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

[Hell Swarm]

The deep lore of post-it notes and absolutely no story as to why you have to murder every creature in the world. A tale truly worthy of toilet paper.

 

[Silverfish]

And he's too fucking stupid to even see the second half of a single line of text so claims there is no point.

He just didn't see it yet. I've noticed an occasional tick he has where he'll respond to a single post over multiple of his own. Just wait a day or so and you'll get a response to the second half.

Don't ever use triangle. 2 handing your weapon is cheating.

You guys use weapons? For shame.

What I find funniest is that Lyric responds to a post making literal points with a reason for why they ruin the game and aren't legit.

Summons don't "ruin" the game. If you don't use them, their existence won't affect you in any way whatsoever.

Having trouble keeping track?

There's that great Arti video of a stone armoured fat roller walking up to arti and hitting him over and over when he was one of the hardest bosses ever. It's not even a close fight, he can't touch the guy doing it.

Even a lot of challenge runners go full Havel's for the Four Kings. DS1 poise is God-tier.

That's not what you are arguing, don't try to change the goalpost now. The argument is literally that rolling is a bad game mechanic. Except it isn't.

How can I change the goalpost when this is my first post in relation to stamina / rolling / i-frames? I never argued that these are bad mechanics, just that they're better suited for shorter games like Demon's and Dark 1 due to their simplicity.

Aside for this being something you pulled out of your ass again (can't be stretched for hundred of hours? Says who?)

Not can't. Shouldn't.

one of your main complaint about Elden Ring is that you are given a myriad of options to trivalize content.

You're confusing me with Hell Swarm again. My stance from the get-go, and in fact even in response to the video you posted that HS found lacking, is that you should use everything at your disposal and that melting bosses with overpowered builds is what constitutes getting good. My souls philosophy, summarized (timestamped at 22:50):

You guys are trying so hard to find things to complaint about in Elden Ring that you have now moved onto denigrating everything FromSoft has ever done

"You guys." I've brought up previous entries of the series as a positive comparison to ER. You're fucking struggling to keep up. Hate to see it.

 

[Hell Swarm]

Zanzibart... forgive me

I ask you forgive me, dearest Nanaya

Which is the DEEP lore of a souls game and which is a joke?

 

[Odoryuk]

Zanzibart... forgive me

I ask you forgive me, dearest Nanaya

Which is the DEEP lore of a souls game and which is a joke?

Zanzibart was a pretty lame joke coined by a person who wrote for Borderlands.

Midra asked Nanaya to forgive him, because he was enduring the Frenzied Flame for a long time, because she asked (or cursed him) to, and in that fight he finally gives in and lets it finally overtake him as a person.

If you don't see difference in the vibes, then, frankly, I'm not surprised you've been complaining about FromSoftware over so many pages now

 

[Hell Swarm]

Vibes is not an argument. The borderlands writer was dead on the nose and you can't see it. Throw in 2 post it notes and a single line of dialog and vatti, ziostorm and zulli the witch will make 10 videos on it each. It's fucking retarded. The abyss woods was empty and boring, reusing content so also lazy. Then you go into a pretty bland dungeon reusing assets and enemies from another part of the DLC and.. well that's basically it. Phase 1 of the boss was cool, phase 2 was another spam fest as most the DLC is.

Wooooooo spooky yellow eyed rats and bloodborne enemies! In a completely empty woods. Peak vibes.

 

[Odoryuk]

The borderlands writer was dead on the nose and you can't see it.

His whole argument was that the writing is so obtuse to the point that there's nothing in there, just random words, which is not true.

Throw in 2 post it notes and a single line of dialog and vatti, ziostorm and zulli the witch will make 10 videos on it each. It's fucking retarded.

It works and you don't need Vaati to get anything, the whole story is buried within Midra's mansion and it's one of my most favorite locations in ER.

Vibes is not an argument.

In entertainment, vibes is all that matters

 

[Hell Swarm]

His whole argument was that the writing is so obtuse to the point that there's nothing in there, just random words, which is not true.

