Critical Role's 'Rockbeasts' Is a Trippy '90s Band Sim Featuring Iggy Pop | Preview

Published Oct 14, 2026, 7:10 AM EDT

Randy Rhodes' first gaming memory is Kirby's Adventure on the NES, and his love for gaming only rose from there. Playing games eventually wasn't enough for him. He began following the industry closely. In 2024, he finally started putting that to use by launching the Project Untitled Gaming Podcast and later the Dual-Wield Gaming Podcast. Covering the news week to week turned out to be something he loved, but a weekly show only has so much room in it, and writing was already something he wanted to do more of.

Randy has written for Lords of Gaming since March 2025 and already has over 200 articles published to show for it. His coverage centers on Nintendo, Xbox, and indies, and runs across news, reviews, previews, and editorial. He enjoys writing about and critiquing the games that he's played, but analyzing the industry brings just as much enjoyment for him. He tends to write editorials that try to dig deeper into the news instead of just restating it.
 

Randy reviews and previews games broadly across all genres. He has a soft spot for co-op games, 3D platformers, and the majority of Nintendo's first-party output, but he also adores cozy and niche titles that don't always get a serious look: visual novels, farming sims, life sims, etc. He's always looking for up-and-coming indie games worth writing about.
 

Outside of games, Randy is into DnD, cooking, music and music production, which inspired one of his favorite pieces to write: 50 Songs Leveled Up By Video Game Samples. He also cares about Black representation in games and in the industry behind them, and he's always looking for opportunities to cover it.

Rockbeasts is a rocking band management RPG set in the 1990s with rhythm game elements, except every character is an anthropomorphic animal. Developer Lichthund brought in Critical Role as a collaborator and co-publisher, and that expertise shows immediately. This choice-and-consequence-driven narrative adventure is right in their wheelhouse, and it's shaping up to be something special.

After roughly 90 minutes with an early slice of the game, I immediately came away wanting more, convinced this could reach the heights of 2025's highly rated narrative adventure Dispatch. From the stellar characters and soundtrack to the robust dialogue and management mechanics, Rockbeasts left me thoroughly impressed. The game is scheduled to arrive on Steam, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, Xbox Series X|S, and PS5 in January 2027.

What Is 'Rockbeasts'?

Image via Lichthund

In Rockbeasts, you play an unnamed manager who drives from New York to the fictional town of Buxville, located "somewhere in the Midwest." Waiting there is a struggling four-piece rock outfit with real potential, but absolutely no ability to realize that potential on their own. The band is an eclectic group of passionate, talented individuals with completely clashing personalities, and managing those personalities will certainly be the biggest challenge in Rockbeasts. Developing the music and promoting the band seem pretty easy by comparison.

Paz is the lead guitarist, a deer who is skeptical but earnest in her craft. She is dedicated and has no interest in compromising her artistic integrity to make it in the industry. Vernon is an egotistical ostrich serving as lead vocalist and songwriter who butts heads with everyone. He loves money, attention, and the sound of his own voice above all else. Hopefully, there's a bit more to him than that as the game goes on.

Carlton is a sea bass who plays the bass, which should give you a sense of the humor you're in for, and he also serves as the timid voice of reason. He hates conflict and being in the spotlight, but he comes off as the most normal member by a wide margin. Then there is Keith, an out-of-control rabbit drummer who is chaotic, volatile, and passionate about his instrument. He loves to drink and brags about once drinking Iggy Pup under the table, but there are hints of addiction issues you will have to manage.

'Rockbeasts' Is an Authentic Portal to the 90s

The art style and character designs closely resemble the marvelous animated Netflix series BoJack Horseman, but with a little more grit. The anthropomorphic cast carries an expressive and eccentric charm to it that makes every character, big or small, stand out. The environments and backgrounds are filled with small details that make the world feel alive without drawing too much attention away from the characters. Rockbeasts has a distinct visual identity that elevates the presentation.

