I’m really bad at Night Reign of the Elder Ring. Not exactly embarrassing, but not great. I managed to beat Ancient Ring playing a version of Astrologer and using spirit summons to tank me while I cast ranged spells. I don’t want to learn how to parry and it takes me a long time to learn the attack patterns enough to dodge them. So in Night rainI play Recluse, or more recently Scholar, I step back and do my best to support my husband and my friend in our little trio to defeat the night bosses. We lose. A lot. Many nights have been spent on Libra. We still haven’t completed the two new DLC bosses added six months ago, although you can partly attribute that to the fact that we haven’t played for a while.
Anyway, what I’m saying is that I suck Night rain. Absolutely terrible. And so it is, SO lots of fun.
I’ve honestly never had so much fun playing a game that I spend most of the time losing, but here we are. I think if you don’t play Night rainit may be hard to understand why we’re still playing this game for over a year when it doesn’t seem to change much from run to run. And yet, it’s these small, subtle changes that make everything happen. Will we have a lot of points of interest themed to the night boss weakness? Will a random event force us to throw our plans in the trash and run across the map while being attacked by dogs, hailed, or swarmed by locusts? Is the bell hunter still in the basement of the castle?
Night rain is a game of incremental improvements that seem momentous. For example, my trio beat Night Aspect, the final boss of the main campaign, a long time ago. But when last year Abandoned hollows The DLC is out, we decided to try it again using the two new characters, Scholar and Undertaker, to complete their quests. It took age as we developed our skills in these new roles, and when we finally did, the surge of relief was electric. Then the next day I accidentally queued us up for Night Aspect instead of the first DLC boss, Balancers. We didn’t notice it until we entered the arena, totally unprepared. And yet, without pressure or worry, we brought it down easily Again. What a rush!
It’s been over a year since the initial launch of Night Reign of the Elder Ringand the community has largely given up hope for future updates beyond The abandoned hollows. And yet the subreddit is still bustling, with people sharing chaotic and hilarious moments, exchanging advice, and asking for opinions on their relics. Personally, I put in 130 hours, and if I’m honest with myself, I’ll probably put that number closer to 200 before finally knocking out Balancers and Dreglord. We haven’t even touched Deep of Night or the Everdark bosses, and I can’t even imagine what it would be like if we did. I would love more DLC, and I think this game deserves it, but how can I complain when I’m having so much fun being so bad at such a consistent game for so long?
Now we’re working on the balancers, trying to learn the new DLC map full of dangerous pits and hidden crystals, and figuring out the best strategy for the second night’s boss, Mogh, Lord of Blood, with his stupid mid-combat insta-kill and stupid tridents that cover the field in stupid blood mist. I’m still working, inch by inch, on my Scholar game, figuring out when it’s best to get really good at throwing knives and when I should turn to throwing pots and eating handfuls of boiled crab. At the end of each game, I pray for a better relic reward that will somehow help me level up my poor scholar, but my luck has been horrible so far. Earlier this week we had our worst night ever Night rain games, with little luck, poor internet connection and generally unreliable gameplay preventing us from getting near the Balancers. The next night we relaxed, practiced the new map and got better.
All this is only part of the Night Reign of the Elder Ring experience.