His argument was that there was no point putting effort into writing good dialog any more because a post-it note (nanaya's torch) and a single line of dialog is enough to make 7 hour essays on youtube. And he's completely correct. From did exactly what he said they did and I can find multiple discussions on Nanaya who isn't a character and what we read may as well be random words.

In entertainment, vibes is all that matters

You're a drug addict or a child. Wait til you discover lava lamps and electronic music. You will never touch another souls game again.

Sunsets are also great vibe creators if you don't want to spend 80 hours going to an empty level.

If you want to play a game that's actually creepy and all built on 'vibe'. I recommend trying No players online. It does what From failed miserably at with the woods. It lacks item descriptions, so it may not be for you though.

 

[Strange Fellow]

People are finally starting to figure out that a bit of mystery is far preferable to an endless exhausting barrage of "lore".

 

[Odoryuk]

His argument was that there was no point putting effort into writing good dialog any more because a post-it note (nanaya's torch) and a single line of dialog is enough to make 7 hour essays on youtube. And he's completely correct. From did exactly what he said they did and I can find multiple discussions on Nanaya who isn't a character and what we read may as well be random words.

Well, then it kinda goes in favor to FromSoftware to make things such compelling that people enjoy so much to discuss it endlessly, huh? Maybe that Borderlands person wasn't even attacking FS, but admiring their efficiency?

People are starting to figure out that a bit of mystery is preferable to an endless exhausting barrage of "lore". Shocker.

That is something that many developers that try to repeat FromSoftware's vibes and fail: they write too much text. Too many names, too many descriptions. They also try to mitigate their low budgets and cram everything into text, while FS provides the vibes with not only text, but visuals and sounds. Midra's cutscene is very strong and without it I doubt people would care about this odd couple that much

 

[Odoryuk]

Also, the thing with headless bodies outside Midra's Manse, people say that they lower their necks when you kill a wintern lantern dude that is associated with each body - that's bullshit, right? I only killed one of these dude weeks ago, and I can't check for myself, so please do provide any info of that if you know it for sure. Frankly, it's too good to be true and FS, despite having a reputation of adding a lot of unnecessary details, wouldn't do this.

 

[Hell Swarm]

People are finally starting to figure out that a bit of mystery is far preferable to an endless exhausting barrage of "lore".

From write the same way JJ Abrams does. As long as there is a mystery box it doesn't matter if you ever reveal what's in it. Which is fine if it's not the dominate way you write your story and the rest isn't "and then kill every powerful being in the land because... well because". Elden Ring gives you no reason to want to become Elden Lord. It doesn't tell you what being an Elden lord means or what it does for YOU. You just wake up and a cut scene your character doesn't see says "go kill these people". And then we meet consort Radahn who is effectively another Elden lord since he's the right hand man to a God and he's literally nothing special or different.

I would really recommend reading more on "Mystery box" writing and how it's damaged every medium it's touched. If you want to discuss how great From's lore is at least read the counter point because From's writing isn't actually original. It's the standard method of story telling for TV series for decades. The only difference is soap operas don't use sword descriptions you shouldn't know and have no context for.

https://www.abdulymalik.com/writing/kill-the-mystery-box

https://www.reddit.com/r/fantasywriters/comments/18zoa5q/the_mystery_box_method_of_writing/

 

[Strange Fellow]

Elden Ring gives you no reason to want to become Elden Lord. It doesn't tell you what being an Elden lord means or what it does for YOU. You just wake up and a cut scene your character doesn't see says "go kill these people". And then we meet consort Radahn who is effectively another Elden lord since he's the right hand man to a God and he's literally nothing special or different.

Great point, too bad it's about Dark Souls 2. Correct me if I'm wrong: The story of Elden Ring is that something has gone wrong with the afterlife so people aren't dying properly anymore, and it's believed that restoring the Elden Ring will fix that, which is why so many Tarnished, including the PC, are trying to do it. That seems like a straightforward and compelling enough motivation to me.

