I'm standing before Radagon/Elden Beast fight. I did a 100% play-through, and I'm compelled to do a detailed write up, if only because i spent 180 fucking hours ingame. I played offline, fully exploring a zone by zone, and when I'd decidde I'm finished up, I'd check the wiki for things I have missed. Hell, around the very end, I even pulled up a full list of talismans/ashes/sorceries/etc, and picked up everything I missed, so I sorta really 100% the game (havent done that for weapons and armor tho, fuck that). I played full melee int build during the whole game. I never leveled my fp, and used sorceries only at the very start of Limgrave, switching to magic GS way before Margit. I switched to dual wielding moonveil and magic uchigatana before I did Caelid, but I havent used weapon art because I had no FP. Then I saw the posts here, tried weapon art spam on some minor dungeon boss, realized its broken as all fuck, and switched over to Dark Moon Greatsword as soon as I found it (I play all From games with MGS build. I just love that weapon.) I added a frost claymore to dual wield at some point (after Consecrated snowfields, I think?), and finished the game with that build. No NPC summons, no Ashes, and no blue estus flasks. Full on 1v1 dodge fest.
Where to fucking start? I enjoyed the game mostly, but the burn out is so fucking real. The game is too fucking big, stupidly big in fact, and thats the games greatest problem. Too many of everything, from weapon arts to magic, which results in the l0lz0rz balance many have pointed out. And as many people in this thread pointed out, this all stems from the open world. Open world as open world (or rather, the overworld) was actually done quite decently (at least before it starts burning the player out with its sheer size), especially when compared to other modern games. Encounter design is shit and non existing in the open world, but the game did seem to produce a well filled and thought out overworld, full with things to discover. The biggest problem tho? The things to discover. Lets start from the obvious - the copy pasted dungeons. While most of the dungeons were ok to good at pure level design, the repeated tileset just killed the thing very fast for me. Oh look, another catacomb, another cave and another mine. Fuck that. Next, c/ped bosses. Thats mother fucking atrocious. The game had like 150 or something bossfights, of which only like 10 were unique. This is an another problem directly created by open world and its sheer size - From obviously lacked the amount of enemies to fill it with, so they decided go with the laziest and worst possible solution "heres that same boss now, but now he has scarlet rot!/now theres two of them/its that same knight, but now hes yellow, and uses lightning!" I even wont point out why this is so motherfucking bad, because I believe that all of us are on the same page here.
But theres another thing I found to be detrimental to exploration and discovery aspect of ER and thats simply - it doesnt fit the current game mechanics. I found something cool in the overworld or a dungeon, i completed it, and now the reward... Oh, look, its another weapon/incantation/ash of war that i cant use! And, as a matter of fact, I WONT be able to use it, because crafting mats are limited, and respec is also limited and a PITA, and so on. Hell, sooner or later, i stopped caring even for sorceries I was able to use - there were just so many of them, and all of them were some variation of "blue light goes broom, dmg does", that made me oh so glad i skipped leveling FP. While finding cool stuff I wont be able to use in the usual Soulsborne world felt cool and not particularly detrimental, here it felt wrong and forced, because I literally took a huge detour, because I did a c/ped dungeon, fighting c/ped enemies and a c/ped boss, only to get something I give 0 shit about. Lets compare ER to another big hit open world game - Breath of the Wild. I found Breath of the Wilds open world to function way better as a part of the whole, even if its design was sorta worse - BotW overworld is way emptier than ERs, and its filled with ever more blatant examples of c/p enemies... But I feel it serves its purpose in the game way better. Why? Its sorta hard to explain, but lets try.
First of all, BotW shrines are just like ER catacombs/mines - c/ped assets on a mini-dungeon, but well designed from game perspective (hell, I'd say better designed than ERs mini-dungeons). The huge difference here is that
BotW is all about finding and exploring shrines. We all know that BotW has a big endgame dungeon, and four or five big dungeons, but the rest of the game is literally exploring the overworld, finiding the shrines, doing them so youd get more hp/stamina, and then rushing the central dungeon. That formula has its fair share of problems, but its how the game works. Exploring the overworld, finding the c/ped shrines, solving their puzzles/beating their guardians, is the gameplay of BotW. Like it or hate it, thats the entire gameflow. And I'm not sure what exactly ER gameflow is - we are all there for the awesome legacy dungeons and big badass bosses, and when the novelty has wore off (and it does so very fast), ER minidungeons, towers and ruins are derivative. They add nothing to the main flow of the game, but a little detour, from which you get... almost nothing. BotW has its fair share of problems, but its structure works - because shrines are the central part of its gameplay, while ER mini dungeons might as well have been deleted from the game. And when I find a BotW shrine I know exactly what I'm getting - a bit of hp or a bit of stamina. Which, while not particularly exciting or awesome, is something I extremely need and want. Sure, ER dungeons give xp - but I can get XP in ER anywhere I want. Literally, anywhere. In BotW i go in a shrine, do a little challenge, sometimes its forgettable, sometimes its actually awesome. All done, I got exactly what I signed up for, tyvm, now where the hell is the next shrine? Beside this, BotW also has a whole lot more of little systems that make exploring the (emptier) overworld more fun, or rather, more of a natural part of gameflow - some basic weather mechanics/stamina management challenges, an interesting weapon deterioration system that actually makes finding an Ice Spear for the seventh time feel good, a decent amount of excellent environmental puzzles that unlock new shrines (I really fucking loved these, some of them felt like straight out of Myst/Riven), more varied and unique overworld locations, and IIIRC, a cooking system that while sucky, beats the crap out of ERs crafting system. More on that later. Dont get me wrong, BotW is a flawed, albeit imho enjoyable game. I'm also not sure is it a better game than ER. But I'm quite sure that the open world formula was a way better fit in BotW, than it in ER.
