The world of Elden Ring is getting a standalone multiplayer co-op action survival game that challenges players to band together in order to defeat the Nightlord.

Developed by FromSoftware, Inc. and published by Bandai Namco Entertainment Inc., the upcoming game, Elden Ring NightReign will thrust players into co-op multiplayer PVE combat against a harsh and unforgiving world. Teaming up in squads of three – or daring to go solo – they must outlast a three day-and-night cycle, making split decisions about combat and exploration across changing maps to become strong enough to take down terrifying bosses at the end of each day.

Players take on the night together in an all-new experience from the team at FromSoftware. Elden Ring NightReign will be a multiplayer-focused return to Roundtable Hold, set in a universe parallel to the events of Elden Ring. Players must choose from eight unique characters, each with their own unique abilities and powerful Ultimates.

Their journeys take them to Limveld, where they will have to make split-second decisions when it comes to combat and exploration in the face of a night cycle that shrinks the map with the coming Night’s Tide. At the end of each night, players will face a powerful boss and, if victorious, awaken to bigger challenges. Each session will culminate in the third night when they must face off against the chosen Nightlord. Individuals can fight the night alone, but strength will come in numbers.

Nightfarers must learn to cooperate to take down these challenges, combining their unique abilities together for an unparalleled experience in the ELDEN RING universe. All is not lost for those who fall in defeat. Unsuccessful runs will grant players relics to allow them to customize and upgrade their characters tailored to their personal play styles.

Elden Ring NightReign is unlike any experience created before by FromSoftware.

In this condensed action RPG, players will never experience the same journey twice as enemies, rewards and Limveld itself are ever-shifting and evolving each session in the realm of the Nightlord, Defeating greater enemies and venturing into the more dangerous parts of the map will uncover more powerful weapons and greater Rune rewards.

Find Sites of Grace to give each hero a chance to level up and gain crucial power. With each session-based adventure being akin to playing through an open-air dungeon, every journey provides an opportunity to grow lasting stat bonuses. Successful runs against the night bring players ever closer to defeating the realm of the Nightlord and unraveling the story behind each Hero in this parallel world.

Elden Ring NightReign will launch in 2025 for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC via Steam.

The post ELDEN RING NIGHTREIGN REVEAL appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

From Software’s latest game to feature their infamous “Souls-borne” gameplay, The Elden Ring, is now thrilling and tormenting players in equal measure.

The Elden Ring places players in the shoes of the exiled Tarnished on a mission to restore the Elden Ring, of which pieces are scattered across the Lands Between, the game world. It’s a fantasy role-playing game of the same ilk as developer From Software’s usual offerings.

I’ve played a lot of From Software’s Dark Souls games, I’ve even dabbled with PlayStation exclusive Bloodborne. Try as I have, especially with Dark Souls III, I can’t say I’ve got on with them. I can see the brilliance in them and their appeal to some, I really can. But unless I had to, I wouldn’t choose to play any of them. I think I lot of that is the time required, the thanklessness, and the general lack of rewards for the first 10-15 hours of play. From Software expects players to invest in their games, more time than most of us have.

With The Elden Ring, it took several factors to make this particular game from the Dark Souls developer appealing.

Since my last Dark Souls experience, I’ve played three other games with Souls-like gameplay: Star Wars: Fallen Jedi, Nioh, and Nioh 2. It was these games that allowed me to get to grips with the very different game design employed by From Software and its imitators. To play one of these games as you would, say, an Assassin’s Creed game (or any constant endorphin-releasing game from Ubisoft), expecting the same rewards, you are going to be disappointed.

Souls-borne games are closer to the unforgiving arcade games of old where you die and there’s actually a cost. Just like games of old, you’ll find yourself having lost your progress and back to the last checkpoint. Also, taking a leaf right out of MMOs like Everquest and World of Warcraft, some of your stuff will need collecting from the location at which you fell.

The Elden Ring’s story has apparently been molded by Game of Thrones writer George R. R. Martin, but still bears the hallmark of Dark Soul’s odd dialogue, in this case usually spoken by someone with a northern English accent that apes Sean Bean. To be honest I found the plot to be a hodgepodge of whatever. I wouldn’t be rushing out to buy an Elden Ring novel.

