SCUM’s Halloween update will arrive Wednesday, October 28, alongside a partial wipe across all official servers and merges affecting selected servers. Gamepires says the wipe will reset bases, gear, supplies, Fame Points and quest progress, while retained characters keep their attributes, skills and gold, according to its Steam announcement.
The merges are meant to bring players from quieter servers together, with more chances to meet, team up or fight. The last official-server wipe came with SCUM’s June update, which returned free-roaming animals to the Island. Gamepires now says there will be no further official-server wipes in 2026.
Halloween brings free items and fixes
The update adds a coffin bed, a hanging jack-o’-lantern, candleholders, a buildable cooking cauldron and a recipe for Corpse Soup. All of the new Halloween items can be earned through gameplay, and the release will not include paid DLC.
Awareness and Archery XP boosts will end with the update, returning those skills to their normal XP rates. Progress earned on the character a player keeps will remain. Gamepires is also working on fixes for grass clipping through base floors, ripe plants that cannot be harvested and animal collisions that can send players and wheelbarrows flying. Full patch notes will arrive with the update.
Maintenance starts before the wipe
On Wednesday, October 28, maintenance for servers involved in a merge or machine move will begin first. The partial wipe and update will start on all official servers six hours later. Other official servers will remain playable until the wipe begins.
| Local time | Maintenance begins | Wipe and update begin |
|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles (PDT, UTC−7) | 02:00 PDT | 08:00 PDT |
| New York (EDT, UTC−4) | 05:00 EDT | 11:00 EDT |
| São Paulo / Brasília (UTC−3) | 06:00 UTC−3 | 12:00 UTC−3 |
| London (GMT, UTC+0) | 09:00 GMT | 15:00 GMT |
| Berlin / Zagreb (CET, UTC+1) | 10:00 CET | 16:00 CET |
| Moscow (UTC+3) | 12:00 UTC+3 | 18:00 UTC+3 |
| Hanoi / Bangkok (UTC+7) | 16:00 UTC+7 | 22:00 UTC+7 |
| Beijing / Hong Kong (UTC+8) | 17:00 UTC+8 | 23:00 UTC+8 |
Server merges and host moves affect official servers across Europe, EU West, Russia, Canada, the United States, Brazil, South Africa, Asia, Singapore and Australia. A host move changes a server’s connection address but does not by itself combine characters. Some servers changing hosts are also receiving characters through a merge.
How to keep the character you want
Only one character can remain at each merge destination, including a character already on that destination. If players take no action, the character with the most playtime will be kept, though that playtime is not visible in game. Characters that are not retained lose their gold and progression, and nothing from them is combined with the surviving character.
To choose a specific character, leave it unchanged and create a replacement character on every other server feeding into the same destination. Include the destination server if it holds a character you do not want to keep. Creating a new character permanently overwrites the one already there and resets its playtime, so check the server carefully first. Log out with the preferred character somewhere safe, ideally in a safe zone. After the update, it will return at its last logged-out location, on the ground and in starting gear.
If you want to carry the value of gear and supplies through the wipe, sell them for gold before maintenance starts. Players on servers being merged or moved need to do this before their affected-server maintenance begins. On other official servers, the deadline is the start of the wipe and update.
Monthly Wipe #1 – Europe and Monthly Wipe #1 – US East are the only live official servers closing without character migration. The official Hardcore servers, including their Third Person versions, are also retiring, but their characters will move to the designated destinations and take on those servers’ rules and camera settings. Older public test servers will close without migration as well. Gamepires plans to establish new test servers for Survivalist and future updates.
Players who prefer less crowded servers can use community servers or host their own. The next update after Halloween is planned to bring the Tattoo System, controller support and Photo Mode. Gamepires is also preparing Survivalist testing, with more information to come when it is ready.
Which SCUM character are you planning to keep if the merges affect your servers? Follow along through X, Bluesky, YouTube, Instagram, Steam and Telegram for updates on the server changes and Survivalist testing.
Scum
Developed by Gamepires
