Elden Ring with seamless coop, roguelite runs, much more fast paced, more diverse builds, fixed (but not too restrictive) classes. Story is typical FromSoftware, but this time you essentially get to experience the story of several badass NPCs; without much ways to roleplay or affect their choices, but still somewhat engaging to experience. Great in coop, okay-ish in single, the endgame is just pure completionism and grind.
[h3]Story - 7/10[/h3]
It's just as confusing as most of FromSoftware games. Sadly, it's also not as epic. You follow the story of a group of surprisingly distinct, well written characters, each with their own reasons to group up and fight against the darkness. Their quests and their backstories tend to intertwine, have occasional nice plot twists and overall, feel like questlines of some NPCs from original Elden Ring. Except that since they're a team, and you can actually play as each of them... it does help the immersion and attachment. I genuinely wish they went a bit further with it, but since it's a game by FS, naturally most of those stories end up being very bleak and depressing, without any genuinely happy resolution.
The main "story", though... it's kind of non-existent. You need to defeat a bunch of bosses in order to get to the main boss. They're responsible for the Night, and you need to beat them for the world to persevere. That's... kind of it. Just a bunch of heroes trying to turn the tide.
[h3]Gameplay - 7.5/10[/h3]
Like I wrote above - it's just Elden Ring, but with fixed classes (and class abilities), more fast paced traversal and combat. You start off as you'd normally do in roguelite, and are constantly getting rushed by a battle-royale-style zone closing in around you.
You get to face almost all of the enemies from the original game; wield almost all weapons, with partially randomly generated stats and abilities.
With the DLC, there are only two maps + several variations where part of the first map is altered to be a different biome. So the runs tend to feel repetitive rather quick, but it also let's you strategize easily what points of interest you want to clean, what bosses you want to farm, etc.
Progression consists of just two things: cosmetics (which are, luckily, easily earned) and relics, that are essentially the only gameplay affecting things that you can regularly take with you in any run. They vary from just very minor buffs to some serious upgrades that serve as a foundation for your further build. And the relics is what all the grind boils down to. Some of them can be bought. Most - are totally random drops. There are no duplicates, thankfully, so sooner or later you will unlock them all, but it's going to take A LOT of time.
[h3]Graphics - 8/10[/h3]
Everything that can be said about the original Elden Ring can be said about Nightreign. Since it essentially consists of, like, 90% borrowed assets. Still looks great.
[h3]Sound - 8/10[/h3]
Literally the same situation as graphics.
[h1]Conclusion[/h1]
7.5/10. If you didn't get enough Elden RIng and/or wanted to experience it in proper, uninterrupted coop, which also happens to be more fast-paced, with relatively short runs and focused on replayability - Nightreign got you covered.