The big deal with The Elden Ring over other From Software games is that it is set in a full-on open world. This means more opportunities to explore without running into deadly enemies at every corner. You can even choose to sneak by some bad guys.

I made the mistake of initially choosing the Vagabond character class from the myriad of choices at the beginning of the game. The resultant experience was very similar to my experiences with the Dark Souls games. I had to get uncomfortably close to my vastly more proficient opponents resulting in some very frustrating encounters that ended with a rage quit.

As luck would have it, a friend pointed out that the magic-using Astrologer class may be a better option. Having ranged attacks proved to be a game-changer allowing me to open up the world, get exploring, and levelling up. The early introduction to my mount, Torrent, helped me get around enemies that would otherwise have destroyed me.

The gameplay distils itself into a journey between the game’s save points, called Sites of Grace. Locating these creates a spawn point should you die, which you will, and a fast travel point. Resting here allows players’ characters to be rejuvenated, level up, move items to storage, and other admin. Unfortunately, resting causes all the enemies to respawn.

To be honest, if the enemies respawning is an issue, you should probably remain in that area. Killing enemies repeatedly until you’ve collected enough runes allows you to level up and equip yourself for the next area. As with all Souls games, players’ characters start ill-equipped for the task at hand and players without the skills to proceed at any real pace. I found it takes about seven hours of slog to “git gud”.

Inventory management is a big part of the game.

Whereas other games may allow the player to forgo optimising their character’s loadout, The Elden Ring is not so accommodating. Having armour that is too heavy may afford better protection than light armour, but may severely affect the ability to roll out of the way enemy strikes, in fact making you even more vulnerable.

Flasks need to be filled for use when healing HP (Flask of Crimson Tears) or replenishing FP for magic attacks (Flask of Cerulean Tears). These are automatically filled at Sites of Grace, but the number of each can be adjusted according to likely use. Killing an entire group of enemies will also fill the flasks, as notified by a swirling mist around the player.

It’s also important to ensure that the right stats are increased in accordance with your play style, personal skill level, and character class. Leveling up and unlocking a point to spend on a particular attribute is only available when you have collected enough runes from killing opponents. These are the same runes that are lost if you die and don’t retrieve them from the location of your character’s demise. The Elden Ring engages players in a huge risk/reward gamble that is, at its heart just a game of patience.

Possibly the most frustrating thing about From Software’s games is not that the games are unfair, it’s that they require a level of discipline that most modern games forgo. Attacks and defensive moves are designed with very specific timings. Similarly with enemies’ attacks and defensive moves. It’s all about watching for openings and carefully choosing when and how to attack. Most games (I’m looking at you Ubisoft) have training us all to smash buttons until opponents fall.

The Elden Ring is not so slapdash.

But I would say that it seems a little more accommodating than the developer’s other games.

The game looks good. Some areas look better than others. Some are a bit bland, others pretty spectacular. Again, the similarities with Dark Souls are very apparent. The landscape invites exploration. The world is full of secrets and surprises that can help you progress if you take the time to locate them.

Whilst there is a set path defined between the Sites of Grace, exploration is key to progressing in the game. There is no real fast way to play the game. Attempting to progress before your character is ready is a recipe for disaster. Even with your mount, you will come across foes that you just can’t beat. These bosses act as gatekeepers, restricting access to other areas.

The game features what I consider to be the absolute bane of Japanese games, ridiculously long, and involved boss battles. Some people like them, and that’s fair enough. But these literal gatekeepers can take some beating. At least, as with enemies in general, the game lets you back off, lick your wounds and try again once your character is stronger. Particularly troubling bosses can be defeated with the help of NPCs summoned by the player or with real players answering requests to take out the monster in co-op.

The Elden Ring is a game that I found best played organically. Running from Site of Grace to Site of Grace, I was able to set up a network of areas that I could explore with little consequences if I die.  Not only is it fun to explore and uncover new locations, but I was also able to find interesting and useful artifacts.

Reviewing a game as vast as The Elden Ring is an almost impossible task, as I am constantly discovering new things and hitting the metaphorical wall. It’s a massive game made even larger by cunning enemies. It’s a game that is going to divide players, just as with all Dark Souls games and their ilk.

