Elden Ring is a Poor FromSoftware Game

[@Kolket1389]

I like how people are confident in their trash opinions

[@SereTheDoggoUwU]

Based

[@DEADSHOOT-wh6ow]

His opinion is bad because he complains about these aspects of the game but yet compliments it even more often. Many people try to trash on a game because of it’s success but if this guy spent 200+ hours on the game you can see he very clearly enjoyed it enough to play it that much .

[@momo-i1t3d]

@@DEADSHOOT-wh6ow terrible take. To say you played/did something for a long time therefore you gotta like it is the worst take in the in human history.

[@dietretard2636]

@@DEADSHOOT-wh6ow played every fromsoft game since the ps2 era. Played games from this company that you never even fucking heard of. And i can say confidently this is there lowest quality game. No i wont waste my time writing paragraphs explaining why as ive already done it a hundred times and dont intend to do it again. Go speak to anyone whos a FROMSOFT FAN and not a typical elden ring stan who doesnt have anything to relate er too, i promise they will tell you the game sucks compared to there other games.

[@sebaswow40]

He's saying the game is not good solely for the purpose of getting clicks lmao

[@logicaldude3611]

Only thing I had an issue with was that the computer (especially bosses) do not react to the moves you make. The react with instantaneous speed whenever you PUSH A BUTTON. One easy example is Malenia. Try casting a spell at her at the beginning of the fight... she doesn't dodge when the spell is cast, she dodges as soon as the game registers that you've touched a button. This happens frequently across all enemies, especially on dodge rolls. The computer doesn't react in real-time, it reacts to the buttons you push in a way that makes some of the fights unfair unless you've gotten to high enough level that you can just mow through them anyway. It's about as close as you can get to the computer reading your mind.

[@everettzarnick2323]

Yeah the input reading is obscene in many cases. It feels very gamey, and ER does a poor job at providing a sense of immersion with how many bosses react to your inputs. Like you said, sometimes its straight up instantaneous.

[@klove5974]

Ah input reading… my old enemy. Made me hate ALL crucible knights in the game and subsequently… hunt them to extinction.

[@digitalintent]

There is actually no input reading in the game. It's animation reading. They tried something different but didn't adjust/tweak it properly for it to feel anything unlike input reading. Example, enemies are scripted to attack when you heal. The animation starts and they immediately attack you. The problem is, they read the 1st frame of that animation and then perform that move even if the actual flask and the drinking animation aren't obvious to the player until frame 10 or so. The script should really make it so that the actual drinking portion of the animation is when the enemy starts their attack. Because it happens at frame 1 it feels like input reading. I'm not defending it at all. They had a very interesting system that could/should have been properly worked on. And, like a lot of things in this game, it was left as is to the detriment of the player's experience.

[@everettzarnick2323]

@@digitalintent That's actually very cool, and has a lot of room for exploration. Im thinking spell casting animations that resemble estus flask drinking and can be used to sometimes bait bosses into overcommitting, etc. If only lol. Like you said, the differences between IR and AR are nullified if it all begins on the first frame with no room for mind games.

[@ibizenco]

Is this why, for instance, "dodging" by pressing the F-key takes almost half a second before it starts (having me killed)? Like "[F]........roll", instead of "[F]-roll". I get killed so often because of this. I press [F] in time, but I start "rolling" too late. So annoying. This game as a program is too slow.

[@aegis7survivor98]

Elden Ring is 100% a roll playing game.

[@moresomoze]

Lol this

[@socriabbas454]

Ah sounds like you never progressed pass storm veil it seems because if you did then you would know rolling is a sure way to get your ass f*cked in this game. This isn't DS3.

[@aegis7survivor98]

I 100%-ed this game 2/22/23. Unless you’re using a buffed greatshield or parrying everything, rolling is the way to go.

[@batteredskullsummit9854]

​@@aegis7survivor98bruh no rolling is bad

[@socriabbas454]

@@aegis7survivor98 I rarely use shield, typically only in catacombs where enemies can ambush you from any corner but other than that, you don't always roll in the game, sometimes you have to parry and jump. Most of the attacks in the game and i learn this AFTER beating Margit that rolling is often times bad .

[@Beanie-Babe]

I feel like Elden Ring's boss design is actively frustrating. In Ds3 (my personal favorite) there was this sort of ebb and flow to combat. It felt like a real fight, a dance, a good old fashioned 1v1 on an even playing field. Mistakes were punished but avoidable, and a skilled player will win 100% of the time. Elden Ring feels like I am fighting game mechanics as opposed to a boss. It is not difficult in the same way that Dark Souls 3 is. It feels like being super skilled at the game isn't the dominant strategy. Elden Ring boss design is often unfair and I find myself blaming other factors or getting upset rather than feeling like I need to improve. It does not feel like I am on an even playing field, this leads to taking power away from the player and I think that's not very fun.

[@wafflboix]

Wouldn't say its unfair. Just bosses are structured differently. You can't wait for a boss to finish a combo then attack, since they immediately get back into action. You have to find openings and punish windows in between their attacks, see what works and doesn't work, like an actual fight.

[@sekiro_the_one-armed_wolf]

The amount of times you are on an even playing field with a souls boss can be counted on like ten fingers lmao. Any boss that deviates from the basic human/player model, even if they are still humans in armor, are fucking cracked out of their mind with crazy superhuman abilities. These games are not about “equal footing in battle,” they’re about repeatedly throwing yourself against insane obstacles over and over again. And yeah, sufficiently skilled players will win 100% of the time. It’s why it has hitless speedruns like every other fromsoft game. What do you mean “being super skilled isn’t the dominant strategy?” Being skilled isn’t a strategy. Skill is the application of strategy. Failure to properly apply strategy means you are lacking in skill. This entire comment just seems like pseudo intellectual word salad to cope with the fact you aren’t as skilled as you thought you were.

[@andreimaxwell4455]

@@wafflboix That would require memorizing their attacks after they've killed you multiple times, less skill based and more precognition because you know when they end their attack based on animation timing rather than player reaction

[@PandaPulse4]

The boss balance feels completely unfair. It’s to force you to explore to farm and upgrade. Because the previous games were linear and smaller scaled, this issue wasn’t so prominent

[@wafflboix]

@Eclipsed972 it feels unfair because the game doesnt teach you what to look for in openings. Id go as far to say that Malenia, whithout her healing is one of the most fair bosses Ive ever fought

[@mushymcmushington7176]

One of my favorite things about most of From Software's worlds is that they never seemed to care about the player one way or the other. They weren't forgiving or kind, but they also they weren't aggressive or malicious toward you, they simply existed and you existed inside them. Same with the enemies, who always seemed like they were essentially just other entities in the same world as you, bound by the same rules and limitations. It was realistic and incredibly immersive. Meanwhile, Elden Ring's world seems to be expressly made for the player's defeat. Defeating the player is absolute priority #1 above all else. The world is littered with traps and ambushes, enemies waiting around corners to push you off of ledges, hyper aggressive enemies with move-sets specifically tailored to catch and punish, enemies and bosses that quite literally cheat. One of the funniest things to do in Elden Ring is to just shoot an arrow into a random direction and watch every enemy in the vicinity dodge as they simply read your input without context. It's downright gamey, and oftentimes feels like I'm playing some Kaizo Mario troll mod rather than traversing a living world. Over the course of Dark Souls 1 to Elden Ring, the design ethos of From Software seems to have slowly changed from "Create a quiet, uncaring world to exist within and explore" to "Create a challenging videogame level to test the player's patience". The Anor Londo Archers are no longer just a challenging little hurdle, they're the entire game.

[@everettzarnick2323]

Great comment, well said. That bit about the Londo Archers being the main course of the game in ER is something I agree with entirely.

[@Solid--Snake]

got your point but I kinda love the idea of having a world made to destroy me and actually conquering it regardless. I do agree this is not how the world of a souls game should behave

[@He-who-wakes]

Wait so your telling me a game where the first bosses tells you that he's going to kill you so you can't progress and become elden lord is full of traps and ambushes??

[@smitty215able]

I've shot arrows at groups of enemies many times and never had all of them dodge at once. Yes, the game does have input reads. Yes, it makes the fights harder. But it's far from impossible to overcome. It's designed to force you to engage with the combat system instead of just cheesing all your encounters

[@AniGaAG]

I agree with you, but I also need to be entirely fair, even though it goes against my favorite From game (that's how you know I'm really trying hard to be neutral here): Dark Souls 3's DLC is when From's bad habits started, this kind of thing does already happen there. There's enemies around corners near ledges who are programmed to shove you the millisecond you walk by; they're programmed to shove so stubbornly, even, that they'll shove at minimum twice even if you're no longer in range. So... yeah. I agree with you, and DS3 is my favorite, but in certain aspects, you can start to see shades of Elden Ring in DS3's DLC.

[@niclasjacobsen7722]

I am quite fearful of how From Software will proceed with the insane praise ER got; I love their games, but I agree on ER being incredibly flawed, to the point where I have put it just above DS2 SotFS for many of the same reasons I have issues with that game

[@everettzarnick2323]

Completely agree.

[@florida_sucks]

i put ds2 above it personally and i don't even like ds2

[@personman1148]

Hopefully the success of AC6 will branch another option as I loved that game

[@devoringdemonsoulq9086]

Agree

[@jeremyallen5974]

Elden Ring was the end result of almost a decade of the fanbase and designers drowning out criticism with their autistic tantrums. You can't improve on anything when your go-to response to criticism is to scream angrily because the meanie heads hurt your fee fees by saying the games are poorly designed

[@dooggo-1402]

Elden Ring made me realize, that I very much prefer, linear, or mission-based games.

[@pjenestratsienatie1876]

So the problem with souls players is that they lack the intelligence to find their way in open world games?

[@oliwierwagrowski3176]

@@pjenestratsienatie1876 No... Elden Ring quest design is just outdated that's all. If you want no handle but actually well made quest design then that's Morrowind or Gothic 1/2, a journal is literally needed in a game like this. Dark Souls are sort of an exception but still it sucks, LoP did it extremely well by just adding a stupid icon and not telling you where to go but still reminding you like "Hey man, you have that quest here or you should talk to the person here, like I'm not forcing it but if you want to progress that storyline then better do it friend!". Let's be real, FromSoftware is stagnating and getting lazy, their last actually good game was Sekiro and even that game only stood out with it's gameplay and design, nothing else. It's funny that Elden Ring is most similar to Dark Souls 2 which is the most hated FromSoftware game, oh the irony!

[@cacadrink]

@@oliwierwagrowski3176 The newest fromsoft game (that isnt elden ring or demon souls remake) is from 2018, that is the definition of outdated, the feeling Elden ring gives you beats any souls game by an entire galaxy. If you don't get the feeling while your playing it, to bad your a weak human

[@oliwierwagrowski3176]

@@cacadrink Did you just say that if a game is older it's automatically outdated? That just destroyed your entire comment ngl

[@Lakata125]

@@cacadrink Low iq comment

[@BoredomK1lls]

I just can’t understand how you speed up enemies + bosses without speeding up the player with them. With that and awful camera work on some bosses I really can’t say ER is even close to perfect

[@Synpathetix]

Most of the enemies were designed for a Sekiro combat style. Giving us incredibly fast bosses that throw out 7-8 hit combos in one go while also delaying single attacks mid-way through said combos while giving us old school DS mechanics is ludacris

[@victory8928]

From what I seen with expert players. There are ways to deal with it well, the issue is the game has little to no repeatability. And the lack of refighting bosses makes it hard to test and learn these skills and openings. Like how malenia’s waterfowl being able to just be jumped over from expert players. But most players wouldn’t because of how they were conditioned to fight bosses due to Margit and the like.

