Everything You Need To Know Ahead Of The Network Test

Ahead of the Elden Ring Nightreign network test, Bandai Namco flew us out to Germany to get hands-on with the game and see what sets it apart from other Soulslikes.

The reveal trailer during The Game Awards gave us a brief glimpse at its Fortnite-like structure, with an enclosing circle pushing players towards a final fight in the centre. But instead of facing off against other players during the climax, you’re thrown into a traditional PvE boss fight.

It’s a mishmash of genres, so there’s a lot to familiarise yourself with, even as a returning player. To make things a bit easier before the network test begins, here’s everything we learned during our five hours.

There Are Eight Night Lords

The Roundtable Hold returns in Nightreign, only now it opens up to an outside training area on a cliff, reminiscent of Firelink Shrine. From the Roundtable itself, you can enter a menu and select a ‘Night Lord’ to fight, thus beginning a match.

Night Lords are the bosses you’ll face at the end of the third day of each run. They are guaranteed, unlike the final bosses of the first two days who are randomised. In total, there are eight Night Lords, matching the eight Nightfarers.

Each Nightfarer Has A Unique Ultimate Ability

A huge shakeup in Nightreign is that it gets rid of classes, replacing them with Nightfarers who have unique ultimate abilities and starting gear that remain the same for each match.

You can find and talk to each Nightfarer in the Roundtable Hold, swap between them at a statue, and select who to play as after matchmaking.

Death Isn’t The End

In Elden Ring, when you die, you respawn at a Site of Grace or, as a phantom, get kicked out of the host’s world. It works a little differently in Nightreign.

Upon ‘dying’, you go down and a circle appears above your head that’s comprised of three bars. This is a meter that your teammates can deplete by attacking you, thus allowing you to get back up. Every death fills another bar on the circle, making it gradually harder to get you back up.

Death also works differently in the open world than it does during the final boss of each day. In the open world, there’s a timer, and if it runs out, you respawn one level weaker. When fighting the day’s final boss, however, there’s no timer. Instead, you remain on the floor until the boss is defeated or everyone dies, in which case it’s game over.

Levelling Is A Lot Simpler

Unlike previous Soulslike games, you don’t level individual stats in Nightreign. Instead, you spend Runes at a Site of Grace to increase your level as a whole, which bolsters every stat, making a notable difference to your health, stamina, and magic which are all crushingly low to begin with.

If you die in the open world before the final boss, you respawn and lose a level, which can be catastrophic in the early game. Your level also resets when you go back to the Roundtable Hold, as progress doesn’t carry over from match to match.

Relics Are How You Get Stronger

While levelling resets with each match, there is a way to improve characters permanently at the Roundtable Hold. At the end of every game — even if you lose — you unlock Relics. These can be equipped at a bench by the main Roundtable, and they offer unique boons like increased bleed damage or a permanent stat increase like strength.

Relics come in three tiers. The first only gives you one boon, the second two, and the third three. They are colour-coded, and each Nightfarer has a specific number of coloured slots. So, you can’t equip every Relic on every character.

Loot Is Shared

In Soulslike games, you interact with a glowing orb to loot an item, placing it directly into your inventory.

In Elden Ring Nightreign, these orbs cause loot to spill out onto the floor for everyone to see. You then have to divvy up the spoils with your teammates.

However, there are unique floating orbs that spawn after defeating a miniboss, and the loot from these isn’t shared.

Instead, you’ll be prompted with a menu that gives you a choice of three rewards. These vary from gear to “Dormant power”, which can vary from tweaks to how your flask works to regaining HP when scarlet rot is triggered. You can only take one of these rewards, but these are plentiful so long as you explore.

Flasks Are Increased At Churches

At the start of every match, you have three healing flasks. These can be restored at a Site of Grace, or through exploration and killing enemies, much as in Elden Ring.

To increase your number of flasks, you have to find churches. An upgrade is guaranteed to be found on the altar, and you don’t need to visit a Site of Grace to use it. Simply grabbing the upgrade will automatically add flasks to your counter.

