Elden Ring

The gratest From Software game so far...

1. Introduction

Just imagine The legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Dark Souls III having a baby.

Did it? Yes, this is Elden Ring.

From the creators of the old good Demon Souls and the community's favourite franchise Dark Souls, Elden Ring was released in 2022 and it's the ultimate soulslike experience in a big, I mean, BIG open world. While in-game, you will never feel bored.

Before hoping in the Lands Between, I had played all Dark Souls and the game was already out for a while, then I kinda knew exactly what to expect, but I had no idea how huge and fantastic this experience was going to be.

2. Story and Setting

Just like Dark Souls, Elden Ring doesn't have an intrusing story telling, so when you begin, just a context of the universe is given.

Your character is the tarnished, a warrior from a previous time who is returning to a place after being banned years ago.

Your mission can change during the play, but, at first, you aim for becoming the new Elden Lord.

The Lands Between will be your home, and when arriving, you can feel something is out of place in this world. It seems abandoned, as if the very gods had forgotten about this land. This can be understood when talking to the inhabitants, exploring ruins and getting done with every abomination roaming across every corner.

You will met every type of characters, since a grumpy but lovely blacksmith to a scary suicidal girl who just wants to see the world in flames.

3. Gameplay Mechanics

The gameplay is a improvement from Dark Souls. It is faster, more dynamic with the introduction of the jumping key and HELL YEAH WE GOT POWER STANCE BACK, BABY.

If you haven't played any soulslike game before, you may struggle to get used to enemies lurking on blind spots, bosses with multiple phases and being killed by, literally, anything. But don't surrender, tarnished: once you get how to do the job, you will never desire to leave it.

The controls are simple: you have a strong attack, a fast attack, jumping, crouching, dodging(yeah you will use this one a lot) and item consuming.

The main difference here from the previeous From Software games are the jumping and crouching mechanics. Before, you had to control your chareacter move speed by making him walk so you could approach enemies and back-stap them. Now, with the crouching key, you can even "run" while prowling to aproach and deliver your deadly blows. The jumping mechanic is also something that adds to combat, since you dont need to find a high-ground anymore to deal falling damage: now you just press the jump and then the attack keys, making this a huge improvement from the prior and awfull jumping mechanics from Dark Souls I, II and III.

The difficult continues, but now it is better to manage. Before, for example in Dark Souls II, you HAD to deal with Capra Demon to carry on(yeah, the dogs, I know, I know). But now, you have some cards under the sleeve to deal with those situations.

First, the summons. Before you had to summon another player or, in some specifict situations, you could summon one or two npcs to help you. In Elden Ring, there is those "summoning bells" to summon "Spirit ashes", which are monster that you can collect and improve to help you on bosses or specific areas. Those ashes can vary from tanky and resistent shields to fast and deadly assassins. There is one that even copies your character with way more health points!

Seccond, the open world. If you get stuck in a boss fight and cant go though it, just take a break! You can grab your horse and just go somewhere else. This is no joke, I had lost the amount of times I surrendered a fight, wandered somewhere else and found a game-chaning item. Do not underestimate the power of exploration in Elden Ring.

4. Graphics and Sound Design

The visuals in this game can be split in two categories: the graphics and the art direction.

When talking about the graphics, Elden Ring is not revolitionary or incredible, it just does the necessary. Sometimes you can easily notice polygons on clothing, monster and scenario. The 3d modeling is just made to serve the game with quality but nothing outlier or astonishing.

But, if there is something that Elden Ring shines like gold, is the art direction.