''Dread Hunger'' was a 2022

online multiplayer A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system (couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...

social deduction game A social deduction game is a game in which players attempt to uncover each other's hidden role or team allegiance. Commonly, these games are played with teams, with one team being considered "good" and another being "bad". During gameplay, players ...

developed by Dread Hunger Team and published by Digital Confectioners.

Concept

The players are cast as the crew of a ship that must make its way through an arctic pass that is blocked by an iceberg. The crew must work together to survive, and find explosives in the environment to destroy the iceberg and sail the ship through the pass. However, their efforts are hampered by two of the crewmen secretly being "Dread Thralls", dangerous cannibalistic lunatics who seek to kill the rest of the crew and feast on their flesh. The Thralls must co-operate to stymie the crew's efforts and kill them one by one, while the crew must remain observant to figure out who among them is a traitorous Thrall, kill them, and escape.

Gameplay

''Dread Hunger'' is a social deception

survival game Survival games are a subgenre of action games which are often set in hostile, intense, open-world environments. Players generally start with minimal equipment and are required to survive as long as possible by finding the resources necessary t ...

with

PvP Player versus player (PvP) is a type of multiplayer interactive conflict within a game between human players. This is often compared to player versus environment (PvE), in which the game itself controls its players' opponents and is usually off ...

and PvE elements.

Development

The game was originally scheduled to release in late 2021. On November 13, 2023, Dread Hunger Team announced that ''Dread Hunger'' official servers would be shut down due to the inability to "support the surprisingly high ongoing server costs" as a result of the servers "being subjected to frequent and severe

DDOS In computing, a denial-of-service attack (DoS attack) is a cyberattack in which the perpetrator seeks to make a machine or network resource unavailable to its intended users by temporarily or indefinitely disrupting services of a host co ...

attacks". ''Dread Hunger'' server tools will be transferred to players in order to "ensure that the spirit of the game remains alive in the hands of its most passionate supporters". ''Dread Hunger'' was delisted from Steam on December 1, 2023, the game's official servers set to shut down on January 1, 2024. After official support ended, its community discovered ways to modify the game. The active community gathers on an unofficial

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, which features a bot that can create lobbies for users to play with their friends.

Reception

''Dread Hunger'' received "mixed or average" reviews according to

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Sales

''Dread Hunger'' has sold more than 1 million copies.

References

2022 video games {{adventure-videogame-stub Social deduction video games