Aight, pretty much slept on this over night.

I had no idea what I was getting into with elden ring even less than most of the people hyped about it due to me not really watching trailers or even researching whats its about. I only really knew that GRRM and FS collaborated on this. In a way this helped as I already had familiarity with FS games, though I never truly finished them. I didn't even know it was open world till week of release .

So picking up ER, 3 weeks of playing through the game, going for achievements and actually finishing it for a first playthrough is kinda a shock to me but I think it only shows how much fun this game is compared to its predecessors.

The feeling of freedom and progression by your means in a big map like this is why I think I sunk over 100 hours into this. Why this was the case for me is just how much I loved the world from the first few sights of grace. They hit the nail in the head with the art style and limgrave only shows their ideas of player choice hammer home. Of course, soulsborne gameplay is here and I LOVE IT. The aspect I always loved was the challenges it had and why I think over time I'm coming to appreciate challenging yet rewarding games, even if I suck.

That idea only gets more interesting with the bosses but player choice is in effect with summonings, which are a great (and now balanced) addition.

One thing I hate though is people ignoring that idea and saying summoning means you didn't beat the game, which is a stupid take I feel as it only helps prove the idea of player choice well.

As for dungeons, some get a but repetitive, others are designed really well. Yeah, there are also some bosses that aren't so great which are just rehashes of other bosses but I didn't mind all too much considering I only did most of those afterwards. A lot of the actual demigods you face are all really great, my personal favourite boss is the penultimate one. Finale boss isn't too great and I found tedious but is quite interesting at a glance due to its design, the music backing it and of course the lore.

I'll be frank, the lore is too vast for little me but the stuff I did get from questlines and possibly subsequent replays will help immeasurably at times. The stuff I did get though is a huge what the fuck, I'm not familiar with GRRM's way of writing but ER somewhat made me curious about this man due to his work on this.

So for what I got out of it with 0 expectations, it's an incredible well thought out open world game with amazing combat, a wide variety of customisation, a interesting world with some great NPC's, intricate level design as well as a god tier music design. For 100+ hours I got my moneys worth and so much more, cannot wait for the DLC's since track records show FS does so well on them.

In summary, good game me like. Discussing this game weirdly made me talk to people more which was actually fun. Appreciated them a lot.

This feels like a story I will grow on to cherish for eons, its sheer earnestness kinda blew me away and I had a tear running down my cheek during the entire last stretch, which is my favourite ever. Absolutely what I needed to hear.

Bazett is truly the Joker for VN readers.


Spoilers //

Special note has to go to its handling of Shirou's legacy and how the entire thing is essentially about a protagonist who was inspired by his deeds, which is incredibly fitting from a meta perspective for an epilogue like this one.