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Has anybody played Dark and Darker?

gaming_again

gaming_again

Member
Being somewhat behind the curve, I just found out about upcoming game 'Dark and Darker' on the PC. It's due for release next Christmas but demos etc. are available.

It's a FPS dungeon crawler that allows you to play in a group in areas populated by other groups that may or may not be friendly. It looks to have the gambling mechanic of Dark Souls (should I quite and trade in what I have now or keep going and risk it for better rewards) as well as the punishing ethos.

I think it looks sick.



I can't seem to find any topic on this... I'm wondering who here has played it and if it is as good as it looks.
 
gaming_again said:
It looks to have the gambling mechanic of Escape from Tarkov (should I quite and trade in what I have now or keep going and risk it for better rewards) as well as the punishing ethos.
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Fixed it for you.

Game looks cool to me. You can request access to play on Steam if you add to your wishlist.
 
Looks pretty fun. If the combat's as well implemented as Chivalry 2 then I'd probably give it a shot.

You probably won't get much of a reaction here though. This is a pure gameplay type of game - not a AAA press button to watch cinematic type of game.
 
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Dark and Darker hooked me hard. I played around 12 hours over the weekend. The gameplay loop is solid: fight through a map then either exit or go deeper. Combat is fun with enough nuance to allow for skilled play. I killed so many barbarians by luring them into a narrow passage and cutting them to ribbons while their weapon clanged off of the walls. Spells and abilities have finite uses to prevent spamming. Intelligent use of abilities is required to have enough resources to reach extraction. I see so much room for expansion and customization in the full product.

Tuning is the only issue. Dark and Darker is borderline impossible solo. Each room is like a D&D encounter. Flanking or running away become infeasible as you activate each room and become swarmed by enemies. You're basically fucked if a group sees you and wants you dead. The starting gear adds to the difficulty by turning even the weakest skeleton into a borderline bossfight. Don't even ask about the second map where opening a door leads you to Satan, his bitches, zombies, and demon dogs.

Dark and Darker shines in group play. The classes compliment each other well. Sharing gear was easy during the playtest and I found a natural camaraderie form with every group I played with. I had so much fun
 
Alot of potential but was janky, biggest thing with this game is the fact they have a circle that closes in like Fortnite to try and force PvP later in the match but it can be quite quick.

You also get Mage spam
 
Mr.ODST said:
Alot of potential but was janky, biggest thing with this game is the fact they have a circle that closes in like Fortnite to try and force PvP later in the match but it can be quite quick.

You also get Mage spam
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I am ok with the circle. The places it funnels players to are sometimes bizarre. Damage from the circle was so low during the playtest that I generally ignored it and found portals in the red.
 
gameplay seems WAAAYYYY too simple for me, you cant choose the attack animation. Seems pretty dumb for PVP.
 
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Just seen recent gameplay videos and it looks really fun but they need to improve on the sword animations a bit before release

 
Just tried it, a lot of fun. Definitely very unforgiving. I also learned people I encounter are not friends, they stab me.
 
Man, what an amazing game. Best game I've come across in a good while. It became my new gaming addiction pretty fast. I've got 50 hours in this playtest and have mainly played wizard.

I also enjoyed watching streamers like Cohh (wild Barbarian action) and MoonMoon (wizard) playing the game, especially the solo runs they did.

I just posted this on Steam:

I cannot commend the devs enough for bringing this amazing game to fruition. It's quite ballsy to come up with a hardcore game like this.
I'm a 39yo grumpy gamer that is very critical about nowadays games (mainly play small indie titles), but this recent playtest has already offered me some of the most satisfying, exciting & intense gaming moments I've experienced. Such a damn solid gameplay core/loop and I really enjoyed playing with others through discord.
I can only hope Ironmace sticks to their vision and not get destracted by the mob of entitled rich kids that went to war, but were expecting a theme park, and come crying that war is unfair and needs to be changed.
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Next playtest will be in February during Steam's Nextfest. I'm really looking forward to that.
 
