From Software Elden Ring - From Software's new game with writing by GRRM

[Vorark]

Late to the party, but finally beat this behemoth of a game. Despite enjoying it very much, it's another victim of the "From Software curse": a strong first half followed by a middling to disappointing latter one.

Limgrave and Caelid were all interesting to explore, underground zones included. They worked really well in tandem due to the radically different visuals, so you do not feel the inherent repetitiveness of the open world. It also helped that Caelid had new, tougher enemies to encounter. Liurna faltered a bit with vast extensions of nothingness yet it was somewhat redeemed by the small Bloodborne-esque village (could very well have been turned into a legacy dungeon), the Academy and that one hidden passage.

By the time I arrived at the Plateau, the open world had gotten stale and I was ready to wrap the playthrough. If it all ended at the Capital, with optional hidden teleports to Haligtree and Mohgwyn Palace (too short of a level), it would've been a much tighter game; Volcano Manor and Mountaintops could've been axed without much of a loss, maybe Farum Azula too.

I also found boss fight quality to dip during the second half, with too much emphasis on speed, huge combos, AOEs and a billion gfx going on the screen. Maliketh was the turning point since most of the time I couldn't even follow the movements of that skooma-addled cat. I ended up resorting to the mimic crutches for most bosses afterwards since I cannot into twitchy gameplay. Didn't help its AI played better than myself.

Hopefully the DLC will be more focused on legacy dungeons than open world shenanigans because Stormveil Castle, Royal Academy, Haligtree/Elphael, the Capital (including that devious sewer maze) and the underground zones were a blast to explore and some of the best content From has created.

 

[HeatEXTEND]

If it all ended at the Capital,

This is very double really, they could have easily shoved the last third of the game into a DLC and nobody would have noticed a thing. Maybe the mountaintop/Farum Azula/Ash capital should have been super sekrit areas? As is it kinda works like a bag of chips, at some point you are done with them but you just keep eating instead of saving some for later; with chips most people have the sense to blame themselves, with vidya not so much.
Then again, free DLC .
Guess it's mostly a luxury problem in the end.

 

[Lyric Suite]

I like the idea of having only legacy dungeons after the Capital.

Best case scenario is that the DLC would be like that, but i'm 100% certain they'll open that one with another open world area.

 

[Child of Malkav]

It'll probably be 1 or 2 areas with the same structure of content like in the base game: each area with its legacy dungeon, caves, mines, catacombs etc each with its bosses plus some roaming and/or night time boss fights, new NPCs with their quests etc.

 

[Caim]

Keep the mountain as part of some alternate ending (have the snake CONSUME THE VERY GODS), make the Mountaintop something similar in cooperation with the Three Fingers questline, and access the tree directly from the elevator.

 

[Lyric Suite]

It'll probably be 1 or 2 areas with the same structure of content like in the base game: each area with its legacy dungeon, caves, mines, catacombs etc each with its bosses plus some roaming and/or night time boss fights, new NPCs with their quests etc.

I hope it's a desert area or something exotic to the extreme.

I don't want to see snow ever again if it's possible.

That's one way to deal with yet another open world area in a game that has too many already: make it thematically unique at the very least.

 

[Skinwalker]

I don't want to see snow ever again if it's possible.

This. The regular snow area (Mountaintops of Giants, both maps) was far too large and exhausting in and of itself, and then they made the player trudge through yet another fucking snow area (Consecrated Snowfields) to unlock the far more interesting Haligtree. And the Mausoleum of Mong, if you hadn't already unlocked it through white mask's dumb quest.

Actually, now that I think about it, the snow area in the DS3 DLC was also too large and too boring. What is it with FromSoftware and snow?

 

[ferratilis]

That's coming from the website that's been in hot waters for gaming Twitch, by embedding its streams on its main website so whenever you're looking up where to find some sword or spell in Elden Ring or how to beat a boss you're giving them a view.

I've been hearing this for years, yet there's still no response from the platform. How do they keep getting away with it? They deserve to be taken down purely based on how terrible their wikis are.

 

[Caim]

That's coming from the website that's been in hot waters for gaming Twitch, by embedding its streams on its main website so whenever you're looking up where to find some sword or spell in Elden Ring or how to beat a boss you're giving them a view.

I've been hearing this for years, yet there's still no response from the platform. How do they keep getting away with it? They deserve to be taken down purely based on how terrible their wikis are.

What Fextralife does is not against the TOS, and the large influx of views makes the platform look good. Even when they got sponsored by some game and raked in far more viewers than the game actually sold on Steam, because apparently Twitch doesn't care about the longevity of advertisement deals on the platform.

 

[kites]

I wouldn’t be surprised if they’ve worked over parts or all of the map to put it into a different end-game state, eg the dark promo picture, rather than just a new area or two. After nearly two years, either not a large team is working on dlc or it is pretty lofty..

 

[HeatEXTEND]

What is it with FromSoftware and snow?

DS1 painting is quality tho.

 

[Lyric Suite]

I wouldn’t be surprised if they’ve worked over parts or all of the map to put it into a different end-game state, eg the dark promo picture, rather than just a new area or two. After nearly two years, either not a large team is working on dlc or it is pretty lofty..

It's gonna be a huge extra area no way they are going to skimp on that.

To me that's the problem as the game already felt too large. The whole Consecrated Snowfield/Haligtree etc already felt like a large DLC for a game that was already as complete as it gets. Another area like that it's going to make this game impossible to finish lol.

 

[Elttharion]

What is it with FromSoftware and snow?

DS1 painting is quality tho.

