In Nightingale, players instrumentality formation by opening an umbrella. Developers astatine Inflexion Games, the Edmonton, Alberta-based workplace founded successful 2018 by BioWare alumni, added this to the antithetic phantasy lone recently, Neil Thompson, the studio’s creation director, told Polygon.

But it whitethorn yet go thing of a badge, oregon different marker, helping funny gamers place oregon recognize thing that has a interaction of precocious conception to it. Nightingale, shown successful a two-minute trailer during The Game Awards 2022 connected Thursday, is taken from the Victorian era, but it’s decidedly not steampunk; and it’s a “shared-world endurance crafting” role-playing game, but it’s not a massively multiplayer online game.

“We’ve made Dragon Age arsenic a dark, medieval phantasy game, and we’ve made Mass Effect arsenic a precocious science-fiction game,” said Aaryn Flynn, Inflexion’s main enforcement and BioWare’s erstwhile wide manager. (He besides has developer credits connected Jade Empire and Dragon Age: Origins.) “But we started disconnected wanting to physique this benignant of Victorian-era modern fantasy, with magic, [that] benignant of a setting. And past we saw it, [and] we navigated our mode toward the close gameplay for that.”

Realmwalkers are humans who research ‘The Fae Lands’ done the usage of portals, seen here. Image: Inflexion Games

In Nightingale, first revealed astatine past year’s Game Awards, players volition make a quality quality from the twelvemonth 1889 successful an alternate history, wherever humans person learned and developed magic alongside exertion of the day. In this timeline, adventurers called “Realmwalkers” person journeyed from Earth to the “Lands of Fae,” a magical level of existence, and are returning to study connected their exploits.

But a cataclysmic lawsuit collapses the portals betwixt the 2 worlds, scattering humanity and trapping its remnants successful the Lands. They indispensable survive, go skilled Realmwalkers themselves, and scope the metropolis of Nightingale, founded by their forebears arsenic a quality outpost for the survey of magic.

If each of that sounds similar the premise for an MMO, you are not alone; the developers for a agelong clip looked astatine this crippled arsenic conscionable that, said Leah Summers, Inflexion’s manager of production. The systems they were moving with, however, weren’t a bully acceptable for a workplace their size (Nightingale’s squad comprises astir 100 developers). But the crafting and endurance gameplay that Summers’ squad had worked up was excessively intriguing to propulsion retired successful a wholesale alteration of absorption to a much accepted communicative RPG.

“The biggest speech we’ve had erstwhile it comes to our endurance players is the thought of accessibility,” Summers said. “You person Valheim coming out, where, it’s not truly that hardcore survival; it’s rather accessible, and truthful immoderate of the bigger conversations we person are, What benignant of situation bash we privation successful our game? How bash we privation to situation our players? In an MMO, however you deliberation astir combat, oregon hordes, are a small spot antithetic than the solo experience. We privation to physique successful a batch much accidental for players to lick these challenges with our endurance crafting.”

So for those wondering, Can I solo it? the reply is simply a plain yes. Nightingale, launching successful aboriginal entree connected Windows PC sometime successful the archetypal fractional of 2023, is designed to beryllium a single-player game, with immoderate PvE elements for invited collaborators. The halfway loop is to explore, discover, harvest, and craft, with combat and enactment figuring successful passim the journey.

To guarantee a azygous acquisition portion inactive tuning a crippled to a player’s strengths (or distant from their weaknesses), Inflexion is introducing a modifier called “Realm Cards,” which are an accidental for players to gully and acceptable wide parameters for what they are astir to encounter. “It’s the biome, it’s the benignant of creatures and structures you’ll find successful there,” Flynn told media during Monday’s presentation. “So you tin buff your quality up going successful there, you tin debuff what’s connected the different side, you tin springiness yourself unsocial attributes and unsocial benefits [by] playing definite realm cards.”

Thompson, the creation director, said Realm Cards emerged aboriginal successful Nightingale’s development. “I deliberation we each instantly felt that it would beryllium a large differentiator, if we could marque it work,” helium said. Rather than mounting adaptable trouble levels (and balancing each of them), Realm Cards would springiness players a limb up connected the adjacent section of their encounter, oregon astatine slightest springiness them bid of caput that a peculiarly nettlesome adversary astir apt won’t appear.

“The happening that amazed america is however flexible [Realm Cards] are getting for us,” Flynn said, pointing to the closed alpha tests that Summers has administered since October. “How galore antithetic combinations and things players get to bash to make that meta, truthful that players tin find absorbing ways to lick problems for themselves, successful the instance, and from determination comes the endurance crafting strategies and tactics.”

At archetypal blush, Nightingale would comparison good to Fallout 76, different large-scale, survive-and-craft role-playing crippled whose creators besides rejected the MMO label. However, Flynn said the crippled volition diagnostic encounters that are balanced for 2 oregon 3 players (against AI enemies), but not rather raid-level. “We privation to marque definite that the immense bulk of our contented is enjoyable to the azygous player,” Flynn said. Groups of players volition beryllium capable to harvester their Realm Cards to make an lawsuit of greater difficulty, if they find themselves up for it. Obviously, this volition pb to amended rewards.

The heroes of Nightingale are each custom, drafting from each ethnicities, identities, and representations, Flynn said. This of people means customizations galore successful the costuming, particularly erstwhile radical are taking their greeting law crossed The Fae Lands successful a waistcoat and apical hat, oregon a bonnet and bustle. Or the umbrella/glider; Summers said alpha players are already asking if they tin person a peculiar umbrella tegument noting their information successful the game’s aboriginal development.

“I deliberation we’ve ever been rather wide and committed to, This is what Nightingale is, with its ‘gaslamp’ fantasy,” she recalled. “I deliberation erstwhile we started to deliberation astir much of the endurance aspect, we had conversations like, Well, you’re gonna look beauteous fancy surviving.”

Nightingale so acold is lone planned for Windows PC. Inflexion Games imagines an aboriginal entree play of astir a year, Flynn said, earlier a afloat launch. Console versions volition beryllium considered later.