Elden Ring Nightreign Needs One DLC Boss Fight Hidetaka Miyazaki Intentionally Made Excruciatingly Annoying

Elden Ring has become a global phenomenon, capturing players’ attention with its vast landscapes, intricate lore, and brutal bosses. Now, Elden Ring Nightreign, the standalone spin-off, is taking the series in a new direction by introducing multiplayer while retaining the core elements of the franchise.

Nightreign is taking the intense experience to the multiplayer genre. | Image Credit: FromSoftware

As fans wait for this next chapter, one question looms large: will it feature some of the most frustrating and challenging bosses from the original game and its DLC? If there’s one boss that stands out for its infuriating difficulty, it’s the Divine Beast Dancing Lion, a boss that has driven many players to the brink of rage.

Elden Ring Nightreign should include the Divine Beast Dancing Lion

Located in the Belurat Tower Settlement Legacy Dungeon, the Dancing Lion is the main boss of this already difficult area. While it’s an optional boss, its overwhelming strength and unpredictability make it one of the most punishing encounters in Elden Ring‘s Shadow of the Erdtree.

This towering lion is a no-slouch, as it boasts a vast array of elemental attacks such as fire, lightning, and even magical blasts, all used with little to no warning. What sets it apart, however, is its unpredictable attack patterns and lack of fixed tells for its actions.

It’s easy to wonder: why did Miyazaki and his team make this boss so unreasonably difficult, especially since it’s the first major boss in the DLC? The answer likely lies in the developer’s knack for creating challenges that test the limits of a player’s patience and resilience.

And this boss certainly achieved that as players were annoyed and often enraged due to its unpredictable nature.

With Nightreign offering a session-based (40-minute) multiplayer experience, this boss will raise the stakes even higher. Just imagine three players working together to avoid the beast’s lightning strikes, dodging fiery sweeps, and coordinating attacks while dealing with its unpredictable behavior.

It would be a thrilling encounter that will be perfectly suited for the Nightreign experience. However, whether or not the Dancing Lion (or any variant of it) makes it into Nightreign remains to be seen. FromSoftware has a history of introducing new, innovative boss fights.

FromSoftware trying to reinvent the experience with multiplayer

The fans have very high expectations for the game. | Image Credit: FromSoftware

The announcement at the Game Awards has sent shockwaves of excitement throughout the fanbase and for a good reason. While Elden Ring had co-op features, Nightreign is going to take a bold turn into uncharted territory by focusing on a more structured multiplayer experience.

This shift from a primarily solo experience to a fully cooperative, multiplayer-driven adventure is a major leap, and with it comes high expectations.

While this shift opens the door for exciting new possibilities, it also raises various questions: How will FromSoft adapt the Elden Ring formula to work in this new multiplayer format? Since it’s not just a task of adding a co-op mode and calling it a day.

FromSoftware is known for its ability to innovate and create deeply immersive experiences. With Nightreign, the challenge will be to preserve the same feeling of tension, strategy, and unpredictability, all while creating a seamless multiplayer experience.

The task is unpredictable and treacherous (just like the boss) but the studio has proven time and time again that it can rise up to the occasion and deliver something extraordinary.

In the end, if Nightreign can preserve that engaging and brutal gameplay while adding the intensity of multiplayer co-op, it has the potential to set a new standard for multiplayer experience.