In contrast to standard FromSoftware games, Elden Ring Nightreign offers a unique twist. It incorporates multiplayer elements and takes inspiration from battle royales and looter shooters, making it quite distinct from the norm, even for those familiar with their exceptional RPGs of the past two decades.
After playing the game on PS5 for over six hours, Nightreign turned out to be a remarkably novel adventure from the renowned developer, offering a thrilling cooperative play experience. While some traditional FromSoft fans might take issue with it, Nightreign is definitely worth keeping an eye on when it launches on both PS4 and PS5 on May 30th.
In simpler terms, Nightreign is referred to as a “session-based RPG” by FromSoftware. This means it offers an action-packed experience where you can refine your character build, uncover hidden mysteries, and face challenging bosses within quick 45-minute sessions. Unlike Elden Ring, which encourages leisurely gameplay for building your character and mastering enemy tactics, Nightreign focuses on swift strategy, making the most of what you’ve got.
In Elden Ring Nightreign, you initiate a game session at Roundtable Hold, your central hub where you choose your character class, or Nightfarer. This game’s version of classes offers four distinct archetypes: warrior, tank, thief, and mage, each with their unique statistics, mobility levels, starting equipment, and two rechargeable powerful abilities that we’ll discuss further.
As I soar into Limveld aboard my spectral hawk, flanked by my gaming buddies, I can’t help but draw some parallels to Fortnite. This game, Nightreign, was designed for a trio, whether you’re teaming up with friends or jumping into matchmaking. However, if you prefer a solo experience, you can still play offline.
Immediately upon landing, you kick off Day One, which is approximately a 15-minute game on an open map that shrinks due to a circle inspired by battle royale games. During this early stage, your main objective is to locate and eliminate enemies to gather runes for leveling up. You start each game with minimal health, stamina, and mana, making you vulnerable to even the weakest opponents who can take you out with just a few hits.
Upon landing on Limveld, the accelerated gameplay is immediately striking. Changing the run button from Circle to L3 significantly improves character speed in our view. The game offers various means to traverse its map swiftly: a wall-mount mechanic lets you scale taller structures such as camps; there’s no fall damage so you can leap off cliff edges and tower tops; and Spirit Springs and Spectral Oaks enable you to jump vast heights and glide long distances. Surprisingly, your faithful horse Torrent is not mentioned in this context.
In this faster-paced game, the leveling process enhances every characteristic of your character collectively, instead of focusing on individual traits. A modest number of levels (up to 15, as far as we can discern) significantly amplifies all the attributes of your character, preparing you considerably for the more challenging adversaries ahead.
Exploring Limveld isn’t just about runes; it’s also about weapons, which form the core of gameplay, offering various styles and damage types for diverse experiences. Since loot drops randomly, every playthrough offers an element of surprise as you may discover new items. The weapon system is structured much like in a game such as Destiny, with shades of grey, blue, purple, and golden tiers, each providing superior stats, passive abilities, and potent weapon abilities. If you come across smithing stones and manage to trade with a merchant before the time limit expires, you can enhance your weapon.
The inventory in Nightreign is disorganized and lacks armor, offering only six slots for weapons. You won’t be over-encumbered, which gives you more freedom to move around. When selecting weapons, remember that they not only determine the type of damage you inflict, but also come with passive abilities that can boost your character’s power even when not in use. So, while you might not prefer a certain weapon at first glance, it could fit into the build you’re trying to create.
As you embark on your quest for improved equipment, your map is brimming with diverse locations of significance. These include churches that often conceal extra healing potions, and bosses bearing names that not only shower you with a wealth of runes but also bestow high-tier weapons and enduring perks to see you through the remainder of your journey.
Given limited time, it’s essential to make the most of each run. This might involve dividing your efforts to explore more specialized equipment or concentrating on defeating bosses for better loot. For instance, rare items like magical staves are often found in towers.
Nightreign isn’t just about what you expect; it holds surprises too, such as spontaneous occurrences. In our trial version, we encountered the Frightful Omen, a persistent pursuer who dogged our heels until one of us met our end or we managed to escape. There were numerous instances where this event threw a wrench in our strategies, but it could also pave the way for victory if we outlasted it. The full game will introduce more such events, and we’re eagerly anticipating the havoc they’ll unleash.
