How to try Dark and Darker playtest despite its unavailability on Steam

Dark and Darker is one of the most awaited dungeon crawler titles that blends first-person gameplay mechanics with role-playing elements in a medieval-themed setting. However, its road to release has been marred by many hurdles, the most recent being the DMCA takedown from Nexon.

This rendered Dark and Darker unavailable to Steam users. This mishap hasn't thwarted the developer Ironmace from continuing its playtest. In turn, they used an unorthodox medium to make the playtest available to fans. The developers declared that fans could delve into it via torrent in the Dark and Darker Discord server.

---

Accessing the Dark and Darker playtest

Dark and Darker developers Ironmace have provided an interesting alternative to access the playtest. This requires downloading the game's torrent files that Ironmace themselves provides. It is natural to be apprehensive about this approach since it involves using applications like BitTorrent or Utorrent. However, this is the only way to experience the playtest.

While Ironmace did tweet the torrent link, it has since been taken down from the social media platform. Interested readers can manually type out the link from the below-displayed Reddit screengrab (start typing from magnet:? to announce). This can be entered in the search bar of your internet browser, provided that you have a third-party torrent client downloaded on your PC.

You can use the torrent link to download the game files (Image via Ironmace)

You must then wait for the torrent file to download and start the installer, which can be found in the specified destination. This can be checked by right-clicking on the downloaded file and selecting the Open Containing Folder option (the terminology may differ based on the torrent client used).

After installation, you can go ahead and enter or create a login ID and password before delving into the playtest. Furthermore, Ironmace has released a patch for this playtest. The link to it can be found on their official Twitter page. It also highlights the process and prerequisites for the patch to work as intended.

Regarding this unorthodox playtest, Ironmace declared the following on the game's Discord server:

“Unfortunately, due to our current situation, we must be careful. Rest assured that we are working around the clock to safeguard the continuance of Dark and Darker. Unfortunately, due to the complexities of our situation, especially across International lines, it is taking time to resolve the Steam situation. In order for us to keep our promise to our fans we’ve had to go old school time.”

Ironmace then went on to share a link to the torrent and warned:

“DO NOT GET THE TORRENT FROM ANY OTHER SOURCES, AS WE CAN NOT GUARANTEE THE INTEGRITY OF ANY OTHER LINKS! All future patches will also be distributed in this manner, and you should ONLY GET THE LINKS FROM OUR OFFICIAL DISCORD ANNOUNCEMENT CHANNEL.”

---

Fans eagerly await Dark and Darker; one user even attempted to recreate it in Fortnite. Until the legal issues are sorted, one can only use the aforementioned method to playtest the game and eventually wait for an official release.