Elden Ring

We don't have a standalone topic for this? Odd.

Doing my usual thing of not going where the game wants me to go. Found a big spiral of air which looked dangerous, but appears to be fine (there's a tutorial for it and everything). Saw a massive creature on the clifftop, and he started chasing me as I got too close. Beat him. Thought I'd defeated a boss… and then it turns out there's a whole gang of them up on the clifftop. Fuck.

Beat an invader near a big colosseum building with no way in. Felt quite good about that. Off we go!

Found a secret crevice in the cliff by a broken stone bridge. Tracked it round the back of the cliff, ended up somewhere completely off the map segment I found. Something about lakes. Got into the castle! Had to turn back, because there's no way through.

Found a church up on a clifftop with a shitty sorcerer inside asking for a donation. The bloodstains around him tell me giving is better than attacking. He's a bit shit. Fought scythe-carrying skeletons in two graveyards. Ended up at a grace spot by a misty lake which is probably a terrible idea. Still haven't fought a boss (bar the one right at the start).

This is just me finding somewhere to jot down my exploits while they're fresh in my head, by the way, don't mind me.

Nothing is more stressful than entering a seemingly completely peaceful area full of player bloodstains

Nothing is more stressful than entering a seemingly completely peaceful area full of player bloodstains

I found a spot FULL of them in the Roundhouse, below the balcony. No idea why, I can't see a way down there (unless it's through all the imp doors).

You can jump now, remember? Jump down and find out.

No, it's a long drop.

I know you're joking but people will be very surprised at the fall distance you can take in this game before going splat, it's pretty hard to judge consistently but it's a nice buff.

I wasn't! I know you can fall further with Torrent, but the drop looks like a punishing one (especially if there's a fight down there right afterwards). Besides, there's no violence in the Roundhouse… so I dunno what's up with that. Maybe later!

You can jump now, remember? Jump down and find out.

I did that. Early. Too early. :p

I’ve been screaming around exploring too, though I’ve played about 24 hours, beaten several bosses (story and otherwise), and still only got to the bit Mart is talking about yesterday…

I was a bit worried about my class choice (Prisoner, trying to go DEX/INT for some spellblade action, seeing as this looked like the first time magic was really viable in one of these), but all the really good and/or cool weapons I was finding were STR and/or Faith, which was especially galling seeing as I very nearly rolled a Confessor instead…

After a very good session yesterday, and now I have a stupidly powerful katana that scales with both DEX and INT, and a second that’s nearly as good, and that I can dual wield with for if I run out of Mind. (I can’t even remember if I have a shield at this point. Maybe next playthrough. :p )

This is an absolutely fantastic game, by the way.

I want to give this a go purely because of the reaction it's getting, and how much that differs from my impression of it. Judging by the gameplay videos (which I'm aware is silly) it looks slow, dull, and utterly uninteresting.

But I can't remember anything getting such universal praise before, from both the press and the public.

I’ve been screaming around exploring too, though I’ve played about 24 hours, beaten several bosses (story and otherwise), and still only got to the bit Mart is talking about yesterday…

I think I've only played about four, maybe five hours. I haven't fought a single boss yet bar the spider boy at the start. Where the fuck am I going then?

I was a bit worried about my class choice (Prisoner, trying to go DEX/INT for some spellblade action, seeing as this looked like the first time magic was really viable in one of these), but all the really good and/or cool weapons I was finding were STR and/or Faith, which was especially galling seeing as I very nearly rolled a Confessor instead…

I am a Confessor. I've found a bunch of weapons - another sword, a crossbow, a flail - and I can't use any of them. I don't even have a staff, so I can't use spells either. FFS.

I started as confessor and I didn't end up using Faith too much, the classes don't really matter a lot.

Looks like I've answered my own question about where I am… the answer is 'In the middle of bloody nowhere'.

https://www.xbox.com/play/media/L2GNRB6D

https://www.xbox.com/play/media/5M9YC282

Seems cozy.

