Hey guys! I hope everyone’s having a fantastic day! 
So, I don’t want to keep this short as I’ve accumulated deep understanding of the gaming world in the past 30+ years. I’ve been gaming for almost my entire life, and so far I genuinely believe No Rest for the Wicked is one of the best games I’ve played in recent years.
I really like its progression, worldbuilding, and overall aesthetics. The closest comparison I can think of is probably Silver on the old Dreamcast, back around 1999. Directional melee combat, radial menu systems, stylized environments, an isometric/top-down perspective with different camera angles depending on the location. Even the radial health/stamina system felt strangely reminiscent, and there are similarities in the world itself.
Which is exactly why I think there’s a need to outline some game-breaking / immersion breaking points of this game.
Before I start this feedback, I want you to understand a few basic things:
- This is not a rant.
- This is not vitriol.
- This is not ill mannered nor ill conceived.
- I pride myself on objective reasoning (so even though I like the game, I still understand it has flaws - among which the multiplayer one seems a hard bargain).
Please note - I am sharing a genuine concern due to a game-breaking design that puts co-op segment in a fairly difficult spot, and makes it feel more like an uphill battle. In fact, it is so game-breaking, that a person would rather play Single player than Co-Op. We need to fix this.
What did I notice?
I started playing with a friend in co-op campaign mode, with me sharing my world. I expected something similar to most other ARPGs or co-op games:
- Instanced loot
- Shared experience
- Quest progression tied appropriately to the host’s world.
Instead of shared progression, it was one player gig
- a) Finish quests on their own
- b) Take all the loot on their own
- c) Buy all the available items on their own
Regardless of both players being in the same spot and doing same questline or hitting same enemy…
Why? 
We could end it there, however I do feel like a bit more info is needed:
I wanted to make sure I wasn’t the only one who felt this way, so I’ve talked with several of my friends, and we all shared same sentiment. The conclusion is that although this is not such a major issue - it is still highly questionable as to why is it make like that in the first place? There doesn’t seem to be any conceivable end goal behind such a choice, which is why I decided to also open this topic. Essentially, this type of a choice immediately creates a discrepancy between players right off the bat, and starts breaking immersion for a conjoint adventure. You lose a sense of progression, exploration, and feel like you aren’t doing anything. The sentiment was - Single player is better simply because people don’t waste time on getting the same activity done. This is a major flaw! If it makes any player wanting to maintain a separate solo campaign rather than actually play co-op, that is not good. Not good at all.
1st issue: Shared loot? Nah.
So, although we’re supposedly in the same “party” as citizens of the same realm, the first major issue we’ve encountered is the >>first-come, first-serve<< loot system. It immediately interferes with fair progression between players and creates unnecessary inventory-management hassle. Can my friend share the looted items? Yes. Is it extra hassle? Yes. Any need to do that? No. Not really.
Don’t enemies scale with extra players? If so, then so should the loot table be for both players, right?
2nd issue: Where’s my quest?
I’m also fairly certain that when a Challenge quest gets completed, I received neither the quest-related item nor the experience associated with it, despite both of us actively participating. That felt super strange. I genuinely don’t understand this design choice because it effectively penalizes players for playing together. It made me confused since this is the first time in my gaming history that I encountered such restrictive measures that penalize, the most, the host of the world. It is usually vice-versa.
3rd issue: Thor’s hammer?
I also encountered a pouch on the ground stating, “This item belongs to another player.” I mean, so what?
I’d understand a restriction like that in an MMO or if there was a serious need to sort out the world economy in an MMO, but in a private co-op RPG world where all resources respawn? Yeah, odd, odd choice. Extremely odd… This makes the economy inflated overtime, so what gives? It makes very little sense.
If a player deliberately drops an item, presumably they are dropping it so another player can pick it up. This was always the case in so many co-op / multiplayer games. Why not here? Why is it locked? Who benefits this? It’s not like you can accidently drop it, either. Item trading and sharing have existed in ARPGs for about as long as the genre itself - drop an item, keep the gameplay flow. Keep the immersion.
4th issue: From 5th gear to 1st gear, engine blew away!
Imagine each time having to stop, inspect an item, check, tell other player what it is, share, press “accept” or “Lock trade” and then observe… YIKES! I am sure that younger players would have a lot more time to waste
This raises a broader question: if the game is designed around co-op, what is the intended philosophy behind these choices? The only reason to even have this would be if the game was more down the path of Diablo / Path of Exile and other MMORPG-related games. But…not private worlds. Right? Or are you doing like a test to see will the system work for a future Diablo / Path of Exile path? That’s the only way I can see why this specific system of trading was implemented.
You don’t really feel like you’ve earned an item if you constantly need to communicate with your friend and ask them to hand something over. It creates unnecessary friction in a system that should ideally make cooperation feel natural.
We really, really, really don’t want to spend 30 minutes checking each other’s gear.
5th issue: Que up in a line!
You also can’t both interact with the same shop at the same time. I can understand restricting certain interactions during quests, but for ordinary vendors it still feels like a strange limitation that adds unnecessary waiting. And again, friction.
Then, on top of everything else, friendly fire exists. Not a major problem, honestly. But… Why? It adds to the broader question: if co-op is an important part of the game, why isn’t more effort being made to make co-op actually feel good?
I understand that some people might see these as minor issues, but taken together they quickly add up to an unpleasant co-op experience. You want to fight enemies in a skill-based scenario, but at the same time you can kill your friends. GG. They feel more like multiplayer systems that haven’t been fully thought through yet. At least implement an option “Friendly fire: Y/N?”. And with friendly fire add like 20% more exp to make people incentivized.
And these are only things I noticed within my first five hours.
How to fix?
The loot and progression systems in particular need attention. There are many ways this could be handled: instanced loot, shared quest progression, shared experience, or simply world options that determine how multiplayer functions when the realm is initially created.
The host should also be able to decide how much other players are allowed to affect their world.
For example, you could be outside gathering resources while your friend stays in town and upgrades every shop without you. At that point, did you actually experience that part of the game? The progression? The narration surrounding it?
Having options here would solve a large part of the problem. These systems could simply operate through world-level toggles:
-
Allow other players to upgrade shops? Y/N
-
Allow other players to progress quests? Y/N
-
Loot system: First-Come / Instanced
-
Share quest experience and rewards? Y/N
-
Allow dropped items to be picked up by other players? Y/N
Giving the world owner control over these rules would preserve the current system for people who enjoy it while allowing others to create a much more conventional and satisfying co-op experience. If your friend can upgrade half the town while you’re chopping trees, the game has effectively allowed another player to consume part of your campaign experience. I do not think that this is intended gameplay.
Thank you for your time and reading through my feedback. I will be looking forward to how the version 1.0 will address these Multiplayer issues, even though the release date was postponed.