When the circle guides you towards an evening showdown against a boss, that’s when Elden Ring feels most typical under Nightreign’s reign. In this confined area, you’ll need to employ the abilities and equipment you’ve gathered to vanquish a boss from the main game. There are two potential bosses per night, depending on the specific run of the Nightlord you’re embarking on.
As a gamer, I find that it’s during these epic boss battles when my ultimate skills truly shine. Each character class offers a unique set of two abilities. For instance, one ability allows me to tag an enemy, so when my teammates strike them, they gain health and energy points. Another ability might be a massive area-of-effect slam attack. The key lies in mastering the art of combining these abilities, as it significantly enhances our team’s synergy, and alters my entire strategy when facing those towering bosses.
During our meeting, we executed a Triple Duchess run (representing the assassin class), which has the unique ability to momentarily render the team undetectable and replicate the damage inflicted on enemies from the past few seconds. By coordinating when we activated our skills, we swiftly defeated a boss that had given us trouble in just minutes.
Beating the final boss at the end of Day One unlocks a fresh start for Day Two. Similar to the previous day, this phase focuses on enhancing the character build you established earlier. You might consider discovering novel abilities and weapons, but due to time constraints, you could potentially grow weaker if you don’t focus on optimizing your existing tools. This dilemma is likely to challenge many gamers.
After overcoming another main boss, you now have just one opportunity left to enhance your character at a location known as a Site of Grace, and purchase whatever you can afford from a vendor. As an ominous scene unfolds, displaying the Nightfarers opening a grand portal, you embark on the final battle against the Nightlord – a new boss created exclusively for Elden Ring’s Nightreign.
Our battle was against a fearsome three-headed wolf known as Gladius, who carried a sword on an enormous chain. We had to leap just as its terrifying swipes whizzed past us, making the air crackle with tension. The path we took to reach this point is significantly shorter than in Elden Ring, but it’s still heart-pounding, especially because failure means returning to the very beginning.
During your current run, it’s important to collaborate not just with the character build you’ve developed during this session, but also with those of your teammates. Though many parts of the game seem smooth and polished, it’s in the final boss fight that you truly appreciate how vibrant and intricate Elden Ring’s build customization remains. Overcoming Gladius was no easy task, even with strong builds, which made our eventual victory all the more satisfying.
Finishing a run, whether you reach the end or not, will provide you with Relics – permanent enhancements that you can customize for specific character classes. These Relics offer various benefits such as healing advantages and damage type upgrades, enabling you to plan your strategy for future runs and build your character accordingly. However, the effectiveness of these bonuses depends on whether your team manages to gather the necessary materials to maximize their potential.
Beyond it, there wasn’t much lasting development, an unexpected lack in the multiplayer arena. During our gameplay, we accrued a type of currency that couldn’t be used within the game itself, leading us to wonder if there are additional character customization options, such as buying Nightfarer skins or simply respecifying Relic traits. The Roundtable Hold appears quite expansive, but was conspicuously devoid of content. It remains unclear whether this area will be populated before release or expanded upon post-launch.
Undeniably, every playthrough offers a unique experience, as if embarking on an adventure with a brand new character and a plethora of build options. With diverse boss encounters, randomly generated loot, unpredictable events, and eight distinct character classes to explore, plus eight Nightlords to overcome, the game’s potential is immense. It’s not hard to imagine spending over 50 hours mastering the different classes and defeating the bosses, without even considering the replay value or future content planned for post-launch.
The innovative Elden Ring: Nightreign is a fresh undertaking from the acclaimed RPG developer, offering an exhilarating co-op experience by emphasizing the top features of the original game and concentrating them into a more immersive, action-packed environment. It’s hard to overstate how enjoyable Nightreign can be! Our team couldn’t help but have a great time as we brainstormed character synergies and ventured out to explore the expanses of Limveld in search of new discoveries together.
Although some might find the game’s experience less intense compared to its creator’s previous projects, overlooking the intricate dance between accelerating all aspects while maintaining the distinctive Elden Ring atmosphere would be a mistake. After approximately seven hours playing on PS5, it seems we’ve barely touched the tip of the iceberg, and we’re eagerly anticipating delving deeper into what promises to be one of the most captivating multiplayer releases in 2025.
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2025-02-12 17:07