about lost friendships. Some of these reviews attach a condition, put by one reviewer as "Its really fun to play with FRIENDS Not randoms". A few solo players went the other way: they joined public games, added the people they liked and built a regular group from them.

Built-in proximity voice chatHigh

14% of longer reviews bring up voice or proximity chat, mostly to praise it. Players like hearing panicked alibis from across the map, not needing Discord or a mod, and being able to pick between voice and text-only lobbies. One reviewer wrote "Proximity voice chat is the best part of this game." The screaming and slurs in public lobbies reach people through the same feature.

Free, light and on every deviceHigh

13% of longer reviews point out that the game costs nothing, often next to the price of Among Us. Another 6% mention that it runs on weak laptops, Mac, Linux or Steam Deck, or that friends on phones can join the same lobby. "Works on all potato pcs, has proximity voice chat, and Free!" is a typical line.

Funny, chaotic roundsMedium

9% of longer reviews call the game funny, hilarious or chaotic. The fart emote, the kill animations and the Pelican get named, and several players say the silliness keeps losses from stinging. One wrote that the roles make "this game less about victory and more about pranking each other."

A steady stream of updatesMedium

When the 7% of longer reviews that mention updates talk about them, it is usually to praise new maps, roles and events arriving often and developers who respond to feedback. A handful of players disliked particular changes: dead players' tasks pushed onto the living, a reworked menu layout, or a voice-chat system that broke for them.

Where players are split

Among Us upgrade or Among Us copyMedium

12% of longer reviews say outright that the game is better than Among Us, and 6% call it a rip-off, clone or copy. Those who dismiss it say the art is uglier, the game is busier and the original is worth its small price. The copy charge also turns up in short negative reviews, sometimes in a single line such as "literally the same as among us, just uglier".

Cosmetics, gold and the claw machineMedium

8% of longer reviews talk about cosmetics and 6% complain about the money side. Some players are content: outfits are optional, nothing is pay-to-win, and one said "i've spent $0 and have enjoyed 100 hours here". The complaints come mostly from players with dozens or hundreds of hours who saved silver for specific items and then saw the shop switch to random claw-machine pulls that mostly return "dust". One summed it up as cosmetics "now mostly locked behind a gambling system (the claw machines) where you used to be able to purchase exactly what you wanted." Half of the reviews naming the claw machine, gacha or dust are dated 2024. Others mention gold being hard to earn without paying, paid name changes and outfits that went missing after purchases or device switches.

18+ lobbies and age checksLow

4% of longer reviews mention adult lobbies. Adults who want a calmer game praise them ("thank god for the 18+ ability"). Others describe 18+ rooms that still fill with children, and hosts who interrogate everyone about age or kick people for sounding young, which teenagers and some adults with high voices both resent.

How many roles is too manyLow

For 3% of longer reviews, the role list is overwhelming or confusing. "The amount of roles in this game exceeds my attention span" is one complaint; others ask for tutorials for each role and map. Defenders point out that hosts can switch roles off and that Classic mode keeps the plain geese-versus-ducks setup.

What frustrates players

Toxic public lobbiesHigh

15% of longer reviews describe the behaviour of strangers in public games, and 13% of negative reviews raise it, about as many as raise the account sign-up. The details repeat: young children shouting into bad mics, people blasting music or soundboards, slurs and harassment, players who team up with friends against everyone else, and lobbies that sit around socialising instead of playing. One player who recommends the game listed it as the only con: "public lobbies are often toxic and full of kids." Several reviewers also say reporting does little and that there is no easy in-game way to report a host.

Mandatory account and failed sign-upsMedium

7% of longer reviews and 12% of negative reviews complain about having to create a separate Gaggle or Google account before playing. They describe verification emails that never arrive, Yahoo and Hotmail addresses rejected, passwords that work on the website but not in the client, rate-limit errors, progress lost after being logged out, and in one case a long-time player who cannot change the email tied to their account. More than half of the reviews raising this came from people with under two hours in the game, many of whom never got to play. "I sure hope the whole mandatory registration thing is worth it for you, because it has just prevented three people from playing this game."