Now lets get to other ER additions - Crafting. Crafting sucks. Shallow, unexciting, pretty much added only so they could fill the open world with generic herbs and runes and what not, it could literally be removed from the game, and noone would notice. Like literally, instead of "rot cleansing herb ingredient", just place "rot cleansing herb", and remove the goddamn crafting, nooone is going to notice, or fucking care. Next on, jump. Excellent addition. Even tho I'd prefer the way it was used in Sekiro, adding another crucial element to the combat system. I mean sure, you can use jump in Elden Ring combat- but only boss I ever used jump was Godfroy, or whatever variation of Godname the first shardbearer was. There where almost no situations in which I care to jump, when I could just roll. But adding jump to the game does allow verticality into game levels, and
boy does it fucking show. Legacy dungeons would not be half as amazing without all that verticality, which is a direct result of adding the jump button. All in all, virus approves jumping. Next, horse. Eh. Twas ok. It felt fluid, and combat felt ok when you figured it out. But the horse itself suffers from a serious lack of progress. You get the horse, you can sprint, jump, and have two different attacks. 180 hours later, the horse functions the exact same way. They could have made it a bit better. Crouch button feels like needless addition also, while it worked in Sekiro, where some encounters practically required it, allowing you to shave a health bar off a boss, here its needless. A mate let me know of a counterstrike just yesterday, havent even tried it, feels op and needless. Same for jump attack, it should be a decent tool in some situation, not a mother fucking spam material. Ashes of War are cool, feels like Tome of Battle felt to DnD 3.5. But, read from my lips. THERE. IS. TOO. MUCH. OF. THEM. Really. Not only is that impossible to balance, testing new cool Ashes gets stale after the thirtieth one. And for the end, I hated the Spirit ashes mechanic. I feel it adds nothing to the game. You literally press a button, something awesome happens - you get a cool little pet, and now you and a pet are going to fight the boss together. You literally have zero input in what the pet is going to do, you just pressed the button, and now hes helping you. It would be fine, if some (most?) bossfights werent designed around it, actively hurting those that dont want to press the button. One curious thing I liked - the pots and perfumes. Nice idea. Shame crafting sucks so much, and the balance is non existing, so I never tried them out. Better luck next time. Another thing worth mentioning - "the puzzles". Or rather, how you unlock the towers, new areas, and so on. Sure, some of them are obscure and shitty, but, sadly, all of them... felt vanilla. Nothing mind blowing or actually puzzling, just "hit this vase, talk to the guy, now talk to that guy, now do that dungeon." A missed opportunity to make something cool, like BotW did with its environmental shrines.
Let me get over to another thing that gets on my nerves, before getting to the good stuff, and thats the plot. Seriously From, fuck you. Dark Souls 1 plot model was awesome, because it was so novel and different. 10 years later, not only has From reused that model for like 5 times, but everyone and their mother has, and I really dont give a fuck about scratching for tidbits and cookie trails to figure out what the fuck is going on. I spent 180 hours in that game, and I'm still not 100% what a Tarnished is, and whats worse - I dont care. I really dont. I was already the chosen undeand/ashen one/bearer of the curse, and I already chased Lord Souls/The Four Old Ones/Lords of Cinder. First time I played Dark Souls 1 I read every single item description in the game, trying to figure out wth was going on, and imagining all those distant places that I could only see a glimpse of. What the fuck is Vinheim Dragon School? How does it look? It worked, amazingly. But now? Its been like five games From, and thousand copycats. Idgaf anymore, ill just wait for Vaati to explain what was going on, and revisit some good memories. On the more positive side, Shardbearers do feel way more connected than any of the previous Uniquemainbossname(TM), because they are essentially a pantheon, and have a certain relationship among them. Individually, they also all share a certain, individual cool mojo, and thats cool. NPCs are also more memorable and humanly, which I also liked. Wont get into their quest deisgn, screw that shit without a wiki. At least it seems Elden Ring has less "you killed the boss, the NPC quest is failed" situations. Oh, also the setting. Sure, its cool, but its Dark Souls 4. Everything looks like Dark Souls 4, and I was already tired of that aesthetic on Dark Souls 3. Sure, Dark Souls 2 had its fair share of problems, but it tried something different concerning the imagery, and it sorta worked. ER is just more castles, churches, graveyards, catacombs and swamps, ooooh will you continue the cycle, and light up the flame, for like fifth time? Idgaf anymore, hard pass.
