It was a bit eyebrow-raising to see Elden Ring Nightreign arrive with a 77 metascore, quite low for a FromSoftware offering, particularly one with the Elden Ring name attached.
As it stands, Elden Ring Nightreign has 66% “Mixed” reviews on Steam.
No Comms – There is no in-game comms system at all to communicate with your teammates in a co-op game.
It will be even harder to play with friends because the game lacks crossplay, unlike practically every other modern title these days.
Two-thirds of players are giving positive reviews; it’s just that the level of positive reviews are much lower than a game from this developer would ever get.
When Elden Ring Nightreign debuted with a metascore of 77, which is extremely low for a FromSoftware product—especially one with the Elden Ring name attached—it raised some eyebrows. However, fans are pointing out the same issues now that the game is live, and their scores are even lower overall.
Elden Ring Nightreign currently has 66% of “Mixed” reviews on Steam. Once more, that is low for FromSoft, and while actual concurrents were excellent, reaching a high of 313,000 last night, it is uncertain how many will remain in the long run.
I don’t blame anyone for not reading a lot of reviews prior to launch, but if you didn’t, you might be logging in expecting some very basic functionality that Nightreign doesn’t offer.
No Comms: When playing a cooperative game, there is absolutely no in-game communication system available for you to use with your teammates. Not a single text or voice chat. Playing with randoms in this way can be stressful because it’s a perplexing choice for a game that’s all about teamwork. The best way to play is then with friends talking on Discord or something like that, but that leads to….
No Duos: This game requires a third random person to be matched into your party if you are playing with just two friends. You can’t work with that third teammate if you want to just load in with a friend because they can either be helpful or just run off and do nothing. Furthermore, FromSoft acknowledged that the lack of duos was a production “oversight,” meaning the game is not balanced for duo play anyhow.
For obvious reasons, there is no crossplay. Unlike almost every other contemporary game these days, the game does not support cross-play, which will make playing with friends even more difficult.
Nightreign has other problems. Even though it has been considered for development, solo play is an extremely difficult mode that most players will not be able to perform, especially since there isn’t even a single instance of inborn self-revive. Performance problems have also been reported in the game on PC, where a single stutter during combat can lead to death and a complete run loss.
Well, it’s not all bad. Though the quantity of positive reviews is far less than what a game from this developer would ever receive, two-thirds of players are leaving positive reviews. A lot of these problems appear to be somewhat resolvable, but it’s unclear how long that will last. We’ll observe how long-term player retention goes.