Bugs, disconnects and mic problemsMedium

6% of longer reviews report crashes, freezes, lag or disconnects, and 5% mention the servers. Reviews dated early 2023 describe server-load errors and failed logins when the game suddenly grew. Others report microphones that stop working mid-session, audio that cuts out on Steam Deck or Mac, being dropped between rounds and then penalised for leaving, and endless loading screens. One player wrote that "the voice system, which is key in this game, has been broken for several weeks".

Kicked by hosts and cliquesLow

3% of longer reviews complain about being kicked from public lobbies for no clear reason: for being new, low level, without a mic, too quiet, for killing the host, or for not being in the host's Discord group. One player said hosts "would kick you from a lobby (without ever playing a game with you or having an interaction more than 2 min with you)". People ask for kick limits, kick reasons or a vote system.

Empty or wrong-language lobbiesLow

A smaller group says quick play never fills or that they waited half an hour for a match: "Hardly anybody was online, I was waiting for a match to start for about half an hour before eventually giving up, dead game." Others find lobbies tagged English where nobody speaks English, and ask for language tags that actually hold. Some short negative reviews simply call the game dead.

Easy Anti-CheatLow

A few reviews object to kernel-level anti-cheat in a casual party game, and some can't launch at all because of anti-cheat errors, blue screens or conflicts with other software. One put it as "It is ridiculous for a game of this scope to require kernel-level anti-cheat".

Smaller annoyancesLow

A handful of reviews mention the game running in the background after quitting, controller support that does not work as advertised, needing five players before a private game with friends can start, and going dozens of rounds without being picked as the duck.

3. The player conversation

Most reviews are short and jokey. Thousands are one line long ("Among us but better", "fun with friends"), and some of the longer ones are memes: ASCII cats begging for awards, pie recipes and fake life stories. Fans and critics alike measure the game against Among Us.

Negative reviews tend to come from two kinds of player. Some barely got started: they hit the account wall, a failed verification email, an anti-cheat error, an empty queue or a first lobby full of screaming, and left within an hour or two. Others are invested players, some with hundreds or thousands of hours, who still like the game but object to how it is run: the claw-machine cosmetics, task and interface changes, voice bugs that lingered, and moderation of the community they spend their evenings in. The positive reviews in between mostly talk about playing with a group, and some warn newcomers about public lobbies.

The dates track the game's history as reviewers tell it. Reviews from 2022 and early 2023 talk about a sudden boom, overloaded servers and the arrival of Easy Anti-Cheat, and claw-machine complaints cluster in 2024.

4. What the developers could do

1. Give players real tools against abuse in public lobbies. Public-lobby behaviour is one of the two complaints negative reviews raise most, and players ask for in-game reporting of players and hosts, visible consequences for slurs and mic spam, and a volume limiter for screaming or blasting mics.
2. Let Steam players in without a separate account, or make sign-up reliable. Account creation is the other, and most of those reviews come from people who never got past verification emails, rejected email domains or password mismatches.
3. Fix the voice chat and disconnect bugs first. Players name voice chat as a reason they chose this game over Among Us, so mics dying mid-session and players dropping between rounds hit what they came for.
4. Bring back direct purchase for cosmetics alongside the claw machine. Long-time players say random pulls and slow dust rates replaced a shop where they could save up for the item they wanted.
5. Limit and explain host kicks. Players kicked for being new, quiet or young ask for kick reasons, a cap on kicks or a vote, and a way to report hosts who abuse the power.
6. Make lobby language and age tags hold, and help quick play fill. Newcomers describe English-tagged lobbies with no English speakers, 18+ rooms full of children and quick play that never starts.
7. Add role and map tutorials. With dozens of roles, new players ask for more than a short intro, especially for map-specific mechanics and complex roles.
8. Smooth the Easy Anti-Cheat and exit problems. Some players can't launch because of anti-cheat errors, and others find the game still running after they quit.