Now, onto the good stuff - First of all, legacy dungeons fucking rock. They are fucking great. The nooks and crannies, the verticality. I fucking loved Stormveil, Raya Lucaria, Crumbling Farum Azula, Haligtree. So, sorta, most of them. Mini legacy dungeons were either ok or good. Of the big ones, Volcano Manor felt meh, and Mohg palace was not really a legacy dungeon. But the good ones are truly top tier From design. All of you who hated Haligtree/Farum Azula - you arent hating them, you are hating the game, because you burnt out
Hell, most designed areas are awesome - I loved all underworld parts of map too. Most of those areas/dungeons, felt like the best From had to offer. Visuals were also fucking cool, but most open world zones felt sorta repeated. Here is Limgrave, your vanilla starting zone. Oh look, its cool and pretty, feels alive. Next we have Liurnia, its sorta similar, except foggy and in a lake. Ok, cool. Now we have Altus, its the same thing as Limgrave, but yellow, ok. Now we have Gelmir and Mountaintops, thats just generic snow and mountain stuff. I fucking loved Caelid tho. It felt evil, and sinister, all the way from start to end. Before I get to bosses, there is another aspect of open world I hate, that bears mentioning - level/challenge control. I fully completed Limgrave and Liurnia. Where should I go now? Caelid looks like a reasonable choice. Onto to Caelid. Fully completed Caelid (even Dragonborrow), nice. Lets go north, onto to Altus... Oh. I'm way fucking overleveled for this shit. Like, whole Gelmir, Altus and sadly, Leyndell, felt fucking trivialized, like literally. Not a single challenge was found there, only did the game start picking up the pace at Mountaintops. First and only thing I could think of was "well i fucked up, I did every side dungeon and ended up overleveled, the intention was to skip most of the side content". And i fucking hate this "design principle", why is it in a game if I'm supposed to be skipping most of it? And why am I being punished for devoting myself? Did I fuck up by doing Caelid before Altus? But it was the exact right amount of challenge, and how the hell was I supposed to know I should be going to Altus? But, then I made it to the very end of game - Haligtree, Farum Azula, Mohgs Palace... And it felt like it was made precisely for my level challenge wise, like those zones were designed for a completitionist style of play, while previous three were trivialized by it. This shit needs fixing, and thats all I say about this (yes, im also getting burnt out by this fucking post).
Now onto bosses. I really wont comment on c/p shit, and if I have to fight another Ulcerated Tree Shit ever again, Ill personally find Miyazaki, and make him commit sudoku for that shamefur display. Of all the main, not repeated bosses (Ill just ignore that they repeated Astel/Godwhatever/Mohg, and Ill mention some of my favorite c/p boss situations), I mostly loved all of them. And wholy fuck, the presentation is new levels of awesome. Like, really. Rykard felt meh, I dislike that sort of gimmicky bossfights, Rennala was beautiful but easy and vanilla, Godfirstshardbearer guy was mediocre, The Giant was shitty, Ancestral Tree Spirits were really fucking beautiful, but easy as all hell. Now, onto the real shit. Margit was excellent. Perfect filter boss, cool moveset, beautiful and cinematic presentation, while speaking some awesome mumbo jumbo I dont understand. Radahn was excellent, except I found him and his horse to look way too fucking goofy. I found his difficulty spot-on prenerf (hes not that hard guys, i think most people try to beat him on horse, and thats just a bad decision.) Full on Mogh fight was excellent, whole new style of fight, perfect amount of challenge. I also enjoyed Maliketh, but I was prolly a tad overleveled when fighitng him. Awesome presentation, decent fight, second phase is a PITA, but he only has half of hp bar. Second Godwyn fight was strange. Took me an hour or so, first phase was vanilla, second was... Sorta cool, but also so fucking annoying. I hate bosses that dont give you time to heal up, and give it a rest. The same could prolly be said for Maliketh, but you can actually use the pillars for cover, while for the Loux guy, you literally have no time to catch a breath. Radagon is ok so far, Elden Beast is a pushover. Astel was also fucking beautiful, not too challenging, which is fine, since I always preferred smaller bosses. Im deeply saddened by the fact I was so fucking overleveled when I made it to Morgott, because the fight looked awesome. Sadly, I beat him on the first try, so I cant really comment on him. Seriously thinking of going NG+ and rushing to him. Commander Niall also looked like an interesting fight, but I also beat him too fast. Now, onto cookie cutter bosses I liked - first fight with Crucible Knight was god tier. Yeah, he has cheap moves, and fucking input reading, but hes what Soulsborne dosses are all about these days. Memorization, practice, discipline, and thinking under stress. I enjoyed him. First fight with Gravity scorpion bull thingy was also awesome, even tho camera could be wonky. Are you ready for a surprise tho? I loved crystalline rot trio. Im not even kidding. Its like a puzzle fight. You have to figure out the best strat to fight them with your build, and then execute it. Sure, its a c/p fight, with "now there are three of them!" and "now they apply rot!" a top of it, but it was a fun encounter. Bell bearing hunter was another good fight, until they started overusing him. Slim godskin was also cool the first time you fight him. Now, the notoriously shitty fights - I hate all the dragons. I fought them like 10 times, and nothing has changed. Hell, even the Lichdragon/Archdragon/The mofodragon fall under this category. Pass. From then on? meh, boring. Great wyrms also fucking suck. Tree Avatars are boring. First time I fought him I liked him, for the nostalgia feels. And so on.
