As promised, this week Bandai namco has shared an extensive video gameplay of Elden Ring. FromSoftware’s highly anticipated action RPG combines all the good that revered director Hidetaka Miyazaki and his team of talents have created over the past decade with the Dark Souls games and their spiritual heirs. That unpronounceable “Soulsbornekiro” universe of which some speak.
I understand that with Elden Ring, our self-proclaimed Japanese creative sadomasochist has packed up all the mechanics and development resources at your fingertips with the intention of experimenting with them, to see what comes out. The definitive “miyazakada”, wow. And I imagine that it will have been at ease, because it is obvious that nothing has been left in the inkwell: animations, sound effects, disturbing designs for enemies and such representative features as bonfires or fog walls.
There is no doubt, create a new IP It is a difficult task: a delicate and meticulous exercise that involves planning myriad resources, experimenting with them to discover they don’t work, and iterating until they do, while ensuring that the original idea is somehow still present after applying the changes. FromSoftware has chosen to skip a few of those steps, as it has done for years, to focus on making good use of what it already has. That gives me a found feeling, a bittersweet flavor, an “I don’t know what I know” that forces me to write these lines.
In normal situations, I would say that Elden Ring is Frankenstein’s monster. A hodgepodge of pieces that comes out walking by a pure miracle. Undoubtedly, the game is not cut when it comes to putting together the parry of Dark Souls III’s Storm King with Sekiro’s mid-jump attacks, and then show you Djura’s distant cousin, the machine-gun bastard from Bloodborne barricading himself in Old Yharnam. But it is that realistically, all that is so well mounted, that more than Frankenstein’s monster it seems that we are before Michelangelo’s David.
Basically, you’ve already played Elden Ring. But you have plenty of reasons to want to play it again. Such is FromSoftware’s power of suggestion. Everyone has copied ad nauseam of his way of doing enemy pinning, rolling, and back stabbing; and few or none have nailed moments like the boss with six fingers on each hand or fighting a dragon on horseback. You see that, and there is no choice but to loosen the wallet. It’s dark, it’s disturbing, it’s immersive, it’s special.
All this we have seen before
- The animation of the knights when they are defeated.
- The sound of receiving the final blow, before you collapse.
- Executions “to the Sekiro“in duration, style and effects.
- Many others based on those from Dark Souls, front and back.
- Gestures, invocations, and even the emerging appearance of spirits.
- That dramatic door opening of all the trailers.
- … and many other things that we very much see.
These are just some of the examples of things that start to smell like humanity. We could continue throughout the day, because it seems that here there is no kind of interest to correct (or at least camouflage) that omnipresent effect of deja vu. Moreover, if we take Rookie NPCs like Alexander, the one with the jar; or the wizard Rogier, any veteran of the series will appreciate that they are designed with the same premises as Siegward from Catarina or Big Logan Hat. The first is good-natured and is embedded in a rounded armor, and the second, well; His name says it all.
The Elden Ring opens before us like the iron gate of an abandoned mansion: majestic, strong; but with a squeaky rust sound that steals all the limelight at the moment. FromSoftware is holding the success formula, and is aware that it is not necessary to change something that is not broken. But at least he could have tried to sweeten that huge library of effects that he has accumulated over the years to make a better impression on, let’s call them, non-believers. In the absence of a demographic scrutiny by the community, I suspect that the rest of the viewers are so happy with what we have that they would understand any of these observations as an attack: “Damn video game journalists, you dirty casuals! They come to take away the Dark Souls that belongs to us. “
The shots are not there, no: a humble servant is just as devoted as those fans, believe it or not. I have a good time with the rhythm and the mechanics that are already there. But of course, sometimes within that unconditional love that we profess the fans of the souls-like there are also things that add up a little less. All these “buts” of which I speak do not detract from a final product that, I insist, does what it has to do: intimidate us, submerge us and above all, have fun. That is the point I want to get to. By all accounts, the Elden Ring experience seems rock solid.
Building on old ground
When you think that the exploration on horseback (or “goat” as we say in 3DGames) limp, a huge dragon appears out of nowhere with one of the most powerful scenes we’ve seen since Shadow of the Colossus. If you are one of those who are not satisfied with the environmental or fragmented narrative, you see that some bosses speak at last and that the NPCs are more expressive; while those who suspect that the world could turn out to be too empty and horizontal are immediately answered with palpable verticality, dungeons dotted here and there like the lost sectors of Destiny 2, among other things.
Perhaps it is unconsciously, but Bandai Namco has managed to balance the dose of novelties with a series of situations with which the most established fans empathize, understand and appreciate. For example, personally I can’t help but think of that scene in which our poor Sinluz looks at an enemy camp with that spyglass that only youtubers used with a certain resentment: for me that is an “open world 101” in the Far Cry or Ghost of style. Tsushima who doesn’t fit much here. But then the part of the castle and it passes me, of course.
The same does not seem so at first glance, but I think the identity seal The Elden Ring is not in the open world or mounts, not in item crafting or stealth. It’s in the combat that we all know and love. The variety of weapons that we see in the gameplay – physical and magical, melee or ranged – is truly inspiring, with special attention to the invocations.
Call of Duty or Assassin’s Creed are repeated, but it is Elden Ring whose seams are visible: is it a question of expectations?
We all have very much seen in breaking the door of an animal to fight for us in games of all kinds, but some of the ones here have mechanics that we direct manually, which carry risks and rewards. That’s fine. Summoning lightning around us is fine. Using a magic bow to attack a dragon from a goat is fine. Launching tornadoes by charging rapier techniques is fine. Elden Ring … on the whole, from what we’ve seen, okay.