Once upon a time there was a card game called Artifact, created by Steam, Half-Life, and Dota juggernaut Valve. This title never performed particularly well, being beset by issues on all sides running the gamut from its approach to monetization to players simply being baffled by its existence. Eventually, all work on the title ceased, it was set as free to play – and that’s where the story ended.
Except, there’s been a couple of little twists in the tale of Artifact. The first one happened a couple months ago, with over 2,000 players suddenly arriving to play the card game all at once, before vanishing like mist in summer sun a few days later. Now, it’s happening again, and this time the numbers are considerably bigger.
At the time of writing there are 3,557 players in-game in Artifact at the same time, with a 24-hour peak of 3,966. To put that in context, normally you’ll see less than 100 people playing Artifact, so that’s definitely a leap for the title. Just like last time, however, it all looks a bit fishy.
Just like the previous occurance these numbers are remarkably level, something that just wouldn’t happen were these players organically turning up to play the game. In addition, the leap from nearly nothing to almost 4,000 happened in a matter of moments, something else that’s sending the alarm bells ringing.
So it’s most likely the work of bots but the question remains – why? There are no trading cards to earn, so it’s not a method of farming money through Steam trading. At a guess, it would seem that it’s related to lending credence to an account appearing genuine – with plenty of hours in a game, albeit an abandoned, free-to-play game like Artifact, it may be more possible to seem like a real account. That said, there is a verification system for a reason – and without a purchase of at least $5 on an account, many Steam features will remain inaccessible.
All of which means that the chances are that Artifact has not been revived, and this is simply the same thing that’s happened to the game before as well as other titles like Allods Online. In a few days these player numbers will fall back down again, and the tumbleweeds will return to the card game once more.
Should you want to dive into something else while you wait for these Steam numbers to stabilize, our guides to the best fantasy games and the best free PC games you can play will ensure you have some excellent company.
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