It is hard to even count how many online showcases I have stayed up all night watching. Because of that, I've developed a bit of a peculiar knack: guessing the game after watching just the opening seconds of a trailer. I can usually tell roughly which company or franchise a new title belongs to—especially when the lineup details have already taken shape ahead of time, which raises the hit rate even higher.

I managed to guess many of the games featured in this year's Gamescom Opening Night Live showcase that way, but there was one game I couldn't figure out until the video ended completely. That game was HoYoverse's 'Nodusfall'. Even though the company logo appeared early on in the trailer, the presentation made it difficult to get a clear grasp of the game as a whole from the video alone, as its style was distinctly different from HoYoverse's previous titles.

During Gamescom, I got the chance to play Nodusfall firsthand. You could tell how much preparation went into it, to the point where they set up a dedicated demo venue complete with elaborate sets near Koelnmesse.

Of course, there is still very little photo or video material that can be shared, and the demo itself only allowed us to check co-op gameplay rather than a complete section of the game. Even so, I was able to experience HoYoverse's expansion firsthand.

To summarize the core of Nodusfall before diving in: no matter what you imagined, it plays differently than what you'd expect.

In the revealed trailer, the vast and solemn presentation reminiscent of Elden Ring leads one to expect a Soulslike game, while gameplay footage showing players hunting down a giant dragon alongside its introduction as a co-op game suggests a monster-hunting title like Monster Hunter.

Yet, unlike what its cinematic style or brief gameplay snippets implied, the game felt much more like a high-pacing co-op action game centered around combat. Establishing this context upfront feels necessary to properly define Nodusfall.

Right from the brief opening tutorial, you can immediately tell that this game has a different feel.

Upon selecting one of the four characters available in this demo build and their specific class, you learn the basic controls alongside actions tailored to that character. Aside from specific button mappings, the control scheme follows a typical third-person action template.

On an Xbox controller, the X button performs light attacks and the Y button performs heavy attacks; combining the two handles basic combat, supplemented by skills and button-charging actions. Button charging can create combo strings like charged heavy-charged heavy-charged heavy attacks. While there are no direct blocking options aside from dodging, you can time a counter-like attack by landing a charged attack right as an enemy strikes. You can also string together combos by rhythmically alternating light and heavy attacks.

Additionally, skills are used by combining the RB button with the ABXY buttons. Combining RB with attack buttons triggers basic skills with relatively short cooldowns, RB with A activates an Ultimate ability, and RB with B uses a skill called Divine.

This structure and combination of attacks and skills reveals the game's overall approach to combat. To summarize Nodusfall's combat system before getting into the full demo experience, combat is designed around cooperating with other players to continuously chip away at enemy health primarily using basic attacks.

It is neither a spellcaster game where you endlessly overpower enemies with potent skills, nor a game where every single blow requires meticulous weight and deliberate exchange. Deep, methodical exchanges excel in single-player games, whereas if skills were overly powerful and spammable here, it would diminish the combat interaction between players in a cooperative setting.

Consequently, skill cooldowns are kept relatively long, and the gameplay design pushes for relentless damage output using basic attacks and charged actions. Since attacks that deal massive burst damage are comparatively rare, maintaining mobility to unleash basic attacks while evading heavy enemy strikes becomes crucial.

To support this, the game's overall sense of weight feels dialed back as well. This doesn't mean the combat lacks impact feedback; rather, individual attacks exert less staggering force on enemies, requiring continuous movement and sustained attacks instead.

The actual demo experience followed a straightforward setup: a group of players who accepted a contract set out to hunt a specific monster. Hints about the world-building shown in trailers or narrative elements embedded within the environment were not present in this build.

Four players dropped into a new region to carry out their mission and rode their mounts toward the monster. A guide path displayed on the ground kept us on track without worrying about getting lost. Furthermore, calling upon the beast-like Divine mount—rather than a plain horse—summoned it instantly, showing that the game avoids sluggish movement in favor of high mobility.

The monster we encountered was a winged beast reminiscent of a white tiger. An enemy featured in the trailer, it initially launched simple attack patterns, swooping down from the sky before transitioning to melee attacks on the ground.

However, its health bars drained slowly, and with multiple health bars stacked, taking it down took a considerable amount of time. In fact, we couldn't finish it in one go; it fled, forcing us to give chase and engage in another round of combat to finally defeat it.

This was where a different style of combat came into play, highlighting the differences between characters. Unlike the tutorial, which locked players into a melee-focused initial character, the main demo let us freely select our character. I chose a ranged character wielding a bow.

For ranged characters, performing basic attacks gradually fills an arrow gauge, which is then consumed to execute charged attacks. When fully charged, the gauge allowed up to four consecutive charged attacks. Incorporating charged attacks into combo sequences also felt different from the tutorial character. Rather than rapidly firing heavy charged attacks, it gave a stronger sensation of pulling the bowstring back fully before releasing a single, powerful shot.

The basic skill cooldown was relatively long at around 20 seconds, and its damage didn't show a striking difference compared to charged attacks. Meanwhile, basic attacks consumed stamina, though performing most actions presented little issue, with heavy attacks being the main move that couldn't be spammed indiscriminately.

Once the monster's health was reduced to a certain point, an execution prompt appeared; succeeding triggered a massive burst of damage. The execution is performed by a single player while the camera cuts to a cinematic view to showcase the action. Meanwhile, other players watch the cinematic move play out from their standard third-person perspective without camera switches.

Ultimate abilities, which have cooldowns exceeding two minutes, vary depending on choices made after selecting a character. In this demo, I chose a transformation Ultimate. During the transformation—where wings sprout from the character—basic attacks are upgraded to skill-level heavy strikes. Building up a gauge through light attacks lets you execute heavy attacks, pouring out multiple strikes at once to deal massive damage. Attacking without interruption during transformation provided enough time to fit in about two heavy attacks.

Since the transformation Ultimate enhances basic attacks, there's no risk of missing a skill shot, ensuring reliable damage output. In contrast, the Divine skill transforms the character into the mount beast; its attacks—such as short-range front paw strikes or jumping tail swipes—made spacing and range management quite tricky, making it hard to use effectively at first glance. This skill also carried an Ultimate-tier cooldown, preventing frequent use.

Being a demo build, healing items were provided generously, and dodges or damage reduction effects were effective enough that dying was rare. Defeating smaller monsters yielded materials that could be used as healing items. However, getting hit by a major attack could easily result in death, requiring players to pay close attention to danger indicators on the ground. If you die, you can either respawn after a set time at a nearby point or wait for a teammate to revive you.

The second boss we faced was a giant dragon ridden by a knight, requiring us to battle both simultaneously, and this was where party members died for the first time. Below a certain health threshold, the knight dismounted from the dragon to attack from multiple directions at once, making health management difficult.

Nodusfall will be a free-to-play title centered on cooperative play, much like HoYoverse's other games. Rather than what was suggested in its initial reveal trailer, the game appears tailored toward a gameplay pacing that fits its live-service co-op structure, while still leaving room for players to showcase their mastery through teamwork.

Indeed, our four-player party and another party playing beside us completed the contract in about 20 minutes, celebrating an S rank, whereas a group that finished last with a C rank took over 30 minutes. Naturally, that party cheered with equal joy upon clearing it.

While the relatively brief demo didn't allow us to explore more, the layout of the town acting as a lobby and the choice of a realistic visual style over the studio's traditional anime art direction felt well-suited to conveying a much more serious world. Deeper details will undoubtedly be revealed through upcoming comprehensive tests and the official launch.