4/5 ★ – beemancer's review of ELDEN RING NIGHTREIGN.

Nightreign is the best incarnation of Souls combat so far. It took everything about Elden Ring's action and made it a little bit more streamlined. You don't have to worry about individual little stats or equipment load, just put on the cool stuff and go. The removal of crouch for burst sprinting is a welcome change. The game is smooth, and pretty, and it's really fun. Obviously, this doesn't hit the WOW factor in the same way Elden Ring proper does. It doesn't have a huge story or incredible new areas to explore, but it is certainly not devoid of secrets, either. It delivered exactly what it wanted to: a fun new multiplayer experience for a beloved game. $40 is expensive for that, but it comes with the same frills that FromSoftware always puts in their DLCs and expansions. The new bosses are awesome, frankly some of the best they've ever done, competing with the SotE DLC bosses. Each boss has a unique and beautiful OST, at least one of which has breached my all time favorite tracks. The bosses' movesets are stunningly beautiful, and even though the runback if you fail is 40 minutes long because you have to do a whole new run, it didn't really feel like a problem because you have the tools and it's co-op anyway. Nightreign is not without issues: there's some random events that are too rare, and there's a little bit of sameness across runs sometimes because you tend to get weapons and drops that are appropriate for your class and the more you know about the game the more predictable individual areas become. But, FromSoftware is also very interested in supporting this title. They've already made some adjustments, and plan to release super hard versions of the bosses this month and there's a DLC announced (probably Shadow of the Erdtree content if I had to guess/hope, since those weapons/spells are not present in the game). New maps would be a breath of fresh air. The game is just fun to play with friends, and works out to be a better version of something we already like to do: randomizers. Elden Ring has been tough to randomize because it's such a large experience, and this gives me a bite size randomizer that I can play with friends, and that's really awesome. This is something well worth the time I've invested, and that'll be even more true if FromSoft decides to give it long term support.