Fourteen years after its first reveal, Mewgenics finally launched and immediately turned a long-running indie legend into a sales juggernaut.
Mewgenics launched on Steam to instant momentum, but even before launch, the game had already carved out a rare “cult-AAA” status. First announced in 2012 as Team Meat’s follow-up to Super Meat Boy, the project vanished, resurfaced, and changed shape so many times that it became shorthand for development hell until Edmund McMillen and Tyler Glaiel revived it in 2018.
A February 10, 2026 release date, locked during the PC Gaming Show, sharpened the “it’s finally happening” narrative. At $29.99, Mewgenics skipped preorders and pushed wishlists instead, funneling years of curiosity into day-one demand.
Mewgenics finally launches and the numbers hit fast
The payoff landed almost instantly: Mewgenics launched on Steam around 5pm UTC and shot to the number one global top seller on Steam, beating out Counter-Strike 2 and Helldivers 2 within hours.
Glaiel said it plainly on X: “We have made back our development budget after 3 hours. Thank you all :)”
and we have made back our development budget after 3 hours. Thank you all 🙂
— Tyler Glaiel (@TylerGlaiel) February 10, 2026
Early reviews pushed the game to roughly a 90 Metascore, the highest-rated release of 2026 so far and a match for McMillen’s best work, including The Binding of Isaac. Reviewers praised its dense, generational cat-breeding systems, emergent tactics, and sheer scale, with several calling it a game that could absorb hundreds of hours.
Players showed up in force. Less than eight hours after launch, concurrent users passed 60,000 on Steam.
For McMillen, the moment carried personal weight. Reflecting during a recent AMA, he wrote that the original cancellation “was quite depressing” but finishing the game now felt like “a ‘SEE I TOLD YOU SO!’” He added that an average player could expect “200+ hours to beat the game” and hinted that DLC discussions would follow once player feedback settled.
