still no reds
It’s fine tbh and was more of a tongue in cheek comment due to the nature of the game being overly complex. I did think perhaps breaking up the core elements into poll options could be useful but I think we all know the answers by now anyway.
Everyone loves the gameplay loop but desperately wants more content and tighter balancing. And the vast majority detest the derank in havoc (which is gatekeeping, in a very predatory way, the only challenging gameplay in the game).
Want to play the extra challenge stuff? Just drag your belly over the coals to get to it! ![]()
very much this.
on one hand, the gameplay is addictive and satisfying when everything works. everything in the creative department, like music, voices, dialog, art is top notch. darktide remains the only game where i’ve ever spent money on cosmetics, and a considerable amount even, and i’ve put more time into it than in other games since it came out, even more than in my beloved boomer shooters.
on the other hand, it came out at the perfect moment, as i doubt that i’d ever have the same goodwill and patience with a similarly unifinished game. tbh many of the early issues have been addressed, like the dreaded crafting , but not entirely eliminated. we still have random base weapons, random curios, random maps with random conditions, and no server browser. Ah, and single player mode. as i said in another thread, i don’t get this fascination with not giving players complete agency. it’s simply tiring. also, balance is not only all over the place, but even minor tweaks take ages.
Overall satisfied ![]()
Mixed. I now have around 170h in VT 2, which i started playing after after 1.6+ thousand hours in DT and for game that is supposed to be technical sequel, supposed to improve upon previous game mechanics, darktide instead in some aspects feels like degraded version of VT 2, despite copying like 80% of things, which sometimes for some reason implemented worse than in previous game.
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Interface and hub problems. No ability to have hotkeys for access to maps, havoc, hadron, psykanium, etc., without mod(s). No ability to say yes/no without mod during gameplay. No ability to map same action to two different buttons, like i can’t quick swap on wheel up and down like i did in VT 2. Multiple other quality of life features available only via mods.
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No ability to choose missions. Afraid much to see how bad some of the maps is and in need of reworks, because people would stop picking them ever again?
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Why they made mortis trials the way they are now, when they could’ve just copy chaos wastes? They are more fun and diverse to play through. Also both mods suffer grom having really easy 1st rounds, but in mortis trials with all the boons it’s not changing much, i lost there only like 2 times maybe? While chaos wastes can put even booned up players into difficult situation, which means they do keep or keep challenge, despite both game mods being boring at the start
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Chaos warrior better than crusher for one simple reason: it’s got louder sounds, it’s got voice lines that indicate it’s present nearby, while crusher can be as sneaky as single poxwalker.
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Darktide missions don’t have unique boss fights, don’t have spectacle,like ship combat, blowing up giant chaos gate, destroying warp nuke etc. Objectives very limited and they kinda limited in VT 2,but what matters is execution, VT 2 can have similar follow up some cart objective, but trough which locations you will follow, what challenges they will give are different enough. In DT there’s barely any differences in interactions with terminals, with getting vacuum capsules and cryonic rods.
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Bots overall worse in DT.
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No ability to boot solo w/bots private game.
This list can probably go on, but i can’t think of anything else right now.
On the other hand very 1st time i booted Darktide via gaypass was half a year or more before i fully started playing it. I did prologue, then googled some info about game, came across video about crafting system and instantly deleted darktide after watching it, till unlocked and loaded update.
So obviously game was improved, specifically:
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Crafting improved, but only partially, getting 17% toughness, 21% health and 3 410+ rating stamina curious(cause lesser rating is +2) is pure insanity even now.
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Talent tree rework, making blitzes no longer kept behind worthless talents. Some of the new talents also good.
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Weaponry was buffed or got affected by talents reworks enough to make at least one mk viable in auric, not in havoc though or not with randoms. Though then came buffs to enemies and ogryn rework both improved his ranged build and hit some weapons.
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I guess game is more stable now from technical point of view.
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New classes are good enough, but they alone not enough to keep me in game, i play maybe 2 aurics per 10 days, don’t want to play havoc.
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Some things it does better than VT 2,like every weapon got special action, sometimes it’s even good. Psykanium is obviously better than training dummies of VT 2,but then again it don’t go full way, there’s still no monsters, no poxburster, no captain, no twins. Inspection of weapons give better information than crappy diagrams of VT 2. I kinda like sliding even if it is goofy. So far no paid difficulty, no paid weapons some of which straight improvement or just best in slot for X class in VT 2(i don’t take into account class specific weapons from character DlCs in either of games, that come with new classes and work for them only). Dedicated servers>p2p despite thousands of errors. I like pox hounds more than assassin rat,100 points to Darktide for this.
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Without quality of life mods i mentioned before and some others this game barely playable. But i wouldn’t play if there was no redeeming qualities, like music, visuals, gameplay in general. I got plenty of satisfaction from it. I played 2-3 runs yesterday in aurics to not get rusty and i liked one of them. I am looking forward to promised new maps, hope for new enemies and improvements to havoc and mortis trials, though as saying goes: hope in one hand and sh*t in other, see which ones fills faster, so i will hope only slightly.
Imbeciles from the management department told it would impact the metric “players stayed loged if for the X ammount of time” causing shareholders moistening.
Perhaps it was Tencent managers.
Crazy how those people in the industry don’t understand you just need to make a good game and respect the customer.
