Elden Ring

[Jastall]

Leyndell is the right kind of maze- enough to give you various directions to go to and areas to explore, but still sectioned so it doesn't feel like random wandering. Plus it has clear landmarks to convey progress. Probably the best designed level in the game so far.

Although I'm getting sick of fighting Crucible Knights now lol. Still get flashbacks of that boss fight every time I see one.

[draynay]

There are some buy 2 get 1 deals that have me considering Elden Ring but I'm worried it will stress me out too much. I hear there are more checkpoints and things. I liked Demon Souls but didn't get too far because dying was a bit of a set back in that regard. I don't find myself overly frustrated or intimidated by difficulty as much as stressed out that I will lose progress. How big a deal has it been? You all have played enough by now to know. Should I go for it? Or am I doomed to be too casual for souls games?

[hellhamster]

There are some buy 2 get 1 deals that have me considering Elden Ring but I'm worried it will stress me out too much. I hear there are more checkpoints and things. I liked Demon Souls but didn't get too far because dying was a bit of a set back in that regard. I don't find myself overly frustrated or intimidated by difficulty as much as stressed out that I will lose progress. How big a deal has it been? You all have played enough by now to know. Should I go for it? Or am I doomed to be too casual for souls games?

It's pretty much lauded as the game of the generation everywhere, and once the dust settles it will be regarded as a monolith in the gaming industry, on the same level as Ocarina of Time or Final Fantasy VII. It's definitely hard, but it's the most accessible game of that developer so far because of its open world, so yeah go for it I guess.

[minteK917]

There are some buy 2 get 1 deals that have me considering Elden Ring but I'm worried it will stress me out too much. I hear there are more checkpoints and things. I liked Demon Souls but didn't get too far because dying was a bit of a set back in that regard. I don't find myself overly frustrated or intimidated by difficulty as much as stressed out that I will lose progress. How big a deal has it been? You all have played enough by now to know. Should I go for it? Or am I doomed to be too casual for souls games?

You should not stress about losing progress or try not to. Because in their game what you lose is often minimal, the real progress is actually made outside the game, its the player learning. Its us vs a single player game, no stress.

[tehealadin]

It's not a mistake?

??

Just finished NG+. Much easier, though there was one notable exception - the draconic tree sentinel outside of Malekith's boss room. Jesus christ. Took me about 3 hours to kill that fucker. Not started NG++ just yet, doing some rune farming, can't believe I only just realised the sacred relic sword method. Around 300k per minute. I want to try and get all of the endings. So far Ranni and the frenzied flame one. Decided to get that so I never have to go back to those sewers/cathedral ever again. I will likely do the dung eater one next, again because I need to go into the sewers, though not all the way. Missed some sidequests, so will use those playthroughs to get those done.

[Fencers]

There are some buy 2 get 1 deals that have me considering Elden Ring but I'm worried it will stress me out too much. I hear there are more checkpoints and things. I liked Demon Souls but didn't get too far because dying was a bit of a set back in that regard. I don't find myself overly frustrated or intimidated by difficulty as much as stressed out that I will lose progress. How big a deal has it been? You all have played enough by now to know. Should I go for it? Or am I doomed to be too casual for souls games?

Hmm. Well, I mean you don't really lose "progress" by dying. Dying is really no big shake in any Souls game, you can go back and grab the souls. It's not like your souls are dropped after dying in a molten pit of lava which you are forced to retrieve naked while being pelted with lemons by your murderer. That is really an overblown perception of the games and is largely diminished in Elden Ring compared to past games in both perception and actuality.

ER has the easiest runbacks of any Souls game, not just From's own games but the genre. Often you respawn less than 10 seconds away from the place of death. There are checkpoints everywhere- not just bonfires/sites of grace. There are little respawn statues as well.

All you lose is Runes on death and your buffs need to be reapplied. Runes are trivial, frankly. You can farm up runes in the millions with one-shot abilities in this game because of the open-world nature of it all being less locked in (so to speak) than similar games in the genre and franchise.

I am level 230 and still haven't beaten the game- just enjoying the exploration right now. I farmed up like 30k runes when I was around level 70 in 30 minutes or so to buy a weapon upgrade. The rest of my levels and fully upgraded gear came from just playing normal. I die a lot. Sometimes on purpose- I leap off shit all the time, just to see if there are secret invisible walkways or hidden passages. Dying means nothing.

