Nightingale vs Enshrouded: Which should you play?

Nightingale and Enshrouded are both games in early access with an emphasis on open-world exploration, fighting, crafting, building, and more. Since the two seem fairly similar, it can be tough to decide which one you want to add to your collection.

Both games are survival RPGs with a lot of the elements you would expect to see in a game of this style. If you’re unsure which one to get, here’s everything you need to know to decide whether you should play Nightingale or Enshrouded.

Why should you play Nightingale?

Nightingale has a magical and mystical feel to it as you are transported to a world that mixes history with fantasy. Its aesthetic is a fun mix of various styles including gaslamp and Victorian, which gives it a particularly unique feel.

In terms of gameplay, you’re thrust into the middle of a Realm you choose with little to no gear. You have to work your way up from next to nothing, and this includes many different aspects you might expect of a game like this, including crafting, cooking, fighting, foraging, and building.

The Realm Card system combined with procedural generation makes every Fae Realm you visit feel vastly different from the last. Exploration is one of my favorite parts of this game because it always feels like there’s something new to find.

Features like the ability to use an Umbrella to glide around, endless Realm Card combinations, and creatures unlike any other give Nightingale immense personality and charm I just can’t get enough of. This RPG is already a gem even though it’s still in early access and has a long way to go.

Why should you play Enshrouded?

Enshrouded has a super gritty, realistic, and rugged feel. If this is the kind of style you’re after, then Enshrouded is the game for you. There’s the constant looming threat of the Shroud hovering over you as you attempt to venture around Embervale, so a lot of this game is locked early on.

One of the best features of Enshrouded is the building system, which is far more advanced than most. You can freely terraform the world around you to create truly unique buildings and bases complete with a wide array of building blocks. This system lets you carve your way through mountains or shape them to your desire, a huge plus if you’re really into an amazing building system.

I’m also a big fan of the class system, which lets you spend points to level up a skill tree. These skills are associated with different classes like Battlemage, Ranger, and Wizard in a style fairly similar to that of Baldur’s Gate 3 and Dungeons & Dragons.

The world of Embervale is pretty impressive, but I can already feel it getting old after just one playthrough. I love games with lots of replayability, and although Enshrouded’s class and building systems are favorable factors for this, the stagnant world of Embervale isn’t.

Should you play Nightingale or Enshrouded?

I personally recommend Nightingale over Enshrouded, and it’s honestly not even close for me. At a time when survival RPGs seem to be releasing non-stop, Nightingale manages to be something special and is a standout from the rest, while Enshrouded just can’t really capture my attention in the same way.

The procedurally generated worlds you can mix and match between using Realm Cards make Nightingale feel larger than life. This is a massive factor working in the RPG’s favor, especially for a player like me who can never grow tired of Minecraft for the same reason.

Nightingale’s immensely complex character creator, which still has more planned features to come, is another huge win that gives it an edge over Enshrouded. Creating my character is one of my favorite aspects of any game, and while the options in Enshrouded are extremely minuscule, Nightingale has so many options that it took me over an hour to finalize my first character because of how much time I spent considering features like my Lineage, character story, and Loadout difficulty.

The one feature I enjoy more in Enshrouded than I do Nightingale is the overall building system, since Enshrouded allows you to truly terraform and customize the environment in a way Nightingale and most other games don’t. I can spend ages enjoying the building system in Enshrouded, but that’s about all I really want to do in Enshrouded, while I can’t get enough of absolutely everything Nightingale offers.

Considering both games are still in an early access state and will be for the foreseeable future, both Nightingale and Enshrouded are extremely impressive feats. But Nightingale is ultimately the superior RPG in my eyes.