Blood Testament starts in Hunt: Showdown 1896 on 8 September, and Crytek calls it the biggest event of the year. Update 2.9 lands with it, and a Blood Moon rises over the bayou and the gulch. Everything below comes from the studio's own description.
What the event is about
A story of dark experiments and hunger. A hunter named Warren Russett lost everything to Corruption until Lynch turned up with her newly formulated blood serum. Russett became hopelessly addicted and gained an insatiable thirst for blood, with consequences players are meant to dig up themselves.
The event runs on both maps, the bayou and the gulch. It begins on 8 September and Update 2.9 ships at the same moment.
Make Them Bleed: one counter for everybody
The central mechanic is shared progress. Every player earns points at once by completing objectives in missions, killing monsters and Targets, and interacting with Blood Wells. It all feeds a single community counter.
- Stage I. Unlocks a new time of day for everyone, the Blood Moon itself.
- Stage II. Unlocks the new Chupacabra trait.
- Stage III. Crytek is not saying what is in it, only that it unleashes "the true new nightmare" on the bayou.
Blood Wells and two new traits
The wells are scattered across both maps, one per compound. They work like a Clue: each team can use a well once. In exchange for a small portion of health the hunter receives the Siphon burn trait.
- Siphon. Lets you loot a Scarce trait off an enemy hunter's body, leaving Siphon itself in its place. Blood Wells are on the maps through Stages I and II.
- Chupacabra. Lets you interact with animals to restore one health chunk. Once unlocked it costs two Upgrade Points.
Note that both are burn traits. They last until the hunter dies, not forever.
The Blood Moon and its two phases
This is a new dynamic time of day and it shifts inside a match. There are two phases and the difference between them is not cosmetic.
- Intense Blood Moon. Crimson light breaks through the stormy clouds, the map takes on a stronger red glow, and monsters attack more aggressively and more quickly.
- Dark Blood Moon. Dark clouds cover the sky, visibility drops, and monster behaviour returns to normal.
For gunfights that means the familiar logic of approaching a compound changes twice inside one match: first you are lit up by the red glow, then you cannot see anything at all.
The new Burgess shotgun
A foldable slide action shotgun with a long barrel and a six round magazine. It takes three slots, and the price for that is long equip and unequip animations. It works with the Bulletgrubber trait, so ejected live shells can be recovered.
- Burgess Bayonet. Adds a blade at the cost of an even longer deployment.
- Burgess Trauma. A reinforced stock turns the heavy melee attack into a hammer strike.
During the event every Burgess variant unlocks through the Battle Pass and stays unlocked through Prestige. They join normal weapon progression once the event is over.
What else Update 2.9 changes
There is a lot here, and some of it changes habits harder than the event does.
- Extraction Points, Supply Points and Scout Towers are hidden by default. Interacting with a Clue reveals two Extraction Points, Scouting Maps can appear at any Supply Point, and the Spyglass still reveals hidden compass icons.
- Weapon balance. The Hunting Bow loses one hit kill range and reserve ammo, the Terminus gains damage and a tighter spread, slug prices drop across several weapons, and LeMat High Velocity Ammo arrives. Tool and consumable prices are adjusted, and Heavy Knife melee hit detection is improved.
- Traits can be saved in Loadouts, zero to fifteen per build, paid for in Hunt Dollars and Upgrade Points. Hunter slots go from 75 to 100.
- Matchmaking. MMR Decay gives returning players a temporary modifier that lowers matchup difficulty and tapers off. The New Player Modifier replaces the old flat cut that ended abruptly at a set rank with a smoother curve.
- Compensation for cheaters. If your hunter fell to a confirmed cheater you now get an automatic flat reimbursement in Hunt Dollars, and if your report leads to action you get a notification. Both show up on your first login after the cheater is dealt with.
If you have not touched Hunt in a while, or are only circling it, we have a long look at how the game feels in 2026. An event with a shared counter is the best moment to come back, by the way: matches will be busier than usual.
Sources
Event contents, mechanics, traits, weapons and the Update 2.9 changes: Crytek's official announcement of 24 August 2026.
Start date and the stream announcements: the Hunt: Showdown 1896 news feed on Steam, 5 September 2026.
