“It’s a Video Game!” – Some Thoughts on Elden Ring

Well, as Timberland once said, “I shouldn’t have left you without a dope beat to step to.” I’ve been on a bit of a sabbatical from the blog. Heck, I was barely  posting for these last two years already. It’s not that I ran out of things to say. I just went to other platforms to say or see them. I never forgot about ‘ole Blogger though. There’s also the fact that I’m a family man these days. Things with Liz and Andy are good, fun, and sometimes a bit tiresome, but that tiresome part comes when you’re chasing a 19-month old around the house.

Another thing that took a lot of time from here was today’s subject: Elden Ring. Back in August 2022, I thought I’d bite the bullet and see what this Elden Ring game was all about. Well, it’s April of 2023, and I’ve put about 238 hours into this one playthrough… no, I don’t have a problem! When you’re married, have a toddler, have a job and other hobbies, you’d don’t get a lot of time to game. Outside of a couple of other games, Elden Ring has been the main game I’ve been on since that time. There were times where I wanted to give up, but I just wanted to see it through to the final boss, and I’ve made it there. Now, that final boss may stay unbeaten (this game was hard), but at least I can say that I ran the race.

This post is less of a review and more of my time with the game. So, Elden Ring is an action RPG created by FromSoftware, the developers behind the Dark Souls series. One thing that made this a little unique was that the worldbuilding lore for the game was done by George R.R. Martin, the author from The Game of Thrones book series. It’s funny that I got into this game because I’ve never played any of the Dark Souls games, and I had no interest for Game of Thrones. I think my love for Skyrim brought me here.

You never know what this castle will throw at you.

The Story is simple… Things and Stuff happens… yeah, If there’s one thing I’ve learned about From Software, it’s that you may have to look to other sources for help and to know what the hell’s going on. Basically, you play as a Tarnished in the world of The Lands Between. The land is ruled by several powerful demigods who are the children of Queen Marika, the original ruler and keeper of the Elden Ring. She destroyed the ring which led this world to become pretty horrible. You’re sent on a mission by a maiden named Melina to repair the Elden Ring and become the next Elden Lord. During this, you’ll spend a crapton of hours fighting respawning enemies and trying to figure out how to beat that one boss.

I see why this game got deemed “Game of the Year” because it deserves that praise. This was a good one. First off, the customization’s pretty good.  Yes, it took a while to get my “Old, Disheveled, Black Confessor” look down, but it was worth it. You have quite a few builds you can start out with and level up throughout the game. For me, I just started out with kinda a basic build for my Confessor. What a Confessor is actually a question you can ask Wikipedia because I don’t know. All I know is that I looked awesome in a black hood with a sword and shield.

You more or less get dropped into the world. Luckily, there is a decent learning curve. You have six large areas to explore. You start out in Limgrave which is honestly the safest place around with a few exceptions. As you move place to place, you’ll fight, die, level up, die, talk to one weird NPC, die, find a beautiful underworld, die, face untold odds, and DIE. If you’re didn’t catch what I was saying before, it’s this: You gonna die a lot in this game! Luckily, you can also find a lot of weapons, armor, spells, and extra help like co-op and summons. Oh yeah, you can get other players who are going through the same hell you’re going through to help out in certain areas.

The area is so, so vast. Even when you think you’ve seen it all, there are probably other areas that you haven’t found yet. That’s one reason I kept coming back to the game. When I would get so peeved at not being able to beat this one area or one boss, I’d just go wandering for a bit. That way, I not only leveled up a bit, but I also found some good loot that could help in facing said horrible boss. Another thing that also helped was that the graphics here were beautiful. I kept wondering what beautiful or horrid sight I would see. I don’t want to spoil anything too much, but whatever you do in the early stages, DON’T GO TO CAELID!!!

I'll just let this be an example of what Caelid looks like. Avoid this area.

The gameplay is pretty solid. It’s your standard fair of swords and sorcery. The combat flows pretty well, and you have a crapload of weapons, spells, and armor at your disposal. The main bosses themselves are a pretty diverse bunch, and they all require a certain way to take them down. Yes, you can just about do anything, but sometimes, it’s best to have your best set equipped. I learned that lesson too much. You also have a plethora of side bosses or dungeon bosses that do tend to show up quite a bit in the game. Thankfully, they don’t’ get old, but it can get tiring especially when you see a boss that you struggled with show up. Revenants,  I still hate you.

Now, while the game isn’t heavy on narrative, you do get small bits and pieces of it spread around the large mass. You also get a few side quests with the different characters you meet. You don’t get to interact with them much, but your time with them is well-spent.  I also liked some of the lore introduced here. You end up finding why the Lands Between is this way and why some of the main bosses look like they stepped out of the mind of HR Giger . I will say that it does take a while to get things going especially when you don’t have much of a mission list around. If there’s one thing I don’t like about the game, it would be that as well as a couple of other things. So,  let me get to that real quick.

You'll never know what I had to fight in this beautiful place. You gotta learn that for yourself.

While this game is awesome, I did have a couple of qualms. What I mentioned before about the game not giving you a lot of help is one thing. Now, I can see some liking this because you then have to figure out things on your own. As for me, it depends. I don’t know how many times I had to search Google to figure out what to do on some side missions. While you’ll have a character say “meet me as so-and-so,” you don’t get that much. Also, and this is a nitpick since I do like the game, most might not like the lack of story or narrative. If you’re just looking for a good time to fight, explore, and collect goodies, you’re good. If you’re looking for something more story-focused and character-driven, I would say look elsewhere.

Yeah, I needed the aid of one of those weird cuddlers. IT WAS TOO MUCH!!!

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And that’s all I really have to say about the game. Elden Ring is a pretty solid game. I do think it was well worth putting all those hours into it, but I don’t know if I’d do a replay anytime soon. 200 hours is too much for me, and I was trying to stick to shorter games since I had Andy! I do recommend it though especially if you’re willing to put in the time for it. Well, I’m outta here. Until then, Peace, God Bless, and be careful out there.