 

[abija]

Also, the thing with headless bodies outside Midra's Manse, people say that they lower their necks when you kill a wintern lantern dude that is associated with each body - that's bullshit, right? I only killed one of these dude weeks ago, and I can't check for myself, so please do provide any info of that if you know it for sure. Frankly, it's too good to be true and FS, despite having a reputation of adding a lot of unnecessary details, wouldn't do this.

I thought the shards used after decapitation were to prevent them from turning into the lantern dudes.

 

[Lyric Suite]

The deep lore of post-it notes and absolutely no story as to why you have to murder every creature in the world. A tale truly worthy of toilet paper.

Ye ye we get it the story is shit, the lore is shit, the combat is shit, the level design is shit, the art is shit. Everything FromSoft ever did was shit, across the board, from King's Field to this DLC.

You are just fucking boring at this point.

 

[Hell Swarm]

Elden Ring gives you no reason to want to become Elden Lord. It doesn't tell you what being an Elden lord means or what it does for YOU. You just wake up and a cut scene your character doesn't see says "go kill these people". And then we meet consort Radahn who is effectively another Elden lord since he's the right hand man to a God and he's literally nothing special or different.

Great point, too bad it's about Dark Souls 2. Correct me if I'm wrong: The story of Elden Ring is that something has gone wrong with the afterlife so people aren't dying properly anymore, and it's believed that restoring the Elden Ring will fix that, which is why so many Tarnished, including the PC, are trying to do it. That seems like a straightforward and compelling enough motivation to me.

Dark souls 2 has a motivation. You're going Hollow and heard there's a cure for it in Dranglec. Why you have to murder people to get it I don't know, but that's a fair shake. Elden ring is "you come from a distant land to become Elden lord because... you just do okay?"

The deep lore of post-it notes and absolutely no story as to why you have to murder every creature in the world. A tale truly worthy of toilet paper.

Ye ye we get it the story is shit, the lore is shit, the combat is shit, the level design is shit, the art is shit. Everything FromSoft ever did was shit, across the board, from King's Field to this DLC.

You are just fucking boring at this point.

I like how angry you are. It's funny and you should keep being angry

 

[Strange Fellow]

Dark souls 2 has a motivation. You're going Hollow and heard there's a cure for it in Dranglec. Why you have to murder people to get it I don't know, but that's a fair shake. Elden ring is "you come from a distant land to become Elden lord because... you just do okay?"

No, I'm pretty sure it's for exactly the reason I said.

Dark Souls 2 on the other hand, you start out going to Drangleic to free yourself from the curse, and you start out rooting around killing some people to go see the king (which is fair enough, as I recall he "peered into the essence of the soul" so he might be a good lead). Then, about halfway though the game, your motivation suddenly changes to becoming the next monarch. The problem is, the old monarch went hollow just the same as everyone else, and it's not clear how anything has changed, nor is there any apparent connection between becoming king and lifting the curse. I would say that kingship doesn't have much luster when you know you're cursed and doomed to lose your mind, and yet the game insists that that's what you want to do. In that regard it's very different from Elden Ring, where the motivation to become Elden Lord is secondary to curing the world of its fucked-upness. It just so happens that you can't do one without the other.

 

[Hell Swarm]

Dark souls 2 has a motivation. You're going Hollow and heard there's a cure for it in Dranglec. Why you have to murder people to get it I don't know, but that's a fair shake. Elden ring is "you come from a distant land to become Elden lord because... you just do okay?"

No, I'm pretty sure it's for exactly the reason I said.

