Steam buckles under the weight of Marathon, a long-awaited roguelike sequel, and the revival of an iconic poker game

With both Marathon and Slay the Spire 2 amassing tens of thousands of players at launch today, dropping a third, hotly-anticipated (and entirely different) game on Steam at the same time appears to be making it hard for people to actually buy them.

According to Twitter game guy Wario64 (and backed up by reports on Downdetector), people are reportedly “having issues buying on Steam” as Marathon, Bungie’s new multiplayer FPS, dropped alongside long-awaited roguelike sequel Slay the Spire 2. Though both games are climbing the charts with tens of thousands of players apiece, the comments to his post throw a third potential reason for Steam’s wobble into the mix-Poker Night at the Inventory.

Telltale’s zany poker game, which closed its doors seven years ago, returned today under the care of Skunkape Games, a “small group of early Telltale employees.”

Known for its wacky crossover characters, including Team Fortress 2’s Heavy and Reginald Van Winslow from Monkey Island of all things, it’s a fan favorite from back when Steam was big but not quite this big. It’s a bit of a time machine in a way. One that I never managed to hop into, but I’m glad to see that it’s back. And with it already being called a “perfect remaster and update” in some early Steam reviews, it’s off to a good start, even if they’re already clamoring for the return of Poker Night 2. Give them an inch, and they really will take a mile.

At the time of the apparent severe struggles, Marathon was climbing high at around 55,000 players, with Slay the Spire two creeping close with 30,000. Since then, the latter has broken the 100k mark, according to Steamdb. We’ll see how things change as checkouts clear, downloads finish, and people head home from work, but it’s certainly worth noting that Slayer the Spire 2 has already doubled the first game’s all-time peak playercount on Steam, which it actually only managed three months ago despite launching in 2019.

The ability for the early success of a $40 extraction shooter, a $25 strategy roguelike sequel, and the $10 comeback of a comical card game to bring Steam to its knees will never not be funny. You can grab all three in place of a $70 title. Isn’t that something? Then again, I remember when that used to happen whenever something like a Steam Sale would drop. Does that still happen? I feel like there isn’t the same kind of hype around those nowadays.