Nidhogg 2 is a tug-of-war you play with a sword, and Messhof knows exactly how long to let the rope burn. The sequel to 2014’s Nidhogg arrived in 2017 for Microsoft Windows, macOS and PlayStation 4, then reached Xbox One in July 2018 and Nintendo Switch in November 2018. It is a fighting game built on a single idea: two players, one screen, and a race to the far end of the opponent’s side.
Trailer, via messhof.
Two Players, One Screen, Ten Arenas
The rules are stripped to the bone. You duel. You win by reaching your opponent’s edge of the arena before they reach yours. Everything between those two points — the sliding, the leaping, the deflected blades — exists to buy you a few feet of ground.
Messhof built ten arenas for the fight, and the sequel adds weapons the first game never had: daggers, throwing knives and bows. There is a character creator too. The original duel is still the spine of it, but the arsenal around that spine is new.
What the New Weapons Change
A thrown knife and a drawn bow do different work than a sword. They stretch the distance at which a mistake costs you, and they turn a game about inches into a game about patience. That is the real expansion here — not more modes, but more ways to be wrong at range.
The move set carries the original’s verbs forward. Slide. Leap. Deflect. The counter is still the sharpest tool in the box, because a parry that lands flips the whole exchange in a single beat.
The Comparison That Matters
The sequel’s additions sit against the 2014 original like this:
| Feature | Nidhogg (2014) | Nidhogg 2 (2017) |
|---|---|---|
| Core goal | Reach opponent’s side | Reach opponent’s side |
| Weapons | Original set | Daggers, throwing knives, bows |
| Character creator | No | Yes |
| Arenas | — | Ten |
| Platforms | — | Arcade, PlayStation 4, PC, Mac, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch |
The goal never moved. The toolkit did.
Messhof’s Art and the Wurm’s Return
Messhof’s own summary promises the return of the wurm, and the sequel delivers it — the thing that eats the winner, or swallows whoever fails to hold the line. It is the joke the whole game is built on: you fight for the right to be devoured.
The studio developed and published Nidhogg 2 itself, the same arrangement as the first game. That independence shows. Nothing here reads like a committee softened the edges of the duel.
Split Screen and the Party Problem
Nidhogg 2 supports single player, multiplayer and split screen. The party mode is where the design gets loud, and it is also where the seams show. A game this precise about distance and timing can turn chaotic when four people are shouting over one screen.
That is not a flaw so much as a trade. The same tight rules that make a one-on-one duel tense make a crowded room funny. Messhof chose to serve both, and mostly it works.
Where the Sequel Falls Short
The additions are real, but they are additions. Nidhogg 2 does not rethink the duel; it furnishes it. Players who wanted a new argument will find a better-stocked version of the old one. That is a fine thing to sell, and a smaller thing than a reinvention.
The game received generally positive reviews on release, and the aggregate sits at 7.7 out of 10 across 17 outlets. That number is honest about what this is: a sharp, confident sequel that improves the toolkit without disturbing the core.
The weapons are the part worth watching. A bow in a game about closing distance changes how you think about every step forward, and that is the one place Nidhogg 2 genuinely argues with its predecessor rather than decorating it. The rest is a good fight, well kept.
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