For me, The Elden Ring adds a level of accessibility and freedom to explore that sets it apart from similar games. Even 20 hours in, I still feel like I’m playing a tutorial and can’t see myself understanding anything other than a basic nuance of the game mechanics without either a crash course on YouTube or another 20 hours of play.

By no means is this a comprehensive review of The Elden Ring, but it should be enough gauge if it is the game for you.

If you hated Dark Souls, you may still hate this game. If, however, you wanted to like Dark Souls and feel you missed out on something great, The Elden Ring comes highly recommended. Of course, if you loved Dark Souls, unless you feel the need to turn up your nose to the more accessible (and interesting) open-world setting, The Elden Ring comes across as a natural progression.

With The Elden Ring, From Software may have finally opened up their unique, refined, and challenging gameplay to the masses.

The post The Elden Ring (Xbox Series X) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

The long-awaited gameplay reveal of ELDEN RING, the grand fantasy Action-RPG title developed by FromSoftware Inc. and produced by BANDAI NAMCO is released!

 Dive into a thrilling adventure and decide the fate of a vast world filled with intrigue and power. Fight against formidable enemies with FromSoftware’s signature melee combat and discover a wide range of inventive strategies made possible by the open-ended Action-RPG gameplay of ELDEN RING. 

A new world filled with fantastic tales and lore has been woven by Hidetaka Miyazaki – creator of the influential and critically acclaimed DARK SOULS video game series; and George R.R. Martin – author of The New York Times best-selling fantasy series, A Song of Ice and Fire.

Players will embark on a journey across a meticulously handcrafted world dripping in blood and deception brought upon by a variety of characters with their own unique motivations for helping or hindering the player’s progress, adversaries with profound backgrounds, and fearsome creatures. Throughout their adventures, players will choose the fate of this cursed land by unravelling its secrets and myths.  

Featuring a vast and seamless landscape with natural weather and time-of-day progression, players will become fully immersed in the world of ELDEN RING as they begin their journey and choose on their own path.

Traverse on foot or horseback, alone or online with friends across grassy plains, suffocating swamps and lush forests. Ascend spiraling mountains, enter breathtaking castles, and witness other sites of grandeur on a scale never seen before in a FromSoftware title. 

ELDEN RING’s role-playing and customization options allow players to define their own unique playstyle. Experimentation is encouraged with a wide variety of weapons, magical abilities and skills found throughout the world; enticing players to follow previously unexplored progression paths. 

ELDEN RING gives players the opportunity to chart their own path through its world. Choose to run headlong into fierce battles against daunting foes or take advantage of the game’s stealth and combat systems to gain the upper hand.

It is up to the player to decide how to handle the many challenges that lay before them. 

“With ELDEN RING, we have applied all our dark fantasy and action-RPG expertise cultivated throughout the Dark Souls series, in order to create a bold, classical evolution of the genre,” commented Hidetaka Miyazaki, Director at FromSoftware, “We’ve crafted a rich world with a staggering sense of scale, based off of legends written for the game by George R. R. Martin. ELDEN RING is a world full of mystery and peril, ready to be explored and discovered; a drama in which various characters flaunt their own mystique and ulterior motives. We sincerely hope you enjoy experiencing it for yourself.” 

“I am very happy and excited to announce the release date of ELDEN RING, a new game created by Mr. Miyazaki and Mr. George R.R. Martin, two creators that I truly admire and have a passionate fan base around the world. I am very happy and excited to be able to tell you about it.”  Added Yasuo Miyakawa, President & CEO, BANDAI NAMCO Entertainment Inc. “We will continue to develop ELDEN RING not only as a game but also in a variety of other areas in order to deliver the worldview and charm of this title to our fans around the world. We look forward to your continued support.” 

ELDEN RING will launch on January 21, 2022 for the PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC via STEAM. The game supports the Smart Delivery on Xbox consoles as well as a Free Upgrade to PS5 for players who purchase the PS4 version. 

Stay tuned for more ELDEN RING news throughout the year.