[@maboilaurence8227]

That lava dragon inside the small cave was the most pathetic boss from a game design perspective in the entire series, the camera was the real boss. if we're gonna hold Dark Souls 1 on a pedestal for what it did right, we should hold these bosses as examples of how NOT to make a good boss fight.

[@trulyspxrkz]

Player speed in this game is atrocious. Every piece of animation the player makes it so painfully slow and you're stuck in the animation for what feels like forever. Attacking, healing, rolling all feel slower than it was in ds3. Going back to ds3 i was surprised how aggressive i could be even against the most aggressive bosses like Oceiros, Dragonslayer Armor and Pontiff. Fighting ER bosses(depending on ur weapon) leaves you with 1, MAYBE 2 safe attack windows before you get damaged by an attack you either thought was done, or a quick attack thrown at you after the boss cancelled his downtime animation on you. It doesn't make for an engaging fight.

[@AniGaAG]

@@trulyspxrkz The funny thing is, an actual average human can wield a claymore faster than a From player character can. Seriously, look at some videos, an even halfway trained person can one-hand a two-handed sword faster than a From player character two-hands it. xD

[@duvetboa]

The Crystallians become much more vulnerable to all damage types after a single riposte. For a dagger build you just needed to posture break and riposte once.

[@blueylewis9419]

"Eldin Ring is somehow both empty and over-saturated at the same time." This sums up my entire opinion on the game. Big open world that looks really nice, but ultimately hurts the game because there's nothing to do, except 20 instances each of the same terribly-balanced, forgettable bosses.

[@CandyOnAChopstick]

This was my problem as well. It feels like wading through muck to get to the meaningful stuff.

[@blueylewis9419]

Like I don't think it's a bad game, I think there is actually a lot to like about it, like how well the dungeons are integrated into the open world, it's just one of fromsoft's weaker titles. @@CandyOnAChopstick

[@Aelvir114]

Eh, I think the open world is done decently enough. Compared to open world games like Breath of the Wild which might as well not have an open world because there’s honestly nothing to explore beyond empty fields.

[@Gungrave123]

you can cut good 85% of the caves, dungeons, graves etc and the game would only be better for it

[@johnnyflannigan136]

Man... You couldn't be more wrong... Being a contrarian is cool though huh?

[@letxgf]

This game could've deserved all of the praise if it was just like 25% smaller, they stretched it too thin, trying to force width/depth with copy-pasting among other things. They also hit the limits of making dark souls combat harder without entering bullshit territory (spambushes, enemies that flail around for minutes without giving any hints as to when they'll stop, enemies that stand there weapon raised delaying their attacks trying to bait the player in dodging or attacking for ridiculous amounts of time or the enemies have that cheeky delayed last attack after a combo, without forgetting the almost constant imput reading), it's still a solid game just not the masterpiece it's being paraded as, maybe even a good game but not a good souls-like, almost like fallout 4 and that faranchise. A lot of the praise I think comes from the fact that this game blew up as much as it did, being the first souls games for many players and since the "culture" is centered around getting good it's easy for a newer player to think they just need to get good when they're factually dealing with bullshit, especially when they've fallen in love with the asthethics and the general souls-like gameplay or community which is normal. I think there will be a "reckoning" of sorts with this game and possibly all souls games like skyrim at some point in the future.

[@king_alonne3707]

imo I think ER needs more rather than less, as other open-world games, ER should have contained more open-world elements rather than souls one, for me as souls vertan I already exeperiance many of the souls that I see replacable in ER, the questlines focused and "the game hub" or firelink shrine clones, there are more but Ig it is safe to tell these two don't fit so well in an open-world game for the least. about the difficulty and enemy design, I guess I don't have any problem for more than 90% of the game content, it is quite a good number comparing to my best souls, which is original Dark Souls, it is imo returns to the player in that matter, difficulty claims specifically. ER -with the overblown open-world- has the best variety of bosses in souls, it is a matter of time to learn them with the new mechanics, but for some reason souls player deslike the game for this very reason, regardless some bosses and some gameplay tacticals fall to the original formula, which means you don't really need to understand the game from a to z, but each for their own and godskin duo has to be one of the worst in souls series and I respect other opnions, but the claim itself is subjective and shouldn't affect the overall quality.

[@Joebreeze5]

Yep. You try to point out the flaws in the game and youre told to get good. Sigh

[@nakiangoderich3014]

25% shorter Honey, it’s called skipping the catacombs you don’t want to loot. 😂😂😂

[@letxgf]

@@nakiangoderich3014 I guess you can never complain about repetitive and bare-bones content because "just don't play it bro".

[@nakiangoderich3014]

@letxgf the repetitive content was done for people who enjoy fighting the enemies, not those that imagine a unique boss for every single dungeon who then wonder why sekiro was canceled. If they did that, there would be no sekiro, and where else would you find the talismans or spirit ashes if they hadn't made as many dungeons? Put them in boring chests you find in limgrave?

[@subashira]

Something about Elden Ring just feels hollow, I can’t even detail exactly what it is but it doesn’t inspire the same fascination I felt for Bloodborne, or DS3 or Sekiro.

[@Lucrei.]

Don't you dare go hollow out there.

[@jamesloucks2562]

The word you're looking for is "innovation" Elden Ring added nothing that truely felt new other than being open world....which games have done for decades. Add that to the bullshit damage balancing, constantly reused assets, copy paste content and horribly balanced pvp, Elden Ring is inferior to other Souls games because it has no clear *identity* Elden Ring ironically suffered by trying TOO hard to be a Souls game instead of just becoming something new.

[@zacoliver5547]

@@jamesloucks2562 I'd rather say Elden Ring is lacking proper pacing. The lackluster and repetitive side content just makes one not want to engage with it. This way the games becomes more or less a horse riding simulator between the legacy dungeons.

[@carsonrutz9659]

Yeah 9 hours in and i dont feel like im playi g dark souls. Alot of empty spaces not utilized. Its frustrating. Your expeirience will be vastly different depending on where you go at the begining. This game has so much content but i feel like im wasting my time.

[@valentinvas6454]

Reading this is so freaking weird man... Elden Ring feels hollow? How??? Elden Ring is their most lively game by far. It has the most varied color palette, it has nearly all kinds of terrain except deserts. Also there are little events happening like the convoys pulled by trolls and escorted by a bunch of people or the ancestral guys herding deers near Nokron. Different races of people fighting each other, day and night cycle and verticality that was never before seen in a souls game. There was a time when I considered DS3 my favorite game but when I went back to play it after Elden Ring I realized how limiting that is. If you find Elden Ring hollow I can't imagine what do you think about some other open world games because Elden Ring is one of the densest open world games that's for sure.

[@TheRealNintendoKid]

you don't even really need to stealth thru that section leading up to margit. You don't have to summon anything either. I didn't even realize I could summon anything there when I went thru it. But if you take your time and don't go hopping around on your horse, aggro-ing every soldier at once, you'll be fine.

[@ducasse8473]

Knowone is struggling to beat elden ring. It's not a hard game. Most people who don't like it are just dissapointed that the endgame is Basically all recycled enemies and trying to get a build started for another playthrough is pretty much just running from point A to B for 2 hours straight. And there's no point in doing that if there are only like 9 completely unique and special bosses to try your build on. I think it's the only souls game that I've ever seen to push so many veterans back to older titles lol. It's like a really hot but toxic girlfriend/boyfriend. Just dump and pump.

[@HeevaEgo]

@@ducasse8473 9 unique boss encounters is deadass more than Zelda and Witcher 3😭😭 I dont see why you complain lmao

[@ducasse8473]

@WinterLight00 and bloodborne has 17. The same developers of elden ring. Elden ring, totk, witcher clearly have waayyyyy more content than games like bloodborne, MHW dmc5, bg3. But it comes at the cost of developers spending time trying to figure out how to best spread out their content and make sure the player spends as much time as possible engaged in their world. Instead of actually making the world feels as little like a video game as possible. With every new installment to the open world genre, you can Google the words "open world games suck." and you will find a growing list of people expressing the sentiment that open world games suck for many reasons, and this is one of them. They take too much time to truly enjoy and most of the shit in it isn't meaningful most of the time. And if you actually tried to replay them again. How much of your second playthrough is going to actually be spent doing the things that you want to be doing? These games are so big that just getting from point A to B takes a decent amount of time and you may encounter many roadblocks. But either way its like "oh wow, the game has x9 UNIQUE MAIN BOSSES and x6 UNIQUE LEGACY DUNGEONS .....but it also has x12 crucible knights, x23 erdtree avatars, x53 optional repeat dungeons and only a few of them will probably actually be useful for your build. Oh! and an entire late game area (the mountaintops of the giants) is basically just the cold version of an area you already played through. (caelid). It's a very fun game 🙂 Why? "Cause every American knows bigger is better" Honestly, what is the actual advantage to elden ring being so big? If they smashed mountain tops of the giants and caelid together and / or cut all of these repeat bosses in half and just scaled the whole game down. Would the game have been so bad? I don't think so. Tldr. Just cause other games do it, doesn't mean it's good. Look up the phrase "open world games suck" on Google or KZbin and you will find MANY people going into explicit detail as to why. And that group of people only increase with every addition to the open world genre.

[@hipwisconsingaming9520]

@@ducasse8473 their is 15 main rembrance bosses in total. 14 if you subtract rykard. soooo thats 3 less bosses then bloodborne 💀 closer to 16 actually if you include goldfrey and margit too

[@ducasse8473]

@hipwisconsingaming9520 yeah elden ring is probably one of the best games to play once and never go back to lol

[@Hauri1972]

Well, after over 1000+ hours in my first ever Souls game, I for myself can say, that this is the best game I ever played.

[@everettzarnick2323]

To each their own!

[@Hauri1972]

@@everettzarnick2323 exactly

[@kristophersmotherman6114]

I call it, the last game I'll ever need.

[@xpgainz]

@@kristophersmotherman6114 I feel you, I bought god of war ragnarok on release and I just cannot get myself to play it.. too busy coming out with new build ideas and no other game offer the same co op, invasion and pvp experience

[@VEGITAS4]

Same

[@jeftecoutinho]

One aspect i didn't like about Elden Ring is precisely the quantity over quality. Some creatures and aspects of the lore don't seem to fit the rest of the world, as if they were included very late in development. The ones i recall now are: - Misbegotten - Godskin Apostles - Souless Demigods - Albinaurics - The Storm Lord

[@theultimatep1e40]

while i agree with the Soulless Demigods and Storm Lord ther are clear parts in the lore that explain that there were multiple Albinauric Settlements and that the Misegotten are just Followers of Miquella. Also the Godskins were a sekt before the shattering or something thats why theres multiple

[@xx_amongus_xx6987]

@@theultimatep1e40 All true, but realize that most of these lore explanations are cheap answers/excuses Fromsoft just added in at the end to explain why they copy/pasted so much. I don't think Godefrey was meant to be an important character whose story Miyazaki really wanted to tell- it's just Goddrick copy/pasted because they didn't know what else to put there to artificially extend the playtime.