Dark Souls 2 on the other hand, you start out going to Drangleic to free yourself from the curse, and you start out rooting around killing some people to go see the king (which is fair enough, as I recall he "peered into the essence of the soul" so he might be a good lead). Then, about halfway though the game, your motivation suddenly changes to becoming the next monarch. The problem is, the old monarch went hollow just the same as everyone else, and it's not clear how anything has changed, nor is there any apparent connection between becoming king and lifting the curse. I would say that kingship doesn't have much luster when you know you're cursed and doomed to lose your mind, and yet the game insists that that's what you want to do. In that regard it's very different from Elden Ring, where the motivation to become Elden Lord is secondary to curing the world of its fucked-upness. It just so happens that you can't do one without the other.

Does any one even tell you how you're supposed to cure the world or that the world is even fucked and you're the one to save it?

• When met in human form at Drangleic Castle
  You have fought admirably on your journey, cursed Undead.
  I am Nashandra, Queen of Drangleic.
  A true monarch carries the weight of their souls.
  The last king of this land, King Vendrick, as he was called…
  He was less of a king than you might imagine.
  He found the strength to rule his people, and when the Undead were born, cursed…
  He found more strength, to face them.
  But in the end, he never took the true throne.

• When talking a second time during the first encounter
  Visit Vendrick.
  We have no need for two rulers…

• When coming back and talking after first encounter, having not activated other triggers
  …

• When talking after killing or just visiting Vendrick
  Drangleic is no longer.

• When talking after obtaining the King's Ring
  Brave Undead, seek the throne.
  Follow the symbol of the monarch, and do what must be done.
  
  It's not rock solid but the queen tells you to take the true throne because the last king failed and guides you through the adventure if you talk to her. Depending on how you look at it you could argue you believe the true throne will save you (the DLC actually confirms this with the triple crown) and the queen is telling you how to sit on it.

 

[Strange Fellow]

That's an extremely charitable interpretation. That may very well be the idea the developers had in mind at some stage, but the dialogue you quote there is as close as the game comes to actually stating the purpose of becoming king, and it's literally just "do what must be done". By comparison, the instructions from the Emerald Herald are a lot more direct, but what she tells you to do is to usurp the throne from Vendrick, and the curse is never mentioned again after reaching Drangleic Castle, even though this should be your character's exclusive priority. What good is a throne if you end up like Vendrick, wandering the crypt as a mindless hollow? Nashandra says that he didn't take the true throne, but there is zero indication of what the true throne is or why we would want it. If you want to talk about mystery boxes, there's a perfect example.

As for Elden Ring, I just watched the intro cutscene again and it was indeed more vague than I remembered, and I can't recall if Malenia goes into more detail. What is clear, though, is that the Elden Ring was shattered and that event lead directly to the abandonment of the Lands Between by the Greater Will, which, we can infer, is when all the bad shit started happening. I think it's reasonable to expect the restoration of the Elden Ring to bring back the Greater Will, considering the shattering is what drove it away. There's a much clearer connection there than between the curse and the throne in Dark Souls 2, which may as well exist in different games.

There's also an alternative view: In Dark Souls 2, it is established that you are cursed and will go hollow very soon unless you find a cure. In Elden Ring, you're not, at least I don't believe so. As such, in Elden Ring a desire to seize the throne for power and glory is perfectly cogent, but in Dark Souls 2 it isn't. The only sensible reason for seizing the throne of Drangleic is if doing so lifts the curse, which, again, you have no explicit reason to think it does because the curse plot is left by the wayside halfway through the game.

 

[Hell Swarm]

The 2nd line of the DaS2 intro states souls can help you keep from going hollow. And Nashadra is implying Vendrick failed to continue fighting and consuming souls so he went hollow. He didn't achieve the true throne, he just retreated. So even if you want to say the story was dropped (and lets be honest From games don't have a story) it's at least explained within the game it's self. The game even implies by the time you reach the castle you're already forgetting why you would try to get there so it's still functioning as the intro predicted.

The Tarnished have no connection to the lands between any more. They have no reason to care about the Elden Ring as they're not in the lands between.

 

[Strange Fellow]

The 2nd line of the DaS2 intro states souls can help you keep from going hollow. And Nashadra is implying Vendrick failed to continue fighting and consuming souls so he went hollow. He didn't achieve the true throne, he just retreated. So even if you want to say the story was dropped it's at least explained within the game it's self.