I found a crystal sword! And I have a staff! Can't use either, need a LOT more levels first (like, I'm Int 9 and the staff needs 15…). So… grinding, I guess?

That village sucked and the boss there with his massive spiked swords and fire breath (Omen-something?) ruined me. Twice. Second time, I fell off a bridge, landed on some rocks and then my runes spawned inside the rock so I couldn't retrieve them. Bah.

Now I'm on the Weeping Peninsula, having crossed the Bridge of Sacrifice. I finally levelled up enough to use my crossbow, so that's nice. Still not met Margit, still not killed a boss. Seven hours in. What a hoot.

(I am enjoying it, honestly)

It's extremely amusing to me that, even though we were briefly in the same area, we appear to have fired off in completely different directions again, to the point where I still don't think I've even seen (or at least visited) the areas you're talking about - despite having played the game for over 30 hours now - and last night I killed another two bosses.

I'm not sure either of us have done it the "right" way, either, because I'm not sure there is one - to me it sounded at first like you'd almost avoided the bits where I thought you were supposed to go early on, but since then I've spent a bunch of time exploring (which is to say sneaking and/or running through avoiding enemies that could very easily murderlise me) and grinding through a bunch of places where I am (or at least was) definitely under-levelled, just trying to find fun gear and bring my level up a bit. There's definitely bits that are easier to do in certain orders, and sometimes the game does give you a subtle nudge, but so much stuff is optional, and there are always plenty of options in terms of where to go, it's just a question of whether or not it's a good idea…

(On which note, I'm still a little annoyed I didn't go Confessor, as I'm liking the look of some of the Faith gear and Incantations more than the INT/Sorcery I'm using, but that just means I'm already considering a second playthrough, despite being increasingly aware of how far I am from being finished with this one.)

Mart - just out of idle curiosity, have you actually unlocked the horse, or the "other place"?

I still don't think I've even seen (or at least visited) the areas you're talking about - despite having played the game for over 30 hours now

The village I was in is up in the top left of the map, up a cliff path beyond a muddy swamp full of massive crabs and poisonous humanoid things. The Weeping Peninsula is bottom right, past the lake with the dragon in it (I assume, I didn't see it but someone under a bridge with a massive metal sieve on his head told me not to go there) and over the bridge guarded by a huge flaming crossbow turret. Will keep going for a bit, then look somewhere else.

I can also summon a giant spectral jellyfish to fight by my side. Because of course.

I'm not sure either of us have done it the "right" way, either, because I'm not sure there is one - to me it sounded at first like you'd almost avoided the bits where I thought you were supposed to go early on

That's exactly what I did, am doing and will continue to do for a while.

but since then I've spent a bunch of time exploring (which is to say sneaking and/or running through avoiding enemies that could very easily murderlise me) and grinding through a bunch of places where I am (or at least was) definitely under-levelled, just trying to find fun gear and bring my level up a bit. There's definitely bits that are easier to do in certain orders, and sometimes the game does give you a subtle nudge, but so much stuff is optional, and there are always plenty of options in terms of where to go, it's just a question of whether or not it's a good idea…

I'm pretty sure I know where I'm meant to go, but I'm in no way prepared for that right now. I'd rather spend time exploring, levelling up and generally seeing the world… that wasn't really something you could do in Dark Souls without getting utterly ruined, so it's nice to have that freedom.

I'm still a little annoyed I didn't go Confessor, as I'm liking the look of some of the Faith gear and Incantations more than the INT/Sorcery I'm using

I have no idea what this means, I've only found a handful of weapons and armour, and it's all just bog-standard requiring me to increase my strength or dexterity. I have some spells, but can't use them without a staff (which I have, but my INT stats aren't high enough to use it). What am I missing?

Mart - just out of idle curiosity, have you actually unlocked the horse, or the "other place"?

