izigame.me

Starting off with the good, This game is an amazing 3 Player co-op experience on Veteran Difficulty. The fights are hard yet not to punishing on a basis and teamwork is required to shine through the fights. The boss fights especially are always something to sweat at and overall gives this game a very big light when it comes to that experience. All the enemies are unique and will get the upper hand on you if your not careful and paying attention, making each region and interaction feel like a breathe of fresh combat and air.
AND now the bad stuff.
This game has a multitude of annoyances and bad design that make it very hard to commit to this game unless you and your friends aren't taking it all to seriously. I mean, seriously, the amount of content in this game that you will miss on one playthrough is INSANE because the Devs want to give players incentive to replay this. The only problem is that the replayability past the first playthrough is a major annoyance and a dry husk.
First of all, the levels you and your party will go through are all randomly generated, and no matter what you do, On a first playthrough, you will always miss content and bosses due to how the devs designed the game. Weapons, Armor, and even Classes will be potentially locked from you unless you go back to redo these levels over and over again for the things that you want. On top of all that, some of these weapons, mods, and armors require certain knowledge in order to obtain them. Problem with that is there is almost ZERO way for you to figure any of that out midgame, and most of it involves the average player looking back and forth between the wiki to see how and more importantly, when they can obtain such an item. These requirements can range from collecting a key item and using it during a boss fight or interaction that has no hints or buildup leading to it, or focusing the body part of a specific boss that ALSO gives no hint or buildup towards. It's bad design, especially if your really hoping for 'your' kind of weapon and end up not getting it until your at the final boss and finally start questioning where all the weapons are.
As stated above, lots of content it barred until a second playthrough.. and the DLC's don't make it any better. Most of the DLC's require you to replay the game AGAIN just to access the content related to it. It's absurd just how much boring and dull repeatability the Devs try and shove into your face through this experience. Speaking of which, the game is extremely punishing for people who miss this opportunity as you will lose out on classes, weapons, and etc for not doing the very specific requirements for them, that you have no way of realistically knowing due to how the game is structured in bringing forth information.
Contrary to what I said in the beginning, despite this being a good Co-Op experience, it is not a good game when it comes to combating anything but bosses. You are mostly just drilling rounds into enemies with almost no recoil and the build customization makes your build in the most standard way 'do more damage' without adding any actually engaging combat design. Classes is where that unique combat shines but no matter what you do it's the same formula.
Overall, I would not recommend getting this game until a very generous sale comes along. Play this with two other friends for the best experience if that were to happen. IF this game does get another installment of the series, I severely hope they will stop with the repeatability nonsense and make ALL the content accessible in one play through.
Edit: So, it's been a long few weeks since I wrote this and I've seen lots of different comments below tackling my review in various ways. Most disrespectful, some actually bringing up good points, and some even questioning the games I do like. I'm going to tackle a bit of those right now.
SO First off, the story is dull. Me and my other friends actually sat through most of it, majorly due to one of us actually being interested in it and explaining it to us as we went. We stopped to read item descriptions and various other armaments that we came across for some hints or even more understanding of why we were here, and only SOME of it paid off. Like finding out the puzzle for the Fae place or learning that we could actually beat the Red King (forgot his name forgive me). All in all? The main story is a giant nothing burger for me while my other friend enjoyed it, but even in the end he was disappointed because all that reading seemed to pay off into nothing.. why? Because of the randomizing system that blocks a majority of content for you on your first playthrough. Which is my biggest problem with the game. A lot of people want to defend that here and say that it's not made for you. Just like me, your entitled to your own opinion, but since your reading, It's a system that is completely unnecessary for the enjoyment of the game and redundant.
The next point I've seen brought up is the build difference. I'll be honest, I'm sure that the build progression and depth goes a lot more deeper, but thats only past your first playthrough which is my gripe with it. A lot of the build potential, just like content is locked behind repeatability that gets 'easier' or more 'manageable' with the class you get at the end of the game. Majority of people playing this won't get the chance to see that. Sure, we all had different classes, like the Engineer or the Summoner, or the Alchemist, but that can only be expanding on and crafted to our liking so much through an initial play through which is what almost everyone who picks up this series goes through.
All in all, the best argument I've heard against this is that it's not for me. With that being the case, I'll take my leave. This game's constant replayability is it's gradual downfall. If no one finds it that missing a total of 60% or more of content on your first thorough playthrough to be insane, then I'll end that here.
PS: I do love souls games, I 100% Elden Ring, am replaying Dark Souls 3 for the 3rd time on my steam deck, and I am thoroughly enjoying Nightreign with 2 of my other friends right now. Saying that I lack the creativity to come up with a build when I've gotten next to nothing in my first playthrough due to the randomizing system is kind of the point of this review. I came into this game expecting exactly what was marketted, and it was locked behind 2 - 4 replays of this game. Thank you for reading, whoever you are, and I hope you have an amazing day. At the end of the day, this is a steam review.