Mixed. It’s still surprising how much friction there is to actually get into a game, even with mods, and it’s much worse design-wise without mods; specifically the Mourningstar hub in general and the mission select menus. Once you get into a mission it’s mostly fine, though some technical issues, mainly server and sound related ones seem ever present.
The audio and visual presentation is overall quite good but affected by the technical issues and limitations. Menu UI and UX really suffers with limiting options, with notable gaps in inventory management and ‘crafting’, like filter, sorting and bulk options.
As long as you’re in a mission , it’s fine, good even, but everything outside of a mission still feels in part both over-designed and under-designed, and neither is particularly player friendly.
That being said, missions do suffer from a noticeable lack of pacing nowadays where spawns are just spewed out at you with no rhyme or reason. Every horde is an ‘ambush’, every specialist are actually two for three of the same one stacked on top of each other and the enemy clipping issues just get worse with density, especially when there are bulwarks and crushers around. A part of this is the ever-escalating feedback loop of player power and enemy spawns, but the game has become more tiring to play whereas it never really felt like that in the first year despite the flaws it had then.
Like it’s not just the newness factor, but in the first year it felt like there was a flow, rest moments, downtime and build-up, now it’s wired all the way through. We could play hours just fine, but now even a mission or two is noticeably draining.
Yeah the drain playing this game is palpable like 3 back to back games and it’s not boredom but mental fatigue that has me going yeah I’ve had enough darktide for a bit.
The game is great, but weird content pipeline with half the content hidden behind events, they spread their attention across 3 game modes which I think is wrong, and the game has too many bugs and runs pretty poorly both graphics-wise and connectivity-wise.
Other than these three grievances, I’m happy with the game, it’s still my favorite game that I play every chance I get.
The heart of the matter.
I refunded Darktide after 45 hours (Thanks Fatshark Support) because, at the time, it had been a year with no solo mode being added. Here we are over 3 years later and there’s still no solo mode. @FatsharkJulia when are we getting Solo Mode?
- Still no solo mode
- powercreep/terrible balance
- barely any new weapons (most of them recycled)
- “new” melee weapons having terrible combos and animations
- little to no maps per year
- buggy mess still
- taunting bugfixing and repairing systems as “content”
- terrible monetization
Same old same old
Not played VT2, but played Darktide at beginning.
Auric at the beginning of Darktide was great. And it is not the fact we practiced that made it bad… but the power creep they offered us.
My opinion is that the fall beginning is when they added high intensity gauntlet.
A lot were happy… but it is here the game mutated from an horde survivor to a fantasy combat simulator.
And must say that I think the work to port the game to console has maybe lead to reduce the horde size due to the great capacity of a console… (yes irony)
I am 2k+ hours in and my over all feeling is mixed i wont go into too much details others already put it much better than i can do.
They could increase the threat and greatly reduce volume of all enemies that are not in a horde…whilst increasing horde size.
The horde being pox walkers and groaners. Having a huge horde appear every now and then is great and could work well with fewer, more dangerous specials/elites/etc
It would be a happier ratio for many imo.
I have the same question… And I know they made a statement that was saying “maybe”. But this is NOT an answer. Especially when you clearly stated 1 week before the release that the solo game mode will be added in one month…
It was not conditional, it was not “we are currently reviewing if we can add a solo game mode”. No… it was “we will add solo game mode in December”
And let’s remind everybody that Darktide was released the November 30th of 2022.
I cannot understand how they could announce just before the release we deliver you a solo game mode next month, and now, 3 years later, still nothing.
Too many problems, inconsistencies and bad design for me to call the game good, best i can do is fun. But at its best it delivers for sure.
I personally feel that the game has downgraded itself drascticaly copare to Lunch state. Sur,e crafting was adressed, locks are gone etc. But overall gameplay is lacking. Everything is melee-oriented Vet was destroyed after skill tree change. Maybe the novelty is gone, but having no long-term goal, nothing to fight for war for Tertium has not changed since lunch.
Classes lost their identity after the skill tree rework. That hurt the gameplay the most.
Last year 2025 was the worst for me in DT. Arbites was fun for a while, then it was nerfed and lost the fun factor. The class turns into smaller Ogryn with better range selection. Hive scum is just bad design for the game as it is now (No thoughnes rediction just doesn’t work in 360 poxter spawn 24/7).
I have mentioned this before, but the fact that the game has no pause phases where you would chill for a bit is really a problem for me. Horde is boring AF, especially since it’s endless.
Same enemies after so long get’s old.
I agree with all you said. ![]()
I have 4k hours (nearly) and still enjoy Darktide, and hopeful for the future, but the game that is playable now is nothing like the one I bought.
I’m super happy to finally have my mucker
(I was always more into Rogue Trader andNecromunda over 40k) , but I’ll die on the hill that Vermintide 2’s combat and map design (immersion) are night and day compared to Darktide.
Vermintide 2 feels like you’re playing D&D with your pals (even if they’re randoms), but Darktide is an arcadey, ‘Suicide Squad Killed the Justice League’-style game with ‘gotts go fast’ tempo, explosions and other effects everywhere, hyper aggressive movement tech, and rainbow enemies (Havoc).
Overall I am very happy with Darktide, but I would have loved it even more if it was slower paced and more tactical, but it is what it is. ![]()
The game is fun, each character feels good, enemies and density feel good for the most part. There’s frustrating stuff, and the devs aren’t addressing some important stuff that’s been broken or missing for years, but overall I keep coming back to play, and keep enjoying it, so I’m pretty happy with it right now. Not perfect, but not bad either.