It"s likely many of you may have never heard of the game 7 Days to Die. The zombie-themed survival game first launched in early access on Steam nearly 10 years ago, in December 2013. While the game has never left early access, it has amassed a loyal audience which has kept the game going.
The game has remained on Steam"s top 100 list in terms of the number of players online at once for a number of years. However, this weekend, 7 Days To Die saw a huge surge of new players online.
It blew away its previous concurrent player record on Sunday, according to SteamDB, with 91,491 players online. As of this writing, it"s currently the 11th most played game on Steam, ahead of better-known games like Rainbow Six; Siege, Dead by Daylight, Destiny 2. and, yes, even DayZ.
Two factors are the most likely reasons for this sudden new interest in the game. One is that on Thursday, the game"s developers, The Fun Pimps, released a new "Alpha 21 Stable" build. The full release notes show that the latest version includes a ton of new features and improvements.
They include new Infestation Quests, tons of upgraded graphics and artwork, a new gore system for the game"s zombies, and lots more.
The other likely big factor in the surge of new players is that 7 Days To Die is part of Valve"s Steam Summer Sale event. The game is discounted by 76 percent down to just $5.99, or you can get a two-pack (one code for you and one code to give to a friend) for $9.99.
Console versions of 7 Days to Die for the Xbox One and PS4 were released in 2016 via Telltale Publishing. However, neither of those versions has been updated in some time due in part to the shutdown of Telltale Games in 2018.