How to Play Lookalike: Rules, Controls, Meetings and How to Win
How Lookalike works, start to finish: roles, tasks, silencing, sabotage, meetings and voting, ghosts, win conditions, host settings and every control.

Lookalike is a free social deduction party game for 4 to 10 friends that runs in your browser. Everyone walks the Relay, a mountaintop broadcast station, doing quick tasks. One to three players are secretly the Lookalike. They silence the crew one by one, crawl through ducts, sabotage the station and copy other players' faces. When someone finds a body or rings the bell, everyone meets, argues it out in the chat and votes someone off. Lookalike was called Mimic until October 2026.
What do you need to play Lookalike?
You need a browser, a name and a room code. There are no installs and no recording, and you do not need an account. Sign in with a free Mutiny account (the same one as Last Ember and Grindzone) and your wins save. Meetings use text chat, so nobody needs a mic, though the game says it is best on a call with friends.
- 4 to 10 players. A room holds ten, and the host can't start a game with fewer than four.
- A keyboard and mouse, or a phone. On a phone you drag on the left of the screen for a stick and tap the big buttons.
- A friend group on a call, if you can. Discord or any other call works well next to the game.
How do you start a game of Lookalike?
- Open Lookalike and type your name.
- Press Start a room. You get a four-letter room code and land in the Green Room, the lobby.
- Press Copy invite and send the link to the group. Friends who open it see Join room with your code. Anyone with just the code can type it under the name box and press Join.
- While you wait, walk to the mirror to pick a color and a hat, and to the laptop to see the game settings.
- Once four or more players are in, the host presses Start the game. Short on people? The host can press Add a bot to fill the room.
Whoever started the room is the host. The host is the only one who can change settings and start the game. The hosting guide covers every setting and how to run a full night.
What are the crew and the Lookalike?
When the game starts, a short intro tells you your role. Crew players are told how many Lookalikes are on the station. Lookalikes see who their partners are, and partners show up with a red name tag.
| Crew | Lookalike | |
|---|---|---|
| Goal | Finish every task, or vote out every Lookalike | Match the crew in numbers, or let a meltdown run out |
| Tasks | Real tasks that fill the crew task bar | A fake task list to walk to, for cover |
| Vision | 6 tiles by default, much less with the lights out | 8 tiles by default, and the lights do not affect it |
| Special moves | Report bodies, ring the bell, fix sabotage | Silence, duct, disguise and sabotage |
How do tasks work?
Your task list sits in the top left, each line showing the room and the task, like 'Lounge: Swipe your badge'. Walk to the glowing station in that room and press E to open the task. Each task is a short mini-game, from swiping a badge to rebooting a server.
- By default every crew member gets one common task (the same for everyone), one long task and three short tasks.
- Long tasks can have two steps in two rooms. Move the footage starts in Archive and finishes in Control. The list shows your progress, like (1/2).
- The task bar at the top fills for the whole crew. When it is full, the crew wins.
- Silenced crew members keep doing their tasks as ghosts, and those still count.
The tasks and map guide lists all 15 task mini-games and where every one of them is.
What can the Lookalike do?
The Lookalike has four tools. All of them show as buttons in the bottom right, with the key on each.
- Silence (Q): take out a crew member who is in range and in sight. It leaves a body where they stood and starts a cooldown, 25 seconds by default. You can't silence another Lookalike, or anyone from inside a duct.
- Duct (V): climb into a vent. Vents link three rooms each in three networks. Pick a room on the buttons or hop with the arrow keys, then press V to climb out. Nobody sees you while you are in a duct.
- Disguise (X): pick another living player and look exactly like them, name and all, for 15 seconds by default. Press X again to drop it early.
- Sabotage (Tab): open the map to kill the lights, jam comms, start a meltdown, or click a room to lock its doors for 10 seconds.
Lookalikes can't do real tasks. Their task list is fake, and the stations stay locked for them. A Lookalike who is voted out becomes a ghost and can still sabotage.
What does each sabotage do?
| Sabotage | What happens | How the crew fixes it |
|---|---|---|
| Kill the lights | Crew vision shrinks to a few tiles | Flip every switch up at the panel in Generator |
| Jam comms | Task lists, cameras and the admin map go dark | Tune the radio to the frequency on the note in Comms |
| Meltdown | A 45-second countdown starts, and the bell can't be rung | Two players hold the two keys in Transmitter at the same time |
| Lock the doors | One room's doors close for 10 seconds | Wait it out |
Only one of the lights, the jam or the meltdown can run at a time, and they share a 30-second cooldown. If a meltdown runs out, the Lookalike wins. A red banner and arrows at the edge of the screen point to where each fix is.
How do meetings work?
There are two ways to call a meeting:
- Report a body (R). Walk up to a body you can see and press R, or E when there is no station nearby.
- Ring the bell. It sits on the table in the Studio. Each player can ring it once per game by default. It cools down for 15 seconds at the start of the game and after every meeting, and it can't be rung during a meltdown.
A meeting stops everything. Any running sabotage ends and locked doors open. Then:
- Talk time. 20 seconds by default to argue it out in the chat. Voting is locked.
- Vote. 60 seconds by default. Press 1 to 9 to pick a player (or click their card), 0 to skip, and Enter to confirm. The vote ends early once everyone alive has voted.