The DS1 painting and Eleum Loyce (sans the frigid outskirts) are great areas. Cainhurst is pretty good too.

 

[AlwaysBrotoMen]

Started playing elden ring. One of the greatest games of all time does not have proper targeting system implemented in the open world. It targets everything including flies and squirrel while fighting the giant bear

 

[Zeriel]

Didn't help its AI played better than myself.

Not sure it is "played better" so much as "cheats a lot". It's not reading inputs, but it acts based on you starting an animation iirc, which is basically the same as reading inputs.

 

[Vorark]

they could have easily shoved the last third of the game into a DLC and nobody would have noticed a thing.

You might be onto something because Haligtree in special does feel a bit out of place compared to the previous zones.

I once read a theory about how that area was supposed to be DLC but made it to the main game at the last minute, hence the rehashed enemies sans butterfly gal. Curiously enough the DLC appears to be related to Miquella, the one who grew the tree, so there might be some truth to that theory. Or maybe From is just lazy.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Or maybe From is just lazy.

I don't think it's that. Elden Ring is truly massive, even if you took all the recycling and counting it as only one area instead of one area per time it repeats, it's still huge.

I'm more curious when we'll see the DLC and how it'll be accessed since having to do it from the middle or end of the game is going to be brutal.

 

[Dadd]

I don't think it's that. Elden Ring is truly massive, even if you took all the recycling and counting it as only one area instead of one area per time it repeats, it's still huge.

But why did the game have to be so large in the first place? A smaller more refined game would've been far better.

 

[Vorark]

I'm more curious when we'll see the DLC and how it'll be accessed since having to do it from the middle or end of the game is going to be brutal.

If the DLC ends up being about Miquella, maybe the cocoon in Mohgwyn's Palace? It is a very late game area unless you follow White Mask Varre questline.

inb4 Malenia will bloom again and return fully powered up.

Spoiler

 

[Zeriel]

I don't think it's that. Elden Ring is truly massive, even if you took all the recycling and counting it as only one area instead of one area per time it repeats, it's still huge.

But why did the game have to be so large in the first place? A smaller more refined game would've been far better.

Because "open world" and "it's so big you have 300 hours of gameplay!" moves lots of units for normies. The amount of people who weren't interested in Dark Souls previously but bought into the Elden Ring hype as a generic open world game validate this theory of marketing. I wish it didn't work this way, but as long as people keep buying games for this reason, it'll keep happening.

 

[HeatEXTEND]

I can also imagine From wanting to try their hand at a different formula for DS, probably wasn't the impetus (money was) but Miyazaki wanting to try something different isn't exactly out of the ballpark.

 

[Damned Registrations]

Keep the mountain as part of some alternate ending (have the snake CONSUME THE VERY GODS)

I think this is actually the trick they missed the chance to do; instead of having all the endings tied through the same progression with just some small extra steps, they should have made them all different. Let Ranni's ending be finished with a fight against Astel or something in that vein, different final bosses for each ending, with differing levels of difficulty and length involved in each one. Would have really cranked up the replayabiliy. Being able to do them all in one run cheapens it somehow.

 

[FreshCorpse]

I don't think it's that. Elden Ring is truly massive, even if you took all the recycling and counting it as only one area instead of one area per time it repeats, it's still huge.

But why did the game have to be so large in the first place? A smaller more refined game would've been far better.

Because "open world" and "it's so big you have 300 hours of gameplay!" moves lots of units for normies. The amount of people who weren't interested in Dark Souls previously but bought into the Elden Ring hype as a generic open world game validate this theory of marketing. I wish it didn't work this way, but as long as people keep buying games for this reason, it'll keep happening.

Normies who pay $70 for a game want it to be of a decent length but I think ultra-massive games are actually a turn-off for most of them. "100 hours of gameplay" is a meme that started in the 90s and is largely self-sustaining at this point. It is somewhat useful to publishers because it can drive hype among a small number of franchise obsessives (eg reddit NPCs eagerly awaiting the Starfield release) but that's it.

 

[Caim]

Keep the mountain as part of some alternate ending (have the snake CONSUME THE VERY GODS)

I think this is actually the trick they missed the chance to do; instead of having all the endings tied through the same progression with just some small extra steps, they should have made them all different. Let Ranni's ending be finished with a fight against Astel or something in that vein, different final bosses for each ending, with differing levels of difficulty and length involved in each one. Would have really cranked up the replayabiliy. Being able to do them all in one run cheapens it somehow.

Yeah, I like this idea. Just spitballing a few bosses:

Regular ending: Radagon, with Marika as phase 2
Goldmask: Elden Beast (no Radagon)
Fia: Fortissax, followed by undead Godwyn
Dung Eater: Lol, lmao
Age of the Stars: Astel, maybe some extra superpowered moon entity or Ranni herself
Lord of the Frenzied Flame: Melina

And some new ones:

Fealty: Pledge yourself to Godfrey, beat up Radagon and Marika, then have him take the throne and serve as his knight
Moghwyn Dynasty: Pledge yourself to Mohg, invade Leyndell, defeat Morgot and Godfrey, then create a tree of blood
Unalloyed Gold: Beat Mohg and put down Malenia, then restore Miquella and have the Haligtree replace the Erdtree
Dragonlord: Restore Placidusax and defeat Godfrey

 

[Lyric Suite]

Sales for Elden Ring are kinda sad, although it's worth pointing out there was a lot of hype going on with this game within the normie sphere and open world was not the only factor why it sold so much more than Dark Souls.

It's still depressing though that a single factor like that, everything else in the game being virtually identical to Dark Souls, increased sales to such a magnitute. Normies are a fucking blight on civilization.