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11 The day after the reveal, on August 26, 2026, HoYoverse ran a hands-on session for invited press. It was not a show-floor build: the studio's own gamescom listing offered trial play for two of its other titles and did not include Nodusfall. Press were taken by bus to a separate venue and played in groups. This page records what that session contained because it is the only time anyone outside the studio has played the game, but every detail below describes a build in development, labelled as such at the time, and none of it is a specification for the finished game.
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33 The Session
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55 DetailWhat it wasDateAugust 26, 2026FormatClosed-doors session for invited press, away from the show floor. Attendees could not queue for itVenueA warehouse-like space dressed as the game's world, with a main floor of demo stations and a darkened waiting area built around a campfireGroupsOne busload of attendees, split into three groupsLengthRoughly 30 minutes of playParty sizeFour playersHardwarePC stations played with controllersDeveloper accessMembers of the development team took questions informally around the campfire between play sessions
66 What the Demo Contained
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88 A character select offering four characters. One of them had two sub-classes and the rest had one.A short tutorial tailored to the character chosen.A hub area where characters were picked and customised before deployment.A contract taken from a board, which set the hunt.A summonable mount, described as a divine beast rather than a horse, appearing instantly when called. A guidance trail on the ground pointed the way.Three boss encounters in sequence, escalating in difficulty, with a campfire rest point between stages.Clear-time performance ranks. One party finished in about 20 minutes for an S rank; another took over 30 minutes and finished on a C rank.Crafting materials for healing items dropped from the smaller creatures encountered along the way.
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1010 Story content was absent. One attending writer noted the demo carried none of the world detail or lore hinted at in the reveal trailer, and that equipment and progression could not be examined in the time available.
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1212 The Three Bosses
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1414 The Chinese press release confirms the line-up first-party: three fights against legendary creatures, one of them 穷奇 and one a portent pairing of a black dragon and its knight built from Norse myth and the Nibelungenlied.
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1616 BossHow it was describedCleaver FellstoneA tree-like creature that opens the run. It has area attacks and summons smaller versions of itself, so the party has to clear adds or get ambushed. Treated as the tutorial encounter, and its fight is cut short when the next boss breaks in and mauls itQiongqiModelled on the beast of the same name recorded in the classical Chinese texts the Classic of Mountains and Seas and the Classic of Divine Marvels, where it is one of the four great malevolent beasts of ancient Chinese myth. A winged quadruped that fights heavily from the air, which makes life hard for melee characters. Its horn can be broken off, it shifts into a bloodier and more aggressive form once damaged enough, and it withdraws once before the party pursues itMaldrakeA dragon and its heavily armoured rider. Below a health threshold the rider dismounts and attacks alongside the dragon from several directions at once. In at least one account the dragon was eventually spent and the fight ended against the strengthened rider alone
1717 Accounts differ on whether the name Maldrake belongs to the dragon or to its rider. None of these three is the Dreadnodus: the debut post describes that as the calamity corrupting legendary beings, which places these creatures among its victims rather than among its forms.
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1919 Combat as It Played
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2121 Light and heavy attacks, with charged variants, formed the backbone. Skills sat on longer cooldowns, so the rhythm favoured sustained basic-attack pressure over ability spam.There was no dedicated block. Releasing a charged attack just as an enemy struck acted as a counter.Stamina was spent by attacking. Heavy attacks were the move that could not be thrown out recklessly.When a boss was worn down enough, an execution prompt appeared. One player performed a cinematic finisher for heavy burst damage while the rest of the party kept the standard camera.Allies could be healed and revived. A downed player could wait for a teammate or respawn at a nearby point after a delay.Ultimates had cooldowns over two minutes and varied with the sub-class chosen after picking a character.Ground danger indicators marked incoming heavy attacks, which could kill outright.
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2323 Build Caveats Stated at the Time
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2525 These matter, because the demo is the source of most of what anyone knows about how the game feels.
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2727 Screens shown during the session carried the studio's own in-development label.Healing items were generous and deaths were rare. At least one attending writer noted the build may have been eased so that groups could finish inside the slot.Parties were strangers meeting for the first time, playing without voice chat.Only co-op boss hunting was playable. The developer FAQ says the finished game will also carry wide story maps in an RPG format and other mission types.
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2929 What the Demo Is Not Evidence Of
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3131 It does not settle final difficulty, the final character roster, the final class list, mission structure outside boss hunts, or any platform question. The stations ran on PC, which is consistent with the only confirmed platform but is not itself an announcement. See Release and Platforms.