22 June 2023 , 00:20
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Eager players waiting to dive into the XDefiant open beta today have been thwarted by server problems that are resulting in getting stuck on the loading screen, being unable to load the game at all, frequent crashes, and more.
After a closed beta in April, Ubisoft is inviting everyone to give XDefiant a whirl in an open beta that kicked off earlier today. Players that participated in the closed beta were able to preload the game and play early, which may have been intended to mitigate some of the stress on the servers; but now that the floodgates have opened, things are not going well.
The XDefiant closed beta bumped up against server issues of its own – and the one million players it drew in likely contributed to the problem. But it was extended once stability had been restored Despite having dealt with such a big influx of people, XDefiant servers are struggling under the strain as they get swamped by even more open beta participants.
"We're aware of server issues and are investigating fixes to stabilize the servers. We will have an update soon - thank you for your patience in the meantime!" tweeted the game's Twitter account, just three hours after the beta had gone live. Executive producer, Mark Rubin, also took to Twitter to apologise for the breadth of XDefiant server issues players are experiencing, attributing it to a 'metric overload' caused by the sheer amount of people trying to play.
"First off, I'm sorry for all of the different issues people are having with the servers. What has been described to me is that we are experiencing a "metric overload" with just so many people trying to play," Rubin explained. "We're hard at work on resolving and will let you know more when I can." This was tweeted out in tandem with the message from the XDefiant Twitter account.
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While the sentiment is going down well, based on Rubin announcing the closed beta extension when servers were janky, affected players are wasting no time in requesting (and demanding) an XDefiant open beta extension. Currently, the beta end date is set for Friday, June 23 at 11pm PDT which is 7am BST / 2am EDT on Saturday, June 24. Extending the beta by two days, as Ubisoft did with the closed beta, would give players a chance for some proper hands-on time over the course of the weekend.
You have to ask why the betas are being held midweek to begin with. It's hard to squeeze in a decent amount of play time after work or school. and an uninterrupted weekend would be preferable. But if server issues do crop up, the whole weekend is a write off. And who knows, maybe the XDefiant betas would be extended anyway to stress test the servers over a weekend. This way the initial start date allows for hiccups and more quality time over the weekend – as long as the XDefiant beta actually gets extended that is.
The last thing the studio needs is to be at odds with the will of the community already.