There are few games that wear their misery quite as proudly as Hunt: Showdown 1896. Crytek’s extraction shooter has always had a wonderfully grim sense of identity, blending the dusty brutality of the American frontier with grotesque monsters, desperate hunters, and the ever-present knowledge that another player is probably waiting somewhere in the darkness to put an end to your evening. It is a world where survival is never guaranteed and looking suitably terrifying is practically part of the job description.
Hunt: Showdown 1896: Starter Pack: The Crow’s Calling understands that aesthetic perfectly. Available exclusively during the Blood Testament Event, this premium bundle introduces two new Legendary Hunters, Corvid: Bile and Corvid: Brood, alongside matching avatars and 1,150 Blood Bonds. It is not an expansion in the traditional sense, nor does it attempt to alter the game’s fundamental mechanics. Instead, it is a carefully assembled package designed to make your next trip into the bayou or mountain wilderness look considerably more sinister.
For newcomers, returning players, and anyone with a particular weakness for plague doctors and ominous bird imagery, it is an appealing proposition. The real question is whether the contents justify the price of entry or whether this is simply another collection of digital cosmetics that will spend more time sitting in your inventory than being used.
Enter Corvid
The headline attraction is undoubtedly the Corvid duo. Bile and Brood look as though they have stepped out of a fever dream in which Victorian medicine went horribly wrong, and that is very much a compliment in the context of Hunt: Showdown 1896.
Corvid: Bile comes wrapped in ragged, weathered clothing, with a distinctive bird-inspired mask that immediately gives the Hunter a threatening silhouette. There is something wonderfully unpleasant about the design. It is not trying to make the character look conventionally cool or glamorous. Instead, it embraces the grimy, diseased and unsettling atmosphere that has always made Hunt stand apart from other shooters.
Brood complements Bile nicely, providing a matching Legendary Hunter that makes the pair feel like two halves of the same disturbing story. There is a sense that these are not simply two unrelated skins bundled together for convenience. Their visual similarities suggest a shared history, and the accompanying description hints at a rather unpleasant one.
The pair are supposedly deadly cures for Corruption, although their unconventional approach to medicine may have created rather more problems than it solved. Rumours that they were involved in the experiments responsible for unleashing a new nightmare only make the characters more intriguing.
That is one of the things Hunt: Showdown 1896 does particularly well. Even when a cosmetic has no mechanical impact whatsoever, the developers often give it enough personality to make it feel like it belongs to the world.
Style Over Substance?
It is important to clarify what The Crow’s Calling actually is. This is a starter pack, not a major content expansion, and the Corvid Hunters do not suddenly grant you superior weapons, extra health or any hidden advantage over other players.
That will be obvious to experienced Hunt players, but it is worth emphasising for newcomers. Your performance in the bayou will still come down to your aim, awareness, positioning and ability to keep your head when gunfire erupts from a building you thought was empty. Bile and Brood might look intimidating, but they will not save you from a hunter with better reflexes.
There is, however, an interesting visual benefit to their appearance. The muted greys, dark earth tones and distressed materials fit naturally into the game’s shadowy environments. Against dense foliage, gloomy compounds and the murky atmosphere of night or fog, the Corvid Hunters do not stand out like brightly coloured cosmetic outfits might.
Whether that constitutes a genuine tactical advantage is debatable. Experienced players will know to look for movement, silhouettes and other visual cues regardless of what skin someone is wearing, and cosmetics should never be treated as a substitute for good positioning. Still, there is something satisfying about wearing an outfit that feels naturally camouflaged within the game’s world rather than one that screams for attention.
Blood Bonds Make the Difference
The other major component of the pack is the 1,150 Blood Bonds. For anyone unfamiliar with Hunt: Showdown 1896, these provide access to premium purchases and give the bundle practical value beyond the two character skins.
This is particularly important because cosmetics are inherently subjective. You might love the Corvid designs, or you might look at them and decide that your current favourite Hunter already has enough personality to last another hundred matches. The Blood Bonds give you something useful regardless of whether Bile and Brood become permanent fixtures in your roster.
They can be used towards seasonal content, weapon cosmetics and other premium purchases, giving players some freedom in how they spend them. That flexibility makes the pack feel less restrictive than a bundle built entirely around a couple of character skins.
For a player who was already planning to purchase Blood Bonds, the inclusion of the Corvid duo and their avatars makes the proposition considerably more attractive. You are effectively getting the characters and profile cosmetics alongside currency you were likely to spend anyway. That is where The Crow’s Calling makes its strongest argument.
A Bundle That Understands Its Audience
The real appeal of this pack is that it feels designed specifically for those who appreciate the atmosphere of Hunt. There is no attempt to introduce anything flashy or out of place. The Corvid Hunters look like they belong in this world, which is arguably more important than simply making them visually impressive.
The plague doctor influence is particularly effective because it taps into the game’s fascination with disease, death and corrupted medicine. Bile and Brood look like people who should probably not be trusted with anything sharper than a spoon, yet somehow they have ended up hunting monsters and other players in one of gaming’s most unforgiving environments. That slightly absurd darkness is part of the charm.
The matching avatars are a small addition, but they round the bundle off nicely. They are hardly going to transform your experience in the bayou, but they allow players to carry the Corvid identity beyond the Hunter models. For collectors and players who enjoy maintaining a consistent visual theme, these little touches can matter more than they might first appear.
The Crow’s Calling
There is a danger that cosmetic packs can feel disposable. A new outfit might look fantastic for a few matches before becoming just another entry in an increasingly enormous wardrobe. The Crow’s Calling avoids that feeling to some extent because Bile and Brood have enough visual character to remain memorable.
They also benefit from the fact that Hunt: Showdown 1896 is such a visually distinctive game. Its environments are oppressive and atmospheric, its monsters are grotesque, and its weapons have a wonderfully battered quality. The Corvid designs fit into that visual language rather than fighting against it.
For returning players, this makes the pack particularly easy to appreciate. You already know what the game feels like, so a bundle like this provides a relatively simple way to add something fresh without fundamentally changing the experience. For newcomers, meanwhile, it provides two memorable characters with which to begin their journey into the game’s hostile world.
The biggest limitation is also the most obvious one. If you are not interested in cosmetic customisation or premium currency, there is very little here that will change how you actually play Hunt: Showdown 1896. The pack cannot make the game easier, and it certainly cannot protect you from the player who has been hiding behind a barn door, waiting patiently for you to walk past.
Final Verdict
Hunt: Showdown 1896: Starter Pack: The Crow’s Calling is a well-judged cosmetic bundle that understands exactly what makes its host game distinctive. Corvid: Bile and Corvid: Brood are memorable, suitably grotesque additions whose plague-ridden aesthetic feels completely at home among the game’s monsters, hunters and decaying environments.
The 1,150 Blood Bonds also give the package considerably more practical value than a purely cosmetic bundle, particularly for players who were already planning to spend premium currency. The matching avatars are a nice finishing touch, while the subdued colour palette ensures the Legendary Hunters feel like part of the world rather than visitors from another game.
It is not going to revolutionise Hunt: Showdown 1896, and nor should it. This is a starter pack built around style, identity and value rather than new gameplay systems. For players who want to look as though they have spent the last hundred years conducting deeply questionable experiments with crows, plague medicine and things that should never have been brought back to life, it is difficult to imagine a more appropriate wardrobe.
