After adopting a free-to-play model which was initially poorly received by the community, the Dark and Darker devs have been working on expanding it. First they allowed F2P players to carry better gear into runs, and are now letting them into the game’s Marketplace, albeit under stricter conditions.
Hotfix 53 saw numerous changes to Dark and Darker‘s gameplay, such as enemy and quest balance, bug fixes, and so on. However, just like the previous hotfix, the main selling point here is the expansion of free-to-play options for players who wish to continue under this model. They will now be able to access the game’s Marketplace, where regular “Legendary status” players can buy and sell items to make an extra buck or two. F2P users will only be allowed to purchase stuff to incentivize an upgrade at some point down the line. The developers justified this with what they viewed as a “pay to win” issue arising when worse-geared F2P users clashed with fully armored Legendary-status holders.
F2P players could not carry gear above Common level when the game returned to Steam. Screenshot by Dot Esports via SGF
This marks the second major push to expand the free-to-play experience for new Dark and Darker players. The game made its grand return to mainstream platforms, including Steam, and launched with a F2P model so as to allow newcomers to give the game a spin and existing players to migrate from their previous platform free of charge. However, the way the model was conceived sparked some controversy and a negative reaction from the community, leading to developer Ironmace looking for solutions to appease both sides.
As things stand, non-paying Dark and Darker players can carry loot and gear up to Legendary level and will now also have limited access to the Marketplace. Seeing as how F2P players can basically now enjoy the full package (albeit stuck on Normal mode only) we might be looking at a shift in the game’s design philosophy that may aim to appeal to a wider audience rather than just its existing one.
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