[@fuadalki]

@@xx_amongus_xx6987 well out of all the characters that you could say that are cheaply put in the lore Godfrey would be last character for me. Especially because his concept art was pretty early released, is mentioned in in the cinematic trailer as haorouh loux, is the first tarnished and has a lot of other characters looking up to Goddfrey such as godrick and radahn. A;so in the cut content of the game godfrey was an quest giver that could be compared as gerhman.

[@xx_amongus_xx6987]

@@fuadalki I wasn't referring to Godfrey, but the misunderstanding is partially my fault because I misspelled the name. I wrote Godefrey instead of Godefroy. Godefroy is apparently some ancient ancestor of Goddrick but for some reason he looks identical to Goddrick, and has almost an identical name to Godfrey. He has no purpose whatsoever in existing.

[@fuadalki]

@@xx_amongus_xx6987 oh yeah godefroy is definitely feels lazily tacked on with being godrick clone and the only variation being that is takes place in the evergaol prison. Although he has some lore significance of being one the first person to practice grafting if I'm right.

[@theDiReW0lf]

I’ve played all soulsborne games to absolute death. I devoured Elden Ring on launch and never went back. Hope they never do open world again. Quality > quantity.

[@everettzarnick2323]

Id just tweak this by saying that if they do open world, they should aim to make it ds1 quality world building: open but narrow. Otherwise I agree.

[@theDiReW0lf]

@@everettzarnick2323 I’ve always considered DS1 more metroidvania than open world, but yeah. That was their peak world design. Unfortunately they’ve never really tried to do it again. Every game since has let you warp right off the bat. Bloodborne was pretty close, I guess, but DS1’s level design is straight genius.

[@muhammadzariff7075]

FromSoft should only implement world designs akin to Bloodborne and DS, nothing more!

[@Fingolfin7455]

@@muhammadzariff7075 BB world design is extremly underappreciated. Their ability to loop these levels around one lantern is truly amazing! I dont even like BB that much.

[@bungalowfeuhler1541]

The entrance to Stormhill taught me that running away is an option. The falling giant served as a classic FromSoft-trick-death for me.

[@NocturnalNick]

I 100% believe that is what you are meant to take away from the encounter.

[@diccchocolate416]

​@NocturnalNick yeah, it's supposed to push you south towards Kenneth and the weeping peninsula. Then when you come back up you're more likely to find the alternate path to margit

[@___.51]

@@diccchocolate416 That's exactly what happened to me on my first playthrough, saw the giant, turned around and followed the big paved road all the way to castle morne lol.

[@diccchocolate416]

@___.51 almost like elden ring is a very well designed game.

[@___.51]

@@diccchocolate416 the design worked on me I’ll say that much

[@infidelicteeth6598]

The dragons in this game are so disappointing, they used to be so imaginative in the early days, the gaping dragon, the weird fuzzy one in ash lake, etc etc.

[@infidelicteeth6598]

@@tavishdegroot5127 I love placidusax

[@maboilaurence8227]

Nah man, we gotta recycle Midir's animations and attacks for easy filler content.

[@Metalmorio]

Wasn't it a Hydra in ash lake?

[@infidelicteeth6598]

@@Metalmorio There's a dragon after the hyrda.

[@Metalmorio]

@@infidelicteeth6598 Yeah I remember now I haven't played the game in a while

[@rhythmmandal3377]

I thought stonesword keys where like Pharros lockstones.

[@toddsmithselbow1732]

I feel like they are, but less rare.

[@elasticater8429]

They are. It's one of the many fumbles in this video.

[@eisenmann_d]

My experience with this game was slightly differente but in general you said everything I said and complained about to my friends. It was the very souls game I dropped, but because of difficulty, no, it was because of how tired I've got of playing it

[@eisenmann_d]

Looking back at this comment... Am I really dyslexic? Why do I so often leave out words when typing? The sentence in my head is formulated normally and then I read what I wrote and it's full of gaps

[@everettzarnick2323]

I have this exact experience all the time, no worries. I appreciate the comment.@@eisenmann_d

[@Drakon332x]

@@eisenmann_d You wrote as you would speak, it is okay.

[@Arcknight9202]

I think you nailed a big piece of why this game absolutely fell apart for me. The "game" parts are pretty good. But since I like to explore everything on my first playthrough, I was absolutely exhausted by the repetition of the enemies, textures, that same house everywhere, the skeletons coming out of the ground by gravestones, the coffins holding only runes, and tedious bosses. It was simply not respecting my time at all. I think it was right around the Giant's Mountaintops that it really started to burn me out. All I could think of the whole time was "I'd rather be playing Sekiro." And I loathed that game so much I was listening to a podcast on the final boss and went to KZbin for the endings. That is pretty damning if I say so myself. I cheesed the bosses as fast as possible just to finish it. I ignored a few areas but who cares. It's simply too long for me to enjoy without any narrative. Funny thing is after ER I went to Nioh and was thinking the whole time "I'd rather be playing ER."

[@Ragitsu]

The _illusion_ of space is infinitely more appealing.

[@crowquet56]

Agreed, I love the game but there's no mystery or sense of accomplishment when it comes to exploring. Every single thing being reused was really disappointing, I wanted diverse levels like dark souls 3.

[@anders092.]

i know this is late as shit but i wanted to add 2 issues that i don't think you mentioned, First, alot of enemies have unnecessary fucking huge shockwave attacks for no god damn reason which just removes your ability to strafe attacks without rolling, Second, the absolute oppression of insane roll catching combos and many bosses having Input reading, so whenever you try and heal someone like Crucible Knight will immediately hit you in the face with some distance covering attack.

[@ETBrooD]

Your comment is basically "this game is hard". Well yes, that's one of the reasons why people play Elden RIng. So you're accidentally praising the game for being challenging. When I play other open world games I get bored quickly because they're too easy. I just cruise through the games and I feel absolutely nothing in my reward center. Meanwhile some of Elden Ring's enemies seem impossible at first, but both the process of fighting them and the final victory are incredible experiences. Elden Ring isn't for everyone. If you don't like really challenging games that punish you for button mashing, it's not for you.

[@anders092.]

that is the most braindead take i have ever seen, hope you get well soon @@ETBrooD

[@tony_tonelg]

​@@ETBrooDyou know that's not what he said. His criticisms are extremely valid and if you didn't notice these problems, you were probably overleveled (which is another huge issue ER has, balance)

[@theresnothinghere1745]

@@tony_tonelg No it is what he said. Heal punishing, roll catching and shockwave attacks are very easy to deal with if you just adapt to them. While elevating the depth of the gameplay once you do. Heal punishing literally just requires the player getting more distance to be safe, or to use a window of attack to instead heal. I don't see at all how its a criticism I always felt the enemies were kinda dumb in souls for just letting me heal in their face and ER fixes this while still giving you a means to heal. Shockwave attacks are generally very easy to jump over, and they often reward the player a window of opportunity with a jump attack, so no rolling isn't required on them. The majority of roll catching attacks often also create an opening during the attack as the boss has to delay their swing to roll catch (and its always the same length delay) creating an opportunity for offensive play during the enemies attack. This not only removes the much simpler 'wait till the enemy finishes' approach the prior games have but it allows the stance system to be used to its full potential which causes the use of charged attacks, jump heavy's, ash of wars to be situationally better options than just using R1 even on lighter weapons like the straightsword. A massive improvement for the gameplay mechanics over prior souls games where r1 is the better option pretty much every time due to being safer and not losing out too much in damage due to linked r1's. So no his criticism are not valid.

[@maboilaurence8227]

@@ETBrooDHard != Tedious.

[@InkyMuste]

It'll be interesting to see how ER will be viewed in a couple of years, it feels kinda like another bioshock infinite. A game that was praised to high heavens at release even though it was a major downgrade from its predecessors and not really anything special, a game that was mostly held up by its hype and impressive visuals.

[@jayko4703]

perfect description, I'm sure it'll always have it's smaller hardcore fanbase, but ultimately it's predicted influence will likely not be as widespread as initial praise implied.

[@dungeater9241]

bioshock infinite has no replay value tho

[@TheRealNintendoKid]

I dunno, I don't think it's anything necessarily incredible when I sit back and think about it, but I'm enjoying it a good bit. It's a lot like the new Zeldas on the Switch, except it's a lot darker and more difficult. I feel like it could do with a little less difficulty at times, or at least a more balanced one when it comes to certain bosses. The Tibia Mariner and the one at the evergaol that the half-wolf NPC sends you to were both pushovers, but holy shit, Margit whooped my ass over and over again. It's stressful, but it's fun. I'm enjoying exploring the world so far. Although FUUUUUCK Caelid.

[@lahunica2726]

You were wrong back then and you're even more wrong now

[@macalvand]

@@dungeater9241Neither does Elden Ring lmao

[@___.51]

You only briefly mentioned music, but I agree completely. After hearing the Limgrave soundtrack loop for the 500th time I now set music volume to 0 except for specific boss fights. Unfortunately much of the worldspace was designed to rely on the background music as there’s little to no ambient sound. Caelid in particular stood out to me for how deathly quiet it was without the looping background track. It’s kind of a shame imo because ambient sounds would make replays more tolerable than the single-track loop they went with.

[@dutchbannger6503]

@mightyhendo9828 are you retarded?

[@jakesteinberg5902]

The underground background music humming is started to drive me insane “EEEEEeeeeEeeee”. Still my favourite game tho

[@doratheshade]

Godrick and Malenia are the only bosses that i turn the music on. The rest was soooo forgettable to me

[@personman1148]

I've noticed Fromsofts souls games music just became DS3 soundtrack all over again. I personally think this game could have benefited from more western wind instruments such as the bagpipes or maybe A larger focus on percussion than orchestral epicness.

