Dauntless Totally Blew It With The "Awakening" Launch, And Now They're Scrambling To Try To Fix It, Here's The Plan

It's no secret that Dauntless isn't in a good place. After being totally silent on the update front for years, the "Awakening" update was supposed to be the monster-hunting game attempting to revamp itself and make that good "second impression" on gamers.

If failed hard on that front.

Honestly, many of us, including me, weren't surprised at all. Removing a lot of the progression veteran players made and introducing loot boxes into the monetization (among other bad monetization decisions) both made a negative impression on me when announced. That impression has done nothing but grow stronger as returning players find themselves having to do a lot all over again. They weren't "totally" reset, but yeah, there was a lot they had to re-do.

Getting an ex-dev calling you out for "blatantly not player-focused" decisions certainly didn't help either.

Here we are, 2 weeks after the Awakening update and Steam launch, and Dauntless sits on Steam with "Overwhelmingly Negative" reviews and any social media platform that host Dauntless discussions is full of players just being pissed. They have every right to be.

I guess this is what you get when a blockchain company buys your game and makes you keep it a secret? Speculation on my part, to be sure.

Something has to give, here. While most veterans of the game likely don't play on Steam, having only 200 or so players on the digital distribution platform isn't a good look.

Cue the "We Hear You" post from the team.

While the post reviews some of the changes already made, it also covers some of the plans to address feedback coming down the line. Some of these "fixes" actually have to wait until the current season is over, though.

While the full post details some technical improvements coming, I'll hit the high points addressing things like monetization and progression for you.

• All returning players will receive 300,000 Rams and 5,000 Combat Merits.
• Returning players will receive up to 500 Peerless Aetherite based on their pre-Awakening crafting
• All game modes will be immediately unlocked for returning players, negating the current need to go through the quest line.
• Update 2.1.1 will remove Steel Marks from the Tier 3 Weapon Talent unlock requirements, ensuring that players who prefer not to engage with Trials or have already used their weekly marks elsewhere are not locked out of core gameplay mechanics and power progression.
• Effective immediately, the previously-paid Aetherite claims from the Store (weekly for Peerless, daily for Shining, hourly for Dull) will be free.
• Next season’s Hunt Pass will reintroduce Platinum rewards - 100 on the free track and an additional 100 on the Elite track.

While loot boxes are directly mentioned as part of player feedback, they aren't specifically addressed. The team probably thinks they fall under the note "Reevaluating monetization strategies to balance sustainability with fairness while remaining rewarding for players" in the post.

Frankly speaking, this just doesn't seem to be the Phoenix Labs I have worked with in past years. I'm sure there are quite a few members of the team that did not want to take Dauntless in its current direction if the choice had been theirs.

Sadly, I don't know if Dauntless is going to get more chances at this point. There's a high likelihood that the current situation just doesn't allow it to be fixed as fast as it needs to here. That would likely result in the end of Phoenix Labs itself given just about everything else the company had cooking was canceled. I certainly hope that isn't the case for the staff, but I'm sure the situation is a bit nerve-racking right now in the office.