The soundtrack is a real showstopper as well. Performed by the band vgtbl.pl, Rockbeasts' original tracks capture the alternative rock and grunge scene of the '90s in a way that feels like a distant memory of my childhood with MTV blaring in the background. As a game built around music, this was a crucial element to nail, and they did just that. The music anchors the entire experience and authentically sells the era.

Adding to Rockbeasts' achievements, the voice acting is superb across the board, and the dialogue is charming and real in a way that fully immerses you in the world. There isn't much in terms of animation, so the game has to sell every member of the band through dialogue alone. Critical Role's involvement first becomes obvious once you hear Matthew Mercer, Sam Riegel, and Liam O'Brien among the voice cast, and I'm sure they play a key role in the engaging dialogue as well. Iggy Pop, playing a radio DJ dog named Iggy Pup, is the first voice you hear when you boot up Rockbeasts, and he completely sets the mood for this rock 'n' roll story.

The Management Layer Runs Surprisingly Deep

Image via Lichthund

Even in the early-game demo I played, the management systems in Rockbeasts have real depth. You juggle time and resources to book gigs that build the band's reputation, feed the band to keep their health up, book studio sessions to improve their performance, and buy and upgrade equipment for better sound quality. You can bribe radio stations to put your songs in rotation and build hype, or take the band to the bar to improve their mood before a big show. There are several more elements that I experienced during my playtime, as well as others that were visibly locked behind progression.

Every decision you make in Rockbeasts costs resources you don't have much of, and that constant battle is what keeps the gameplay engaging. Time, cash, mood, health, hype, and focus points all pull against each other constantly, and you may have to make sacrifices to push the band toward your ideal. Will you focus on band practice and make sure the band's music is so good it's impossible to ignore? Or will you focus on promotion and drawing crowds to make as much money as possible, no matter the cost?

The rhythm game mechanics are the weakest part of the gameplay. You press button prompts as they scroll across the screen in a single lane, which won't be much of a challenge for any rhythm game vets. These sections appear during practice sessions and performances, with timing calibration available if your display has lag. On normal difficulty they are easy to pass, though chasing the scores that unlock the best rewards gives a bit more of a challenge. Although they're not the crème de la crème, they are short and infrequent enough that they never drag the experience down.

My one real frustration with the gameplay was navigating the environments with a controller, which felt cumbersome at times. Selecting and interacting with objects became a hassle whenever multiple were on-screen together, and I spent longer than I should have fighting the cursor. It's a small gripe that a few months of polish could smooth out before January.

Lichthund and Critical Role Nail the Choice-Driven Narrative

Image via Lichthund

The narrative layer is just as good as the management side right off the bat. Dialogue options and choices steer the band into different trajectories, and the central tension is the one most bands face. Do you keep them true to themselves and their craft with a higher chance of failure, or sacrifice who they are to make it big at any cost?

I did not run into anything truly divisive in the early-game demo, but the choices already carry weight. Deciding how the band celebrated a successful gig meant knowingly upsetting one member no matter which option I picked. Other choices are mechanical, such as convincing another band to give up their studio time, where I could either bribe them with $100 or attempt a memory puzzle with a chance of failure.

Rockbeasts makes the scope even more apparent at the end of each act, when your choices are stacked against players worldwide. In Telltale fashion, you get to see what percentage agreed with you or accomplished the same objectives. The recap displays where there were branching choices that could result in a narrative shift. At the end of Act 2, I saw that 3% of players failed to meet the venue owner's criteria to perform the gig, an objective I had assumed was guaranteed. If the full game is filled with branching paths of this level, it will make the replayability layer even more robust.

Rockbeasts is now one of my most anticipated indie games of 2027, and the 90 minutes I played only scratched the surface of what Lichthund is building. The combination of a deep management RPG, a choice-driven narrative with Critical Role's voice acting and writing pedigree behind it, and the unique anthropomorphic characters in a nostalgic '90s grunge scene all come together in perfect harmony. The rhythm sections aren't the most engaging and the controller navigation needs a bit more tuning, but the rest of the package, from the authentic soundtrack to the immersive dialogue, paints one of the most creative and well-realized games of its genre. I'm already counting down the days until the band's mainstream debut in January 2027.

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