- The votes are shown. You see who voted for whom, unless the host turned on anonymous votes.
- The ejection. The player with the most votes is ejected. If the top count is tied, or skip has the most votes, nobody is ejected.
With the default settings, the ejection screen says whether that player was the Lookalike and how many Lookalikes remain. After the meeting everyone is back around the Studio table, the bodies are cleared, and the Lookalike's silence cooldown starts over.
What happens when you are silenced?
You see the player who silenced you, then you become a ghost. Ghosts see the whole station with no fog, move faster and pass through walls. Crew ghosts keep doing tasks to help the crew win.
Ghosts can't report bodies, ring the bell, fix sabotage, use the cameras or vote. They can chat, but only other ghosts see it, both out on the station and in meetings. A Lookalike ghost can still sabotage.
How do you win Lookalike?
| What happens | Who wins |
|---|---|
| Every Lookalike is voted out | The crew |
| The task bar fills up | The crew |
| The Lookalikes match the crew in numbers | The Lookalike |
| A meltdown runs out | The Lookalike |
Ghosts don't count toward the numbers, and neither do players who leave mid-game. When the game ends, everyone sees who the Lookalikes were, and the host takes the room back to the Green Room for another game.
What can you see on the station?
- Fog of war. You only see what is in your line of sight, inside your vision range. Walls and closed doors block it. Players and bodies you can't see are not drawn.
- Cameras. The console in Security shows four live feeds of the halls. While anyone watches, a red light shows on the console, so everyone knows the cameras are on.
- The admin map. The table in Control shows how many people are in each room right now.
- Your map. Press Tab or M to see the station and the stations for your next tasks.
Lookalike controls
| Key | What it does |
|---|---|
| WASD or arrow keys | Walk |
| Click | Walk there. It finds a path around walls, and clicking a station walks you to it and uses it |
| E or Space | Use a station, or report a body when there is no station nearby |
| R | Report a body |
| Q | Silence (Lookalike) |
| V | Duct in and out (Lookalike). Arrow keys hop between vents |
| X | Disguise, or drop it (Lookalike) |
| Tab or M | Open the map, and sabotage as the Lookalike |
| Enter | Chat, in the Green Room, in meetings and as a ghost |
| Esc | Close a task or panel |
| 1 to 9, 0 | In a meeting: pick a player, or skip |
| Enter | In a meeting: confirm your vote |
Each task also shows its own keys at the top of its panel. On a phone, touch the left side of the screen and drag for a stick, and tap the big buttons to act.
What are the Sheriff and the Engineer in Lookalike?
They are two optional crew roles the host can switch on at the laptop. Each goes to one crew member at random, and only that player is told.
- The Sheriff can shoot with Q, on the same cooldown as a Lookalike's silence. Shoot a Lookalike and the Lookalike is out. Shoot a crew member and the Sheriff is out instead, so a Sheriff who guesses wrong pays for it.
- The Engineer can use the ducts with V, the same way a Lookalike does. That makes the Engineer fast and hard to place, which also makes them easy to blame.
- The Sheriff needs at least three crew in the game, and the Engineer needs two. The roles are revealed on the end screen.
What happens at the end of a game of Lookalike?
The end screen shows who won and why, who the Lookalikes were, who held the roles, and the top stats: most silences, most tasks and who fixed the most sabotage. Press Save the card for a picture of the game sized for the group chat. On a phone it opens the share sheet.
Can you play Lookalike alone or with bots?
Yes. Press Play with bots on the start screen to open a room just for you, press Add a bot until there are at least four of you, and press Start the game. Any host can add bots the same way to fill out a room of friends, up to ten players in all.
- Crew bots walk to their tasks and do them, report bodies they see, run to fix the lights and comms, and hold the meltdown keys.
- Bots remember who they saw and who was standing with whom. In a meeting they say where they were, name whoever was last seen with the victim, and answer back when someone names them in the chat.
- Bots vote on what they saw, or on the name the chat keeps coming back to. Otherwise they skip.
- A Lookalike bot fakes its tasks, silences someone only when nobody else can see, and sabotages now and then.
To learn the station with no pressure, the solo room also has Free roam as crew and Free roam as the Lookalike, where you walk around with four dummies that stand still. Nobody wins or loses in free roam.
Frequently asked questions
How many players do you need for Lookalike?
Four to ten, and bots count. The host can't start a game with fewer than four, and a room is full at ten. To play alone, press Play with bots and add three or more bots.
Do you need a mic to play Lookalike?
No. Meetings use text chat, and nothing is recorded. The game is best on a call with friends, like Discord, but it works without one.
How many Lookalikes are there?
One by default. The host can set up to three, capped by the player count: one Lookalike under 7 players, up to two at 7 or 8, and up to three at 9 or 10.
How do you win as the crew in Lookalike?
Finish every task so the task bar fills, or vote out every Lookalike. Ghosts can keep doing tasks, so being silenced does not take you out of the race.
What happens if the vote is tied?
Nobody is ejected. Nobody is ejected when skip gets the most votes either.
Is Lookalike free?
Yes. It runs free in your browser at /lookalike, on a computer or a phone.

