Public Playtest Update: Stability First

Public Playtest Update: Stability First

We know many of you were looking forward to October 15th. We were too. But we've made the call: the public playtest won't happen on that date. The playtest is still coming, but not before the build is ready for it.

Phillip and Dini sat down to explain where the game currently stands, what we've learned from the closed tests, and why we made this decision:

TL;DR

• The public playtest will not take place on October 15th
• The playtest itself is still coming - this is about when, not if
• We're not announcing a new date right now, we'll only commit to one we can keep
• When we do announce it, the gap between announcement and playtest will be short
• The closed tests did their job: they showed us that stability isn't yet where it needs to be for a test at this scale
• The closed test keeps running, and we'll invite new waves in deliberately small, targeted groups
• Development and closed testing continue: new mechanics, assets and content are being added constantly
• Early Access has moved to 2027

Why we're making this call

The build is growing well, but the closed tests made one thing very clear: stability needs more work before we open Ardem up to hundreds of thousands of players at once.

We'd rather put that work in now than force the game to meet a date we're no longer confident in.

So instead of announcing another date today, we'll keep testing, improving and hardening the build, and only commit when we know we can deliver. The closed test keeps running as part of that.

New waves will be invited along the way, deliberately small and targeted rather than large numbers at once, because what we need right now is focused testing, not scale.

The same reasoning applies to Early Access, which is why you'll see 2027 on our store page from today. A survival world where dozens of players share a persistent map lives or dies on how well it holds up under load, and that part needs more time than our original window allowed. We'll narrow the date down as we get closer.

One thing we could have communicated better

The closed test had a limited number of randomly selected spots per wave, and we didn't make that clear enough upfront.

That's on us.

We understand why some of you were disappointed, and we'll communicate this more clearly next time.

Ask Us Anything — Live Q&A

Have questions about the playtest, the current state of the game, or what's coming next? Join us live on the Ardem Discord Stage:

October 8, 2026 · 20:00–21:00 CEST

Phillip, Dini and the team will be there to answer questions directly from the community. Soft- or hardball, we will be there.

— The Techtive Team