Phasmophobia’s Art Director, Corey Dixon, recently discussed Kinetic Games’ decision to shift towards community-based events and offered insights into plans for 2025. His comments come after members of the ghost-hunting game’s community expressed that they missed hunting down and shooting snowmen during last year’s Christmas event.
The last two events have deviated from the usual format, introducing collective, community-wide goals tied to a points system. In this setup, tiers are unlocked as players locate Krampus Boxes and build up enough points to unlock rewards like ID Cards and trophies. Drawing inspiration from titles such as Helldivers 2 and Destiny, these events aim to encourage collaborative progress and shared achievements.
“People come to Phasmophobia to play Phasmophobia.” said Dixon in response to a discussion board about Community Events on Reddit. “While chasing snowmen or finding recipes is fun, we found from feedback the “enjoyable period” really doesn’t last long, sometimes lasting only about an hour, maybe two, for most players.”
Dixon goes on to explain that creating these events demands substantial time and resources, pulling programmers and artists away from developing the elusive Horror 2.0 and 1.0 updates - content that will remain in the game indefinitely, essentially.
“Once the game is at 1.0, we can relook at seasonal events and add layers that can be repeated each year, without the stress of removing vital developers or slowing down content.” said Dixon.
We’ve been playing through the challenges and enjoying them over the past week. It’s evident both events were likely developed simultaneously, with the Christmas event feeling like a reskinned version of the Halloween event. Dixon seems to hint that the Easter Event will have more spice to it, so we will be looking forward to seeing what changes are made to make the events feel more individual in 2025.
“We’re still getting to grips with what needs to be done to make a good, consistent seasonal event, but we think by Easter (which isn’t far) it’ll be perfect, such as Rotational maps each day etc.” Dixon added.
“Once more of the game is fleshed out, the rewards for these events can be much more interesting, player clothing or potentially even equipment skins (if we decide to go that route!).”
The Christmas event, which began on December 12, is still underway. Despite its recent start, the community has already unlocked the tier 2 upgraded ID card, and everyone has until December 31 to earn the third-tier reward - a Krampus Trophy.
Phasmophobia is now available on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S. You can use PSVR 2 if you feel like a few more jump scares.
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