Elden Ring Nightreign director says leaving two-player co-op is a “balanced decision.”

Elden Ring Night Reign is a cooperative spin-off with an asterisk. You can play it with a group of three or alone, but not in a duo, says An IGN interview with director Junya Ishizaki. However, there is no technical reason for this annoying limitation. It’s about game balance.

“This was largely a game balancing decision, rather than a game design decision,” Ishizaki said. “So it came as development progressed.” Like inside Elden Ringenemy health scales based on your party size. However, the team found the “sweet spot” is three players because it doesn’t “feel too overwhelming or too busy,” he said.

Even Elden Ring worked fine with two people, Night Reign has a very different approach to combat. You only have three nights to level up and collect equipment before the worst bosses appear. Practical previews of IGN And PC gamer Suppose the run-based structure speeds up the action compared to what you know in the original game, and the unique heroes have abilities that they can perform together.

It will also be faster to travel through the randomized world. In the trailer, characters fly over lava pools on ghostly eagles and climb walls. You race to find as much loot as possible before night falls and a Battle Royale-style circle swallows you up. Three groups of players “ensured that each player could go off on their own and cover a portion of the map” before reuniting for the boss, Ishizaki said.

Solo players or duos looking for a third party can use matchmaking to fill the blanks. Otherwise, you still have to use a group password to find each other. As someone who played the game with the Seamless co-op PC mod, I wouldn’t be surprised if a modder figures out how to make two-player co-op work. But until then, the rules are the rules.

It is understandable that not everyone is happy with this. “Well… that sucks. I planned to play with my friend, who I always worked with Elden Ring with,” one Reddit user commented a message about the news. “If a random third person intervenes, that might be okay, but it’s not like that person will be included in our voice chat.”

The circle may not be the only thing Night Reign recreates the Battle Royale experience: you might be the third wheel in a group that coordinates without you, or the duo that ignores the random player on the team. In a game as brutal as Elden RingI’m not even sure a ping button would solve that.

Elden Ring Night Reign will launch in 2025 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and PC. FromSoft is also conducting a short beta test in February.