Yes and yes, assuming you mean the Roundhouse. Both just require you to find lost grace spots, no other progress needed. Finding as many as possible seems to be my goal currently, so I can then teleport around the map at will.

OH.

I've found two 'evergaols', which is as awful as it sounds. Been soundly thrashed in both of them, so will come back to those later. Probably.

Other random discoveries:

• Crested the brow of a low hill while following the road (well, what seems to be a road) and saw two of those massive giant monsters ahead. However, it was a convoy! They were pulling a wagon which had a chest in the back - I assume, it's the same wagon you see by the gatefront ruins and those have chests - but there were horseback guards everywhere and shambling slave monsters following behind. I dodged it, but I bet there's something good to be had there.
• Down a slope between some rocks, I spotted a fence that denotes a guard camp. It wasn't a guard camp though, but more of a… slave camp? There were guards and lookouts (sorcerers with crowns that could throw blue bolts), but mostly it was just shambling slave beings scratching at the ground in simulated work. Killed a few, but left them to it.
• Looking down from a cliff, I saw a pitched battle between two guards and a large gaggle of goblin-like things with clubs. Thought they might take each other out, but it went on for ages… I ended up wading in and slaughtering all of them.

I like this stuff. Feels much more like a living world than just narrow corridors and bridges with enemies just standing around. Very enjoyable.

It's the best open world by an absolute mile, the fact that you and Jdub have played for hours and not had much overlap is one aspect of why.

And the great thing about feeling you're in a high level area or whatever is you can fight potentially op stuff for the areas you ARE supposed to be in. If you open that Chest you will be invincible during the animation, just mash Y/Triangle to take what's in it and if you die you will still have it. There are very sequence breaky parts in other games but obviously this takes it to the next level.

My best one so far involved a seriously powerful knight, who on our first encounter cleanly parried my very first attack, and then damn near one-shot me with the riposte. I started trying to evade him, made a break for the room he had been guarding. Stepped on the switch for the lift in there, but he managed to join me on it, at which point I was basically screwed, as I’m still pretty squishy, and tend to kite around sniping, rather than getting up close and personal, especially if the enemy is that strong.

Second attempt was going a little better, right up until I ended up in the room with the (now absent) lift again, only to fall down the shaft, followed by the knight, who never respawned again thereafter.

32 hours in now, still finding new places, full of mysterious things, and loving it.

I still don't understand why the man under the bridge was wearing a big metal sieve though.

Killed a massive pink flower that couldn't really fight back. Climbed a lookout tower. Activated another evergaol (so that's three). Found two churches, one of which was guarded by headless ghost knights. Examined some kind of skeleton statue and now there's a blue stream of light flowing out of it to the south. Spotted a huge building on legs nearby with a massive bell hanging underneath, which is now ringing loudly and ominously.

Still not killed a boss.

Found a cave. Poisonous cave. Got poisoned. Can't use Cure Poison spells. Fuck.

Got into the walking building. No idea what to do there. Climbed another tower, opened a chest, got teleported to the far, far top right of the map. Big castle, massive killer statue. Yikes. That'll do for today.

Dont forget that every church has the item to empower flask heals!

Got into the walking building. No idea what to do there. Climbed another tower, opened a chest, got teleported to the far, far top right of the map. Big castle, massive killer statue. Yikes. That'll do for today.

If that's the area I think it is, that was my favourite farming spot for ages - you can basically avoid the "bodyguard" (which you've described as the massive killer statue) and then (carefully) head down the hill taking out the soldiers (Vulgar Militia?). They could pretty much one-shot me when I first got there (and they still have at least one move that can still get me in one with 25+ in Vigor, I think), but they're pretty easy to sneak up on, and then finish off, as long as you don't get ambushed by more than one of them at a time. They're also each worth over 1,000… I want to say runes?