Yeah, but that is no basis for a story with a beginning and an end. Player arrives in Drangleic, consumes powerful souls for a while and then the game just sort of ends? That's a shit story. If the throne absolves the player of having to seek souls (in essence, if it lifts the curse) then that's fine, that's an end to the story. But nothing in the game says it does.

The game even implies by the time you reach the castle you're already forgetting why you would try to get there so it's still functioning as the intro predicted.

If we take the amnesia thing at face value, that would mean that your character has no motivation at all, and simply goes around killing these powerful beings for no reason. Which, again, fair enough, that's how the game starts and I have no problem with that, but you're always looking for a way to get uncursed, and if the game doesn't tell you how to do that at the beginning, it needs to do it at some point before the end of the game or the whole thing is pointless.

The Tarnished have no connection to the lands between any more. They have no reason to care about the Elden Ring as they're not in the lands between.

I swear the game tells you that the shattering fucked up the process of deceased souls proceeding to the afterlife (or being taken into the Greater Will, if you prefer), making the Lands Between either a purgatory, or a mortal world/purgatory combo. Now, you being your difficult self, and me not being able to cite anything specific to back this up, we can say I hallucinated all that, in which case the murderhobo motivation still remains.

and lets be honest From games don't have a story

On the contrary, the good From games that I've played have simple, easily summarised stories.

• Demon's Souls: You're trapped in Boletaria, and to escape you'll need to kill demons to lull the Old One back to slumber.
• Dark Souls 1: You're undead and doomed to lose your mind. To prevent this you have to amass powerful souls, defeat the old God whose decline has led to the world going to shit, and usher in a new age of fire (which we're told is a nice age while it lasts). Granted, there's also the whole Kaathe thing (which is also very clearly explained once you find it), but taken at face value the story is straightforward.
• Sekiro: Do I need to do this one? The game has a shitload of cutscenes.
• Elden Ring: The Ring was shattered and the Lands Between went to shit. You're a Tarnished, and you want to repair the Ring. If it's not to fix the shithole that is the Lands Between, or to let people die properly again, it can be for simple murderhobo reasons, power, wealth and hot chicks.

Dark Souls 2 is the only one with serious issues. It starts the same as the first game, then ????? you must become king for reasons (even though by all accounts it's a shit job and won't help you get uncursed).

 

[Ravielsk]

Correct me if I'm wrong: The story of Elden Ring is that something has gone wrong with the afterlife so people aren't dying properly anymore, and it's believed that restoring the Elden Ring will fix that, which is why so many Tarnished, including the PC, are trying to do it. That seems like a straightforward and compelling enough motivation to me.

Well since you asked here goes.

People not dying is quite literary the least of the problems in the world of elden ring if it is even at problem at all. The only ones who are ever mentioned as being problematic in regards to their immortality are "those who live in death" but even that is only in the sense that their existence is somehow at odds with the golden order. Not in the sense that it violates natural order or is somehow unusual for people to be immortal.
As far as we know immortality has been the norm in the lands between. That said the only thing mentioned for certain is that Marika removed the rune of death from the elden ring by which she most likely stopped natural death from occurring... but again this is never really explained, just mentioned.

The elden ring has literary nothing to do with any of this, at least as far as the ingame material goes. Nothing even alludes to the fact that it shattering somehow altered the world. The only thing concretely said is that the War of Shattering rekt the world but the shattering itself seems to have had little to no impact(at least nothing in the game states anything to the contrary).

 

[Strange Fellow]

The elden ring has literary nothing to do with any of this, at least as far as the ingame material goes. Nothing even alludes to the fact that it shattering somehow altered the world. The only thing concretely said is that the War of Shattering rekt the world but the shattering itself seems to have had little to no impact(at least nothing in the game states anything to the contrary).