You 'll notice I skipped that one boss - Malenia. And, the verdict is on, and I.... fucking loved her. Really. Its a fast, slick fight, with extremely telegraphed moves once you figure them out. Second phase is a phenomenal variation of the first - she has bunch of new moves, but also most of the old ones, except they now lead into new mixups and finishers. Oh, also, the presentation, it was fucking jaw dropping. Now, dont get me wrong. Waterfowl dance is bullshit. I feel the move itself isnt so bad, you can dodge it concisely with a little practice and watching other players videos on yt. Whats bullshit is when she does it in melee range. Either you are going to tank it out with hp, or you are dead. Its simple as that, and thats bullcrap. They are going to nerf it sooner or later, thats for sure, and I sure as hell hope they dont overnerf it, because mastering the boss and beating it is a thing of beauty. Some tips for manbros who want to 1v1 her - dont do it all at the same time. Practice her for an hour, or so, and when you start getting mad, quit the game and do something else. Do this for couple days, and you get her. The day I beat her, I got her second phase to 5% in the first hour. I continued playing for like 5 hours, and I was barely getting her second phase to 40%. Took a long pause, did some house chores, went for a beer or two, came back home, took another beer, and beat her on my first try, semi tipsy. Thats the thing, salt is the worst thing that can happen to you. Thats also the worst thing about melee Waterfowl dance. Its unfair, and incredibly salt inducing.
Mind you, Im aware not everyone likes this style of bosses, and this style of play. I love them tho. I know Im almost finished with the game, I beat the whole shit, now Im gonna chill for a couple of days, and enjoy mastering this beautiful fight. its the same reason I loved Friede, Father Owl, Isshin, etc. My only advice is to give it a try. Just relax, and enjoy fighting them. The way to mastery is beautiful, and nothing beats the satisfaction once you do beat them.
Now, this garguntuan mess of a post might look like i hated the game, because I mostly pointed out the flaws. Thats not the case. There is so much about the Souslborne formula thats brilliant, that im not going to get into now, and From sure does know how to execute it right (because they invented it, maybe? hm). I feel a shit From game is way better than 95% of games out there, and this game wasnt shit. It was faulty as all hell, but the parts where From design shines, it truly does shine. All in all, I'm actually glad they did tried out something new, and I'm glad they tried open world, and I'm glad I played it. But I also god damn hope that next game is going to be structured like Sekiro, and not like ER. One can hope. Oh, also, give us a sci-fi game.
DS1->Sekiro->DS3->ER=DS2. Havent played DeS and BB., DS3 is where it is only because some of the best boss battles in the series (TNK, Gael, and my all time favorite, Friede.) There is a big debate running around on what exactly should be a soulsborne boss - veterans who played the game in release order seem to prefer a DeS "gimmicky" sort of boss, which places accent on different mechanics/tactics, while youngfags seem to like DS3 style blenders. For better or worse, while I sure can appreciate a DeS style boss, I just love a tough as nails boss which requires precise memorization, practice, and I dare say, flexibility, or rather, variations in builds. Now, another thing - I rank DS1 above Sekiro, because I feel the game is way more monumental than Sekiro, and its impact and strength in time it was released cannot be matched by Sekiro... But I'd much rather replay Sekiro. My personal fav From game, even tho Im quite certain DS1 is a bigger, more important and more revolutionary game.
Thats about it. Now, onto the Elden Throne ye Tarnished.
