Ready or Not, a popular (and controversial) first-person tactical co-op shooter and SWAT simulator, is getting a free trial on consoles. The trial will feature full access to the game and will be available for the rest of 2025.
On December 3, Void Interactive announced a new limited-time free trial for Ready or Not. The trial is available now on PlayStation 5 (with a PS Plus subscription), Xbox Series X, and Xbox Series S. Once downloaded and installed, players will have access to the entirety of Ready or Not, including every mission. Players can enjoy the game for three hours before the trial ends. After that, all progress made in the trial can be carried over to the full game if players decide to purchase Ready or Not. This free taste will be available only on consoles and only until February 20, 2026.
First released in 2021 on PC via Steam early access, Ready or Not has been mired in controversy over the years. The game lost its original publisher, Team17, shortly before launch. The SWAT sim courted controversy over its subject matter, including a level set in a community college. When Kotaku’s own Ethan Gach played the game in 2022, he felt it was unfinished and filled with juvenile humor and unsettling copaganda. I recently played it earlier this year, and while the action is tight and snappy, everything around it, including how it makes you treat every human you meet as a threat, is hard to ignore.
In July, it found itself buried in a whole different mess of controversy when a patch was rolled out across PC that made changes to some in-game assets, including the censorship of nudity. This was done to make the game easier to release on consoles. Fans who had been playing for years called foul and review-bombed Ready or Not. A modder rolled back the changes within an hour of the patch going live. Things have calmed down a lot since then, and the game has continued to receive frequent updates. Earlier this year, the game’s community manager was fired after joking about Charlie Kirk’s killing.
