Following the Deadman Spring Finals, we published a comprehensive overview of the issues the event faced, which can be found here.

In the same article we also said that we had identified possible resolutions, and that we needed to take time to determine just what was viable, and what would work best for you. We're now well-placed to announce what our plans are.

We will conduct a 're-run' of the Spring Finals. Given the effect of the game bugs, we feel it is the right thing to do.

The final 256 players from Saturday's event will be re-invited to compete. Their accounts will be as they were at the time the Permadeath stage began (gear and levels included). This was not an option at the time of the event. It's only in the aftermath that we have the information and resource to hand.

The results of the Spring Finals on Saturday 30th March will still be honoured, and prizemoney paid. This re-run is an additional event.

We need to ensure that the game content is in working order, and to accommodate this it will be subject to intensive testing, and we'll host a beta in advance.

We don't have a specific date for you just yet, but we'll communicate it publicly and message the invited competitors privately to update them as and when we're able.

Prizemoney is yet to be determined, this will be communicated publicly and messaged to the invited competitors.

In addition to considering how we could do right by the players affected by the issues of the Spring Finals, we've been discussing the long-term future of Deadman, competitive gaming, and PvP as a whole.

The Deadman Summer season will continue as planned, ending on Thursday 2nd May. The top ranking players will be invited to compete in the Deadman Summer Finals, details of which will be communicated at a later date.

In last month's Message to our community we outlined our intentions for PvP. We spoke about our efforts to up the amount of research and engagement we'll be doing, and we spoke of our desire to strengthen PvP and competitive gaming as it is a key priority of ours.

We said that we'd be making huge changes to Deadman, but we now believe that the changes we had in store, largely feature content-driven, wouldn't be enough to elevate Deadman to the level it should be at. Even outside of the issues from the Spring Finals, the run-up to the event revealed a huge disconnect between the community and the gamemode. It isn't something that can be fixed by flashy content changes. We need to take the time to dig deep into what makes Deadman special, and to ensure the right level of integrity and competition.

With that in mind, the Deadman Summer Finals will be the last Deadman event in its current format. Deadman will be on hiatus until we've taken the time to redesign it. It could be that it changes so much that we'll rename it accordingly.

We want to reiterate that this is not us canceling Deadman. It's an opportunity for us to work closer with you to determine what you want from PvP and competitive gaming. Working groups of players and influencers are already underway, and the first such group is meeting early next week! It's about us taking the time to work on a design a strategy for content and events which includes from long-term competitive strategy (which includes the likes of Deadman) to grassroots PvP and PKing.

The Old School Team