Steam hit Dark and Darker extends playtest over network issues

Four adventurers journey into a dim dungeon
(Image credit: Ironmace)

The Dark and Darker playtest has been extended by three more days to compensate for some of the issues players experienced when it started. 

As announced via the game's Steam page, the playtest - which started on December 16 and was initially set to end on December 23 - has been prolonged and will now end on December 26 instead. The reason behind these extra three days is due to the game's developer IronMace wanting to make up for the early network issues, instabilities, and rollback issues players were experiencing at the start of the playtest. 

As documented on the game's Twitter account, shortly after the playtest went live, players began reporting server issues and bugs in the game. Thankfully, the developer quickly solved the situation and rolled out a hotfix that ironed out some of the teething issues Dark and Darker was having. Unfortunately, things didn't stay smooth for too long, and three more hotfixes had to be rolled out. It seems like things are going well right now, though. 

Despite these initial issues, it doesn't seem like players have been put off the PvPvE dungeon crawler. In fact, the game has blown up on Steam, managing to achieve a peak concurrent player count of 52,576. IronMace addressed this milestone on Twitter, writing: "What the heck is going on?! We hit over 50K concurrent players today. Thanks a heap to our awesome community!" 

The only downside is that Dark and Darker isn't going to release fully until Q4 2023, so we've got some time to wait until we get to experience it at its full potential. 

Fancy giving the playtest a go? Take a look at our Dark and Darker class guide before you get started. 

CATEGORIES
Hope Bellingham
News Writer

After studying Film Studies and Creative Writing at university, I was lucky enough to land a job as an intern at Player Two PR where I helped to release a number of indie titles. I then got even luckier when I became a Trainee News Writer at GamesRadar+ before being promoted to a fully-fledged News Writer after a year and a half of training.  My expertise lies in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, cozy indies, and The Last of Us, but especially in the Kingdom Hearts series. I'm also known to write about the odd Korean drama for the Entertainment team every now and then.  

Read more
Elden Ring Nightreign screenshot showing a monstrous, terrifyingly large enemy
The first Elden Ring Nightreign network test "has ended" after a few disastrous hours, and "an additional network test is being considered" to make up for it
Elden Ring Nightreign screenshot with three players battling an explosive creature
Sorry Elden Ring sickos, the Nightreign network test only lets you play for a few short hours a day
Monster Hunter Wilds screenshot shows a character and their Palico looking towards the camera.
As PSN outages subside, Capcom is extending the next Monster Hunter Wilds open beta for an extra day as the "test period was cut short"
Four adventurers journey into a dim dungeon
Dark and Darker's legal battles are far from over as the popular extraction RPG has been pulled from the Epic Games Store again
Elden Ring Nightreign
Elden Ring Nightreign network test times – here's when you can play the beta
Elden Ring Nightreign
Elden Ring Nightreign network test starts with a stumble as PlayStation servers go down for maintenance just as it begins
Latest in RPG
Baldur's Gate 3 screenshot showing Astarion, a pale male elf with short curly white hair and red eyes, looking over his shoulder with a smirk on his face
Baldur's Gate 3 Astarion actor comes face to face with what might just be the best merch to come of the RPG yet – a 5-foot Funko Pop figure of his character
The Witcher 3 screenshot of Geralt
Avowed and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 tap into the same thing that makes The Witcher 3 so compelling – and it's something I'm always looking for in RPGs
Atomfall
Atomfall boss "very familiar" with Baldur's Gate 3 director's frustrations with publishers, as he recalls horror advice that games are "faster to make" if you "make fewer bugs"
Official art for Hopetown, featuring a group of miners looking towards the camera.
The battle to steal the Disco Elysium successor's spotlight continues as former and current ZA/UM devs reveal teasers for their new RPGs simultaneously
Horizon Forbidden West
Horizon Zero Dawn's Aloy is the star of Sony's leaked AI-powered character prototype, which allows users to ask questions to an unsettling, emotionless version of the protagonist
Atomfall screenshot
Fallout: New Vegas is a big inspiration for Atomfall, which is why you’ll be able to kill every NPC in post-apocalyptic Cumbria
Latest in News
Death Stranding 2: On the Beach
Dark Souls 2 fans remind Death Stranding 2 director Hideo Kojima that he won’t be taking the DS2 acronym that easily
Minecraft Diamond Armor
Minecraft Pocket Edition got its name because one of its devs was a big "Nintendo nerd" who wanted to pay homage to the Game Boy Pocket
Death Stranding 2
Hideo Kojima says Death Stranding's themes of connection came about because "I thought I lost everything when I became alone nine years ago"
Monster Hunter Wilds trailer screenshot showing a young woman with long blonde hair tied back into a ponytail smiling slightly, pumping her left fist in the air
Monster Hunter Wilds' infamously confusing menus spare no player, not even Gemma's voice actor herself: "This is honestly what I’m struggling with the most"
Death Stranding 2 kiss
Hideo Kojima says "it was very difficult to direct" Death Stranding 2's big kiss scene, but Norman Reedus thinks "it was niiice" locking lips with Léa Seydoux
Ms. Marvel alongside the mutants of Age of Apocalypse
30 years after the original Age of Apocalypse, Ms. Marvel Kamala Khan will travel to the alt-reality to save X-Men history