With Nightingale, a big hope in the survival genre is on the agenda for 2023, coming completely without PvP. Just before the Game Awards, we were able to talk to the developers and bring a ton of new information.
What is Nightingale anyway? The project was introduced in 2021 and quickly gained a lot of attention. Nightingale is a survival game set in the Victorian era, specifically in the year 1889.
In this world, the game tells a story based on alternative history, mixing fantasy with real events and figures.
In the world of Nightingale, a fight for survival rages among humans against the dangers that the various worlds bring. Through portals, you can travel to and explore different “realms.” One of them you can even designate as your home.
In doing so, you are not only constantly searching for new resources to build a home for yourself and gradually advance humanity, but you are also searching for the last bastion of humanity, the eponymous city of Nightingale.
For turning this concept into a good game, the newly founded studio Inflexion Games is responsible. Although Nightingale will be the studio’s first game, it is staffed entirely by experienced developers. Especially some BioWare veterans who worked on games like Dragon Age are involved.
As part of the Game Awards, the developers showed a brand-new trailer and revealed some details to us.
Complete focus on PvE and exploration
What do you do in the game? Mainly, you are looking for resources in the various realms that you can enter and shape yourself using the so-called realm cards. You rely on an arsenal of various cards that not only roughly determine the look and biome of the realm but also the loot and its difficulty.
The whole game is optimized so that even as a solo player you should be able to experience everything. Weak portals will bring you the same loot as the most difficult ones, just in lesser amounts. The former BioWare developers promise that even people playing Nightingale alone will fully enjoy their experience.
Then you jump through the portal and literally explore a new world. Although you can meet other players, a maximum of 6 on one map, they will work together with you. Nightingale completely forgoes a PvP system.
How do you move around? Instead, the focus is on exploring the worlds, for which you have a lot of tools at your disposal, as shown in the latest trailer.
So you can not only climb steep walls thanks to mountaineering gear but also glide through the world with an umbrella. In true “Mary Poppins” style, you can explore the dangerous worlds while being shielded from the rain.
Deep valleys, high mountains and extensive cave systems holding particularly nasty monsters await you.
However, you cannot tame and ride the monsters, at least not yet in Early Access, as the developers have informed us.
From axe to wand
How is combat? Nightingale offers you three different weapon categories to choose from, thematically fitting into the fantasy world of the 19th century. The focus, at least at the start of your survival adventure, is fully on melee weapons like axes and swords.
Later, you’ll have the opportunity to also use ranged weapons like flintlock pistols and rifles. But the materials for these are hard to find and the ammunition you spend must be crafted by yourself. So you must be cautious when firing.
In the endgame, you even have the option to rely on magical weapons. However, these are meant to be a long-term goal and nothing you get thrown at you, according to the studio’s CEO.
How does death work? Like in every survival game, death plays a significant role in Nightingale, but it is relatively gentle in direct comparison to genre colleagues. If your character passes away, you keep everything you were wearing at the time of death.
At the same time, you lose everything that was in your inventory. It will be left as a small backpack at the location of your demise, where you can later collect it again.
Additionally, after your death, you will receive a curse for a limited time that makes you weaker before you return to full strength.
There are story quests, but you must find them yourself
Is there a plot? Nightingale has an overarching plot. You play an involuntary realmwalker who travels through the various worlds to rebuild humanity. In this, the so-called Fae are your greatest enemies.
The Fae are magical beings that are significantly more powerful than ordinary humans. However, they are not inherently evil, but have various characters. Nevertheless, the developers describe them as dangerous since most see humans as mere objects and “toys.”
Opposing the Fae are six different factions of humanity led by various NPCs. You can also meet and talk to them in the world. They even have various quests for you.
How do quests work? If you find a settlement where NPCs are located who have tasks for you, you can talk to them and help them with the problems in their realm. These tasks are not supposed to be generic and even tell a story.
Also, they should not be too short and require you to return to the respective NPC multiple times. Many NPCs are based on real-world figures and actual novels. You may encounter Ada Lovelace, Henry Hyde, Allan Quatermain, and many more.
Aside from that, there is no direct storyline in Nightingale.
Much more, the developers want to push you in a certain direction, but the real adventures and stories are to be written and experienced by the players themselves.
You can start next year
When can you play? Currently, Nightingale is in a closed alpha phase, where only very selected fans are allowed to play. However, this is set to change in early 2023, when the survival game is expected to enter a closed beta.
Later in the year, Early Access is expected to start, allowing anyone who wants to join in. However, it is currently unknown how much the access will cost.
How many people can you play with? A maximum of 6 players can be on one map at the same time, making that your maximum group size. However, the developers talk about a shared world where everyone can play together in some way. We do not yet know the details about this.
Can you set up private servers? No, at least not in early Early Access. During the initial phase of the game, Nightingale will not support private servers or modding.
The developers explain that they need to continue optimizing the server structure themselves to allow more than 6 people on the same instance. However, modding is expected to be enabled early in the Early Access phase.
What does Early Access bring? You can play Nightingale yourself and freely explore the realms with the card system, but the entire game is not yet available. The eponymous capital Nightingale is also not visitable at the start of Early Access.
During the EA phase, new content will continuously be added to the game, and seasonal content should enhance Nightingale as well. What exactly this will look like is still unknown.
Is there a character editor? Yes, and it is surprisingly extensive. The developers confirm that they place great value on allowing players to truly be the character they want to be.
Numerous clothing options come along with this. By the way, the outfits and armor in the game are not tied to genders or body shapes. This is also intended to contribute to maximum freedom in character creation.
What do you think of Nightingale? Are you looking forward to the survival title and the realms, or is there something you dislike? Feel free to let us know in the comments here at MeinMMO.
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