Hytale’s Insane Spawn Rates Just Made Me Do Something I’ll Never Forgive Myself For

I was never really a big Minecraft fan. Call me a heretic, I guess, but every time I tried to get into it, I just couldn’t. Yet, somehow, Hytale has its hooks in me. Even without the Adventure mode available during early access, it still feels like it has more structure than Minecraft, and I feel like I have a stronger sense of goals. I’m also enjoying the combat and the different weapons available—especially the bow. And maybe it’s just the fact that Hytale reminds me of Portal Knights, another sandbox RPG that I have a soft spot for. In any case, I can’t quit playing it, even if its early access state and the bugs that come with it do irritate me from time to time.

Speaking of bugs, Hytale has some insane spawn mechanics at the moment that I’m sure will eventually be fixed, but for now, they frustrate me to my core. In my experience, they primarily occur when I’m underground, although it could be that they’re just more noticeable when I’m underground due to the closer quarters. Essentially, I can kill the few enemies I see in an area, only to turn around for a brief moment and five or six additional enemies that weren’t there before have spawned right on top of me. Hytale isn’t a difficult game by any means, but mechanics like this can make it unnecessarily demoralizing at times. In fact, after one of my most recent encounters with the game’s weird spawn mechanics, I was so exasperated by the outcome that I committed what I would consider an unforgivable sin.

Difficulty Matters to Me in Gaming

When I was a kid, I played every game on Easy difficulty, as long as there were difficulty options provided. I didn’t care about knowing, at the end of the day, that I completed a game on its hardest difficulty. The bragging rights didn’t really appeal to me either. I’m just not a competitive person, so being better than someone else means very little to me. All I really wanted was to be able to play a game without getting frustrated at it, see its story play out if it had one, and feel like an overpowered hero the whole way.

However, as I’ve grown older, being better than the me I was yesterday has become one of my core values—as cheesy as it sounds. I don’t necessarily want to be better than someone else, but if I can improve myself, for myself, in any way and walk away with the sense of accomplishment that comes with that, I’ll take that route in a heartbeat. When it comes to games, I have the same philosophy. I no longer enjoy playing games on the easiest difficulty because I know I can tackle harder difficulties if I’m patient, and I put in the practice necessary to succeed. In fact, I refuse to play Destiny 2 campaigns on anything but Legendary difficulty anymore because doing so helps me grow as a player, and the rewards that come with it are certainly a bonus as well.

That’s why what I’ve just done on Hytale is something I will never forgive myself for.

Hytale’s Funky Spawn Mechanics Just Made Me Do What I Call Cheating

I’ve been playing solo on my own world, ironically called “Hyrule,” clearly in honor of my undying love for The Legend of Zelda. For the most part, it has been a relaxing experience, as I’ve been able to play at my own pace, do my own thing, and have no one looking over my shoulder with critical eyes. Every time I start playing, I venture out into the wilds of my world in search of new locations and better resources to advance production at my base. Most times, my adventures in Hytale are fulfilling, rewarding, and, in the best way, memorable. Other times, little early access kinks get in my way and back me into a corner.

While adventuring underground during a recent Hytale session, I found an abundance of resources that I had been searching high and low for. Needless to say, I did whatever it took to fit everything I absolutely needed into my inventory, even if it meant leaving some things behind. Unfortunately, all that work trying to get back to my base with what I needed most was eventually undone by Hytale‘s weird spawn mechanics—well, most of the work anyway.

After clearing an area of a few enemies and then naturally assuming I was free to farm some more resources, what felt like only a few seconds passed before an entirely new wave of different enemies was on top of me, seemingly from out of nowhere. I had no choice but to run after being overwhelmed, but that just sent me straight into a new batch of monsters, and I was done for. To be honest, it was one of those frog monsters (now called “Bams” by the Hytale community) that ultimately did me in. They just won’t let you get away, no matter how hard you try.

See, the thing about dying in a survival crafting game like Hytale with the default world settings on is that you suffer an inventory penalty. With that inventory penalty enabled on my world (because, don’t forget, I don’t play games on the easiest difficulty), I dropped most of what I had just spent a significant amount of time farming for. To top it all off, I was far from home with no teleporter, and it was late enough in the day that I just immediately quit to desktop.

I was utterly demoralized. I had no desire to keep playing. In fact, I was upset enough that I thought I needed to take a more lasting break from Hytale. I didn’t end up doing that, of course, and instead decided I didn’t care about playing on the easiest difficulty in this game—at least until Adventure mode is released. As such, I went into my world settings and turned off Inventory Penalty On Death, which would cause me to hold on to those precious resources the next time I died with them on hand. I also went ahead and turned off fall damage too, just so I could make my way back to my death location on the map and then just keep digging into the ground until I fall onto all the items I dropped.

What made me change these Hytale settings in the end was not merely that I wanted to make the game easier, but that I felt betrayed by the game’s spawn mechanics, which gave my enemies an unfair advantage against me. When the spawn rates are fixed (assuming it’s a bug), I’ll turn the inventory penalty and fall damage back on, but until then, I’m perfectly fine with “cheating” my way through this.

I know I’m not alone in my experience either, as I had to go online to see if other players were encountering the same issue, if not just to reassure myself that I wasn’t going crazy. One Reddit post by Nickers1501533 seemed to echo my sentiment, asking the community if Hytale‘s spawn mechanics are an intended feature or if it’s a mistake that will eventually be fixed. Another post by dreyken974 blatantly referred to the game’s spawn mechanics as annoying, which is true, if a bit of an understatement.

From a certain perspective, this could be a “git gud” scenario, but if you’ve played Hytale and have experienced its weird spawn mechanics firsthand, then you understand. And maybe I’m being a bit dramatic when I say I’ve committed a sin I’ll never forgive myself for, but that’s how seriously I take difficulty in games. I’m not the type that enjoys smooth sailing unless I’ve had something to do with how smooth it is. However, in Hytale‘s current state, I’m okay with making that the default until I have more control over my fate.