How Beautiful Light playtests work, and how to get into the next one
Deep Worlds has run Beautiful Light playtests since 2023 through its Discord, with no NDA. How to get picked, and what each wave tested.
Beautiful Light is not out until December 2026, but people have been playing it for more than three years. Deep Worlds tests the game with its community in waves, and those tests have shaped some of its biggest design decisions.
How to get into a playtest
According to Deep Worlds' own posts on Steam:
- Join the official Discord. Playtests are organised on the Deep Worlds Discord, not through open registration.
- Watch for announcements. In 2023, the studio said the Discord's insider role was what got members notified when a test was coming.
- Expect a draw. Places are limited, and in November 2023 Deep Worlds said participants were selected at random from those who apply.
Deep Worlds has also said it wants to move to much bigger tests. Its 2025 plan called for the first medium and large scale playtests on Steam, to stress the matchmaking, servers and backend, and its January 2026 post described 2026 as a year of larger playtests with thousands of players. The studio's Steam posts, which run up to February 2026, do not yet report on an open Steam playtest, so check the Discord for the current status.
Watch on YouTube from 16:17Players FLY now?! BEAUTIFUL LIGHT - New Anomalies, new guns, new equipment and more DEV UPDATE #9No NDA
Deep Worlds chose from the very first test not to put players under a non disclosure agreement, which it noted is rare in the industry. Players were free to stream the game and talk about it. That is why so much playtest footage of Beautiful Light exists online, and also why older footage can show systems that have since changed.
Watch on YouTubeBeautiful Light, Pre-Alpha Gameplay, Special 200k Wishlists on SteamThe playtests so far
| When | What Deep Worlds reported |
|---|---|
| May 2023 | First playtests, with the first version of the game loop. The netcode held up to 27 players in 9 teams |
| July and October 2023 | Further playtests, alongside big changes to the Ground Zero raid loop |
| December 2023 | Playtests dedicated to content creators |
| January 2024 | First community playtests of the year, testing performance on more PC configurations |
| October 2024 | The biggest session up to then: more than 250 Discord members plus content creators |
| November 2024 | Findings on balance, bugs and design |
| Late 2025 | Several internal and community playtests, focused on bug fixing and gameplay |
| July and August 2026 | Playtests with outside players, reported on the official Discord: PvP confirmed as fun, onboarding called bad, and a successful server test in early August |
In July 2026, Deep Worlds' CEO Aherys also explained on the Discord how the next waves will grow. More than 200,000 people had asked to play, too many to invite at once, so the studio plans to start with 250 players, then 500, 1,000, 2,000, 5,000 and more. Discord members get priority, before playtests also open on Steam. There is no date yet for the larger waves.
What playtests changed in the game
Deep Worlds has been open about decisions that came straight out of testing:
- Camping at the end of raids (2023). Players waited it out, because nothing rewarded securing the artifact first. The studio's answer was that the first team to secure it should get a clear advantage and become everyone's target.
- Performance (2023). Even on high end PCs, performance was described as mediocre. Deep Worlds planned to hire an engine optimization specialist, and has run optimization passes since.
- A raid that felt on rails (late 2025). The fixed chain of objectives on Ground Zero became repetitive. That feedback led to the rework of the core game mode announced in January 2026, and to new points of interest on the map.
Before you apply
Make sure the game will run: the system requirements call for an SSD at every tier. And if you want to know what you might be testing, the anomalies guide covers the monster side of the raid.
Sources
- Deep Worlds news on Steam: the FAQ (21 April 2023), the playtest report (31 May 2023), the 200,000 wishlists post (1 November 2023), Dev Update #1 with the 2023 rewind (13 February 2024), the 2024 review (27 January 2025) and the 2025 review (14 January 2026)
- Development update videos presented by Psychoghost for Deep Worlds, on YouTube
BL Guide, unofficial community coverage of Beautiful Light: how we check what we publish.