Blast from the Past: When an Unfixable Bug Killed The Bathhouse

Remember March 2023? While the gaming world was buzzing about the latest AAA releases, a small indie horror game was making headlines for a very different reason—it was being delisted due to a bug the developers couldn't fix. Not wouldn't fix. Couldn't.

The Mystery of Room 203

Chilla's Art, the Japanese indie duo behind atmospheric horror titles like The Convenience Store and The Closing Shift, released The Bathhouse in October 2022. It was a psychological horror game set in a traditional Japanese bathhouse where players uncover paranormal phenomena.

Everything was fine. Players were getting spooked, reviews were positive, and the game ran smoothly. Until it didn't.

Around December 30th, 2022—a full two months after launch—players started reporting something bizarre: they couldn't enter room 203. Not due to a puzzle they hadn't solved or a key they were missing. The door just... wouldn't work.

The Plot Thickens

Here's where it gets wild: the developers hadn't updated the game since October 8th.

Nothing had changed on their end. The game that worked perfectly for two months suddenly had a game-breaking bug preventing progression past a critical early-game checkpoint. Players were stuck, unable to continue.

Chilla's Art posted a public notice on January 30th, 2023, explaining the situation:

Their theory? An external software update—potentially Windows or Nvidia drivers—had broken compatibility with Unity HDRP's FSR (AMD's framerate-boosting technology). Through no fault of their own, the game had been sabotaged by forces beyond their control.

The Failed Fixes

The team temporarily pulled the game from sale on February 6th to work on a fix. On February 24th, they released Update 2.00, confident they'd solved the problem.

They hadn't.

Players continued encountering the room 203 bug. More updates followed. More failures. The bug kept reappearing, like a ghost haunting the very game about hauntings.

The developers were stuck in their own horror game—chasing a phantom bug they could see the effects of but couldn't locate the source.

The Workaround That Wasn't Enough

Eventually, a workaround was discovered: deleting save data and starting fresh would allow players to enter room 203. But this was a band-aid, not a cure. And for a story-driven game, forcing players to restart wasn't exactly ideal.

On March 17th, 2023, Chilla's Art made the heartbreaking decision:

"Unfortunately, we weren't able to find out what is causing the 203 bug. We thought we had fixed the issue, but all of a sudden, it appeared again. We don't want to cause any more trouble for you guys, so we decided to remove The Bathhouse from Steam."

The game was delisted permanently.

Why This Case Still Matters

The Bathhouse incident is a fascinating case study in modern game development's fragility. Here was a game that:

1. Worked perfectly for months
2. Broke without the developers changing anything
3. Couldn't be fixed despite multiple attempts
4. Was ultimately killed by external factors

It's a reminder that sometimes, bugs aren't just code mistakes—they're the result of the complex ecosystem games exist in. Driver updates, OS changes, hardware variations, and middleware interactions can create problems that are nearly impossible to solve, especially for small indie teams.

The Haunting Legacy

For those who purchased The Bathhouse before its delisting, the game is still playable (with the workaround). But as a commercial product, it's a ghost—visible in Steam libraries but nowhere to be found in the store.

Chilla's Art has since moved on, releasing other horror titles and continuing to build their unique brand of atmospheric terror. But The Bathhouse remains a cautionary tale: sometimes, the scariest bugs aren't the ones in your code. They're the ones you can't see coming.

Have you experienced a game-breaking bug that just couldn't be fixed? Share your stories in the comments.