The film stars Ryan Reynolds, Jodie Comer, Lil Rel Howery, Utkarsh Ambudkar, Joe Keery, and Taika Waititi.

Levy passed on the script but reconsidered after Hugh Jackman introduced him to Reynolds, resulting in him leaving the film adaptation of the Uncharted video game he had been developing.

Its "players" (the online persons who have real lives beyond Free City) wear sunglasses and spend their time fighting each other and causing mayhem.

Accessing the players' view of the game, Guy visits new areas and meets Millie at vlogger Revenjamin Buttons' stash house, where they attempt to steal evidence leading to her source code.

Guy eventually realizes that there is something more to an NPC's existence, and goes with Buddy to get the evidence Millie wanted from Buttons, who accidentally glitched through the edge of Free City's map and discovered an older build of Life Itself, recording a video clip in the process.

Guy recalls the location of an island containing remnants of the Life Itself build and they attempt to reach it before the Free City 2 launch wipes all old content from the servers.

Antwan fires Keys, has every player removed from Free City, and sends an unfinished Guy-resembling character named Dude into the game.

Before he can destroy the final server, Millie offers a deal to not sue him for copyright infringement and surrender the Free City franchise's profits to him in exchange for her creation.

During the development of Life Itself, Keys had encoded what he knew about her tastes into an AI routine in the game, which was eventually incorporated into Free City, explaining why Guy felt drawn to MolotovGirl.

Recurring NPCs in Free City include Britne Oldford as Missy, a barista; Camille Kostek as the bombshell that was originally associated with Revenjamin Buttons and bank robber #3 before befriending Missy; Mark Lainer as a bank hostage who always has his hands up; Mike Devine as Officer Johnny, a police officer that Guy knows; Sophie Levy as a big city dreamer; Vernon Scott as the manager of the bank that Guy and Buddy work at who would get attacked by bank robbers as part of a Free City bonus; Naheem Garcia as Joe, a convenience store owner whose store is always robbed by the players while being thrown through his window; Anabel Graetz as Phyllis, an elderly cat lady who needs help finding her cats; Ric Plamenco as an ice cream vendor in the part of Free City where no quests are; Kenneth Israel as a businessman; Michael Malvesti as a newsstand vendor; Michael Tow as a man who quotes "looks like rain"; Colin Allen as a shoe store clerk; and Bob Gilliam as a news anchor at FCNN (short for Free City News Network).

host Alex Trebek made a posthumous cameo appearance in his final film role before his passing on November 8, 2020.

"[21] Levy had previously been attached to the film Uncharted, an adaptation of the video game series of the same name, before he left to make Free Guy.

[23] Levy decided to hire production designer Ethan Tobman over other candidates with more feature film experience after being inspired by the energy he brought to the project.

[22] Levy found it liberating to be influenced by other games and films but not required to make a direct adaptation of an existing franchise.

[30] The film features several weapons from other video game and film franchises, including a Mega Buster from Mega Man, a lightsaber from Star Wars, one of Fortnite's pickaxes, the gravity gun from Half-Life 2, the portal gun from Portal, as well as Captain America's shield and Hulk's fist from the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

[39] Free Guy's marketing team created parody posters in the style of other video games, including Super Mario 64, Minecraft, Among Us, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, Mega Man, Street Fighter II, Doom, and Animal Crossing: New Horizons.

[1][5] In the United States and Canada, Free Guy was released alongside Respect and Don't Breathe 2, and was initially projected to gross $15–18 million from 4,165 theaters in its opening weekend.

The website's critics consensus reads, "Combining a clever concept, sweet, self-aware humor, and a charming cast, Free Guy is frivolous fun.

[6] Peter Debruge of Variety magazine called the film an "at-times unwieldy mashup of multiple-reality blockbusters like The Matrix and The Lego Movie" and said that "Free Guy is a lot of fun, despite the fact that Levy and the screenwriters seem to be changing the rules as they go.

Giving the film three out of four stars, he wrote "Thanks in large part to the vibrant, funny, sweet, endearing work by Reynolds and Comer, Free Guy delivers.

Club gave the film a C+ grade and said, "For all its casual mayhem, Free Guy turns out to be a rather cuddly crowdpleaser, a high-concept blockbuster trifle with bubblegum ice cream clogging its circuits."

"[68] Nick De Semlyen of Empire was critical of the film; he compared it unfavorably to 2018's Ready Player One, and said that although it is "eager to please" it "doesn't really hang together, even as you're watching it.

[83][84] In March 2022, Steve Asbell, president of 20th Century Studios, said a script was being submitted shortly and called the sequel "a fantastic story".