There's another waypoint at the bottom of the hill, so I would often teleport there and then do a loop of the hill (avoiding the massive bastard), level up and then do it again, if I really needed a boost.

get teleported

"Oh wow the map goes out this far, fuck"

Got into the walking building. No idea what to do there. Climbed another tower, opened a chest, got teleported to the far, far top right of the map. Big castle, massive killer statue. Yikes. That'll do for today.

If that's the area I think it is, that was my favourite farming spot for ages - you can basically avoid the "bodyguard" (which you've described as the massive killer statue) and then (carefully) head down the hill taking out the soldiers (Vulgar Militia?).

There's a hill??! From what I can see, there's no way out of the area I'm in other than teleporting back to a different grace spot. Where I spawn at the grace spot, there's a flight of stairs behind me and a walkway, leading to a massive drop with a lift… except the lift doesn't work and you can't interact with the lever, so you must have to come up from the bottom. I did run into the area with the statue, saw two raised platforms on the left and right (the one on the left has… something I can't use on it? A stone frame with a hole in) but didn't look over the back ledge. If there's stuff down there… well. Goddamn.

For reference, here's where I'm talking about… the grace spot is up by where the statue is.

get teleported

"Oh wow the map goes out this far, fuck"

Yep. Really impressed.

There is no hill beyond the ledge, just a sheer drop. I'm definitely not where you think I am, JDub (the map says it's the Divine Bridge).

Headed south from the Weeping Peninsula. Came across a village where the people had all gone mad with something… their eyes glowed orange, as did those of the local rats. Found a spell that seems to give me the same effect. Killed two crossbow-wielding harpy things. Made it to the castle (Castle Morne) after dodging another massive killer statue… this one had a huge crossbow that fired bolts like rockets. Looks like the castle's gone to pot, there are dead people strung up everywhere and humanoid beasts with swords. Oh dear.

I'm blown away by this game. Aside form knowing it was coming out at some point and then being pulled in by that cheap Curries pre-order I don't think I spent much time checking out the hype. I don't know if that approach has served me really well or if it's just that for the last… 13 odd years these have been the games I've most enjoyed playing. At some point during that time I read a piece about these games and how they effectively ruined other games for their players. That's obvious hyperbole but I sort of get the point. In between these titles I can waver between so many titles without any commitment to them but with these titles something in my brain just goes "great, we're doing this again" and that's it, I'm in. God of War is about the only game outside the FromSoft titles I can think of that's done this in recent times.

I loved the exploration around Stormveil castle and have been finding different nooks, crannies and npc characters that are threading together items and clues. Most recently I found a warp to a far off area populated by little jawa types who drop 1000+ runes with each death. I've become a farmer to spec up my Vagabond and do some spell casting. This was prompted by finding ashes of a knight and not having enough FP to summon them. It performs pretty well on base PS4 as well but I'm on the PS5 stock checker more often now.

Knight schmight, it's all about the spectral jellyfish. And wolves. But mostly jellyfish.

There is no hill beyond the ledge, just a sheer drop. I'm definitely not where you think I am, JDub (the map says it's the Divine Bridge).

Nope, we're in totally different areas again. :D

dizzy appears to have (again, possibly) found where I was talking about though. He'll probably know if he gets down to the bottom of the hill, and sees why I've never tried to get over the bridge there…

I'm worryingly tempted to start a new character, to try a different playstyle, despite my current one being perfectly fine, and actually quite kitted out now. I just feel like trying a more in your face and/or sword & board character, with Faith magic.

I think I need help.

dizzy appears to have (again, possibly) found where I was talking about though. He'll probably know if he gets down to the bottom of the hill, and sees why I've never tried to get over the bridge there…

Yep, only went that far last night - I'd mostly stuck to the first 10-15 guys when farming but went right down the track and… NOPE.

I need to find this place, but I almost don't want to… that means I'm not exploring organically.

