And now we come to Elden Ring. The game that won Game of The Year back in 2022, and now I have recently finished both playing the main game and it's DLC so let's talk about it.
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Premise:
Elden Ring like Dark Souls before it, takes place in a fantasy world that has fallen apart into chaos after an event called The Shattering which happened due to the Shattering of the Elden Ring and the Night of the Black Knives. After this event the Demigod children of Queen Marika began to take the pieces of the Elden Ring called the Great Runes and began conquering parts of the Lands Between.
Queen Marika would then call upon the Tarnished to return to the Lands Between after they were exiled, and have returned to restore the Elden Ring and bring about a new world.
The game follows the protagonist: The Tarnished, like most Fromsoftware games, we can customize and create the character as we wish. With several classes being in the game: Hero, Bandit, Astrologer, Warrior, Prisoner, Confessor, Wretch, Vagabond, Prophet, and Samurai. All of which have different levels, stats, and weapons that the player can use. The Tarnished fights through the Demigod children, claiming their Great Runes until they make it to Lyndell, and after a small detour they are able to fight the final boss and restore the Elden Ring, or create a new age without it... or just burn it all down. You choose what you want.
After the game was released, two years later, the Shadow Of The Erdtree was released. Bringing in a new story, new bosses, and a new ending within said DLC. The DLC was very good, I loved the Land of Shadow, and the bosses namely Messmer, Rellana, and Midra: Lord of Frenzied Flame were some of the best Fromsoft has ever made. The final boss is very difficult, I only one because I used the special ability of Malekith's Black Blade, so I'll take the win.
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Gameplay:
We've already been here and already seen this. Elden Ring is a Soulsborne game so because of that the gameplay is very similar to that of Dark Souls and Bloodborne, the exception here however is... well... the game to me felt easier, likely due to the new mechanics.
This game introduces very overpowered spells (You know the ones), guard counters, a refined system of Ashes of War (This was introduced in Dark Souls 3, still trying to beat that game), and of course the open world system. And because of this open world system, a lot of bosses are reused, some share moveset of previous bosses in other Soulsborne games (Erdtree Avatar and Asylum Demon share most moves). I am fine with this since it felt easier the one thing that annoyed me the most however was the delayed attacks of most of the enemies.
Am I the only one that felt like the delayed attacks only happened after you dodged? Is that just me? Because in Bloodborne and Dark Souls (1 and 2), I could figure out the timings and move on from them, but in Elden Ring it felt like most enemies would delay there attacks for so long.
But I will say this, I love the system of gameplay for Elden Ring, it is very creative and I hope Fromsoft improves it in there next Soulsborne game... unless they want to continue there Armored Core series, which yes, I am playing and it is very fun so far.
But I want to quickly talk about the Bosses
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Boss Fights:
As expected from Fromsoftware, the bosses in there game can be very difficult. The Shardbearer bosses and achievement bosses are the biggest examples (FUCK YOU MALENIA!). While, of course, there were some minor bosses that were either just regular enemies that would show up much later or were enemies with more health (Misbegotten and RuneBear for example). I do enjoy these bosses, some were annoying, but they were manageable for the most part... unless they were a gank and I would use spirit ashes for them.
The lore however is something else.
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Lore:
How can I say this lightly... Oh screw it.
The lore for Elden Ring is AMAZING! A lot of the character quests were fun to do and were fun to explore, although I did use guides to help me with them.
Some of the lore ties to the Dragons thats cool, the idea of the Golden Order, Ranni and the Night of the Black Knives, The Volcano Manor, Stormveil Castle, Godfrey/Hoarah Loux and his Tarnished, Queen Marika and Radagon being the same person (kind of), and my favorite, the lore behind Miquella becoming a god was so interesting and fun. Yes I found all 13 Miquella Crosses, and the lore behind his journey to becoming a god was cool... even if it his Holy Attacks combined with Radahn's attacks were annoying as all hell.
I can clearly see some ties of the lore being connected to Dark Souls 1 and Dark Souls 2, especially with the Dragons and Godfrey being sent away which goes with the Dragon Keep and The Giant Attack that happened in Dark Souls 2, and the Dragons being fought was reminiscent of Dark Souls 1.
The other thing I want to talk about the NPC Sidequests.
Namely these characters: Nepheli Loux, Roderika, Kenneth Haight, Boc the Seamster (Best boy!), D: Hunter of the Dead, Fia, Ranni The Witch, Blaidd the Half-Wolf (THE PHYSICAL EMBODIMENT OF MANS BEST FRIEND), Millicent, Latenna. Along with the DLC NPC's: Sir Ansbach, Needle Knight Leda, Igon (CURSE YOU BAYLE!), St. Trina, Count Ymir, and Jolan.
Due to the Open World, I can definitely see how much Fromsoftware put into the sidequests and I greatly enjoyed doing all of them, from helping Nepheli find a new purpose, aiding Fia, helping Millicent, working with Sir Ansbach... except that they cut one that being Kale's Quest.
Take a quick look if you want to, side note the voice actor fucking kills it in a later section of the video. (12:01-13:40)
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Ending Thoughts:
100/10!
Fromsoftware nailed it with this game! There are some minor issues that I wasn't a fan of, but the game was very enjoyable to me. I'm currently working on Dark Souls 3, and Sekiro, after that Demon Souls will be the last of the Soulsborne.
Thank you all for reading this review.
Hope you all have a good day/afternoon/night!
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Video Game Reviews
FanfictionThis is just me reviewing the video games I played and think deserve a quick review.