The post FIRST ELDEN RING GAMEPLAY REVEALED appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Before I start, I’d like to point a few things out. Sekiro will likely already have a feverishly loyal user base, and they will love the game, just as they loved From Software’s Dark Souls games and Bloodborne. This review is not for those guys, who should go out right now and pick up Sekiro. This review is for the rest of us.

Ninjas and samurai are cool. And it’s to feudal Japan that From Software take us to for this punishing stealth/combat game. As the one-armed Wolf, or Sekiro, players must utilise the abilities of a special artificial arm, the shinobi prosthetic, to free the Divine Heir, Kuro from the clutches of Genichiro. Genichiro wants to use Kuro’s Dragon Heritage, the same power that kept his mortally wounded bodyguard, the shinobi (ninja) Wolf after losing his arm, to create an immortal army.

The plot is esoteric and either natively mad or lost in translation. But it is Japan, with ninjas and samurais. The perfect setting for a sword-fighting action game with a sprinkling of the supernatural about it.

The game uses that awful, dated 90s-style user interface favoured by the likes of Capcom. Why Japanese developers can’t send their people on decent UI design courses is a mystery to me. To be honest, it’s not a nice-looking game. It looks better than Dark Souls I-III, but probably not as good as Bloodborne or 99% of other recently released supposedly AAA titles.

The general gameplay visuals are acceptable, but offer little of note, as with the UI, the animations, and general polish all feel very dated. If From Software just don’t seem to offer the same level of finesse of their peers.

Sekiro is all about the combat or avoiding it. I never worked out when I should be taking which approach. Nine times out of ten I got the same result…death. The combat is OK, better than I found that of Dark Souls et al, probably only because it is easier. Likely alienating those players. The stealth makes no real sense, the game offering literally no explanation.

You die a lot, sometimes it seems as if you are supposed to die, like your death propels the story. It’s not clear, what is clear is that every time you die the world, especially those that you have come into contact with start to succumb to a sickness. This adds some narrative guilt to your already bruised sense of gaming prowess.

The grapple is fun, like a feudal Japanese Batman, you can swing into, and out of, combat and climb onto rooftops to traverse the huge open world. It is an extra control that adds to a very unintuitive control scheme.

There is a glimmer, and I say a glimmer, of genius in the game. As you fight, die, rinse, repeat, the game starts to grant players a small insight as to how it is supposed to be played. The poorly communicated on-screen prompts start to make a bit more sense. All I could think, though, was what a wasted opportunity to make a break out game, rather than just another niche effort.

I want to like Sekiro. I like it more that Dark Souls and it is much better than Bloodborne. But it’s still a chore to play. Sekiro’s chaotic player immersion system, whilst better than the usual From Software game, is at the opposite end of the careful, skilful-to-the-point-of-clinical way Ubisoft eases player into the gameplay. It’s basically bad game design masked as a difficult game mechanic for a more discerning player. Elite gaming snobs will, no doubt take issue with this. Well, I don’t care.

If you seek the challenge missing from your general hum-drum existence, and enjoy using video-games to give your life meaning, you are propably going to like Seiko: Shadows Die Twice. But you’d be better off seeking real life challenges that improve you as a person.

For the rest of use that cherish our time playing games, but don’t have the twenty-odd hours required just to “git gud” on Sekiro, forget it. There are plenty of other games out there far more deserving of your time.

The post Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (PlayStation 4) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Déraciné is a tricky one. In one hand it’s a very deliberately paced puzzle adventure oozing with ethereal atmosphere, but on the other hand it’s an insufferable exercise of boredom and painfully pedestrian gameplay.

Developed mostly by FROMSoftware in collaboration with Japan Studios, one would be forgiven in assuming Déraciné is a VR successor to their accomplished non-VR titles like Bloodborne and Dark Souls. However, digging through their  back catalogue, FROMSoftware actually have somewhat of a curiously eclectic past, with a number of translucent experimental titles dotted among them.

Déraciné seems to harken back to those days, and it makes sense – this being their first foray into VR. Why push the boat out too far right away…

You play as a disembodied “faerie” who, according to European folk lore, is a young and pure spirit removed from the confines of its spiritual realm and placed as a presence among the living.

It’s set inside the grounds of a stately period-style boarding school where you uncovering a variety of mysteries contained within its 4 hour or so story.

