The best bits of my Elden Ring Nightreign hands-on preview session were the moments where my teammates and I pulled off coordinated strategies, and I say that as someone who's always played FromSoftware games solo. It feels like cheating to instantly stagger a world boss with two players on the warrior class Wylder both dumping their ultimate attacks, only for our third member to double-dip that damage with the devastating replay skill of the Duchess and finish the fight with a riposte. In another run, our team's sorceress-like Recluse used their ultimate to brand enemies with a mark that refills your health and mana when you attack them, setting us up for victory in the second half of a long fight. This kind of thing happens all the time, and as you learn more about the items and playable classes, planning out your party's synergy only becomes more engrossing.
You can think of Elden Ring Nightreign as a PvE battle royale boss rush with prescribed classes and roguelike buildcrafting. Each run, you'll drop into a map with procedural loot and points of interest, level and gear up during the day, fight random bosses at night, and repeat for two in-game days to prepare for a big boss on day three. A run takes about 35 to 45 minutes. Now, co-op has been an optional nicety in FromSoftware RPGs for a long time, but playing with friends hasn't really been possible without help from mods or repeatedly fiddling with an arcane matchmaking system. (It seems much better in Nightreign: set a password at the hub and hit join.) Even then, it would probably be spotty and janky. After Elden Ring, in particular, players grew hungry for a fluid, cooperative experience.
