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CO-OP / TROUBLESHOOTING

Black screen when joining friends

The game has an official patch note that says the lobby black screen was “hopefully” fixed, yet the Steam thread still contains players reporting a black screen or an unresponsive join action. Start with the low-risk session checks.

Community reportPatch 1.0.4 attempted a fixChecked 25 Aug 2026
Short answer: update everyone, have the host create a fresh lobby, and join shortly after it starts. One thread reply says joining a session created much earlier worked better, but another player says restarting did not solve it. There is no single community-proven fix yet.

Safe order of checks

  1. Confirm the same game version. Close and update Steam on every machine before testing the lobby again.
  2. Have the host create a new session. Do not reuse a lobby that has been open for a long time while diagnosing the problem.
  3. Join early. Use a Steam invite or the in-game join path immediately after the fresh session starts.
  4. Try a private lobby. Patch 1.0.5 added an invite-only private lobby option. It is useful for reducing variables; it is not a guaranteed black-screen fix.
  5. Restart both the game and Steam. Do this after the fresh-session test, not before every single attempt.
  6. Test one variable at a time. Note whether solo play works, whether the join button responds, and whether the failure is a black screen or a frozen menu.

What the evidence says: the Steam thread has 23 comments and includes reports from Windows and Linux users, a no-response join button, and one player who said joining a recently created session helped. That is enough to justify a troubleshooting page, not enough to claim a universal fix.

Patch context

Patch 1.0.4 listed a “hopefully” fixed black screen when trying to join a lobby. The same patch also added support for larger lobbies and changed the final-island path. Patch 1.0.5 added private lobbies, while 1.0.6 focused on save-file checks and crash-save behavior.

Separate these symptoms

SymptomStart withDo not assume
Black screen after joinFresh lobby, join early, same version.That a GPU driver is definitely the cause.
Join button does nothingSteam invite and a new host session.That waiting longer will repair the lobby.
Solo works, co-op failsCompare host/join timing and session type.That your save is corrupted.
Menu remains open but cursor disappearsQuit cleanly, restart, then test a new session.That the session is safe to keep using.

If it still fails

Capture the game version, host platform, join method, approximate lobby age, and whether solo mode loads. That information is more useful than a generic “multiplayer broken” report. Link the report to the official Discord/bug-report path if the developer requests it.

Primary community threadSteam Discussion: “Black screen when joining friends” · 23 commentsOpen the discussion ↗
Official patch archivePatch 1.0.4, 1.0.5, and 1.0.6 announcementsOpen Steam announcements ↗