Phasmophobia players have raised more than $230,000 (around £173,000) for the American Heart Association, more than doubling the total from last year’s event. The developer, Kinetic Games, announced the final figure on 6 November, closing out a community drive that ran for about a week.
How the Ghost Hunts for Hearts drive worked
Ghost Hunts for Hearts ran from 26 October to 2 November and was organised around streaming. More than 500 streamers signed up to take part, which Kinetic Games and the charity describe as the biggest turnout yet for a creator fundraiser run by Heart Liive. Heart Liive is the American Heart Association’s streaming initiative, which connects content creators with fundraising campaigns and audiences on live platforms.
Last year’s event raised a little over $100,000, so this year’s total represents a substantial increase in both donations and participation. The drive was built around a community target, and the total was announced once that goal had been passed.
Phasmophobia is a cooperative horror game, so the fundraiser fit naturally with a player base that often streams sessions and shares its experiences online. The charity campaign relied on viewers and players as much as on the streamers who were directly taking part.
Rewards for streamers and the community
Kinetic set a target of $200,000 at the start of the week. On 3 November, the studio posted on X that players had surpassed the goal, and it confirmed that an animated version of the event’s Advocate ID Card and Badge had unlocked for everyone who logged in to the game. Players were given until 15 November to claim the animated card.
Streamers who took part were able to hand out an event-exclusive Advocate ID Card and Badge to their viewers as a Twitch Drop. This gave viewers a reward for watching and supporting the campaign, and it meant that the cosmetic items were tied directly to the fundraising effort rather than to in-game progress.
Tom Dent, lead social media and player experience manager at Kinetic Games, said the community had exceeded expectations. “The Phasmophobia community never fails to amaze us, and this year they’ve outdone themselves,” Dent said. “Thank you to every streamer, viewer and player who took part.”
About Phasmophobia and the game’s current status
Phasmophobia launched in Early Access in September 2020. The game sends teams of up to four players into haunted locations, where they gather evidence of what is lurking inside. Its appeal rests on cooperative investigation, with players relying on equipment and teamwork to identify different types of paranormal activity.
The game is currently available in Early Access on Steam, PS5, PS VR2 and Xbox Series X/S. A Nintendo Switch 2 version is also planned, but no release date has been given. Early Access titles are unfinished games that developers sell while they continue to add content and fix problems, and Phasmophobia has been in that stage for several years.
Earlier this year, Kinetic Games confirmed that the game’s 1.0 launch had slipped from 2026 into 2027. The studio said it was prioritising quality over speed after a poor reception to its Player Character Update. Kinetic later apologised to players for problems with that update, admitting it “missed the mark” and “didn’t deliver on our promises to you.”
What the publishing launch means for the studio
Kinetic Games also launched a publishing arm, Kinetic Publishing, earlier this year. Its first title is Contact Protocol, a starship job simulator that is due out in spring 2027. The move gives the studio a way to support other developers while it works on its own games.
For readers, the charity result shows how a game’s community can organise large fundraising efforts when developers provide clear goals and rewards. For Phasmophobia itself, the next major milestone is the 1.0 release, which has no confirmed date beyond 2027, and the status of the Switch 2 version remains unclear. Whether the community’s strong fundraising carries into that launch is still an open question.