[@doratheshade]

@@personman1148 Same. The entire soundtrack isn't something unheard of. I think the closest we got to a new sounding track is Godrick's theme. It's dynamic , it's fast, the chord progressions are very floaty and almost feel like a whole character altogether. The rest is pretty much generic soulslike stuff with choirs, strings etc etc

[@chopsandtoots]

This is my 4th Fromsoft title, with a tiny bit of Sekiro game play. This is probably the weakest installment imo and I've enjoyed it the least. I really wanted to love this game like I did DS1 or BB. For the amount of promotion for the game and having GRRM's name slapped onto every ad (despite him having apparently very little to do with the story) the vague Soulslike storytelling has gotten old. For those who just arriving, yeah of course they're praising the immersive and vague lore but it's getting pretty stale by now. Especially when you have such a massive world and there's so much to the story. Personally I think Sekiro was a deviation that was done extremely well. The story was a bit linear, sure. But it was a well done story and the combat was incredible. Apart from jumping and some new spells, combat really isn't anything new in ER. Horse combat (unless you have specific types of weapons) is not the greatest and becomes more of a headache than it is to fight on foot. I feel that my character is as slow and clunky as I was in DS1 whereas the bosses and enemies have crazy tracking and speed. They also have weird AI in general; with one of the black knight assassins in the evergoal she was hyper aggressive the first time I fought her and incredibly passive the second time when I killed her. I've noticed enemy range for spells seems a lot farther than my own and that seems a little ridiculous. Some people have said they took the worst aspects of DS2 and put them in ER. Others have said that if this game wasn't a fromsoft title it would have been judged much more harshly. I have conflicting feelings on the game as a whole. Worst of all are the fromsoft fanboys praising the game simply because it's a Fromsoft title and refuse to hear any kind of criticism towards it. It's this crowd that loves git gud narrative and acting like beating these games is some kind of massive accomplishment and over time the games have steadily upticked in difficulty and that seems to be the main thing the games are revolved around now. Going from DS3 to DS1 made me realize how not difficult DS1 really is. And going from ER to DS3 made me realize how insanely fast and multi-comboed the bosses are in ER. The Demon boss in the DLC was an absolute breeze when in the past I really struggled against them. I love these games for a variety of reasons but from DS3 to ER I've been enjoying them far less. The difficulty was never a reason why I love these games. Ironically my favorite ER boss was the Fire Giant. I found his moves to be predictable and very easy to dodge.

[@firmak2]

to each theyr own, i think its one of theyr best work if not theyr best work to date.

[@chopsandtoots]

@@firmak2 and to me their best title would be Bloodborne. The people who can't handle those criticizing ER and acting like it's the best game to exist since sliced bread and is absolutely perfect in every way with zero flaws is just making the experience far worse.

[@firmak2]

@@chopsandtoots "and acting like it's the best game to exist since sliced bread and is absolutely perfect in every way with zero flaws is just making the experience far worse." i dont know how it makes the experience worse, thats like saying a show is bad because of the fanbase but i agree that its cringy.

[@chopsandtoots]

@@firmak2 more in the sense of, when you try and either talk about ER's flaws you get shouted down by the people who are still riding the hype train or insulted and it's rarely a constructive conversation. I can't really even discuss the game with a friend of mine because he vehemently disagreed on the Elden Beast fight being objectively not very good (as in, he thought it was a great fight), and does nothing but praise the Melania fight despite her essentially being a Sekiro boss in a Souls game. Even on videos like this and others the fans are fucking toxic and annoying about it. If you love the game endlessly why watch critique videos only to be an ass? The souls community in general can be really annoying with their gatekeeping but damn ER is next level. The subreddit is pretty bad, though I've been seeing more topics about things that people dislike about ER and it's more of a discussion.

[@cacadrink]

@@chopsandtoots and tell me how is bloodborne better, their map is smaller less detailed, its considered the easiest souls game by almost everyone, their bosses are a joke and a lot more weaker then elden rings, the graphics are awful for a 2015 game i mean bo3 released in 2014 and the graphics are insanely better, The main game is to short, Mediocre character customization, small selection of weapons, The game actually helps you find the bosses rather then you looking on your own, Their best weapon is obtainable from the start without doing any work and makes the game 5x easier. Thats just the cons and theres a lot more now im going to list the pros: guns.

[@Kamn_exe]

Does anyone else have an issue with button input lag? It like I have to push a button seconds in advance. Maybe I'm playing it like an action game.

[@everettzarnick2323]

This generally occurs when your hardware isn't up to scratch when running a game. Or, alternatively, you're using an advanced TV instead of a monitor. Console or PC?

[@666Kaca]

DSPgaming has this problem all the time

[@Izak_Klark]

​@@666Kaca We all hate DSP

[@AniGaAG]

I agree with you about being forced to use different weapons for different bosses sometimes, but for different reasons. I think that, with resistances being kept more "tame" like in the past, a big part of the uniqueness of every playthrough is that, depending on your build, you have different degrees of difficulty with different enemies in different places at different times. So when you crank resistances up to where you just have to switch, that uniqueness fades.

[@animaegray]

I agree on a lot of points. I'm pretty much done with the game at 50 hours. Got to Crumbling Farum Azula at level 98. The game's balance is absolutely ridiculous, like 80-90% of the time it felt too easy or too hard, and honestly, most of the time it was the former. The game doesn't really put a lot of checks on you with regards to how high you can upgrade your weapons and level up with respect to where you are in the game. You can get up to +15 upgrades from just Liurnia, Caelid, and Limgrave (plus Weeping Peninusila, but it's basically an extension of Limgrave) without putting any real effort. All those areas are open to you from the get go and if you play it like an open world game (which it is, duh) and explore, you'll stumble upon those smithing stones without a whole lot of effort. Likewise, you'll a ton of inventory souls that will boost you quite a bit level wise for also very little effort. As for its open world design - it isn't a true seamless open world game. It's a collection of large overworld levels that you teleport between. There's zero reason to travel between those levels on horse (or on foot, if you're crazy enough), you can't even travel between some without a loading screen. For all intents and purposes, those overworld levels could've been islands with fixed teleport points between adjacent ones because that's the basic design of it. The game suffers heavily from what I can only refer to as item diarrhea. It's almost like a hack and slash game (like Diablo II), except you must pick everything up because you can't know in advance what it is. There's zero consistency in placement - it can be a garbage crafting item, it can be a garbage weapon, it can be a good set of armor, or it can be a game breaking talisman. You can't know what it is until you pick it up. The good stuff can be in plain sight, the useless stuff can be hidden in some obscure ass catacomb, so you raise your hopes up, and what do you know, you get pickled octopus balls that raise your stamina 7% for 23 seconds if someone nearby is being poisoned. The weapon upgrade system is downright delusional. You need 96 smithing stones (no, really, it's 3 upgrades per stone tier, 12 stones required per tier, max level is 24 for regular stones, do the math) to get to the penultimate upgrade level. Meanwhile, it's just 9 for somber stones. Why? No idea. It costs a ton of runes to buy the stones and to upgrade, and you'll also always be behind on the Ball Bearings in terms of being able to buy the same stone tier as your main weapon upgrade. In other words, unless you're a Souls Nerd and you really, really love these games and you don't mind farming runes and experimenting, and you don't mind the sheer inconvenience of physically buying all those items because of course you must manually do that (and then run back to the blacksmith just to pad the playtime some more)... well, all the 500 weapons that you pick in the game are utterly useless. You can only try them out for their moveset. Want to actually use just one of them? Tough luck, cough up 2x-3x the runes required for the level up. It's not a bad game, but seeing it praised to much is absolutely crazy. The game is deeply, deeply flawed in virtually all of its aspects. The shitshow that is ER's UI alone is worth a couple of paragraphs of ranting. The runes in the inventory still do not pool with the regular ones when you level up or buying/upgrading? It is such an obvious and easy to implement QoL thing. The game's chock full of these obvious inconveniences that were present in other games, and to this day Fromsoft thinks it's all fine and good. There's no quest log and the quests are ridiculously obscure and convoluted. If you think about it, their quest design has the same exact flaw as a lot of other open world games - it relies on quest markers and a quest log. Except there aren't any. The most common argument against quest markers, of course, is that you need to design the quests in such a way that you don't need them in the first place. Oh, the irony.

[@Masta2Playa]

What do you mean that the weapons are useless? I never really used the normal smithing stones, because there were only exactly 4 weapons I used in the whole game, and 3 of them (every one except my first weaoint) used somber smithing stones, and since these were the better weapons overall, I did not understand the usage of normal smithing stones anyway

[@frysebox1]

git gud

[@factormars4339]

Or maybe you don’t understand how to progress without pain.

[@majeedmamah7457]

The game has so many items in order to support different playstyles.

[@davidnewhart2533]

​@@frysebox1 You git gud. Git gud at arguing bro.

[@whendowedie7835]

18:46 soliar proves that devs want you to use summons, just use it or don't, my first time at this gate I died the the giant the lured him out and killed everyone on foot so this whole part of the video really sounds like you just want something to hate because you can't beat fire giant or something, theres no problem with that fight 'you' are the problem. DS has always been about creativity and elden ring being open world leaves us with countless options for anything from this point on, if you don't like that it's your problem

[@laikenf]

Agreed, as hard as I tried, I was not able to enjoy this game and was extremely disappointed on how little to no effort I felt was put into actually pushing the souls formula forward.

[@bs7257]

One thing I think about a lot is because of the rolling/I frames mechanic bosses should most of the time have their attack chains limited in speed so players can reliably roll though an entire attack chain and maybe slip some attacks in the middle of a chain. DS3 did a great job of that for the most part but when you start paying attention in Elden ring you realise it’s super common to roll though 1 attack and not be able to roll through the next attack in time because it comes out so quick it catches you at the end of the roll animation. The only real counter to this is just knowing when to run away and stay out of range which just makes bosses inherently less interactive and engaging imo. Elden ring was my first Fromsoft game and I thought it was good but not the industry defining game everyone was calling it. Only when I went and played the other souls games I realised how fromsoft sacrificed so many carefully thought out design principles for the sake of a bigger and “better” game. I hope this isn’t indicative of the future of the souls games

[@lahunica2726]

A year and a half later and you show like many ds3 fans that you still don't understand how to play in Elden Ring. If you did, you would know that staying out of range isn't like ds3 style where you infinitely roll without learning patterns to escape bosses rather than doing what Bloodborne taught players, to dodge into bosses. Elden Ring made sure melee players understand that the hard way from the very first bosses. If you roll into attacks and into bosses, they stop attacking and try to change their position. They become super vulnerable. This simple fact decredibilizes all those criticisms of people playing like it's ds3 again, when ds3 doesn't even play like ds1 and ds2.

[@Elyakel]

@@lahunica2726 A year and a half later, we can still see copium from the elden ring fan base about how the game is perfect without any flaw and how the game is 200% fair The more i play the game the more i can see how unfair it is , it's a good game but far from the masterpiece people claim it to be ( I'm a full melee player, never played magic except in DS2 because the game want you to have ranged option thanks to the gank squad)

[@lahunica2726]

@@Elyakel who said that ? Try to come up with arguments, otherwise you will only be remembered as irrelevant to this discussion.

[@Elyakel]

@@lahunica2726 my bad i'm just a annoyed by how the fanboy are annoying about the game , my fault xD Well i didn't like any bosses in the game ( yep except the first elden lord , he is fair but fucking easy ) I dont really like how they can punish you for rolling , like for example margit with his light blade, if you evade the hit just before the light blade you take the blade , and of you don't evade the hit before the light blade and evade the light blade you take the thrust in the ground A lot of them have this problem , no matter where you evade you're sure to take at least one hit from this combo We also have mogg, a good fight overall but you have to bring the flask with you otherwise you take damage and can't evade the hits It felt unfair most of the time, and the summon didn't help at all they made the boss weak I don't really know if my problems are because i played with midroll but it wasnt fun at all ( hope the long list of patch have made the game better , i only played the first week and i've done all bosses except plassidusax) I also hate when bosses can go in and out of the fight like maliketh , you spend your time running after them like mario64 with the rabbits and it was so boring

[@TheGallantDrake]

block and guard-counter?

