Cannot Join Friends: Lobby & Black Screen Fixes
Last verified August 27, 2026 · Game version 1.0.9
The three fixes that clear most cases:
- Everyone quits to desktop and relaunches — the joiner and the host.
- Host recreates the lobby and sends a brand-new invite (dead half-joined sessions never revive).
- Still stuck? Swap hosts — NAT asymmetry makes one of you consistently the better server.
What Each Patch Changed About Connecting
| Patch | Session change | What it means today |
|---|---|---|
| 1.0.4 | Lobby cap raised to 8; first dedicated attack on the join black screen; gray-screen-at-launch fix. | The notorious launch-week failure got its real fix early — but stale sessions still wedge. |
| 1.0.5 | Private lobbies and session-type switching arrived (game restart applies the new type). | An invisible lobby usually means invite-only privacy, not a broken connection. |
| 1.0.9 | Main menu gained a Steam connection / relay debug readout. | Before blaming your router, open the game: a red relay indicator pinpoints network trouble upstream of every setting below. |
Symptom Quick Table
| What you see | Likely cause | Action |
|---|---|---|
| Invite accepted → screen dims forever | Dead half-joined session | Quit out fully; host recreates lobby; use a fresh invite. Rejoining the corpse never works. |
| Kicked back to main menu seconds after loading | Version mismatch or stale code | Compare build numbers on both title screens; let Steam finish pending updates; reboot Steam itself. |
| Friend’s lobby not visible anywhere | Privacy set to invite-only (added 1.0.5) | Host flips session type or sends a direct invite — invisible-to-search is by design now. |
| Random disconnects, gear state rolls back | Connection drop mid-save window | Treat gear like any loss event: triage before saving. |
The Full Checklist, Fastest First
- Quit to desktop on every machine, relaunch, retry once through a fresh invite.
- If that failed: host deletes the lobby entirely, creates anew, invites again. One retry, not five — hammering a wedged session deepens it.
- Check versions: identical patch number on both title screens. If the guest’s Steam shows a queued update, finish it before the next attempt.
- Open the main-menu relay readout (new in 1.0.9). Red means the route to Steam networking is unhealthy — switch networks or reboot the router rather than reconfiguring the game.
- Swap the host role once. The better-uploaded player should serve; wired Ethernet beats Wi-Fi for the hosting side specifically.
- Restart the whole Steam client on the affected machine — remaining stuck cases live in client cache, not the game.
- Verify game files (Properties → Installed Files) on whichever end joins-but-never-loads.
- Session type confusion after changing privacy? The change applies on a game restart — flip it, quit fully, relaunch.
Session Types Since 1.0.5
Public sessions accept browsers and strangers; friends-only opens invites to your list; invite-only hides the lobby from everything except direct invites. Anti-griefer behavior tightened in the same era — randoms can no longer wreck your save the way launch-week horror stories described, and invaders who do slip in get shown the door faster. For crew roles, loot sharing, and boss scaling math, theco-op guide has the deep dive.
Co-op Connection FAQ
Is the join black screen ever going away for good?
Patch 1.0.4 shipped the first dedicated fix, and players reported far fewer occurrences afterward — launch-week threads describe being “literally forced to refund” over it, while later posts say updates cleared it. It is not fully extinct: half-joined dead sessions still happen after crashes, which is why the leave-and-recreate step below stays first.
How many players can actually play together?
A lobby holds up to 8 anglers since Patch 1.0.4, but balance is tuned around the classic crew: boss HP tops out at the 4-player multiplier. Expecting eight people to get a fair fight is not what the cap was built for.
Does joining mid-boss-fight break anything?
Boss health locks the moment the Rage Bait is cast based on who was present. Late arrivals do not inflate it — but they also do not shrink a fight that spawned understaffed, so a duo summoning before the third friend arrives will carry the 2x pool into the whole encounter.
Sources & Verification
- Official patch notes feed (app 4001890) — basis of the 1.0.4 / 1.0.5 / 1.0.9 session changes above
- Steam Discussion: “Black screen when joining friends” — launch-week severity and the community workaround order
- PATCH 1.0.5 announcement — private lobbies and session-type switching details
Data on this page is re-verified against the sources above after each official patch. See our editorial policy for how we source and correct game data.