Darkest Dungeon II re-emerges from the shadows with a release date, alongside plans for a Steam Next Fest demo

The last seven years have seen no shortage of new entries in the roguelike genre. And although plenty have been as gritty and tough as 2016’s Darkest Dungeon, very few have found a way to make the stress of all those repeated runs into a game mechanic. Anyone looking for more opportunities to push even more poor adventurers to their breaking point in conflict with an ancient and unspeakable evil got their wish in 2019 when Darkest Dungeon II was first announced. After quite a lengthy Early Access period on the Epic Games Store, the second in this series of gloomy and verbose dungeon crawlers is heading to Steam and a 1.0 launch in the not-too-distant future.

In a February 6 tweet, the official Darkest Dungeon Twitter account announced that Darkest Dungeon II finally has an official May 8 release date and that it would be arriving on both Steam and the Epic Games Store. This comes on the heels of a February 4 tweet confirming the game would also have a demo available as part of the Steam Next Fest that runs from February 6 to 13. This period should give Steam users a glimpse into what Epic Games Store users have had for quite a few months now, as well as what challenges the game has in store for them down the road.

Related: The best team compositions in Darkest Dungeon 2

Darkest Dungeon II makes quite a few substantial changes to the roguelike formula from its predecessor. While the first game’s turn-based combat and dark tone remain much the same here, some major shifts include the introduction of a new, more RPG-like party system featuring unique heroes that you may just grow attached to. The new game also ditches the musty old dungeon crawl for a new stagecoach-based method of travel.