Hunters,
We have been closely monitoring your feedback since the reveal and release of Update 2.6. Though we are pleased to see that many of you are enjoying the update with its features and additions, we have also been paying close attention to community sentiment regarding some of the optional premium content introduced with this update. We wanted to take a moment to address those concerns with you.
As a live service game, Hunt relies on ongoing monetization to support its continued development. Our goal has always been to strike a careful balance between free content updates and optional premium content that does not impact gameplay but instead adds fun ways for players to express themselves in-game. We acknowledge that the initial pricing balance for Update 2.6 was misjudged, and we apologize for that.
We are excited to see that tens of thousands of players have already explored the new Player Profile customization options and have started the new Story Challenges. However, we also recognize that some of our recent decisions have caused frustration that we did not intend or desire to introduce to this community.
Based on your feedback, we are making the following changes:
Story Challenges
- The time limitation for the “On the Winds of Midwinter” Story Challenge, as well as future premium Story Challenges, will be removed early next week. [list]
- Players who have already purchased a story will be able to complete it at their own pace. [list]
- With this change, we have identified an issue in certain Story Challenge chapters that include challenges tied to live content in the current event (For example: Killing circus grunts will only work while the Murder Circus is available). We will need some additional time to provide a solution to these that we will share at a later date. However, please note that Story requirements may change slightly after the event ends to ensure they can be completed afterwards.
[*] It is our intention to add more optional, seasonal-themed Story Challenges in the future, which we hope will add even more depth to the Hunt experience. Though we recommend experiencing it during the relevant season, as its narrative and artistic direction are closely tied to that theme, that choice should be up to you. The purchase window for these will remain linked to certain times of the year, but once purchased, you will be able to progress through these at any time and at your own pace.
[*] If you choose not to purchase it this time, we plan to bring back relevant seasonal Story Challenges in the future years. This was always our intention, but we failed to communicate this clearly as part of our reveal with 2.6.
[*] We intend to continue to add a mix of free and premium Story Challenges over time, and will continue to offer a variety of formats here to meet different player preferences. [/list]
[*] We have also heard your concerns regarding the pricing of the premium Story Challenges. As a result, we will be lowering the price to 1,150 Blood Bonds.
- Compensations in the Blood Bond price difference will automatically be issued next week for those who have already purchased the Story.
[*] Additionally, we will be reviewing the difficulty of Story Challenges. While these challenges are meant to offer meaningful lore-driven objectives, some have proven more demanding than intended. We will continue adjusting the balance between challenges and rewards, so they feel engaging, but not overwhelming. This will be an ongoing experiment for us all, and we welcome your further feedback, especially in light of the changes we’ve noted above.
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Player Profiles
- Avatars for all Blood Bond Hunters will be reduced to 100 Blood Bonds. [list]
- BB compensation for these purchases will be issued next week.
[*] Equipping and displaying Stat Trackers on Player Profiles will become completely free starting from next week. Seeing the progress of these Stats will remain free as it was before.
- Compensations will be issued accordingly as soon as these changes take place.
[*] We would also like to clarify some of the confusion surrounding stats tracking:
- Rest assured that all your achievements related to stat tracking are tracked by default, and there is no requirement to pay for progress tracking. You can see the stat progress by highlighting the tracker in the menu. If you decide to enable public display later on, all progress accumulated up that point will still be shown.
- Due to technical limitations, we were only able to retroactively populate some trackers with historic data recorded from the first time you logged into Hunt. Unfortunately, this was not possible for all data points, which is why some statistics may appear already progressed while others may start at zero with the launch of 2.6. We do not plan to reset your progress of these stats, but will provide a clear list of all impacted stats and their specific start dates for tracking soon.
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Other
- We are also aware of the bug causing weekly challenges to appear auto-completed for some players. [list]
- After conducting an investigation, we believe we have identified the root cause and are now working toward a fix, which is planned for next week.
- All affected players will be able to complete their challenges and claim their rewards.
[*] We are also aware of several bugs affecting the progress tracking for some items and categories and are currently working on a fix. Thanks for your feedback, which has allowed us to capture them early and start working on the solutions, including an issue where stats for some weapons and tools are not tracking properly and some other values have inconsistent values across various categories.
- We will be prioritizing a fix for those in the upcoming updates.
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Above all, we want to emphasize that the trust and loyalty of our community are our highest priorities. Every decision we make is guided by the desire to keep Hunt fun, fair, and sustainable for many years to come. While a stable source of income is necessary to support ongoing development, it should never come at the expense of your enjoyment or confidence in us. We acknowledge that we missed the mark this time, but hope our upcoming changes, fixes and compensation will go some way towards restoring that.
As always, we welcome your feedback. Please continue sharing your thoughts through social media or by reaching out to our Community Team. Your feedback is actively collected, reviewed, and used to guide our decisions.
Thank you for standing with us, Hunters.
