On May 30th which, at the time of writing was two days ago, Elden Ring Nightreign celebrated one year of existence.

On this site, we had a piece published not long after its release displaying the twelve hardest bosses in the game, with brief blurbs on how to beat them. But today, to celebrate the game’s 365th day, we will analyze it with a review, displaying the game’s pros and cons. Spoiler alert: more of the former than the latter exist. After all, the game has made it for a year now, and quite strong at that.

So, let’s get started with what makes Elden Ring Nightreign a fundamentally good video game.

A tonal shift that doesn’t forget its roots

Some may label this game as somewhat of a ‘boss rush’, in the sense that players will fight a lot of boss enemies while constantly rushing throughout the map of Limveld, or the Great Hollow if you prefer the DLC. Indeed, this game is quite fast paced, very time sensitive, and there is a lot to be gained situationally in slaying “field bosses” or “camp bosses” while the clock is ticking.

Unlike a traditional Soulsborne game, Elden Ring Nightreign does not have the player slowly progress through a number of large maps, culminating in an eventual final boss fight. This game is akin to a Battle Royale in the sense that players are dropped in a random space, onto a (seemingly) randomly generated map, and they begin each run from level 1. Level 15 is the max, and this figure is something players have two in-game days to achieve. At the end of each day, a “Night Boss” appears to attack the team before they can proceed to the next day. Then, on the third day, the “Nightlord” is fought, who can essentially be viewed as the ‘final boss’ of that particular run. Gearing up to be as strong as possible to slay the big bad is the ultimate goal of a run.

Overall, this pace of play suits the gameplay mechanics adapted seamlessly over from Elden Ring itself. It doesn’t have a “Fortnite” feel to it. The means in which both games reach their climax are similar, but the end game itself and the combat mechanics of the game cause it to rightfully be something very, very different from a Fortnite. You have a “circle” mechanic, referred to in-game as the Night’s Tide. Being outside of the circle is generally untenable for any sort of long period, and the circle shrinks periodically over time during a day, forcing players to work around this time sensitive mechanic.

Fan Service

Something From Software has become progressively more known for over the last ten years is its ability to reference beloved or iconic aspects of past games, in an appropriate manner. But they broke through in this regard in a major way in making Elden Ring Nightreign. Famously, a great deal of “Night” bosses in this game are bosses from Souls games in the past. Some examples include Knight Artorias from Dark Souls 1, The Duke’s Dear Freja from Dark Souls 2, Nameless King from Dark Souls 3, and a number of different Demi-God bosses from Elden Ring such as Morgott and Mohg.

As well, each Nightfarer in this game has at least one, sometimes more, skins which reference or straight up copy iconic aspects of past Soulsborne games. Guardian has a Solaire of Astora skin, Raider can dress as the Catarian Knight Siegmeyer (or Siegward if you prefer), Revenant has a Sister Friede skin, Duchess can be made to look like a Darkwraith, and so much more.

Although the nostalgia does wear off before long, especially given how this game does put players through its gameplay loop over and over again, this was a nice touch to the game that will make it memorable years down the road.

Nightfarers

This aspect of the game is arguably the biggest changeup from the traditional Soulsborne gameplay loop. Instead of having the opportunity to build a character from scratch and level them up in a customizable way, players must choose from ten different playable characters, referred to as Nightfarers.

Thankfully, From Software made sure that every possible playstyle was accommodated amongst the cast, and left plenty of room for nuance and malleability. You have your big, burly brawling characters like Raider and Wylder, you have your backline projectile damage dealers like Ironeye and Recluse, down to a utility tank in Guardian, other ranged support characters in Revenant and Scholar, then a more nuanced take on fast paced melee playstyle seen in characters such as Duchess and Undertaker. As well, there are no character restrictions for a team of three players in this game. A team could consist of three players all enjoying the same character, so there isn’t room for frustration if a player gets ‘locked’ out of their preferred Nightfarer.

