Last night, one of the biggest earthquakes ever recorded on Earth occurred off the coast of Russia. Extraordinarily, so far, no one has died nor even been seriously injured, although millions are being evacuated from coastal areas in Hawaii, California and Japan for fear of incoming tsunamis. A bizarre knock-on effect of this event is that, well, Duo Expedition for Elden Ring Nightreign has been delayed.
Given the (literal) magnitude of the earthquake (a massive 8.8), it does seem a little frivolous to be concerned about how it might affect the patching of a popular multiplayer game. However, we are in the remarkably fortunate situation where—so far at least—there has been no loss of life, nor any significant reports of harm. It’s still possible that large waves could affect a huge number of countries, as far afield as China, New Zealand and Peru, and 13 foot waves have affected parts of Russia. However, even tsunamis have, so far, been minor. Despite this, evacuations are vital, with reports that waves could reach 10 feet in Japan. As such, Elden Ring developers FromSoftware have left their offices and canceled July 31’s planned release of Patch 1.02.
“Due to the tsunami warning following the earthquake near the Kamchatka Peninsula,” reads FromSoft’s statement, “we have decided to postpone the distribution of the ‘ELDEN RING NIGHTREIGN’ Patch 1.02, which was scheduled for today to tomorrow, July 31 (Thursday) after 10:00CEST / 1:00 PDT.”
Duo Mode was due to add the ability to play Nightreign in pairs, a feature fans have been begging for since the game’s release. The game was launched designed to be played in groups of three, which is an unusual group size for multiplayer gaming, and clearly far harder to pull together than just partnering up. The lack of a two-player mode felt even more strange, though, given you could also play solo. Two days after the game came out, a modder created an unofficial two-player option, demonstrating it was certainly possible. FromSoftware said at the time that not including duos was rather oddly “overlooked during development,” and that the game had only been balanced for three-player play. That was due to change over the next couple of days.
Patch 1.02 was also going to launch alongside the addition of a second group of the more difficult Everdark Sovereign bosses, with Maris “Augur” Fathom of Night due to be first. As Ethan said yesterday, what was one of the easier fights in Elden Ring is due to become one of the toughest bosses you can take on in Nightreign, but again, we’ll now have to wait a bit longer to experience this new encounter.
Obviously there’s no word yet on when the patch will now arrive. FromSoftware are doing the smart thing and keeping themselves safe. That’s clearly the priority far above rolling out a patch, and we wish everyone the very best.
Same to anyone near a coast in the vast affected portions of Earth today. Stay safe, listen to evacuation orders, and worry about video games later.
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