[@cardmossdn8058]

1:11:27 Holy shit, the arrogance. “I didn’t enjoy this game, therefore it’s a disappointment”. This review was a mess bro. Just a melting pot of criticisms that can be applied to the entire series, massively subjective, emotion-based arguments, and misunderstandings of the game’s core mechanics. I really wouldn’t have cared if you’d just left it at that, but then came the “how are people giving this a 10, this game blows”. I’d be perfectly willing to respect this argument if not for the constant tone of condescension. Controversy gets views though, I guess

[@Frosty_Th3_Snowman]

Omg, if I spent 60 bucks on something, was looking forward to it and it didn't meet my tastes, it's a disappointment. Not to you, maybe, but is to me. See how easy that is to figure out?

[@ryanwardell9975]

In DS3, I could confidently beat the game with several different builds. Elden Ring, the last quarter of the game I really have to optimize the build unless I want to be one shot or stuck in delayed combos that are coated in particle effects. All of this being said, the idea of Fromsoft being LAZY is insulting and flat out untrue. The artistry and sheer amount of content is borderline masterful. Just because it's flawed and has design aspects that seem to be not well thought through does NOT mean it's lazy. It's very hard to find games that have lazy devs... except Mojang and mobile games lol.

[@ironence8621]

I don't really get the roleplaying argument. I would argue that in this world where the threats can sometimes be literally made of stone, realistically it would be common sense to carry around a smashing weapon to deal with them even if it isn't your primary weapon.

[@everettzarnick2323]

It isnt an argument about pragmatism in the world of ER, its a matter of having access to every build, weapon, and strat on your first playthrough. When you are asked to play with every facet of the game on a playthrough, you aren't really playing a role, you're just in a fantasy world. Think skyrim, but with every skill at 100. You're hardly an "archer" or a "rogue" at that point. All the same, the roleplaying argument is the weakest argument in the video and I wish I had spent more time fleshing it out.

[@KrazyEngima]

My only gripe with this, is that you have to talk to a guy who directly tells you not to go through the front gate because youre gonna get folded. Youre the one choosing to run straight up roads into large groups of enemies lol i feel things like that are less to be ran through like a mad man and moreso to give places like stormveil more life. It makes sense for areas that are important to have a swathe of guards around the entrance.

[@alsenar2]

I think we went to "soft" on FromSoft... *sorry* ...and praised them too much. Especially with Elden Ring. It's a good game, yes, but i think if FromSoftware had not been the developer then the people would have criticized the game a lot more. That's my opinion.

[@everettzarnick2323]

hohohoho good one.

[@3irmaos.]

I enjoyed my time with the game, but the replayability is without a doubt the worst in the souls genre, a lot of interesting items have a low damage cap, and considering simple enemies in the late game have more HP than most of the dungeon bosses, you're filtered to use the same weapons and builds as everyone else, because they feel like the only viable ones, I'm going back to Yharnam.

[@everettzarnick2323]

I enjoyed this comment. Glhf in yharny. thanks for watching

[@king_alonne3707]

welp you can beat ER at level 1, while bloodborne is the real linear unengaging game at the second playthrough. like you just do the same thing twice, unlike in ER where you literally decide almost anything. but each for their own anyway.

[@subashira]

@@king_alonne3707 “I have never played Bloodborne.”

[@king_alonne3707]

@@subashira it was for free in April, I was there to welcome the casul players like you as an invader. seriously this is the stupidest reply I could have ever get. get lost.

[@subashira]

@@king_alonne3707 Holy shit does your life depend on these games LOOOOOOOL. I’ve 100%’d Bloodborne from back to front and objectively your critique was just wrong.

[@David-tr4jl]

About halfway through the video, but I wanted to mention that the Crystal bosses are gimmick fights. One you stagger them for the first time, their outer crystal shell cracks and you're then able to do real damage. Not sure yet if you bring that up later in the video or not. Good points so far but I thought I'd mention that.

[@everettzarnick2323]

The RPG argument is the weakest argument of the script, and I wish I had spent more time on it. There is still an annoyance with vigour dependency in this game for me, but ultimately you're right. Good roleplaying usually involves locking out certain builds from playing certain ways, so my argument was uninuitive and, probably, somewhat backwards.

[@randorandom9494]

​@@everettzarnick2323there's actually another boss that fits your argument much better, and that is Borealis, the dragon in Mountaintops. He has 80 resistance to slash and thrust, and 40 resistance to other elements aside from strike, so I had to waste a lot of titanite and runes for a mace that I didn't care about.

[@Ramhams1337]

@@everettzarnick2323 there is vigor/health dependency in all souls games. mid/late game you need more vigor than early. like the recommended lvl for finishing ds3 is like lvl 65-70. elden ring late game is recommended to be like lvl 150 or something. it's pretty obvious that enemies are gonna do more dmg so you need more health. pretty sure lvl 30 health in ds3 is fine. but you need like 50-60 vigor late game in elden ring. but you're also gonna be twice the lvl so it shouldn't be a problem

[@Damesanglante]

Elden Ring was my first experience of this company's games and never in my life i've been more frustrated about a game. It is designed like this so the sunk cost fallacy and pride push you to keep playing. Companies these days are manipulating people.

[@everettzarnick2323]

They abandoned the human element amd plugged this game into the profit equation, me thinks. Sunk cost fallacy indeed.

[@lumendrake2265]

I'm not a fan of Elden Ring but relying on multiple enemies as a way to generate difficulty isn't bad. it can be poorly done, but it works well within the Dark Souls framework based on deliberate action and playstyle/build choice affecting encounters. I have videos on my channel where I explain this

[@jordanmoreno7481]

So where's the dark souls 1 critique

[@Lord_Artorias]

Yeah…. I cant really read most of your complaints. All i hear is stubborn personal behaviours. Strong lack of personal development. Just ”me, Me and myself”.

[@n1lknarf]

35:30 the fact that dragon's dogma fixed the "big monster fight" problem years ago but fromsoft gets praised for letting players fight ankles and toes in 2023. For those who don't know: in dragon's dogma you have to climb on monsters and dragons and crawl on them to their weak spots to actually damage them. Nothing will be more exciting than having to beat a dragon in its heart while its flying, or having to climb the tail of a gryphon to reach its wings and burn them so it crashes on the ground, all of this while in air. Fromsoft is the pinnacle of mediocrity. People shit on ds2 ancient dragon because it's boring and lame, but praise elden ring when it has the same dragon design that ds2. Only kalameet had something interesting going on.

[@SunnyOddny]

Fromsoft is not "the pinnacle of mediocrity" thats a stupid sentence. i agree with everything else you're saying but man relax

[@huyphung802]

Turn it into gimmick fight doesn't really fix anything though, and it turn boring after your 3rd boss with how spongy they are

[@Ramhams1337]

what's the fix? a gimmic fight? they have made those fights as well. those are usually not that fun either

[@huyphung802]

@@Ramhams1337 are you asking me those question?

[@Ramhams1337]

@@huyphung802 it's one question, and i was asking the dude who said dragons dogma fixed the issue. so i was asking how. and if it was a gimmic fight that was the fix

[@erickmeikoki6195]

after playing this game enough times, i agree with everything in this review. The game is so...unfulfilling. Bosses leave a lot to be desired, the map leaves a lot to be desired, the scaling system everything. Just feels hollow.

[@wisecontragio172]

bro the main game ain t shit, you need to play the DLC, it s like a cheap, AI-generated, boss power fantasy over the player character, i swear down nobody play tests these games no more

[@everettzarnick2323]

I plan on playing the dlc and making another video on the game. Ill keep your words in mind.

[@eh298]

skill issue

[@nero4624]

Lil bro couldn't get pass mogh and radahn

[@BotBoy-un3pz]

@@eh298 boss design issue

[@RemnantofTheTom]

I feel like the only main bosses have issues in the dlc are Metry and Radahn, the others are fun and fair to me, especially Rellana, Bayle, Messmer and Midra

[@ultor7654]

Great analysis, solid statement and wise comment. As a souls vet I was very disappointed with that game. Thank you for sharing Sir!

[@everettzarnick2323]

And thank you for your comment. I appreciate it.

[@breznsalzer7323]

The "issue" with Elden Ring is just the open world. It's basically the only new thing it brings to the table and one might argue a new aspect was much needed in the souls formula. It certainly opened the genre up to new players since open world has been the way to go for years now and many players praise Elden Ring for exactly this feature because that's just what they prefer. However i think that an open world does not really fit what made the earlier titles so great, actually it often works against those strengths. Balancing is essentially impossible, there are very few handcrafted levels that are still remembered years later but instead open areas with forgettable copy paste enemies, few unique bosses for a game that size, exploration is only (somewhat) rewarding the first time around and the whole game is just bloated with content that is completely irrelevant once you've seen it once and realize that there is nothing of value there for your second playthrough. The earlier souls games were shorter, much more rememberable and replayable experiences with very few boring or unnecessary content, with Elden Ring i'm not even sure if i can get myself to start a new run for the DLC because it's just so much boring busy work (at least if you suck at souls games like me and need those levels). In the end it's still the best game of the year - just not as good as its predecessors

[@anonymousperson8903]

You’re right it’s not as good as its predecessors. It’s better.

[@mihaimercenarul7467]

@@anonymousperson8903 worse waaaay worse

[@anonymousperson8903]

@@mihaimercenarul7467 Equal*

[@mihaimercenarul7467]

@@anonymousperson8903 level design is worse, the open world is ok but aside of hiding the useless landmarks and mission objectives that other open world ganmes plague the map with, if you are underleveled you can't do much in higher level maps aside of running and picking an item that is supposed to be taken later. The open world also sacrificed the linear good level design. Most dungeons have worse level design, the bossess are waaay worse than in previous titles like sekiro, dark souls 3 and bloodbourne. The weapon system is full of useless weapons that have bad stats instead of being more unique. Same with many ashes of war and summons. The bossess rely on enemy summobs by doing crazy movesets that leaves you no window to attack and dodge efficiently. The soundtrack imo is not as good as previous titles, still good tho. Not to mention being one shot by a boss, then grinding a lot, theb when you return abd one shot the boss is not satisfying nor rewarding for me. I much orefer a fair challenge where he doesn't one shot me nor I one shot the boss, but in elden ring it's hard to do thay since it's easier to be underleveled or overleveled, abd when you are just the right level, the boss is atill poorly designed.