Nightlords

As discussed previously, Nightlords are the final boss of an “expedition”. Before players can begin playing the game, they must decide which expedition they would like to go on. The expedition they choose dictates which Nightlord they’ll have waiting for them at the very end of a run. This can essentially be viewed as a list of “targets”, making them out to be very important. It was, of course, essential that these Nightlords were designed well. Safe to say, From Software hit it pretty well with these Nightlords, as there really aren’t any particularly poor fights with these umbral entities. They are all well balanced, fun to interact with, fair and they are all greatly thematically differ from one another. This stems from gameplay mechanics all the way down to which type of weapon or what element you should use against each specific Nightlord.

Relic Builds

As players complete more and more runs, especially ones which successfully defeated a Nightlord, Relics will be earned at the end of an expedition. These are mostly entirely randomized, with some static drops acquired on beating a Nightlord for the very first time. Ultimately, players will accumulate enough to craft a “build” with. Due to the random nature that Relics are acquired, lots and lots of skill expression can be had here. Players who enjoy build making will love interacting with Relics in this game. Each of the game’s playable cast is flexible and has several different ways one could go about building them.

Gladius, Beast of the Night

This is the very first Nightlord players are allowed to fight. I will assert that it is also the single best original boss in this entire game. Gladius is a fantastic introductory boss who was pristinely well designed to fight a group of three players. This is a Cerberus-like boss who begins the fight as a giant, monstrous three-headed fire breathing beast. When it enters second phase is when the fight really gets good, as the beast will split itself into three separate bodies to present a dilemma for a team of three players. It will go back and forth between these two forms until defeated. As this is the very first Nightlord of the game, it presents a simple but very effective dilemma for a group of potentially new players; how do we balance a boss who can essentially match our numbers?

Then, the Everdark version of this boss goes unbelievably hard, posing as a stiff challenge. Everdark Gladius hits like an eighteen wheel truck, presenting the same challenge with much grander stakes to a team of players who will be much more experienced with the game by this point. Everdark Gladius may actually go down as one of the better bosses From Software has ever made.

And as a closing note, From Software gave this boss an incredible soundtrack. Really, everything about it aesthetically is great. The way Gladius is presented and has cinematics on a lot of his Everdark moveset really shows how From Software placed a lot of emphasis on his value, viscerally.

Caligo, Miasma of the Night (regular version)

In the realm of simple cosmetic value, this is arguably the greatest dragon From Software has ever made. It does very slightly become undone mechanically, so I’m not ready to put this one all the way up there with Midir and Bayle in terms of the full boss fight product. But, off of simple visuals, this one is one of the greats.

In her regular boss fight specifically, Caligo is just so nice to look at. She has two attacks specifically which are just downright gorgeous to look at from a distance; one where she will essentially freeze the sky and try to drop it on the player, another where she will emit a huge roar and release an enormous blizzard off of her body that travels nearly the entire length of the boss room. Obviously, these attacks are harder to appreciate if you’re actually getting hit by them. But if you happen to be a safe distance away and get the opportunity to simply gaze at Caligo while she does these attacks, you will likely be left at least somewhat awed.

It isn’t just these two attacks, either, as this fight is just loaded with cinematic value. The boss room is perfectly well crafted to accommodate a giant frost dragon. As the fight begins and Caligo’s roaring can be heard overhead, it really gives off this feeling that a long, possibly tiring struggle with a powerful entity is forthcoming.

Ordinarily, this is the part where a critique would start to give off some of a game’s shortcomings. That is coming, but there are two subjects worth discussing which are not necessarily good or bad. I will present the positive and negative aspects of them, and you the reader can decide if you feel they make the game better or worse. I am simply on the fence.

Everdark Time Sensitivity

The subject of an Everdark boss was alluded to briefly. This is a brand new, original concept unique to Nightreign specifically. Each week, two Nightlords at random are chosen and their Everdark versions are made available for players to fight. Everdark versions take the original boss, scrap the first phase of the fight, and given it a new, unique third phase. An Everdark boss is also statistically superior to its regular version, with more HP, doing more damage and often taking less damage. Many of them also massively change mechanically in some way, one such instance will be discussed shortly.

On one hand, Everdark versions provide an opportunity to gain a different experience with a Nightlord. It also makes Nightlords much harder. So, your group might be beating the tar out of the regular version of Gladius, as he’s meant for brand new players to take on, and will get steamrolled by an experienced crew. That crew will not so easily be able to brush aside Gladius’ Everdark form; as mentioned, Everdark Gladius hits like a truck, and will keep this crew on their toes for sure.

