Elden Ring Review: Era Defining

Note: The following review contains minor spoilers for Elden Ring, and was based off a PS5 playthrough. While nothing major will be shown/discussed, those wishing to go in completely fresh here is the short version: The game is a generational masterpiece.

One minor thing I expected in Elden Ring was patches of seemingly solid stone which disappeared upon being struck, but after a lot of misplaced swings I began to doubt the game contained any illusory walls at all. However, during one of my ventures in the Lands Between, the games setting, I noticed a cluster of signs in front of a nondescript patch of crag, and I decided one more thwack couldn't hurt. My expectations were low, those signs had deceived me before, but shockingly the rocky surface faded away to reveal a dark narrow passageway beyond. The illusory wall had been hiding one of the games excellent optional dungeons, and I excitedly dived in. Sadly, this excitement was misplaced. The cave was short, unchallenging, and contained no real reward, taking less than 5 minutes to explore. I returned to the entrance, mood considerably dampened. A hidden tunnel being a bit small would not even count as a flaw in most games, but it took away a bit of Elden Ring's magic. Morosely I scanned my map, wondering which direction to turn next, when a thought hit me like a thunderbolt.

I knew the game had illusory walls now.

I dashed back to the end of the cave, and sure enough one of the pitch-black dead ends proved to be nothing of the sort. I walked into a vast cavern, one which could only be traversed by clambering across a series of immense blue crystals. Lose your footing at any point and you would plunge downward into a lake of viscous green poison, inhabited by something with far too many limbs and far too little hospitality. Eventually I made it through, only to be greeted by another series of tunnels with their own set of menacing residents. My reward for making it past this final set of challenges? A boss fight with an enemy totally different to anything I'd seen before, which beat me so savagely I gave up and left, making a mental note to revisit it in around 10 levels time.

The only problem with Elden Ring is how obsolete every other open-world now looks.

Temple Run

It may seem odd to start a review with a rambling story about a surprisingly large cave, but for me this captures the single best thing about Elden Ring. For while I was galloping, slicing, dodging and dying my way through the stunning Nordicly-inspired landscape, two thoughts kept smacking me harder than any great club ever could.

The game can't be this big.

The game can't be this detailed.

But it always was.

The one time these thoughts left me, during the aforementioned cave story, they came roaring back with a fury upon the realisation that the stony dead-end was actually a gleaming new adventure. Whatever else you have heard about graphics, combat, difficulty, mysterious NPC questlines, and tortoises, the single most important aspect of Elden Ring is that the medium of videogames has never produced a world more worth exploring. Which is shocking giving that in the lead up to release, many believed an open-world setting would be a fatal flaw.

End of game challenge? More like finishing the tutorial...

Moving to an open-world has become a popular strategy in big budget gaming over the years, but the news FromSoftware would be taking this path was concerning to say the least. There is perhaps no team more revered in gaming than Hidetaka Miyazaki's, but a vital part of their game design was that their worlds were all essentially elaborate corridors. This "corridor" design allowed for precise enemy placement and tightly designed encounters, something that could be completely with a more open environment. It seemed nigh on impossible to create a game where you could explore freely, and also enjoy the signature challenge found in FromSoftware's corridors.

Yet, somehow, Elden Ring manages it.

The land is vast and wild, but none of the frenetic fun of "corridor fighting" is lost, in fact it is somehow improved upon. By utilising a wide variety of different locales, enemies, hazards and dirty tricks, Elden Ring ensures the classic thrill remains untouched. Yes, you can approach those ruins in any direction, but the skeletons are all going to wake up immediately no matter what, and if you aren't paying attention you'll be much deader than they are. Yes, you have the freedom to ride past the giant crabs in mire area, but if you hit a dead end you'll be faced with a pincery demise due to all the crustaceans that have followed you down this little cul-de(ath)-sac. You are free to do anything you want, but the Lands Between is full of unsettling denizens who have been put in the perfect place to ruin your day. All this is to say, the game does not lose the Dark Souls magic, while adding setting more vast and detailed than any that have come before.

You, me, anyone else who has touched an open-world game over the last decade, we've been made to settle for less. Barring a few notable exceptions (Yes Breath of the Wild is one of them) open-worlds are a stale format, full of cookie cutter enemy encampments and radio towers. Elden Ring boldly asks the question, "What if it wasn't bad?". What if instead of the same human opponent populating the same lifeless base, we put in a sea cave with two beast-human monstrosity bosses? And a catacomb patrolled by what can only be described as an industrial lawnmower with a grudge against life? And a convoy containing precious cargo pulled by a duo of grumpy giant trolls? (These examples are all from my first hour within the Lands Between) The game being as big as it is would not impress me at all, for the largest open-worlds are frequently the most dully repetitive, but the fact that every inch of the map is bursting with unique challenge and reward just shows how much better this genre can, and should, be.