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I never gave Escape from Tarkov a chance. Never cared for the mechanics and gameplay. But Dark and Darker enticed me almost immediately. Surely because the fantasy aspect of it really caught my eye. A couple of days ago I decided to give it a shot, and holy shit did I have a blast. I enjoyed it SO much more than I was expecting to. There's a few things I hope they improve, and I look forward to seeing what it's going to look like at release. But I threw 10 hours into it way to easily, lol.

I too hope they release this in EA soon, because it's received a TON of attention. If they wait too long, I'm not sure how it's going to affect things. Well, and I can feel the withdrawals already hitting. :messenger_frowning_
 
I kept hearing how addicted the streamers I watch were so I just had fun watching instead of playing cause I don't want to go through withdrawals with everyone. I hope it goes EA soon too. It looks awesome.
 
MiguelItUp said:
Next playtest is February 6th apparently. I was reading folks say that EA is rumored in Q2 2023? But we'll see.
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It says Q4 2023 on steam. If thats true they need to go early access, just ask £20 for the game and they will get massive funds to make the game better.
 
Yes, the game looks very interesting but early access = no buy. I'l gladly check out the game once they are actually finished with it.
 
I wanted to play this on the Deck, but it's not optimized. They could make the menus more streamlined. It's PvPvE, so I hope some good solo runs are something in the future. Maybe I'm asking for too much. I'd buy something like this.. some sorta ultra hard fps dungeon game.
 
Here's a dump of the recent dev QnA on Discord: https://i.redd.it/w9u5vg9h6h8a1.png

Some highlights:
  • 26 man dev team
  • Team wants to fully focus on development, reason for doing playtests
  • Overwhelming positive reception
  • Focus on implementing features rather than balancing right now
  • Bard confirmed next class, and interested in adding a monk, shapeshifting druid, lock/necro, summoning and charming mobs confirmed
  • Experimenting with different character races
  • Wants to add as many maps and dungeons as possible
  • Not F2P confirmed
  • Seasonal wipes
  • No AH, but wants to make trade more comfortable, will likely implement filter
  • Interested in player housing
Also this interview with Terence is an interesting watch:
 
10 more days until the next playtest!

Also, because this is the best game, I've made some DnD inspired art using Midjourney:

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comicbook.com

Steam Demo Cracks Top 10 Most Played List Before the Game's Release

The top 10 of Steam’s list of Most Played Games can be pretty tough to crack, and when a game makes the list, it’s a major deal. There are some games that are basically always there, and they’re usually joined by the occasional massive game release. However, a free demo for Dark and Darker was […]
comicbook.com comicbook.com

The top 10 of Steam's list of Most Played Games can be pretty tough to crack, and when a game makes the list, it's a major deal. There are some games that are basically always there, and they're usually joined by the occasional massive game release. However, a free demo for Dark and Darker was released during Steam Next Fest, and has quickly attracted a lot of players. The game is currently sitting in the 8th place spot, having hit a peak of 106,345 players today, and has 99,102 players as of this writing. That's pretty incredible!
 
A new playtest has just been announced!

We would like to thank @everyone for helping us out with our most successful playtest to date. We collected so much data that we are still in the processing stage right now. We will share lots of interesting data once we get a chance to catch our breath. The recent playtest also gave us a lot of clues on how to proceed with development. We realize we still have some important questions that need to be answered. It is for this reason we have decided to schedule another playtest prior to our Early Access launch. We hope to test some pretty substantial additions for this playtest that requires a bit more development time than in the past. Therefore, the next playtest is scheduled for April 14-19th. We know the extended down time between the playtests may be disappointing to our fans but we will work our hardest to make the next one even better than before. As always, thanks to all our fans for your wonderful support!
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ChoosableOne said:
Wow, it's awesome! I'm surprised no one is talking about it in here. Don't sleep on this one folks.
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GAF can be such a weird beast, offering a social platform where some of the most hardcore & passionate gaming connoisseurs share and discuss their hobby. Yet one of the most promising upcoming hardcore titles is hardly gaining any attention. In my 39 years of both being a console and PC gamer, I know this game is something special, and I'm sure many GAFers would enjoy this game if they actually tried.
I think the game will gain more traction once EA is out, or it could forever remain an underdog on GAF.
 