[@anonymousperson8903]

@@mihaimercenarul7467 Lol. This is all so subjective dude. " level design is worse," I don't think it is at all. Elden Ring has a many great levels...and Stormveil, Leyndell and Shadow Keep are among the best levels they've EVER done. "the bossess are waaay worse than in previous titles like sekiro, dark souls 3 and bloodbourne" I don't think they are at all. ER definitely has a better boss roster than Bloodborne. Sekiro and DS3 are close but with ER's DLC coming out I think it clears both of them boss wise. "The weapon system is full of useless weapons that have bad stats instead of being more unique. " I mean...isn't that VERY souls game? But Elden Ring has way more 'unique' weapons than any of them. "The bossess rely on enemy summobs by doing crazy movesets that leaves you no window to attack and dodge efficiently." No, the bosses are not balanced around summons, and all bosses have plenty of windows to attack and dodge effectively: you just need to learn their patterns and position well. The ER boss move-sets are harder, but they are generally fair. "he soundtrack imo is not as good as previous titles, still good tho" Debatable. I personally slightly prefer DS3 and BB soundtrack but it's close "Not to mention being one shot by a boss, then grinding a lot, theb when you return abd one shot the boss is not satisfying nor rewarding for me. I much orefer a fair challenge where he doesn't one shot me nor I one shot the boss, but in elden ring it's hard to do thay since it's easier to be underleveled or overleveled" I agree that ER was basically impossible to balance and even then they didn't do a GREAT job...some bosses are puzzingly under-tuned. However I don't mind too much because on repeat play=throughs I can curate my play-through so I'm fighting bosses at the 'right time.' Also, let's not act as if DS3 or BB are well balanced...they are way too easy, bosses are very under-tuned, all very un-balanced in the players favour. ER is only slightly worse in that way.

[@levacarvalho]

"I'd argue that taking more time from the player's pocket is the only content that Eldon ring consistently provides" Best quote of the video

[@adamswing6115]

I agree with most of what youi said in your video, however in the section where you describe how Elden Ring isn't a good roleplaying game, you brought up having to switch to a strike weapon and stop roleplaying to beat the boss. I don't think this is a very good argument, considering that 1, I'm 99% sure this is an optional fight, and you can just go off to do something else. 2, if you hit them enough, even with a non strike weapon, their armor breaks, getting rid of their damage resistance, and leaving them open to a critical hit. And 3, I'd argue that the boss being gated off actually rewards/penalizes roleplaying in a design decision that I think is pretty well thought out. You can see this design in a game that I assume you like alot, since you compared it to Elden Ring twice, Morrowind. The guilds in the game won't let you rank up if you don't have enough in a certain skill, With the Telvanni especially being gated off if you don't have access to Levitate.

[@everettzarnick2323]

Looking back, the roleplaying argument falls apart since FS gives you plenty of avenues to take apart niche side content. Id say it still holds up with the "just level vigour" problem in elden ring, but that's very subjective, since you probably should be getting one shot by late game bosses if you dont level HP at all. If I did the video again, id definitely rework or take out the roleplaying argument and shorten the segment on the giant ambush in the beginning. Lessons learned.

[@blackestyang7528]

a few things 1) the Stormhill gate is a great introduction to luring out enemies. Attentive players will notice the giant chasing them out of the archers' range while the archers will stay in place. More attentive players will notice southward ruins along the gateside cliff where Torrent can jump over to wrap behind the gate entirely. There's near always a "direct" approach and a "side" approach to enemy groups and setpieces throughout the open world and even parts of the legacy dungeons for people paying attention. There's enough deliberation in the environment to mark careful thought, which Mountaintop of the Giants is not, but projecting that poorly designed area to the entire game would be dishonest anyway 2) spirit ashes needed to be introduced in a way to where the player can't miss them, since meeting Ranni at the Church of Ellah after teleporting there is specific enough that it happens either by accident or with a guide. This would clearly convey it as an intended mechanic players can choose not to use if they don't want to, instead of as an extra option 3) the biggest problem with the bosses is nearly all of them are playing Sekiro while the player is stuck in Demon Souls. The inability to convert defense into offense means long periods of waiting for a boss to finish an attack The environment design and enemy placement is still as strong as it's ever been. The bosses, unfortunately, are starting to show the limits of a combat system that was *not meant* to move this fast. This has created a lot of worry for where their next "souls" game will go, or god forbid, how it might influence Armored Core VI (but being only a year apart, Elden Ring's more questionable decisions *shouldn't* factor into AC6)

[@makia3]

36:16 The solution is so simple that I figured it out the first time I fought these dragons, get on your horse and ride in the opposite direction. This itself discredits your opinion about bosses or difficulty for me because you’re below average in terms of using your brain to figure out solutions and will instead whine and complain that it’s bs. Souls vets lack any creativity in how they play games they just play them the same way and when they’re punished they think the game is being bs, Fromsoft can’t add any complexity to their games without people whining.

[@zachchase7516]

Exactly this. For sure there’s some valid points here, but just whining about having to do something new to beat a boss is so asinine. Like « oh, my role!!! ». Bro, you’re rpg’ing a char that is so stupid it wouldn’t imagine picking up a mace for one fight? On top of that dude literally played a mage and said spells are weak. Like come on dude. If you want to hate it that’s fine, but don’t make up shit.

[@makia3]

@@zachchase7516yea bros calling shit he doesn’t understand bs without even trying to figure out a solution, text book sign of scrub mentality.

[@randychristensen1028]

I've seen a lot of Elden Ring critique videos over the last year but this one by far has to be one of the most uninformed, nitpicky and worst takes I've ever come across. Good job my guy

[@everettzarnick2323]

ty

[@SaintKines]

It's always interesting watching these videos to see how different people play and think about these games. Whether they praise them as perfect or over critique them and hold them to a standard that no other game lives up to either. At the main gate, my first time through, I saw the giant before I even attempted to go through. I basically spoiled the ambush by accident. So I did what a Souls veteran does in this scenario, I lured it out with arrows and beat it 1 on 1 and then wiped up the mob on my way to greatness. There is usually at least one more option than the ones you're thinking. A lot of it comes down to play style too and that's why I understand when people don't like something as much as I do. The video is nitpicky as hell but obviously made by a Fromsoft fan that cares. Thumbs up.

[@johndodo2062]

Plenty of games live up to what this game doesn't. Stop lying to yourself. The user scores don't lie and they are the only ones that matter. And elden is a 7

[@SaintKines]

@@johndodo2062 I gave it an 8. I don't think I'm lying to myself. I don't see where I claimed the game is perfect either. It's not. I agree with some of the critiques here and think some where either nitpicking on purpose or based on user error.

[@jacksondiers582]

@@SaintKines yeah but you said people are holding elden ring to a standard that other games aren’t held to. That’s just factually wrong. Elden ring is repeatedly let off the hook for issues that other games are constantly harped on for, that’s the reality of it. And it’s mostly due to the stupidly loyal fromsoft fanbase that froth at the mouth for any reskinned dark souls game that they release. And on top of that, people say elden ring does so many new things in gaming when in reality it just completely copies a whole bunch of mechanics from other games. It’s just the first time a SOULS game did it and people are acting like it’s the next coming of Jesus. The problem a lot of people have with this game, its ratings, and its reviews, is that they’re completely dishonest. Elden ring is held up on a pedestal and many of the genuine flaws the game has are brushed off by mega fans while at the same time they criticize other games for those exact same issues. Seen it plenty of times in threads like this.

[@Jamer6765]

@@jacksondiers582 also a lot of the reviews are just in genuine and just going along with the popular option to not get crucified by from software fans.

[@jacksondiers582]

@@Jamer6765 No doubt that’s definitely the case. I’ve played games with similar ratings and Elden Ring cant even hold a candle to them. Don’t tell fromsoft fans that though they’ll have an aneurism.

[@TeaNoSugar87]

Some really butthurt fanboys in the comments, which goes to show that From are fully mainstream now I guess. I agree with most of what you said in the video. Not sure why this game inspires the amount of love that it does. It's a great game but its flaws are so glaring and pervasive that it can't possibly be considered perfect.

[@cardmossdn8058]

No game is perfect, especially not Elden Ring. The criticisms that he gave in this video were awful though, it’s no surprise people are angry

[@hare75]

The criticism was so exaggerate too much when they see a flaws it's already a worst fromsoft game which is stupid Actually elden ring was already a great game even at launch, ofc it's not perfect but it's FAR FAR FAR from the worst game

[@firmak2]

"Not sure why this game inspires the amount of love that it does. It's a great game but its flaws are so glaring and pervasive that it can't possibly be considered perfect." nobody considers this game seriously perfect but its good is far outweighed by the bad. add to that the game doesnt consider you an idiot and its very easy to see why its loved.

[@Jamer6765]

@@firmak2it still does not deserve across the board 10/10s

[@firmak2]

@@Jamer6765 depends, if 10/10 means flawless then no but then no game can ever be 10/10. But if 10/10 means it exceeds in expectation what it sets out to do then i do believe it qualifies as a 10/10. And as i mentioned its negatives are far outweighed by the good.

[@Tim_593]

After watching this whole video in one sitting, I have some things to point out and some I really disagree with. I agree with the point that a lot of the content here is copy-pasted, bland, uninspired, frustrating even. I experienced all of those things even in my first playthrough, though the first 100 hours (basically doing everything you can do before Morgott) were a blast. Now, when replaying, I dont enjoy even those early sections for the same reasons why I didnt enjoy the late game. Its just unrewarding filler most of the time. I have a build in mind, I know where the items are, I complete it within the first 3 hours, and then the entire rest of the game is just a steamroll. My largest Problem with the game however, is that I think the entire first half of DS3 is also just run-through fodder in every subsequent playthrough. But its worth it because the late game bossed are so good and rewarding to master. I have no issue running through Farron Swamp, because everything after it is fun, even in my 50th playthrough. The Elden Ring endgame is the opposite for me. They technically bring the challenge that I dont get from DS3 anymore, but its done in such a poor way, where I just have to dodge an onslaught of attacks (some of which feel RNG on their own) to get one (or none, depending on weapon choice) hits in. This is also where I had my largest point of disagreement with the video, because I would rather fight 3 Magma Wyrms at the same time than Beast Clergyman. Also from watching the Video, I noticed a couple points that kind of hurt your credibility, like calling Godfrey Morgott, calling Malenia Miquella and saying Sorceries were bad. (which is the weirdest take on Elden Ring I have ever seen btw, those spells are all broken) I did ultimately agree with most of the things you said, only that I still recommend the game to people because it either gets them into the Souls Games, or at least delivers 80+ Hours of fun gameplay on the first playthrough. I did come here after watching your Morrowind video by the way, which did not have these minor issues and I really enjoyed that one.

[@everettzarnick2323]

The video has some errors in it, and I don't deny it. The spells, in my playthrough, were absolutely underpowered, although there were a select few at the time that obviously broke the game. Things might be different now. I appreciate the comment all the same.