"How convoy-nient" I said to myself before being immediately bludgeoned to death.

Let me pause my gushing for a second, and try to provide some balance. After all, even I can admit Elden Ring has its faults. However, I must also be truthful and say absolutely none of these stop the game from being "perfect" in my eyes.

Let me explain.

If you critique games "by subtraction", that is to say every graphical flaw or frustrating enemy knocks a point off, Elden Ring would sit between an 8-9 out of 10. However, if you value ambition over flawlessness, if you would rather see a game shoot for the stars than settle for the moon, then what FromSoftware have put out is essentially beyond reproach. Yes there are graphically stronger games out there, yes the game can be too obtuse, yes the weapon upgrade materials have boring names, but this is a gaming experience in a class of its own. The fact I use "Smithing Stone 2" to improve my hammer does not prevent the game being "perfect".

(Sidenote: I have used a PS5 for my playthrough, and have noticed barely any performance problems, but the reported issues for PC players cannot be overlooked. Sadly, this review is only true for the console version I played, and must be disregarded if you are a PC player.)

So the world is impressive and the flaws don't hold it back, but surely there's more to say than this? Well, of course. Elden Ring retains the stamina-based combat system first seen in Demon's Souls, although there has been a lot of improvements made over the years. The game cherry-picks the best elements of what's come before, retaining the pace of Bloodborne, the healing of Dark Souls and the jumping of Sekiro. Elden Ring also takes "Weapon Arts" from Dark Souls 3, where each weapon possessed a unique action supposedly of great benefit to the user. Sadly in Dark Souls 3 this idea was great in theory but not in practice, with the "Arts" in question seldom being more useful than a regular attack. This is no longer the case. Elden Ring's "Weapon Skills" are an improvement on what came before in every way, with skills providing a powerful "ace" which can be key in tougher fights. However, if you do feel disappointed by your swords special power, don't worry, "Ashes of War" are items found throughout the world that allow you to equip new skills. This compliments the exploration well, as it gives another exciting set of rewards worth braving the latest poison swamp for.

This is not a true poison swamp. Just a swamp with poisonous enemies in it. Also dragons.

The combat being based on what came before but subtly improved is how much of Elden Ring can be described. Over the years Hidetaka Miyazaki and his team have proven unmatched at cramming far too many corpses into a suit of armor and animating it in a truly horrific way, which is one way of saying the boss fights are once again rather good. The lore is rich, inventive and utterly innaccessible to all but the most dedicated of players, or those who know to watch a certain YouTuber's videos after the fact. The NPC's populating the Land's Between are completely insane in an endearing way, most playing out hauntingly sad tales you will never see the end of because quest lines are borderline impossible to follow (Also many of them sound British for some reason).

Many will have read the above paragraph already knowing everything it said without having played Elden Ring, because that's just how Hidetaka Miyazaki and co. make games. Very good games mind you. But games that you can bullet point.

• Setting - Quite unique and incredibly bleak.

• NPC's - Pretty miserable about the setting.

• Combat - Brutal but rewarding.

• Side Quests - EASILY MISSED.

• Graphics - Good, but not mindblowing.

• Bosses - Best around.

• Story - Something is definitely happening, I just don't know what.

This all rings true for their latest outing, but with one golden addition which elevates it above the rest of modern gaming.

• Open-World - I doubt you could even imagine it.

I see trees of gold.

Ultimately, there is but two words say about Elden Ring. Play it. If you have never "got" Soul's combat, take heart in the fact there has never been more options, including upgradeable NPC summons which can take the sting out of even the toughest encounters (If you felt like a friendly giant jellyfish would have got you through Bloodborne then I've got good news). You might get stuck on a boss, but unlike previous games in this mould, you have a huge wild world to explore, and you won't get stuck everywhere. And everywhere is where you should be going. Whatever it takes to get through Elden Ring, get through it, because for the first time in the long time, a triple AAA open world is worth every bit of hype.

Now if you'll excuse me, I must be going.

I have so much more to explore.

Score: However many poison swamps there are in Elden Ring out of/10