Herbspiceguy said:
A new playtest has just been announced!




GAF can be such a weird beast, offering a social platform where some of the most hardcore & passionate gaming connoisseurs share and discuss their hobby. Yet one of the most promising upcoming hardcore titles is hardly gaining any attention. In my 39 years of both being a console and PC gamer, I know this game is something special, and I'm sure many GAFers would enjoy this game if they actually tried.
I think the game will gain more traction once EA is out, or it could forever remain an underdog on GAF.
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Yeah the hype is massive elsewhere online.

The developers say console versions are planned so maybe it'll get more traction here soon.
 
With the ongoing lawsuit development of the game is still going on as Ironmace has released some new footage on their YT channel over recent weeks. No word on early access release.

The current state of the US lawsuit is that Ironmace lawyers have filed for a dismissal.

Also Nexon providing misleading evidence is piling up:
 
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Early access release is out!
From following court case updates to 'boom, EA is here' felt quite sudden.

I've just bought the Hold the Line edition and I'm downloading the game through their launcher which can be downloaded from the official website.
 
Any GAFers (still) playing DaD?
It's still my main game and thought I'd give an update here for the ppl who are interested, on the fence, or have played past iterations/playtests of the game.

Development is still going strong with a steady playerbase sitting at a steady 11-13K.
No news regarding the Korean (Nexon) lawsuit.

Some of the big features that have been added over the past months:
  • Normal mode: common (white) quality gear limit on entering map. Basically noob/casual mode.
  • Map rotation: all maps can be played as solo/duo/trio
  • Mining and crafting: they added iron, copper (uncommon) and gold ores (legendary) and craftables, besides cobalt (rare) and rubysilver (epic), and just recently herbs to make meds
  • Quest and affinity system: doing quests for specific merchants opens up better quality wares and craftables
  • Ranking system: based on your performance (emphasis on PvE rather than PvP) you gain adventure points (AP), accumulate enough AP to gain ranks which are tied to seasonal rewards (big gold bag, skin)
  • MMR: no details disclosed as to what the criteria it's based on
Just yesterday the devs did a QnA, which has been transcribed to this Google doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LqgFH1WuisLL07nsBrIycHq_99gsV9V4xNCIrX3mhp0/
Some highlights:
  • Moved to new office space allowing for larger team, went from 20+ to 50 currently
  • 500,000+ game copies sold in the first 6 months netting over $20 million USD
  • Still dealing with ongoing DDoS attacks to the extent of calling it a "consistent war"
  • Upcoming content:
    • 5 x 5 (trio's) goblin cave map
    • Ruins to move to top level map of Crypts/Inferno (as originally planned)
    • New ice cave map
      • will not have a swarm/circle mechanic and is part of 3 tier level system similar to Ruins/Crypts/Infero, it's Ice village/cave/abyss
      • mobs: Ice Giants, Yetis, an Ice Troll and Ice Skeletons.
    • Auction house
    • Guild hall
    • Arena (PvP)
    • Plans for subclass system through skill tree, like World of Warcraft
    • (Re)confirmed classes: druid, sorcrerer, paladin
 
Man, I haven't played in months. I still really love the game, but I know the last time I played I was just getting frustrated at the matchmaking and gearing. It felt like you'd always go up against someone that was out gearing you across the board. So, you'd basically get one tapped repeatedly. After awhile it just wasn't fun, and I took a break. I still adore the game will go back soon enough, I just know that there have been ups and downs in the community regarding a number of things since I've been gone.

I really look forward to seeing how they continue to support it, and I hope it DOES make it to Steam soon enough to get them more traffic. I really don't care for "extraction shooters", but Dark and Darker was the only one that clicked for me.
 
It climaxed into a heated "Timmy's" vs. no-lifer sweats debate and resulted in the addition of the 'normal mode' where players are limited to going in with only common (white) gear and a limit of finding rare (blue) gear inside the dungeon.
 
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