Out of breath and nearly out of bullets, I take cover on the roof of Lawson Station. The last surviving enemy trio has been chasing me down from a compound away, and they now know that I'm a solo player. As I frantically load the last few slug rounds into my shotgun, I can hear their footsteps approaching on mud, then a metal ramp, then on concrete. I know two of them are using long-range rifles because I heard them firing from across the map. I heard the other shooting at me with a revolver, so it's more than likely they have a shotgun that'll destroy me up close. If I can let them get into the middle distance, and I time my ambush just right, I might be able to catch them off guard.
Such is life in Crytek's now five-year-old first-person shooter, Hunt: Showdown. I started playing this game in April of 2020, and I recently passed the 2,000 hours played mark. While that's a fairly vomit-inducing amount of time to spend playing any video game, I am silently proud of that accolade. Until picking up Hunt, I hadn't played 1,000 hours of a single game, and now there's barely a day that goes by where I don't think about this enthralling shooter.
It amazes me, though, that even five years into its life, so many people still have no idea what Hunt: Showdown even is. The game has carved out a very survivable audience for itself in today's live-service genre - it's outlived massive franchises like Marvel's Avengers and countless games that were prophesied to survive far longer than Crytek's passion project. And yet, so many multiplayer shooter fans still don't have a clue what it is.
Allow me to explain, Hunt: Showdown is a PvEvP game set in the monster-infested swamps of Louisiana in the 1890s. Up to 12 players in teams of up to three enter a mission with the goal of Hunting down eldritch bosses, all the while, defending themselves against enemy players. Weaponry is historically accurate albeit with a steampunk twist, the death of your in-game characters is permanent, the AI haunting the maps is unforgiving, and above all, sound is king.
Just from that explanation, you can probably tell why Hunt hasn't attracted a massive mainstream following. It's a hardcore objective shooter that's probably not for everyone. Still, it's kept me ensnared for coming up on four years now. With the New Year beginning, here are the things that keep me coming back for more.
Sound
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Crytek built this extraction shooter around binaural audio, and more than any other game you've played, it demands that you obey its sound design laws. Every action you take is audible to other players, including basic things like reloading, healing, and taking out a throwable.
If you play for long enough, you'll be able to pinpoint what weaponry an enemy is using from across the map because they all sound so distinct. Soon after that, you'll even learn to triangulate their exact position from three compounds away.
I've never played a game that has the ability to make my heart race like Hunt does. Even after 2,000 hours, I will frequently finish an enemy encounter with my heart pounding through my chest, and my hands sweating, and that's all thanks to Crytek's audio team. There's something so incredibly important about how sound is implemented into this game. One player even managed to get a kill while playing blindfolded recently. Although the sound design may be overwhelmingly stressful at first, once you learn to pick up audio cues, you start to understand the language of the game.
Picking out what weapon has just been fired can help you adjust tactics going into a fight. If you recognize the sound of a rifle that needs to be reloaded after every shot, you know you'll have time to push in close when they miss. Distinguishing the noise of hellhounds versus that of a Hive helps you determine what route you should take to your objective, and using your map knowledge when listening to the footsteps around you means you can anticipate where a player will peek next.
Balance
Like any multiplayer game, the Hunt developers are in a never-ending balancing act, especially since they're always adding new content to the game. I've watched countless updates come and go where veteran players take to Reddit like crybabies, decreeing that a new weapon or custom ammo will kill the game or be unbalanced.
Yet, patch after patch, in-game event after in-game event, Hunt's arsenal defies all odds and the game continues to be the most balanced multiplayer game I've ever played. You can take the cheapest, least powerful weaponry into the bayou with you, and if you hit a headshot or just outplay an opponent, you can kill someone who's brought the most expensive gear. Since weapons are lootable, you can then make one hell of a profit from your victories.
There's so much depth to Hunt's gear, and one reason I keep coming back is that I'm constantly experimenting with new loadouts and tool combinations. It may be a community meme to take in a cavalry saber and two Sparks pistols, but role-playing as a pirate is a hilariously viable playstyle. As is taking a backseat and using a long ammo sniper, or going in guns blazing with a shotgun that will set your enemies ablaze when you hit them.
Community
Before I start this point, I'll admit that like every online community, Hunt has its fair share of cheaters, toxicity, and sweat-lords who only care about their KD ratios. But besides maybe Deep Rock Galactic, Hunt: Showdown has one of the most wholesome in-game communities I've come across. The content creators are pure miracle workers that only amplify my appreciation of the game, teamwork is rewarded through in-game incentives, and the developers actually listen to what the player base wants.
But perhaps most importantly, player encounters in the game can be endlessly entertaining. Hunt has proximity voice chat, so reenacting your favorite moments of chivalry from Western movies becomes second nature. I can't tell you how many times I've gone in as a solo player, killed two members of a trio, then had a mid-fight negotiation with the last survivor who wants to know if we can "talk it out."
There are friendly encounters and hilarious moments of truce-pleading to be had in this game, and that isn't exactly common in competitive multiplayer shooters these days.
Low lows, and high highs
As you might be picking up, Hunt is not exactly a forgiving game. There's a saying in the player base: "Hunt giveth, and Hunt taketh away - but mostly Hunt taketh."
Losing streaks are common because there are so many ways to die in this game. Seriously, Crytek even put together a video that shows 50 unexpected ways you can be killed - a few of which are the noise traps littered around the maps. While losing can hurt, especially if you lose a high-level Hunter with great traits and gear - winning feels sensational.
Coming out on top of a 40-minute match that was filled with players and monsters slaying, escaping with bounty tokens, and looted weaponry - it's all a perfect storm that makes coming back for more very tempting.
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