Warhammer 40,000: Darktide (opens in new tab) officially launches on November 30, but anyone can pre-order it on Steam right now. Reaction to the game is decidedly mixed at this point, to use an overused expression: some players seem to like the game, but quite a few have posted negative user reviews; Darktide currently has a Steam user ranking of " mostly positive" position, with 70% of user reviews (open in new tab) giving it a thumbs up.

This is a surprisingly low number for a sequel to the acclaimed Vermintide, but it may not be indicative of how players feel about the game in a few weeks. Technically, Darktide was reviewed before it was "released". In a message (opens in a new tab) about what to expect from the "preorder beta," developer Fatshark listed a number of features not in the beta, such as proper spawn points and detailed weapon status displays, and pretty much all the content missing from the first beta release He warned that the first beta release lacked quite a lot of content.

New content, events, and possibly fixes and tweaks will be rolled out on a four-week schedule. (It's not actually on a weekly basis, but that's how Fatshark described it, so we'll go with it.)

WEEK ONE (November 17 - November 20)

WEEK TWO (November 21 - November 27)

WEEK THREE (November 28 - November 30)

NOVEMBER 30 (LAUNCH)

In short, Fatshark is treating this pre-release beta as, well, a beta test: giving a limited number of players access to a limited selection of the game and making sure everything works as expected. However, there have been complaints, for example, about missing information on weapons, even though the studio clearly states that detailed weapon status displays are not available. Other user reviews criticize the lack of a private lobby (which opens in a new tab) and solo play, and many complain about overall performance, even with relatively robust hardware. Many of the negative reviews state that the game is interesting but not ready for release.

"It's a fun game, not bad, but not enough content to feel fresh," wrote one Steam user. After playing several times with different characters, I didn't feel the same excitement I felt in Vermintide 2, and I didn't like any of the starting characters."

"This game is fun and not bad, I just didn't like the characters.

"The game is not ready for release, has consistent crashes, and (the early access version) definitely runs worse than the beta," wrote another.

Darktide players are not entirely to blame for the mess. Beta testing is as much a marketing tool as a diagnostic these days, often presented simply as a way to play the game faster rather than to figure out what is still broken, and opening up the user review feature on Steam only amplifies that impression. Fatshark says this Darktide release is a beta, and it clearly is, but it is fully open on Steam, including user reviews. In other words, for those who have purchased Darktide, Darktide is effectively a full release, and how they react to it will leave a lasting impression on the public, for better or worse.

Here are some of our own thoughts so far on what we like and dislike about Warhammer 40,000: Darktide (opens in new tab): it's wonderfully grim, but like many other games on Steam, the ray tracing We've found that it struggles, and unfortunately has a tendency to crash. In the words of online editor Fraser Brown, Darktide is "still in beta."