Elden Ring: Nightreign

Game feels like a recycled greatest-hits album same brutal combat, but with little innovation. FromSoftware leans too hard on old tricks: punishing difficulty, vague mechanics, and zero communication features. Want co-op? Pray your random teammates don't suck, because there's no cross-play or duos. Even pros like FightingCowboy call the balancing unfair bosses feel tuned for masochists if playing solo, not fun.

The world is stunning, but reusing assets and mechanics from past games (*cough* Dark Souls, Elden ring *cough*) makes it feel lazy. FromSoft excels at single-player, but their multiplayer attempts are half-baked. If you have 2 friends on the same console/platform who are willing to play while on a discord call then the game is ok, if not it sucks.

Every trope, every trend compressed into a repetitive and watered out open world, sprinkled with fan service.

While previous From Software games respected the player, this title does the exact opposite.

They expect you to do the same content over and over and over and over again, running through the same hoops, hoping for some random stats to make your character strong enough to beat the boss before the time runs out, all for some random reward that will make the next repetitive run hopefully easier...

From Software's RPG games where innovative by their meticulous design, every enemy and item had a reason for being there, using detailed lore and challenging difficulty to make the player feel grounded and the world formidable.

While in this game everything feels random like it's a mod generated by AI.

I guess with the huge success and growth of Elden Ring, it was too tempting to not cash in with this genetic mess.

As someone who borderline worships FromSoftware and gets hyped for every new title they release, it honestly pains me to write this - but Nightreign just isn't a strong entry. It's not terrible, no, but it's alarmingly average by FromSoft standards.

I really tried to give the game a fair shot. In the beginning, I even thought, "Hey, this is actually kinda decent." But the further I got, the more obvious it became: there just isn't enough substance here. After the second Night Lord, everything starts to blur into repetition. Same enemies (mostly pulled straight from the base game), familiar bosses, and a gameplay loop that gets stale way too fast. You play through two "days" with your friends (or solo, which - from what others are saying - is absolute misery), grind through familiar Elden Ring mobs, then fight a Night Lord. Rinse and repeat.

The roguelike system - which should've brought in variety - feels completely hollow. 90% of the drops are just boring stat boosts: +3 stamina, +5% damage, that kind of uninspired stuff. Only once or twice did I get something actually fun and unique, like a "walking build" that rained arrows just by moving - and that was awesome. But moments like that are shockingly rare, almost accidental.

Co-op works surprisingly well technically - no major lag, very smooth experience, which honestly impressed me. But then you realize: no communication tools, no crossplay, not even duos. For a game so heavily focused on cooperative play, that's just... baffling.

What hits the hardest, though, is how much this doesn't feel like a full game. More like a mod, or maybe a small DLC. Not a properly fleshed-out, thoughtfully designed experience. And for $40? That's asking too much. Even as a die-hard fan, I can't really justify that price.

TL;DR: If you love FromSoft and just want to bash some bosses with friends, sure - it's okay for that. But don't expect anything fresh or groundbreaking. It's just "pretty decent," and nothing more. I truly hope they expand on it in the future, because there is potential here. Unfortunately, right now it feels like they barely scratched the surface.

Compared to Elden Ring, or even other From Software games, this doesn't really meet the mark. However, it's fantastic compared to the other AAA slop that comes out nowadays. The gameplay is awesome, with tons of variety in playstyles with 8 different playable characters, or Nightfarers to date. My favorite is the Executor, who has a Sekiro-Style parry ability. The teams of 3 players keeps the game refreshing, with combinations of different Nightfarers changing priorities ingame, like trying to make Magic users more powerful by finding Wizards' Towers. Another aspect of the game is that Fromsoftware is new to multiplayer-focused games, which is a double edged swor. That means that you pay for the game (and the dlc that will release later this year) and that's it. There are no microtransactions, or anything. There's a downside to this being Fromsoft's first step into multiplayer focused games. There's no crossplay or ingame chat of any kind except for a map ping feature and emotes. The lack of communication can make the game infuriating when your team doesn't want to do the next logical step, and just wants to fight a giant dragon at Lvl.1. The game's not bad, but it needs improvement. If at least one other member of your team has enough experience, it's going to be a great run, because the newer player will just follow the two experienced players more. Luckily, Fromsoftware is great, and is pumping out hotfixes and new content.

I've had a lot of fun playing this. But I can see why a lot of people don't like it. It does need plenty of work still. But even the way it is now, I'm really enjoying it, and can't stop playing.

Sure, some runs are bad, but most are okay. And some are GREAT, when you find the right loot for your build.

FromSoft needs to add better loot and passive abilities to make the builds stronger. Especially after being a mini-boss (I don't want abilities that require guarding!)

Also the Nightlords fights are kind of annoying because 80% of the time, you're chasing them around the huge arenas.

I keep finding new things and ways to play. (I just found out that weapon buffs are active by just having them in your inventory, you don't even need to actively use them!)

Hopefully they keep adding more and patching it up. Has a lot of potential.