However, there are no magic flasks this time. To restore FP, you need to find blue trees in the wild or glintstone items. Levelling up also restores FP, and there are ultimate abilities that allow you to regain magic by attacking enemies.

There Are Merchants And Smithing Stations

Throughout Nightreign, you can find phantom merchants. They sell pre-concocted Flasks of Wondrous Phystick, consumables, and even smithing stones.

That’s because, by every merchant, you’ll find a smithing station. Here, you can upgrade your gear without needing a blacksmith to help. It doesn’t work exactly like Elden Ring, however. Instead of the usual +1 through to +10 system, weapons are divided into rarities.

There’s No Fall Damage

One of the strangest things to get used to in Nightreign is the lack of fall damage. You can leap off any ledge and survive, which goes hand-in-hand with the faster-paced gameplay. Don’t be afraid to jump off a cliff if it means escaping the Ring of Fire quicker.

Scarabs Drop Talismans

Another crucial part of Nightreign, like Elden Ring before it, is Talismans. With a simplified level system, these allow you to truly fine-tune your build, but finding them can be tricky. Scarabs drop them, so it’s always worth chasing them down before they disappear.

Equipment Weight Doesn’t Matter

A huge change to Elden Ring Nightreign is that equipment is weightless, so you can’t heavy roll even if you fill out every single equipment slot.

You could hold six greatswords and still fast roll, which is perfectly in keeping with Nightreign’s faster pace.

Weapons Have Passives

To that end, it’s worth stocking up on a variety of weapons. Even if you don’t use them, they have unique passive abilities that make you stronger.

It’s always worth checking a weapon’s description to see how it might benefit you, since this is one way that you can begin to tailor a build on the fly. Several weapons with passive bleed benefits, and one strong bleed weapon, will tear through bosses, for example.

Bows Don’t Use Arrows

Another form of gear that you’ll find in Elden Ring Nightreign is, of course, bows.

A huge advantage to picking up a bow or crossbow in Nightreign, however, is that you don’t need a stock of arrows or bolts. You can fire them infinitely.

Standard Enemies Indicate What Boss You’re Fighting

At the end of each day, you’re pushed into a final circle marked by an Erdtree. Before the final boss appears, however, a few smaller enemies spawn that you’ll want to take care of first. If you take too long, they’ll gank you alongside the boss.

These indicate what boss you’ll be facing, too. For instance, the finger hand spiders spawn ahead of the Centipede Demon, and various Omen appear ahead of Margit.

There Are Random Encounters That Can Make The Game Easier, Or Harder

Speaking of The Fell Omen — while he can be one of the last bosses of Day 2, he’s also a random encounter. Just as in Elden Ring, there’s a chance he will attack you while you’re busy exploring and getting ready for the night. This, like all random encounters, is marked by a red circle (only his encompasses the entire map).

Margit hounds you to the ends of Limvelt, even into the cramped mineshafts below. If you manage to defeat him, you’ll get a boon (like increased damage), but if you lose, you’ll get a negative modifier (like increased damage taken). We only saw one other random encounter during the preview, a small red circle full of ants. It was much easier, and defeating all the ants gave us another boon — improved dodging.

All Map Markers Are Shown From The Start

A stark difference between Elden Ring and Nightreign is that the map shows every single point of interest by default. Since there’s a fiery circle closing in on you from the start, there’s not much time to explore, so having all the map markers allows you to quickly plan a route with your teammates.

You can rush to the nearby church and increase your flask count, find an easy boss for early loot and Runes (and thus levels), or venture underground for upgrade materials. If you’re playing with strangers and don’t want to use voice chat, you can even agree with their plan by marking their pins, thus turning them white.

The Nightreign network test begins in just two days, running from February 14 to February 17. So, if you want to get a headstart fresh off the hawk, make sure to keep these features in mind.

Systems

Released

2025

Developer(s)

From Software