Dying is the most meaningless it has ever been.

Phenomenal game. The best I have played in years, easily the best game since Diablo 2 in my opinion. The game design on display is nothing short of a masterclass in both philosophy and execution. It has elements of the older adventure games and modernity in being approachable that is very enjoyable in the course of play. It is a highly, "playable" game, so to speak.

Only a handful of bosses are mandatory to progress the story. The majority of the game is optional. It's just a place to explore, discover and romp around in ever-gaining in power for your character. Which is relative anyway; you are't so powerful that you totally are without fear of danger or so weak that anything is ever required grinding. It is possible to beat the game at level 1 with a stick the same as level 300 with a +10 weapon, and both scenarios have the possibility of failure/game over.

I was killed by a pack of wild dogs that jumped me even at level 230 last night. Earlier in the day, I had one shot a dragon at level 90. There is always a challenge of some kind depending on how you play the game and even powerful characters/players can be brought low in turn.

The game is worse on PC than on a console, IMO. YMMV, but the PS5 version is a perfect marriage of game and platform. Use a controller if you must play on PC, it's a lot more intuitive.

[draynay]

Hmm. Well, I mean you don't really lose "progress" by dying. Dying is really no big shake in any Souls game, you can go back and grab the souls. It's not like your souls are dropped after dying in a molten pit of lava which you are forced to retrieve naked while being pelted with lemons by your murderer. That is really an overblown perception of the games and is largely diminished in Elden Ring compared to past games in both perception and actuality.

ER has the easiest runbacks of any Souls game, not just From's own games but the genre. Often you respawn less than 10 seconds away from the place of death. There are checkpoints everywhere- not just bonfires/sites of grace. There are little respawn statues as well.

Yes, logically I know it's not that big a deal to die, but stress responses aren't always logical.

I appreciate you all taking the time to answer my question, I do really enjoy exploration so I think I'll get enough enjoyment out of this game even if it stresses me out a little.

I was also a big fan of Diablo 2, so our overlap in game tastes is helpful to know about also, and I was going for the PS5 version as well so no PC concerns to worry about.

[Fencers]

Yes, logically I know it's not that big a deal to die, but stress responses aren't always logical.

I totally understand.

To hopefully ameliorate some of those stress points, there is no real loss in the end. One might lose 2k runes in one death but make back 40k in a couple of minutes.

I appreciate you all taking the time to answer my question, I do really enjoy exploration so I think I'll get enough enjoyment out of this game even if it stresses me out a little.

No problem. Just have fun with it. You can always teleport or ride your horse away if things are too intense. Open world, they really don't narrow your play very much in this game.

[yasiru]

Yes, logically I know it's not that big a deal to die, but stress responses aren't always logical.

I appreciate you all taking the time to answer my question, I do really enjoy exploration so I think I'll get enough enjoyment out of this game even if it stresses me out a little.

I was also a big fan of Diablo 2, so our overlap in game tastes is helpful to know about also, and I was going for the PS5 version as well so no PC concerns to worry about.

I was not a fan of the dark souls games at all because I did find them too difficult for me personally when I dabbled in them. However, I love Elden Ring and I find it more approachable than all of the others mainly due to the open nature of the game, so take that as you will.

[Fencers]

Pretty good video essay on Elden Ring here:



I do think Elden Ring will affect the way games are made and played going forward.

[Darkarath]

Well, I got the platinum yesterday. The game is amazing, a masterpiece, and I cannot wait to play the DLCs (that I guess they are doing although currently we do not know if they exist).

Sadly, I have no motivation to play it anymore until new content is added, as I have killed every boss, earned every trophy and I am not into PvP. Played NG+, defeated some bosses, but meh, is not even close to the first playthrough.

[Simca]

I hope they mess with the enemy health/damage/reward balance. It feels like for the first half of the game they did a good job, and then towards the end whoever gave a shit about that... stopped giving a shit about it. In a dungeon where you fight 2 Erdtree Burial Watchdogs, the final boss has like 1500 health. The Watchdogs have triple that. It feels like every dungeon boss has "why is it always weak foe?" messages plastered everywhere, and I agree with them.