The gameplay basically involves interacting with, or running errands for a number of children, initially to convince of your presence, and then set to complete a variety of mostly insultingly basic (put this object in this location) or unintuitive (whatever I’m thinking, do that) puzzles or tasks. Thus moving the story forward, and onto the next melancholy vignette.

The conceit here is that the entire world is frozen in time, only coming alive at specific contextual trigger points and mostly consisting of serviceable animations and flat, sonnet-like dialogue. Though in fairness, the dreary blandness of its storytelling may actually appeal to those who don’t want to wrestle with the sensory overload of many other VR titles.

The game requires dual move controller support and is bereft of full locomotion and smooth turning, providing only set teleportation positions to warp towards and incremental turning. This means that those with already well-developed VR legs will probably find it disorienting at times.

As a faerie, you have the ability to transfuse the spiritual energy out of a living object into a dead one, and while this sounds like a fascinating mechanic – is routinely used for perfunctory tasks like reviving a dead flowers…

Graphically though, Déraciné is pretty. With fairly realistic textures and well lit environments, the world is among PSVRs best realised visually. Though hardly an argument since its viewed from very specific viewpoints, it’s still nice to look around and breathe in the atmosphere.

There are also a number of collectable keys to find, which could possibly warrant replay for the most hardy and possibly self-deprecating of players. Once through is almost certainly enough though.

If it’s meant to feel somewhat poetic and dreamlike, it goes some way to achieving that – but getting through it was an effort of tenacity rather than genuine intrigue.

All in all, personal taste is the key here. The point and click adventure style in VR doesn’t appeal greatly to me but mileage will almost certainly vary. But on my personal opinion alone, and based on the wealth of other great VR titles out there, I can’t easily recommend Déraciné.

The post Déraciné (PlayStation 4 / PSVR) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Let me tell you a story. A naïve, youngish man had heard about this Souls series, who got excited to see Demon Souls pop up on PlayStation Plus. After downloading it with excitement, he got in and started making his way through this creepy world and died. Then he started again, and died, followed by a couple of hours of dying and throwing his controller down in frustration. Following this he spent the next few years hearing about how amazing Dark Souls is but feeling as if that boat had sailed. Along comes Dark Souls Remastered and new chance to jump on that boat.

Dark Souls Remastered has you create a character to wake up in a cell, in what appears to be the worst world to be a human. This world has been through some stuff, starting with being a foggy world ruled by dragons. An age of fire came where many prospered including humans, but the age of fire has started to fade, and people are dying. Your character is one that is losing its humanity when you take over, and you stumble your way through the world.

Not too much more story is unfolded, at least for the first long while. Instead the next stage has you stumble out of this prison and give your first major goal of ringing a couple of bells. The first one of these took me over 20 hours thanks to the many undead enemies between me and it.

The hardest stage of the game to enjoy, and get through, is learning the game’s systems. It will take a couple of hours of experimenting and dying before things start to click. This is mostly because of the clunky combat system. Attacks are slow to initiate and hit, sharing the same stamina bar with blocking. Learning to balance these, especially as someone who is used to fast paced combat is no small hurdle. If you run at enemies and swing willy nilly, you will die a lot, as I did.

Venturing forward can be hard too, because you will travel quite a way between the fires that you use as checkpoints. This means that if you die, at times you may find yourself needing to cover quite a bit of ground. This at first is quite a chore and demotivating but after a while it becomes a system you learn to use, that’s punishing and rewarding. The hardest part of this is that the souls you collect work as experience but can’t be applied until you reach a camp fire or backtrack to one. If you die, your souls get dropped on the ground, and you must make your way back to retrieve them, with all those enemies back in place.

This wouldn’t be so hard if it wasn’t for the enemies all respawning. Because running uses your stamina bar, you can’t run for long, paired with tight corridors it can be tough to get those souls back without fighting your way through the enemies again. You must do at least as well as your last attempt to keep all that experience, because dying drops your new bounty of souls, and the previous one disappears.

This means you will keep repeating the same runs, until you finally get to your new campfire. Hard learned lessons include not discovering that you must ignite them AND sit by them for it to be a checkpoint.

