The dungeon-exploration escape game "Dark and Darker" has a new addition: an open beta of the very similar Dungeonborne is currently underway on Steam. The exact duration of the playtest is not yet determined, but it is expected to last one to two weeks, after which Dungeonborne will launch in early access.

It's one of those betas that you can participate in by pressing the invite request button on the Steam store page. But there's no need to wait: the playtest is open to everyone, and I was automatically included as soon as I clicked the button.

Dungeonborne's playtest has not overtaken Dark and Darker on Steam's concurrent user chart, but it is definitely a contender, with a respectable peak of 14,448 concurrent users.

While I like the Diablo-like inventory and methodical first-person melee combat, I am resigning myself to the fact that I am really bad at game extraction. I lose my nerve trying to find escape portals without being humiliated by low-level monsters, so I'm completely outmatched by confident players who chase after me like a deathmatch.

At least my character, a skeletal cryomancer named BartSimpson, looks pretty cool; Dungeonborne's eight classes have tradeoffs, like speed versus health, damage versus healing, and poor It comes with unique abilities like BartSimpson's mobile and effective Ice Storm attack. I haven't really mastered that spell yet. I still haven't gotten much use out of it because I spend a lot of time running away from little bats and such that try to kill me.

What I like about Dungeonborne right now is how quickly I can get into a match. On the casual Clouseau Castle map, it only takes 20-30 seconds from the time I click "Start" until the game starts. I think this is really important, especially in a game like extraction games with abrupt and disappointing endings.

Indeed, I might actually be hopeless. I'm no longer being killed by the player, I'm just being hunted down and chewed to death by the mimic.

Meanwhile, after a court battle forced it off Steam in 2023, the original first-person extraction dungeon crawler Dark and Darker returned to the platform in June. Its free-to-play model has not been well-received and is more of a free demo, but the developer says it intends to "make amends" and seems to be doing quite well, with positive user reviews and a place in the top 50 most-played games on Steam