The hardest enemies in this game (besides Malenia/Radagon/Beast) are overworld enemies that give like 4k runes when killed (i.e. absolutely never worth it). I feel like the game would have been even better if they had 3 devs take a quick pass on enemy health (particularly dungeon boss health, which is pathetically low in the endgame) and rewards from overworld enemies.

As it is, the "most correct" way to play is just sprinting from boss to boss, dodging enemies because fighting them is a waste of your time. That may have worked fine as a way to play previous games, but in a game focused on exploration, it's a huge clash with the game's design.

(I personally don't play like this, but most of my friends have adopted this philosophy, especially in later areas. Whenever I complain about a certain overworld enemy, their response is "lolol why are you fighting overworld enemies? are you bad?". That seems like a design problem.)

Edit: One other minor gripe with overworld enemies while I'm on the topic - it would be nice if there was an 'enemy defeated' for each enemy that doesn't respawn once killed in the overworld. Early on, that's the case, but later there are entire sections of enemies that never respawn. Maybe they thought it would get tedious happening over and over (and they're probably right), but it'd be nice to know that "hey, this wasn't a waste of my time because this section will be easier" by some way other than just attempting to respawn them.

[yasiru]

…

As it is, the "most correct" way to play is just sprinting from boss to boss, dodging enemies because fighting them is a waste of your time. That may have worked fine as a way to play previous games, but in a game focused on exploration, it's a huge clash with the game's design.

(I personally don't play like this, but most of my friends have adopted this philosophy, especially in later areas. Whenever I complain about a certain overworld enemy, their response is "lolol why are you fighting overworld enemies? are you bad?". That seems like a design problem.)

I disagree that this is the correct way to play, as you described. You said it yourself, this game has a lot of focus on exploration, so that in and of itself makes the game rewarding as well as fighting all over world mobs and bosses. This sounds more like a problem with how your friends play than a design problem. Fighting mobs only for runes isn't why I fight everything, it’s the fun of fighting with the mobs and bosses period.

[Fencers]

I hope they mess with the enemy health/damage/reward balance.

I agree with this and talked about it earlier. I think some of the runes/rewards for mundane enemies are out of whack. It makes no sense some enemies who are barely even a threat would give 4-5x runes per kill (which you can one-shot easily) but more aggressive enemies are still giving out Limgrave runes in the endgame.

Although the inherent reward of the exploration is the discovery itself. Not an implicit or accomplishment-centered reward. If the latter were true, there would be more necessary structure to the exploration. The design indicates From Software doesn't care if you ever discover these things or when.

It only takes a single instance of design enforcement to negate the counter-strategy of running past everything. Whether or not the player engages with it at all.

[Mehrunes]

Started running into the tedious duo boss fights. Duo gargoyles weren't so bad since the second one isn't active at first but the poison and heavy attack spam was still annoying. Duo Tree Sentinel was a nice bit of jousting I suppose, although they make the Draconic one that comes later look easy.

Weird way to say "jump on the nearby battlement and snipe them while they can't hit you".

Duo Crucible Knights, tho? Man, fuck that fight. I ended up killing them by running around like a coward for 5 minutes easily, firing a few glintstone pebbles at them and then running ad nauseum. One was left and I could finally enjoy the fight, except I played super defensively since dying meant wasting 5+ more minutes poking the spear one to death again, and deciding to come back later meant running the basilisk+chariot oneshot gauntlet again and screw that.

Night Maiden's Mist is where it's at for sorceries to deal with Crucible Knights (duo or otherwise). Also the Ash of War from Loretta works great against them (and all shielded knights) because their AI doesn't know how to deal with the second slash.

[Jastall]

Weird way to say "jump on the nearby battlement and snipe them while they can't hit you".




Night Maiden's Mist is where it's at for sorceries to deal with Crucible Knights (duo or otherwise). Also the Ash of War from Loretta works great against them (and all shielded knights) because their AI doesn't know how to deal with the second slash.

Na, I'm the sporting sort. Well kinda, I found that crossing the door behind them and coming back when they do resets their AI somewhat so only one chases you while the other slowly walks back. So I did exploit that to get one to 25% before the other joined. Still a pretty hard fight but manageable and fun. As for the Knights, solo they're a fun fight so I don't wanna cheese them. But the duo was just some bullshit. I'd rather have seen a Knight paired with a magic user or even a Perfumer, you know, enemies with synergy and different fighting styles. Two slow behemoths in armor that delete you if you come close just encourages cheesing rather than outskilling them. My friend loves parrying and usually Crucible Knights are vulnerable to that, but even then it was too risky to have one wallop him as he finished the riposte animation on the other or said animation just straight up didn't trigger and he got pancaked.