Spent all of lunchtime in this castle, roaming around killing things. Did two full loops and couldn't work out what I was missing… there doesn't seem to be a point to the place, no end to the means. Except I was standing right by where I needed to go and missed it. Oh well. It's right by a grace spot, so I can easily go back and carry on. Not tonight though.

Read a lot of discourse about Elden Ring's UX (or lack thereof) and then saw this.

Oooof. If it did look like that (which is to say, it looks like every other open world game that I hate), I'd never have even considered picking it up.

The little western dev pile-on on Elden Ring has been equal parts pathetic and entertaining. That Horizon Zero Dawn dev looking down his nose at Elden Ring's quest design in particular makes me not care about playing that game at all anymore.

I get it's not for everyone. But here, I like not being told where to go or what to do. When I end up with a laundry list of tasks, it feels like work. I don't want that from my games.

Everything with icons everywhere, with reams of tasks and pointers of where to go… that's not for me. For some, but not for me. The people saying their way is the right way can fuck off, there's no clear science to what's right or wrong.

Massive bosses that can kill you with one hit, however, those CAN get fucked. Finally met my first boss, only a small one, and I can get it down to two-thirds health at most. On the other hand, it can kill me without even thinking. Sigh. Elden Ring is finally doing what I stopped playing Dark Souls for.

The little western dev pile-on on Elden Ring has been equal parts pathetic and entertaining.

I kind of sympathise with that reaction, to an extent.

Western triple-A studios focus-test everything to hell and back. Almost every rough edge is sanded off, which results in a lot of visually similar, homogenous experiences, all in the pursuit of publisher profits – maximise appeal, maximise sales, minimise risk. Crunch is punishing, and bonuses are tied to review scores, so everything is played super-safe, at the cost of reducing significant innovation (outside of the rendering pipeline, at least). But people still take pride in what they do, and they work hard within pretty tight restrictions to make something good. Okay, maybe it's not breaking any gameplay design barriers, but it's solid, accessible and fun.

And then here comes From Software, thumbing their nose at every convention, and they get accolades heaped on them for it.

Also, it's maybe worth pointing out that the criticism (at least the stuff I've seen) wasn't aimed at FromSoft, it was about what was perceived as a double standard held by reviewers. Imagine if the next Assassin's Creed didn't have a quest log! Ubisoft would be pilloried.

I BEAT A BOSS.

https://www.xbox.com/play/media/7875WA39

no, it's not a massive pink flower that can only fall over on top of you, shut up

I have never seen that boss

I beat something that Al hasn't, this is the greatest day of my life.

It probably means you fucked up.

More like I did lol. I should have probably did a final comb over before beating it but…it's a very big map. >_>

It's in the depths of a dark, poison-filled cave to the south east that's quite hard to see through the trees in front of the entrance.

Speaking of caves though, I'm currently in another - I found a place called Morne Tunnel, which is full of the same humanoid monsters that have overrun Castle Morne. Plus, things with pickaxes that have rock-hard skin, meaning swords ping off them. Thank God I have my whip, it cuts through them like butter. Bet there's another boss in here somewhere…

There was a boss! I beat him. I'm on a roll.

https://www.xbox.com/play/media/FCP3H6G5

Or I was, until I got crushed repeatedly by a giant tree. Gah.

I still know that this game most likely isn't for me (just the inability to pause is completely incompatible with my life) and I've tried soulsboure games before and they haven't clicked with me at all, but damn my resolve is wavering. I reckon I'm only a few days away from wasting £40 quid on this.

I am fully with you. I’ll have bought this in three days, be complaining about it in four, and have given up in five.

Every aspect of it except the combat sounds wonderful.

If you currently have a gaming PC, there’s an ‘easy mode’ mod. No such luck on console of course.

If you currently have a gaming PC, there’s an ‘easy mode’ mod. No such luck on console of course.

Aaaaaaand I bought it.

Now where do I get this easy mode? Also, is there one for real life?