What if Elden, but Ring?

I am on the final boss fight for Elden Ring, learning how to get good enough against Radagon to still have enough resources left over for the Elden Beast. I think it’s one of the best games I’ve played in quite awhile, but I do have some issues with it. Spoilers below.

Watching my boyfriend play Elden Ring, I was so very excited to get a chance to play it for myself, once he was done with it. I play a lot of action RPGs — Scarlet Nexus, Horizon Forbidden West, and so on. These aren’t “Souls”-like games that string together elaborate and punishing boss fights with a thin plot, but they do require being generally aware of what’s going on.

While he was working through the game, I played through to the first boss in Bloodborne, an earlier game by the same company. I also picked up Salt & Sanctuary, a 2D “Souls”-like game not made by From Software, but with that same vibe. I made decent progress up until I didn’t.

Still, I read that Elden Ring was the more approachable “Souls”-like, that opened almost the entire world to you after the tutorial. It was an open-ended experience where you chart your course, with only the gentlest of hints to guide your journey.

Elden Ring was, by far, the least enjoyable game opening for any RPG I have ever played, save one. I died to absolutely everything I came across. My timing was bad, my gear was bad, I had no idea what I was doing — and at this point you might be expecting me to continue with, “…but it was the most fun I have ever had in an RPG”.

Nooooooo nope. If I hadn’t had coaching from my BF about how to approach the bosses, where to go next, just what to do, I don’t know how far I’d have gotten into the game.

I did find that dragon to kill for a quick few levels, and another farm spot up on the Atlus Plateau that I got to early that let me just outlevel a lot of the difficulty and let me play around with builds. Coaching got me a weapon — Reduvia — that would carry me through the game until I got Eleanor’s Poleblade, which did the job until I finally got the infamous meme weapon Rivers of Blood. When fully upgraded, I could slice through most everything.

Grinding levels further got me some knowledge and ability in Dragon Communion Incantations, which was my secret sauce through most of the boss fights afterward. And that was my build. Rivers of Blood in my main hand, Dragon Communion Seal in my offhand, ready to cosplay a dragon at the drop of a hat.

Did you know that there are quests in Elden Ring? Because aside from the Ranni quest that my BF was talking me through, I believe I missed every single other quest in the game. There’s a lot of stuff I won’t be able to read, places I won’t be able to go, gear and spells I just won’t be able to obtain, just because I had no frickin clue whatsoever that they existed, or, if I’d been lucky enough to encounter them, wasn’t clear on how to continue them.

I’d finish a task for someone to return and find they were dead. Why? I don’t know. Apparently a sorcerer offed himself in the main base and I was supposed to pick up some stuff — gone now, I never saw it. There was an NPC in the base that apparently led to a nice ending if you hugged her enough. I didn’t know that.

The entirety of my run has been — how do I get to and then complete the next boss? And so I have missed so much of the game. I get that this is supposed to encourage players to play again on NG+ or maybe from the beginning again, but mostly it makes me upset. Like I have been wasting my time and should have been taking notes or at least looking up NPCs I met on the excellent wiki.

I worked hard on my blood dragon knight build. Together with my mimic, I walked through the bosses in the icefields of the mountaintops and then to the ruins of the capital city. This build turns out to be useless against the final bosses in the game, but that’s okay. I’m working on something and I do expect to be able to get some ending to the game sometime this week.

I can’t actually say I’ve enjoyed my time in Elden Ring. It feels like a job. I’ve learned some stuff about myself, though. I’ve learned that I really do want direction in the game. If only so I know what the heck is going on. I don’t particularly want to replay this, once done, and I don’t feel any desire to go back and play another Souls-like game — not even the ones I have started.

I’ve watched plenty of videos, and its clear the people showing off the moves and tricks have a deep understanding of the game, deep enough so that the various mechanics are variations they have seen a dozen times and they dodge, roll, parry and punish with easy. I envy those people.

Elden Ring is an achievement, and it deserves all the praise. It’s just not a game for me. I will stick to the RPGs that give players a little more guidance. Horizon Forbidden West is like Elden Ring in a lot of ways, but you always know which plot threads are available, even if you choose to ignore them. Common complaint is that the game is leading you on a little TOO much, with protagonist Aloy continually narrating things she thinks she ought to be doing. But, HFW is an open world game leading to big boss fights that can be taken on with a wide variety of builds and weapons — among many other simularities.