[Fencers]

As for the Knights, solo they're a fun fight so I don't wanna cheese them. But the duo was just some bullshit. I'd rather have seen a Knight paired with a magic user or even a Perfumer, you know, enemies with synergy and different fighting styles. Two slow behemoths in armor that delete you if you come close just encourages cheesing rather than outskilling them. My friend loves parrying and usually Crucible Knights are vulnerable to that, but even then it was too risky to have one wallop him as he finished the riposte animation on the other or said animation just straight up didn't trigger and he got pancaked.

These are the encounters I think your mimic is most helpful. Especially you put forethought into how you summon the mimic such as swapping to a 1h+Shield with a good weapon art and enchant spell for the mimic and swapping to a more offensive weapon set for yourself.

Early on, before my mage basically broke the game, I often carried a heavy great shield and flail to swap for my mimic. That gave me enough time to have it tank for me while I power stance two staffs and un-freaking-loaded till my FP bar was empty. The Physik with the damage bubble and no FP cost was hitting the ultimate button. Literally deleted bosses way above my level in seconds.

[Jastall]

These are the encounters I think your mimic is most helpful. Especially you put forethought into how you summon the mimic such as swapping to a 1h+Shield with a good weapon art and enchant spell for the mimic and swapping to a more offensive weapon set for yourself.

Early on, before my mage basically broke the game, I often carried a heavy great shield and flail to swap for my mimic. That gave me enough time to have it tank for me while I power stance two staffs and un-freaking-loaded till my FP bar was empty. The Physik with the damage bubble and no FP cost was hitting the ultimate button. Literally deleted bosses way above my level in seconds.

Hadn't leveled my Mimic actually, only had a +7 Kaiden Mercenary who is very aggressive and usually pretty decent but gets ass whooped by the shield knight in particular. I got Mimic itself to +7 right after the double Crucible dungeon due to finding lots of grass in it, haven't played enough to test its effectiveness yet. I usually run Carian shield + magic Greatsword which should do fine-ish, anyway I'm not looking for cheeses unless I feel like I have to. Conquering a difficult fight is far more satisfying than trashing a boss with an OP builds for me, at least the first time around.

And honestly the game is so huge, and most of my enjoyment lies so much in the discovery, that I doubt I'll replay it for a notable amount of time save to play DLCs. Just the thought of redoing the early game completely discourages me.

[draynay]

I was not a fan of the dark souls games at all because I did find them too difficult for me personally when I dabbled in them. However, I love Elden Ring and I find it more approachable than all of the others mainly due to the open nature of the game, so take that as you will.

It does seem like it would work well when I get stuck on something to just run off and screw around elsewhere until I'm a little better leveled and a little better playing.

If I get better at this style of game it will mean I can get back to Demon Souls too which is a bonus.

Just google a bit to see which class fits your preferred playstyle and dig in.

Yeah, I wish I'd known to do this when I tried the first Dark Souls, they just toss you in the deep end and don't teach you how classes work at all. I'll be figuring it out soon.

[Fencers]

Yeah, I wish I'd known to do this when I tried the first Dark Souls, they just toss you in the deep end and don't teach you how classes work at all. I'll be figuring it out soon.

Just a note, classes don't mean much in the end.

By choosing a class at the start all you are effectively doing is choosing starting equipment and level.

However, there isn't anything to stop a Warrior class from going full mage or a Confessor class wearing heavy armor, a great shield, and swinging a colossal weapon.

The best starting class for a player unsure of what they want to build toward is the Wretch. Starts at level 1 with all stats equal. So one can be more flexible in the early game.

Whereas choosing Samurai to start might mean you have to wait a lot longer to use X or Y weapon/spell compared to the Wretch that has a lot more choice early on.

In the end, a Warrior, Confessor, Prisoner, Astrologer, etc. They don't play any differently from each other or have anything special about them at all.

The stats aren't ever higher/lower than the others either. A Samurai and Confessor can have the same amount of Dexterity or Vigor, for example.