The one thing about the game I hate, but laugh about now, is the unfair deaths. Take for instance a bridge I am running across at enemies. A dragon flew from behind without warning and burned me alive. I had no reason to think he was there, and I hadn’t learned I had to ignite the fire and sit by it, so this was a tough lesson. Another moment I finally got past a section that was plaguing me, and I run up an enclosed circular stair case, to immediately be slammed by some super powerful, optional boss that instantly killed me. As I have improved, those moments have become funny, but at the time I wanted to scream.

The other annoyance, which may be in part due to the game’s age, is some elements of the combat such as swords hitting objects. The number of times you must fight in enclosed spaces where you can’t swing your sword because it hits a wall giving your opponent an opportunity to take you out was, and still is, infuriating. You lean to coax enemies out, but if you have been having a good run and that kills you, it feels unnecessary.

Yet despite the game’s many flaws, I found myself returning night in and night out, excited to try to get further. The game gave me every reason to be grumpy and quit, but it’s so darn exciting to get a little further, especially when you finally topple a boss that has troubled you.

Now I finally get to understand what “the Dark Souls of…” means. A brutally difficult, sometimes unfair, game that is frustrating, repeatable, and fun. I am far from beating it with thirty-ish hours at this point, but now this game has become a gaming ambition. Even with its flaws, I hope one day to beat it, but for now, I need to rest my soul.

The post Dark Souls Remastered (PlayStation 4) Review appeared first on Shane the Gamer.

Dark Souls has become formulaic. An exciting, familiar routine of dread and difficulty, but a routine nonetheless. That’s not a criticism. Bonfires, weak and strong attacks, rolling, backstabbing, shortcuts – these are all things that we as Dark Souls players have loved so much they are now being almost directly facsimiled into other games. But it does point out that the series, after so many games, has perhaps worn out its novelty. Like an uncle who pulls a coin out of your ear at every single Christmas dinner, it is exciting now for the nostalgia that lingers, not for the freshness of the experience.

But what am I talking about? Ashes of Ariandel is the first of two planned downloadable content packs for Dark Souls 3, and the two are said to be linked. Set in the Painted World of Ariandel – a white wonderland of mystery and pain, it is a relatively short experience (set aside one or two sittings to see everything) with one main boss and one optional one. There are a range of new weapons and outfits, but I never really felt the need to swap anything around.

The DLC environment features more open areas than the largely linear main game. Though these areas give the illusion of being open, with wide expanses for you to explore, what you quickly realise however is that they are deceptive, as they are for the most part linearly connected to each other. Once I figured this out, I felt a bit disappointed, especially with the relatively large number of bonfires, cutbacks and shortcuts you can unlock to make reaching each connecting corridor much easier. What appears to be a real challenge at the start is, in the end, not much different from the rest of the series. The DLC was an opportunity to push the boundaries and give the more dedicated players a chance to really stretch themselves, yet From Software largely let this slip by in this release.

Besides the main story, there’s a new dedicated PvP arena for those who have missed that functionality from previous entries in the series – though PvP was never really my cup of tea. Although there’s only one arena at present, the game seems to indicate more may be added as time goes by. The inclusion of a PvP arena may be enough for some to make this an instant purchase, though From Software will have to maintain a close eye on the evolving meta to make this viable over the long term.

In the end more Dark Souls is never a bad thing. It is still a beautiful, foreboding world full of well thought-out places and challenging enemies. The gigantic vikings especially were a test of skill and patience. Yet I cannot help but feel a little let down by Ashes of Ariandel. Where Dark Souls II’s DLC explored new and delightful worlds and mechanics, this DLC simply follows patterns that we as players are well (perhaps overly) accustomed to. This isn’t bad per se, but it isn’t hard to imagine that it could have been more

If you loved and played Dark Souls 3, then Ashes of Ariandel is more of the same, and is an essential pick up. If you were perhaps a bit bored or put off by the main game, then this DLC unfortunately has almost nothing new to offer you to convince you to get into the series.

Dark Souls is an equation that we know so well now that we often know the answers before fulling reading the question. Ashes of Ariandel then is some more rote learning, more pages in the textbook to memories. I hope that the next, and last DLC experiments more, takes more risks. It would be a pity for Dark Souls to end on a similar, unsatisfying note.