On the other hand, why did Everdark versions have to be time sensitive? This is the aspect I am truly on the fence for. It does instill elements of FOMO or, Fear of Missing Out, into players, which draws people back to the game. The purpose of the time sensitivity is clear. But this is the very first Soulsborne game to come out, ever, where a player may want to fight a certain challenging boss, but simply cannot because it isn’t their turn for their Everdark version to be available.

Soulsborne games have always been about the grit and grind of a difficult journey. One aspect of said adventure is typically running into a challenging encounter, strategizing ways to get around it, then feeling that classic, euphoric sense of joy when the player finally clears the hurdle. With Everdark versions, the player can simply be robbed of these triumphant moments, as they are racing against the clock in the process. It isn’t just how much resilience you have, it’s how many hours in the day you have to play the game, too. I personally have friends with hundreds of runs with me in this game that have not conquered each Everdark form in the game because of this; if they were not time sensitive, this wouldn’t be the case.

The Storm Ruler

The Storm Ruler, like many past Soulsborne things, was brought back to Nightreign. It only exists in a very brief flash though, as it is only given to the player right before they go to fight Maris, Fathom of the Night’s Everdark version. As such, players will find that they simply cannot access the Storm Ruler unless the Augur Everdark expedition happens to be available…

On one hand, the Storm Ruler in this game is really fun to use, maybe the best Storm Ruler iteration From Software has ever made. It is cinematically electrifying, with really cool sound effects, impressive visuals, and making the player really feel their successful hits.

On the other hand, the Storm Ruler is simply an awkward fit in a game such as Nightreign. Its presence completely undermines a major portion of the 45 minute expedition leading up to the fight in which it is used. Everdark Maris simply cannot practically be defeated by any non-Storm Ruler weapon, which removes a ton of weight and importance in the weapon the player acquires during the run. The player is just gifted a free Storm Ruler by the game itself right before the fight begins, so there is no exploration, no intrigue or nuance with how the weapon is received, it’s simply teleported into existence and that’s that.

Now, on that note, let’s discuss a couple things which somewhat weigh this game down.

Light Facilitation of Hate Speech

Though certainly unintentional, the fact that this has not been addressed over a year later is slightly concerning. The gist of it is, the player has the freedom to name their in-game profile whatever they want, and this can be changed at will. I can name myself “Andrew” one game, then decide maybe I don’t want strangers knowing my real name the next match, so I decide to simply be “A” for the next game. I can switch between these two, change it up for any reason, completely at my whim.

Unfortunately, you know very well as do I that there are plenty of people out there who will, and unfortunately have, abused this. There is also not any sort of censorship system and no way for the game to detect particularly nasty names. As such, you have people who will name themselves after racial slurs, bigoted words, anything they can think of to upset other people in as hateful a way as possible.

There is ‘some’ wool being pulled over the player’s eyes…

This game directly and blatantly advertises itself as a roguelite. As well, it gives off the illusion that each map is randomly or procedurally generated, theoretically giving a unique experience with every single run.

Neither of those things are really true. This game only has very, very light at best elements of a roguelite. In a true roguelite, progress is made in small steps, lots and lots of death is expected, and the game is supposed to get statistically and mechanically more difficult the deeper in you go. That is simply not how Nightreign works. Sure, plenty of death will come; it is a Soulsborne game at the end of the day. But in-game progression only resembles a roguelite somewhat with the Relic system, and not in any other way.

As well, Limveld and the Great Hollow simply are not procedurally or randomly generated, even if they really seem like they are. Direct variants of both maps exist and were carefully handcrafted, not generated. While this makes the experience more consistent, and enough variants exist to give off an impression of generation, it simply is not the case. To those with hundreds, approaching thousands of runs, this will quickly become apparent, and the game’s layout may just some day become stale to you as a result.

And, that’s it.

Elden Right Nightreign was a massive shift in direction for From Software. It was a pretty enormous risk which drew criticism from its devoted, loving fanbase, but was played with adoration all the same. This game easily has enough going for it to warrant an A for a grade. It would be great to see From Software take this game’s concept and flesh it out a bit more for a future release.