[@Tim_593]

@@everettzarnick2323 Maybe you got unlucky with some of the ones you tried. Because even just the starting spell in Glintstone Pebble murders everything in sight with effectively no drawback

[@Ramhams1337]

@@everettzarnick2323 the spells have been broken from the release. maybe you just used bad spells or beginner spells

[@chinaski5280]

Kinda of late but I've been thinking how FS just refused to bring mechanics from Sekiro into ER or just washed them out to the point of making them unintuitive: take the stance mechanic and the guard-counter. While in Sekiro you had a way of 1) visualizing the stance damage on your screen, so you could make choices with that knowledge instead of guessing, and 2) had a way of chasing every enemy that hops backwards to keep on the pressure because Sekiro runs as fast as anyone, or faster, in ER if an enemy hops back and starts one of his "sit and watch" moves, say goodbye to your stance damage. Like Malenia loves to do. Also, the Tree Sentinels are exactly Gyobu (boot Sekiro and compare them), but Gyobu doesn't have that stupid ranged attack spam that it can switch too and also far less tracking and "oops, got you" moves. The Tree Sentinels will even take a distance from you out of melee range so his horse can start spamming fireballs for no reason. Every "skilled" player (i.e., someone who has exploited the AI of the enemies of these games to avoid their tracking without dodging because every single, and I mean every single enemy, in this game can hold still for a second or more before one attack to deliver the next one to mess with your timing) will say that you actually has to charge attacks to build up stance damage. So, for example with Margit you have to bait a very specific jump or that stupid move where he holds his arm still for 5 seconds to queue a charge attack while hoping he doesn't pivot and tracks you anyway (not locking on helps, but wtf). I don't buy this is how the game is supposed to be played by the developer, this is just the way no-hit players have found to deal with the one single mechanic this game has to offer in terms of difficulty: awkward combos and timings made to fool you into a dodge or bait into a punish that can be answered with a zero-frame follow-up that every single boss has, like the Crucible Knight tail swipe. For example, take Smough's spin with the hammer at 1:03:09. If it was in ER, he would follow-up the slow spin with a quick 360 spin-to-win like "haha got you with this one, you thought I was done", in fact, there is an enemy in the Mountaintops that does exactly that. Meanwhile Smough's swing actually has much more weight and feels natural, but ER's combat just does not feels natural at all. It feels specifically crafted to mess with the dated dodge system. So basically, ER's stance system is just a worse version of Sekiro's in every sense. Also, I just don't understand how they decided to make you fight the Godskins again (and again and again), and then Gideon with a full hp bar, but Maliketh, it's most unique boss arguably, only has half of one proceeded by an awful fight with terrible pacing (I don't agree with you on this one, I think the Clergyman is just bad). Maliketh comes after a cutscene, throws a barrage of attacks that will instantly kill you and then you come back with knowledge and just kill him in 3 to 4 hits eventually. A well-paced Maliketh fight as THE pre-final boss would do much better than the whole boss rush gauntlet at the end. Finally, the story and lore of this game makes absolutely zero sense even by FS standards. Dark Souls 1 had a story with missing bits. ER has a few bits of what could be several stories: it makes no sense that there is an encounter with Godwyn's corpse at Stormveil and where it is actually supposed to be, except that it's cut content. Mohg in the sewers is a remnant of early development where it was supposed to be a regular enemy instead of a boss. There is at least 3 concepts of death in this game, apparently unrelated to each other. It is impossible to narrow down Marika's intentions: while Gwyn's intentions were clearly stated to you in game, besides the vagueness and dubiousness there was never a contradiction. Marika is a completely contradictory character, and absolutely every single conclusion about her character is possible based on what the game gives you. Finally, Godfrey is a character that is presented at a cutscene in the beginning of the game and in Stormveil, but vanishes only to appear again as boss in the end, which makes me think he was meant to be tied to the castle but was retconned as a final boss in the end. ER is the game the community wanted: it is Dark Souls 4 in an open world and it has (the same) pvp, and it's "hard" for veterans and noobies alike. Also, all the previous hits are there, including the dog with a sword in his mouth. Hence the success. There are new mechanics there which are the poor man's version of Sekiro's mechanics (where FS actually was creative with gameplay), but none of them gets anywhere. I think the Souls and Soulslike genre is drained. There is nothing new to be done with it, at least not with the same quality. If ER wasn't so keen on being "difficult" and huge it would fare much better, honestly.

[@everettzarnick2323]

Great comment. Im playing through the game again right now and its funny that you mentioned Margit. Im fighting him and I forgot just how punitive his attack chains are; very quick and without much room for return. The best method for beating him was running away and then returning and awaiting his slower attacks. Hardly the kind of fight DS3 gives you with something like dancer, for example, where you're constantly in the fray. The discrepency between his "sit and watch" moves vs. his moves that are CLEARLY designed just to give you a way to chip at his hp is so obvious that its painful to see the blatant insertion of "slow, heavy attack" as a bandaid fix to his combat. This is true for many of the enemies, as you mentioned. Crucible knight tail is another great example. Just annoying and time consuming. Sekiro enemy attack patterns without the sekiro combat. just doesnt work with me. Thanks for the comment, its golden.

[@jod_hates_it_here6895]

i’ve seen more and more of these videos saying Elden Ring was a let down. I just don’t understand how the perspective switched just like that. it’s probably the best game i’ve ever played. i don’t get it.

[@hare75]

He just possessed by half-quantum tv

[@firmak2]

it hasnt changed. Its still in the running for game of the year and its basically ER vs God of war. i think ER will take it.

[@pinetapple2961]

@@angel17891 Whats the best game you've ever played

[@subashira]

@@pinetapple2961 mgs2

[@xRichieeex]

It hasn’t changed a lot of people had these opinions, But any criticism toward this game gets met with dick riders that thinks this game can do no wrong .

[@makia3]

1:10:29 yea buddy you didn’t understand ER bosses played the game like ds3 had a miserable time and proceeded to complain bro all you had to do was watch how people like ongball play the game and learn from them. Just watch feeble kings video on ER boss design so you can learn how to fight the bosses this is coming from a guy who originally hated ER bosses and thought they were boring after watching feeble kings video and playing the same way as him I now think that the bosses are the best in the series. I recently played ds3 for the first time and was incredibly disappointed with how easy the bosses were I killed MIDir 2nd try and Geal 4th try and my build is an average dex build, there were no position based openings no use for charged R2 or ashes of war just R1 and roll spam which got boring literally every boss in the game was solved in the same way whilst in ER every boss main game has its own rhythm you have to follow to no hit.

[@UndeadMerchant]

Jesus, you have to study and copy how other people play to be able to have fun with the bosses? How is that in any way good?

[@makia3]

@@UndeadMerchant I didn’t say that you had to but as a reviewer you should do your research so you know wtf you’re talking about instead of spreading misinformation. I

[@FK74396]

After my 3rd playthrough I’ve finally realized that Elden Ring’s open world is a Ubisoft open world without any markers on it. Same repeated dungeons/outposts, same repeated “bosses”, same map section collection.

[@SterlingSanders]

Wow, I’m only 20 minutes into this video after having just felled the Elden Beast over 150hrs of trial and tribulation in my first Fromsoft game, and I’ve done nothing but nod my head vigorously listening. I’ve never played the other games, but what a roller coaster.

[@everettzarnick2323]

I hope it was at the very least an entertaining watch. Thanks for the comment, sanders.

[@qing7902]

I'm not sure you gave ER enough shit for its repetition. Not even just the fact that bosses are constantly being reused, or the fact that there's only 7 unique bosses (6 now that the DLC reused one), but the fact that so many of them pull directly from move sets in the previous games. I'm not sure how active you are in the Sekiro community, but its a pretty widely held belief that Malenia was repurposed from the framework of Tomoe from the rumoured cancelled DLC, considering how her moves look so much like Sekiro moves. The narrative's lack of originality and lack of general sense is also a massive problem I have with the game, which I'd also tie to the terrible implementation of NPC quest lines. But yes this game is absolutely a step backwards and it infuriates me at times how few people even recognise any issues. FromSoft games are special, I don't want them to just become the "we make hard games" developers where we all seal clap because yet again they made a hard game.

[@Ramhams1337]

well there are 40 unique bosses. and 8 unique bosses you only fight once.

[@benprickett8894]

If you are going to say the DLC takes away a unique boss then you have to include the dlc bosses. So then its 15 unique bosses. Id also say that consort radahn is entirely different to base game radahn and should not be considered a reused boss fight.

[@qing7902]

@@benprickett8894I think if the pace of new bosses to reused bosses was the same in the base game as it was in the dlc, then ER would be a much better game. I’m happy to say that Consort Radahn is a different fight from Starscourge Radahn, but it still felt like a retread narratively.

[@facundovera3227]

Saying that Starscourge Radahn and Promised Consort Radahn are reused boss fights just because they're the same dude isn't right, all of the animations are new. After the release of the DLC Elden Ring has 16 non-reused bosses, quit being dishonest about it.

[@qing7902]

@@facundovera3227 16 non-reused bosses is still wildly low and it can’t be used as a counter to the base game being terrible for repetition. while i concede that radahn is a different fight to the base game version, he is a reused story beat which felt like an incredibly cheap payoff

[@bravingbrivatebrian]

Best thing about Elden Ring is that it will pull beginners into the old catalogue. Fromsoftware is special. I loved Elden Ring but it is to me, the clear cut "worst" game of the series. Still an amazing game. Especially given today's video game climate. I hope Fromsoft never does an open world game again, but I am happy they tried it. They did a good job too, I just find the open world formula to be bland.

[@everettzarnick2323]

Couldn't agree more, Dringo. FromSoftware is pretty much the gold standard for gaming right now, and if Elden Ring does nothing else but put them on more people's radar, I'd call it a success, despite my obvious misgivings.

[@Sneed4guild]

Agreed. Pretty sure the 80/20 rule applies here, where 20% of people are analytical enough to realize how many flaws elden ring has, whereas 80% just can't. Look at those black wagons and stale yellow trees copy pasted everywhere, how siofra river is an empty facade, at the problem of spending 3 hours clearing a castle (that looks like some other castle) for a wizard staff on your rogue. I didn't get these feeling at all from DS3, it was all finished and fine-tuned. Since Elden Ring is open world and not a branching linear game like the other souls you often feel like all you accomplished was marking a checkmark for the map, not opening up or potentially closing a branch with meaning, story and substance.

[@chainedhex]

stale? your monitor is older than jesus if it looks stale to you, also its shocking that castles look similar, its almost as if the castles that look similar are built by the same people. also i wonder what the guidance of grace means, im sure it isnt telling me to follow it right?

[@makia3]

All these “critiques” of ER shitting on the game have aged poorly. After playing every single Fromsoft title this game is the best in every aspect, Fromsoft continues to evolve with every game they release and this is the culmination of every game they’ve created in the past.

[@AniGaAG]

"Most of us have been starved for even a taste of incredible game design over these past few years" ... uhm... if you play nothing but big AAA releases, yes? Otherwise, no? I'm getting really tired of people pretending like AAA stuck on repeat is everything gaming is. (... and also kind of tired of people treating From and their games like the second coming of Christ. Like... calm down. They're good, some even great, but folks - calm down.)

[@Ramhams1337]

i mean. i hate dragon fights as much as the next person. but. 1 it's optional. 2. you are literally fighting the dragon with a dagger dealing like 15-18 dmg when it has like 6k+ health. that's gonna take like 350 swings. maybe get a weapon that does more dmg or upgrade the dagger. 3. having a collosol weapon would actually be better here since you could stagger the dragon. 4. by hitting it's feet you can avoid the backwards blue breath attack by just getting on torrent the second it flies in the air. also crystallions are literally just tanky untill stance broken. doesn't really matter what you use. dagger just deals next to nothing before stance broken. and something heavy unupgraded might deal 20 dmg or somehing. i also find it kinda weird you hate on elden ring for having to level vigor when you more or less have starting health in an area you called "mid way through the game" you suprised you get one shot in the harder parts of the game where the enemies are stronger? shocker. "im role playing as a lvl 1 wretch, it's so bs that i don't do any dmg and that i get 1 shot with my 600 health on a huge ass dragon" make it make sense atleast

[@TheOneAndOnlyZelenkaGuru]

Optional is the dumbest excuse for shit game design...

