Highlights
- Dying in Nightingale no longer creates a death chest, but instead results in loss of durability, time, and food buffs.
- The team at Inflexion Games aims to set Nightingale apart from other survival games with its unique death mechanics.
- Update 0.1.3 brings bug fixes and changes, including more accurate ranged attacks in third person and improved UI for recipe selection.
Update 0.1.3 brings multiple bug fixes to Nightingale, but the biggest change is dying will no longer create a death chest. The mechanic has been utilized throughout a number of survival games, but the player community found it tedious, and sometimes impossible, to collect the dropped items after reviving. Looking to set Nightingale apart from others in the genre, a new mechanic has taken the place of death chests.
Like many other games released in 2024, Nightingale is an early access open-world survival crafting game. It features magic, monsters, classic literary figures like Victor Frankenstein, and more throughout different realms that players can travel to. With an expansive crafting system, collecting resources is a priority, especially in higher level worlds. Dying, which causes player loot to drop where the character took their last breath, often puts a kink in any gaming session plans a player may have.
How Nightingale's Gameplay Can Improve Throughout Early Access
Nightingale offers a survival experience unlike any other, but it could still be improved in several areas throughout early access.
Having items drop upon death is a popular survival game mechanic present in almost every open-world crafting game in the genre. Looking to set itself apart from the competition, the team at Inflexion Games has changed how death impacts players in Nightingale. Instead of creating a death chest containing dropped loot, items will lose durability, food buffs will disappear, and time will rapidly pass.
Having to reclaim fallen items is an action many survival players are familiar with. Trekking back to the spot a character died takes time and can be difficult to complete, especially if the death was caused by a boss or large group of mobs. This is further complicated in Nightingale by the use of realms, which may no longer be accessible to the player after they revive. Whether the realm was visited through a portal among a chain of portals or is owned by a friend who is no longer online, getting hard-earned items back can be a hassle.
Thankfully, having a different punishment for dying will set Nightingale apart from the competition, as well as solve the issue of locating death chests through the Faewilds. This change in death mechanics also comes as even more survival crafting games are releasing onto the market. Showcasing ingenuity during early access points to a healthy respect for the player community and an openness to the features they want to experience.
While Nightingale can still learn from other games in the genre, such as Palworld, these changes take it in the right direction. Inflexion Games is using early access as a time to distinguish the title from competitors and fine tune what makes Nightingale special.
Nightingale Update 0.1.3 Patch Notes
Bug Fixes
Progression Blockers
- Completing Nellie Bly’s Elder Eoten quest no longer blocks Ludivine Saint-Clair's quests.
- Bound Puppeteers should no longer cause disconnects around Gloom Sites of Power.
Art/Visual
- Quartz no longer has an unintentional glow at night.
- Sun no longer bleeds through clouds around foliage.
NPCs
- Fixed some instances of creatures spawning under rocks in Desert Realms
- Players should no longer see quests that cannot be completed due to finishing a conflicting quest branch (example: the pacifist route option will not show if the aggressive route is completed for that quest instance).
Resources
- Forge, Quarry, and Alchemist Minor Cards now correctly increase related resource yields as per the Card description.
- Planted Carrots and Delphinium now grow as intended.
Misc
- Mini-Vaults can now re-open from inactive portals
Game Changes
Player Character
- Death chests have been removed. Dying in 0.1.3 will now cause loss of durability, food buffs, and time. A death icon will still mark where the player died in case they wish to revisit the location and can be removed from the Realm map.
- Ranged attacks in third person are more accurate to where the player is aiming.
UI/UX
- When selecting a recipe, it now displays the item’s base stats.
- Driftwood and Deadfall now have the same harvest symbol.
