I think this genuinely falls into the "too much of a good thing" category for me. In so many ways it improves upon the Dark Souls series, which it is a spiritual successor to. And I would rather play Elden Ring again than go back to the Souls games at this point. But its truly massive size, for me, is just a bit tough to manage. It's probably mostly my fault; I feel compelled to root up every nook and cranny of a game, and so I deeply love Fromsoft's smaller experiences like Bloodborne and Sekiro. But applying that same play style here meant doing a lot of things that I just didn't want to do, and there were long segments (especially near the end) that felt like a slog. (Not in the poison swamp sense.)

Knocking off a star seems to harsh for all of that, though. It's my own fault that I can't seem to play this game in a way that would let me have the most fun with it. The way you want to have fun is in here, I guarantee it. Just do your best to find it and stick to it.