Video Game / Meccha Chameleon

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Meccha Chameleon is a Co-Op Multiplayer hide-and-seek Indie Game developed and published by Japanese developer duo lemorion_1224 and Haganeiro.

Players are assigned either as Chameleons who must blend in with the environment to avoid getting caught, or as shotgun-armed Hunters who must find the former before the timer runs out. A core gameplay mechanic involves the use of painting tools that let players freely change what their blank models look like in real-time.

The game was released on June 9, 2026 via Steam.

Meccha Chameleon contains examples of:

• Abnormal Ammo: The Hunters' shotguns fire shells that leave paint trails and splash paint upon impact.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • Forced Taunt, as its name implies, forces all Chameleons to automatically taunt and attract the attention of Hunters. It helps the latter in their search when a Chameleon remains silent, and especially when voice chat isn't needed or used by the other players. Its interval can be set by the host.
  • If Ammo Limit is enabled, a Hunter's shell isn't used up when they miss their shots against a fleeing Chameleon. One shell is also restored upon a successful hit.
• Bilingual Bonus:
  • The game is officially titled Meccha Chameleon in English, but "Meccha" is meant to be read like a Japanese word which means "super" or "very", thus the title can be interpreted as "Super Chameleon."
  • The thumbs-up commendation that can be given to a Chameleon is called "Eeyan," a Japanese term for "That's great!"
• Bottomless Magazines: Depending on the host's settings, Hunters can either have finite or infinite shotgun shells.
• Call a Smeerp a "Rabbit": The titular "chameleon" refers to the hiding players, tiny stick figures who can paint themselves to match their surroundings.
• CAPS LOCK:
  • On its Steam pages, the game's title is either written normally as Meccha Chameleon or written in all-uppercase as MECCHA CHAMELEON. The stylized title art plays around by using all-uppercase letters that vary in size, looking like MEcCHA CHAMELEON or MEcCHA ChameleoN depending on how you see it.
  • When Hunters are about to search at the start of each round, the Chameleons' individual locations will be briefly layered by a large "HUNTER COMING" graffiti.
• Chameleon Camouflage: Players start each round with a plain white character model, but can use a paintbrush, an eyedropper, and color sliders to blend in with the environment just like a chameleon.
• Eldritch Location: The Backrooms map, just like its eponymous inspiration, is a creepy area with physics-defying furnitures and objects that are clipped through each other or rotated in the wrong directions.
• Hidden in Plain Sight: More than simply hiding successfully from Hunters for the round, the Chameleons will get points if they're in the direct sight line of a Hunter without being spotted, giving them an incentive to hide somewhere out in the open (that said, points don't do anything).
• Hollywood Chameleons: The Chameleon players hide themselves by painting over themselves to blend into their surroundings, as a clear reference to the idea of real chameleons doing the same. However, the game does not have any actual chameleons.
• Non-Standard Game Over: Hunters lose if they don't find all Chameleons within the given time. If Ammo Limit is enabled by the host, Hunters will also lose automatically when they run out of shotgun shells even if the timer is still ticking.
• No Plot? No Problem!: The game is basically just hide-and-seek with a painting feature, and has no story beyond that of a normal hide-and-seek game.
• Notice This:
  • Chameleons can whistle to taunt and attract the attention of Hunters. The sound is proximity-based; it doesn't reveal where a Chameleon is per se, but it provides Hunters a clue on where to search.
  • The post-round Answer Check highlights each Chameleon's previous hiding spot with a glowing outline of their model.
  • As an Obvious Rule Patch to prevent cheating, any Chameleons with their bodies too deeply embedded into walls or objects will have their outlines visible through walls.
• Obvious Rule Patch: Some mechanics are implemented to minimize unfair advantages:
  • A Chameleon whose body is "buried" too much in the environment will eventually have their location revealed by the game and are thus encouraged to hide elsewhere. This ensures Hunters can still find them in reasonable hiding places.
  • Chameleons cannot spectate or know each other's locations in Increasing Tag mode to avoid having pre-emptive advantages if they get caught and become Hunters later on.
• Self-Duplication: Chameleons can make clones that copy the appearance and pose of the original when they're created on-the-spot, though they can also be despawned manually.
• Shout-Out: The Backrooms map is based on the eponymous Creepypasta that originated from 4chan, particularly having an area with a prominent mono-yellow wallpaper and floor.
• Wallpaper Camouflage: Your model can easily stick to walls and ceilings, and thanks to the in-game tools, can be manually painted on to resemble the texture of the surface behind it.