Okay, so it's: Elden Ring is shattered -> War breaks out -> War causes the Greater Will to fuck off. The shattering is still the catalyst. Besides, that doesn't really have any bearing on my synopsis, does it? It's still broadly right.

And, to repeat myself once more, even if you want to completely ignore the death thing (even though I think it's pigheaded of you to insist that the cessation of natural death isn't a big deal), there remains the murderhobo thing. If the problem with the Lands Between is that it's in the ravages of civil war, your motivation to become Elden Lord (stomping all your rivals in the process) and usher in a new reign, is perfectly rational.

 

[Ravielsk]

As for Elden Ring, I just watched the intro cutscene again and it was indeed more vague than I remembered, and I can't recall if Malenia goes into more detail. What is clear, though, is that the Elden Ring was shattered and that event lead directly to the abandonment of the Lands Between by the Greater Will, which, we can infer, is when all the bad shit started happening. I think it's reasonable to expect the restoration of the Elden Ring to bring back the Greater Will, considering the shattering is what drove it away. There's a much clearer connection there than between the curse and the throne in Dark Souls 2, which may as well exist in different games.

The first time you are told that fixing the elden ring would even register on the greater will's radar is only after getting your first great rune. Before that point nobody even tries to sell you on the idea that the elden ring is something you should or even could care about.

After obtaining a Great Rune
"Great Elden Ring, root of the Golden Order."
"Anchor of all lands, giver of grace, wellspring of all joy."
"Until it was shattered."
"The tragic corruption of the Order has taken its toll."
"Across the realm, life lies in ruin. Fallen to pieces."
"Foul curses and misery spread, unabating."
"But the Greater Will has not abandoned the realm, nor the life that inhabits it."
"So it is that the Tarnished are guided by grace. Called to act."
"Brave Tarnished, your Great Rune is a handsome shard of the Elden Ring."
"Seek another of its kind."
"To become Elden Lord, and restore the Golden Order."

Metyr's staff later on confirms that the greater will has left the lands between but its highly debatable when that happened.

Staff fashioned from the tail-fingers of Metyr, the Mother of Fingers, and the microcosm raised aloft over the crux they form.
Catalyst for casting both sorceries and incantations.
The Mother received signs from the Greater Will from the beyond of the microcosm. Despite being broken and abandoned, she kept waiting for another message to come.

 

[Strange Fellow]

You have to assume that the player character has a basic knowledge of the world they're living in, and that includes the fact that the title of Elden Lord is up for grabs. Everyone knows that.

 

[Hell Swarm]

If the throne absolves the player of having to seek souls (in essence, if it lifts the curse) then that's fine, that's an end to the story. But nothing in the game says it does.

If you beat all 3 DLCs and go to vendrick's memory you can form a united crown that disables the hollowing mechanic. You can argue that is DLC and doesn't count, but it does completely validate the story of Dark souls 2. Vendrick never conquered the other kings to become the true king. You do and get an item that validates your entire quest.

And, to repeat myself once more, even if you want to completely ignore the death thing (even though I think it's pigheaded of you to insist that the cessation of natural death isn't a big deal), there remains the murderhobo thing. If the problem with the Lands Between is that it's in the ravages of civil war, your motivation to repair the Ring and become Elden Lord, stomping all your rivals in the process and ushering in a new reign, is perfectly rational.

The lands between aren't a From exclusive idea. I forget where it's borrowed from now but it is and you fail to understand even the basic story elements present here.

The rune of death is sealed, it has been sealed for quite some time. Death is impossible and having stolen a small amount of death a demigod was killed with it. Something considered impossible before that because death was not possible. The tree respawns you in a way never explained.

Secondly the lands between are not the only place on that planet or however they wish to shape the world. The lands between have all this going on but else where doesn't. The big ass tree and the Gods manipulating the land may have no impact on things beyond it. The lands between is a very small island compared to what else maybe out there. If I'm a tarnished living my life some where else what possible motivation do I have to go there except for a prophecy no one ever explains to you?