Going on the run with FromSoftware’s unexpected spinoff

Developer FromSoftware

Publisher Bandai Namco Entertainment

Format PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series

Origin Japan

Release May 30

For all the challenges FromSoftware has presented over the years, rarely have we had to worry about punctuality. In Elden Ring: Nightreign, though, as night literally draws in, a deadly blue flame encroaching from the edges of the map, it’s imperative to stay one step ahead, making a dash for a small circular haven that will become the only unaffected spot. Arrive late and – in more typical From fashion – you may as well prepare to die.

It doesn’t help that Nightreign’s network test, which allows us to spend several hours dipping into one of the maps, is by nature a time-limited format, nor that the network fails its test on our first session, the servers not up to the task, further reducing our time with it. Yet even as later sessions prove more reliable, we’re against the clock outside the game as well as in, and there’s a lot to take in at a pressurised pace. It doesn’t help that From forgoes any tutorial, instead laying out basic rules in a codex secreted in the menus. (Hopefully, the full release will have proper onboarding.) We learn most things after we’ve been grouped with two random teammates and dropped into Limveld, an area that feels smaller than its inspiration, Limgrave, and sprint off to see what we can find.