The patch day for “Hunt: Showdown” unleashed turmoil, server closures, and exasperating download odysseys.
Initially meant to signal the kickoff for the new in-game event “Judgement of The Fool,” the patch day on Wednesday, June 18, ended in utter gridlock for Hunt: Showdown. Right after the deployment of update 2.4, reports of widespread technical issues began to surge. Players on PC and consoles reported connection failures, matchmaking glitches, and complications in obtaining in-game currency. The severity of the problems rendered normal gameplay impossible.
The emergency fix: Total server shutdown
After early attempts to rectify the situation proved ineffective, Crytek took the drastic step of shutting down all Hunt: Showdown servers globally. The game experienced a complete offline period for several hours. In an official statement, the studio later clarified that the update had functioned smoothly during all internal tests but faltered under the actual load of live servers. Instead of attempting to mend the flawed version with hotfixes, the team chose to implement a full rollback. The entire game reverted to the previous stable version 2.3:
“Hunters, we sincerely regret the ongoing issues following update 2.4. After exhausting all potential solutions, we’ve opted to revert the game to update 2.3 to regain stability and will continue to monitor the situation.”
Patch Day transforms into a download odyssey
Meanwhile, patch 2.4 is now accessible in its corrected form across all platforms, and the servers are stable once more. According to Crytek, issues regarding undelivered Twitch drop rewards have also been addressed. Consequently, the “Judgement of The Fool” event is set to commence with a delay.
However, as the developers worked on a solution behind the scenes, the rollback resulted in considerable inconvenience for many players. Those who went through the entire process first had to download the problematic 24 GB patch, then another substantial update to revert to the previous version, and finally, after successfully fixing the issues, download and install the corrected patch a second time. This download marathon proved particularly frustrating for players with slow internet speeds or limited data plans.
The tumultuous days also impacted the community: The game’s recent Steam ratings temporarily dipped to “Balanced” due to an influx of negative feedback. Now that the issues have been rectified, the rating is gradually improving, in part because the community is advocating for reconsideration of reviews made out of frustration.