The first-person shooter set in the late 19th century Louisiana bayou, Hunt: Showdown, is playable on PlayStation, Xbox, and PC, but does it support crossplay? The game is almost entirely online aside from a series of single-player trials designed to hone certain skills before tracking down one of Hunt: Showdown's four bosses, and crossplay has become increasingly common in live service multiplayer games. Cross-platform play in Hunt is possible, but is extremely limited, and doesn't ultimately have as much functionality as other popular games.
Most importantly, the PC player base is entirely separated. Any sort of matchmaking on PC, whether in Quickplay or Bounty Hunt with skill-based matchmaking on or off, will only include other players also using a PC. The high-stakes, hardcore nature of Hunt makes this virtually a necessity, since players using a controller are generally at a disadvantage against those using mouse and keyboard. Luckily, the community has been growing steadily over the last year or two, and those on North American or European servers rarely have issues with matchmaking, especially during events like Hunt: Showdown's recent Winter Solstice event.
Crossplay is enabled when playing Hunt: Showdown on consoles, though. Any given game might have a combination of players on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S. Hunt is first and foremost a PC game, and was in early access for a while before its official launch, but only came to consoles in 2019. PC players still seem to be developer Crytek's main demographic, but crossplay and a recent boost to 60fps for current-gen consoles have been great boons to the console Hunt community. Even though the crossplay implementation is a welcome feature, it unfortunately has a major caveat.
Hunt: Showdown Parties Don't Support Crossplay
It is not possible to create a party in-game comprised of players from two different console families. Crytek hasn't implemented any sort of proprietary Hunt: Showdown account system, meaning the game has to rely on the built-in friends lists and invitation systems created by Sony and Microsoft. This means a PlayStation player cannot team up with someone using an Xbox, and vice versa. The game clients are technically the same across generations, so PS4 and PS5 players can join one another, and Xbox One and Series X/S players can do the same.
Until a change comes in a new Hunt: Showdown update, there's only one way players on different console platforms can try to join each other. When looking for teammates, Hunt creates the team first before matchmaking begins. Players hoping to get around the limited crossplay system can make sure they've got the same desired server regions, and try to search for teammates simultaneously hoping the game will match them together. This may not be worth the effort, especially during peak activity hours, but until Hunt: Showdown brushes up on its barebones crossplay feature, this is the only option for Xbox and PlayStation players to party up.