[@Ramhams1337]

@@TheOneAndOnlyZelenkaGuru what is the shit game design, i need specifics otherwise i can’t agree

[@TheOneAndOnlyZelenkaGuru]

@@Ramhams1337 Optional? Bad game design is fine is your point, just saying why that is dumb

[@Ramhams1337]

@@TheOneAndOnlyZelenkaGuru when did i say that? and that isn't my point at all

[@TheOneAndOnlyZelenkaGuru]

@@Ramhams1337 Literally was

[@Melchizidek777]

Noooo you can't criticize the golden boy! It is without fault! It's no surprise this is so many people first souls game, it's hands down the easiest

[@GreenWolf2k]

I honestly believe most people wouldn't have beaten this game if they didn't look up the many broken builds which are pretty much required if you don't want to risk breaking your control once you you get to the last 3rd of the game.

[@randorandom9494]

I would like to voice a few other problems I've had with this game. 1. Stamina. Even without leveling endurance you have so much that you can almost endlessly spam roll and R1, and while most enemies are still stunlocked easily, the bosses have to "counter" this with hyperdelayed attacks and endless combos, and end up mostly being annoying. 2. Can't open the map in combat. Just why? Lock me out of fast travel but at least let me see where I'm going even if a single dragonfly somewhere is after me. 3. Legacy dungeons. While Stormveil Castle, Leyndell, Volcano Manor were some of the best parts in the entire game, the other legacy dungeons were either disappointing and small (Caria Manor, Castle Morne, Nokron, Sellia) or poorly balanced (Farum Azula, Haligtree, Ordina) 4. Catacombs. The real problem here is not the reuse, but rather the fact that you never know which catacombs have what loot. Best example: on my first playthrough, I chose dex and went through almost half the game without a single katana, and turns out there was Uchi in some Limgrave catacombs I missed, great. Then some catacombs have bell bearings that let you buy titanite from the merchant, making them very useful for all builds, but they're still not "marked" as more important. 5. Strangely enough, the world feels very disconnected for an open-world game. Instead of using the interesting world design to move around, you have use teleporters to get to areas like Deeproot, Mohgwyn Palace, Farum Azula, Haligtree and so on. It almost feels like the game is punishing exploration sometimes, like first time going to Siofra, you're met with a beautiful view, light all the fires, fight a mediocre boss and... that's all? Felt like I wasted my time there. 6. Movement. Now this point can apply to a lot of open world games, but I thought that after the success of Sekiro they'd try to experiment with that more, like navigating the world with a grappling hook. Though as you mentioned, the horse movement sucks and its momentum combined with pitfalls has probably killed me more than Maliketh. 7. The quests. They are basically the DS3 quests but put into an open world, which just doesn't work. The one that confused me the most is Volcano Manor. In any other RPG game, it would've been a faction that you can either join and do their assasination quests for some kind of bad ending, or completely ignore them, infiltrate the dungeon and kill the boss. Well in reality, if you want to do the former, you have to wait all the way until Mountaintops to finish their quests, and it still ends in a fight with Rykard, and then they thank you for killing him (huh??); and if you want to oppose the manor (like you should, if you know about their backstory from Gideon), you have to abandon a few other questlines, and find either an illusory wall, or some random enemy that teleports you here. Special mention to the Ranni quest (needed for one of the endings), which requires you to pick up the doll, rest at a specific bonfire and select the talk option THREE TIMES before you can progress it.

[@MarkLoganFIB]

Ehhh You simultaneously have too much and too little. If you like dodging you have plenty. If you prefer shields you never have enough. Dogshit design.

[@randorandom9494]

@@MarkLoganFIB edited to add more stuff but i agree

[@HongoIV]

I just didn’t love Elden Ring. I should've it's the culmination of everything I wanted in a succesor to Dark Souls, an amazing story, music, character art, open world. But I just didn't love it. I have 200 hours on my first character and around 500 hours total. That being said, I've only been able to play through the game once. I revist it twice a year to give it a try because I said I want to love it like I loved the Soulsborne series. But I can never finish a second play through. No matter how many times I try, I end up losing interest.

[@maboilaurence8227]

I've never a played a game with bosses this inconsistent, you either steamroll them on your first try on a friday night after coming home drunk from a party or or you get absolutely destroyed with awful movesets and obvious input reading. I love the game, I'd recommend it to anybody, it's better than most AAA games this year, blah blah blah; but damn is it shallow and nowhere near as good design wise as other Fromsoft's games. The honeymoon this game received by so many youtubers claiming it to be the best Fromsoft game is absurd, I'm not saying they were shills but they lost so much credibility to me.

[@asundelgun3487]

I think the thing that kills Elden Ring is that its a game of two halves. The first half is a wondrous breath of fresh air. Dark souls in an open environment. Who wouldn't love that? Then after Fire Giant it shows it true self. Bunch of reused enemies that have turned into damage sponges that can also one shot most builds. The end game areas that are open are mostly barren with very few points of interest. The "legacy dungeons" seem unfairly difficult at times and it turns into DS2 where you just want to sprint through rather than explore. If you choose to continue to explore you are rarely rewarded as the items you find at that point are mostly useless. Then you have the bosses...The endgame bosses are absolutely ridiculous and seem like they don't belong in this game. The feel more like Sekiro or Bloodborne bosses in Dark Souls. Its not a good balance. The first half of the game is beautiful and engaging. The second half is boring, bloated and unfair.

[@everettzarnick2323]

A good summary, I'd say.

[@user-jv3ry5xy4f]

People complain about the second half, reused enemies and such but then they say dark souls 1 is perfect

[@toooydoeur]

​@@user-jv3ry5xy4f funny how both are an 8/10

[@asundelgun3487]

@@user-jv3ry5xy4f now where did you see me say DS1 is perfect?

[@user-jv3ry5xy4f]

@@asundelgun3487 I was talking about people in general and how most people are biased towards ds1. Not you specifically

[@BasedChadman]

DS1 remains the peak of their games ER can't touch BB at all, either

[@Sixth_SSense]

So glad opinions are a thing

[@BasedChadman]

@@Sixth_SSense Me, too, so I can have the right one

[@kkrkkr5093]

The game where the second half of it is just pure dogshit? Right

[@BasedChadman]

@@kkrkkr5093 Leave DS2 out of this

[@namtrinhhai1035]

@@BasedChadman No, he mean that the second half of DS1 is bad. DS2 not deserve to mention here. That game is just insult to series

[@wafflboix]

You cant go into elden ring expecting dark souls 4. The boss mechanics are a combination of sekiro and dark souls. You cant wait for a combo to end then try to get some hits in, you have to find openings in between attacks, see what works and what doesnt. You dont have to fight every single enemy you find on the map, and the repeated bosses arent meant to each have their own unique experiences, some are just meant to level up the player. The one flaw i have with this game is the fact the game doesn't teach you any of this. It doesnt tell you that bosses have an invisible stamina bar, it doesnt tell you that its better to fight bosses with aggro and try to look at it differently from dark souls. Every souls veteran came into this game expecting it to be basically dark souls but open world, that's why so many people that were new to the franchise loved it. I do agree the game has a lot of flaws, but overall its still a great game. You can play the game with basically any weapon you find, you can explore and find new things even after multiple playthroughs. Its not my favorite soulslike by any means, but its nowhere near a bad game, just a flaw on the developers side to not be able to introduce the player properly into this new and expansive game.

[@nealwesco7465]

Elden Ring sits in a weird spot where by itself it is better than 80% of what is out in the market today. But when put next to its siblings it just can't live up to the pedigree it is supposed to have and you get a sizable amount of the fanbase defending what they think it is supposed to be because it is a FROM game and not it on its own merits.

[@skeltaldelegate5408]

As someone who has played every Armored Core and Soulsborne game, I can tell you that you hit the nail on the head in this video. Fromsoftware has clearly adopted a new design philosophy that seeks to close the gap between low-skill and high-skill players by introducing more damage source saturation rather than designing more intuitive mechanics and encounters. These choices incentivise players to invest in health and defense (which coincidentally has better cost-reward than damage) and then designing their encounters based on that archetype. They no longer want players to learn how the game works and prefer people to just trade hits and facetank particle effects with hitboxes. They did the same to Armored Core 6 by introducing hard-lock and shrinking the speed spread between heavy and light builds by 50% while retaining the same spread for AP (health) as previous titles. ER plays like a game made by someone who could not beat DS1 but still wanted to make a "difficult" game.

[@davidsweeney7837]

I was trying to be open minded. I love Elden Ring but it has flaws… none of the stuff you mention. ‘I can’t use one tool for all of my problems’. You don’t say… ‘I refused to level up health or change weapon and got one shot!’ Yep sounds likely… I changed my play style occasionally… I still think it a role playing game. Because it is!

[@barbecueswithsauce4178]

I like dark souls 2 more than Elden ring. Am I a bad person?

[@everettzarnick2323]

No, that game is fun and at least tries to experiment with the formula, however jankily.

[@GM-xk1nw]

You have mental problem

[@DooDoo-f4v]

You have taste and the ability to discern trash gameplay loops from fun ones.

[@umwha]

12:09 - Its a testament to the amount of adventures that you were able to do all that without getting the horse? Thats not good design dude

[@everettzarnick2323]

I disagree. Tight packed adventures at every turn with no downside to not having torrent is easily a plus for the early part of Elden Ring. The caveat being that it only works for new players. Vets, as I point out, will almost certainly feel the pain of not having torrent no matter where they are.

[@whendowedie7835]

14:34 getting mobbed is not new to the souls series

[@worstposterTL]

only jump heavies, doesn't try strafing, charged heavies, jump dodging, or using spacing as a way to dodge attacks "the game forces you to play a certain way"

[@evgenyomegin]

You can dodge all of that by pressing roll button. Dodge roll is imbalanced.

[@worstposterTL]

@@evgenyomegin when you dodge roll an attack that can be outspaced, strafed, or jumped, you lose out on a lot of damage and poise break potential you could have otherwise had. It is also substantially more expensive stamina-wise. often the difference between a light and a charged heavy punish. margit the tutorial boss with its hugely delayed attacks, easy strafing, and position-based followups, is trying to teach you that blindly spamming roll at every animation isn't going to cut it.

[@archite001]

It sounds like you just don't like the design of the game, not necessarily that it's "Hollow, fundamentally flawed, and lazily designed". A title like, "Elden Ring is not my cup of tea" would be more accurate

[@TheSoftcoreMonkey]

True, but that wouldn’t farm as much engagement wouldn’t it?

[@amwazdraws6890]

How can you look at the open-world and the legacy dungeons and call it "lazy"? I only think that the last few areas and bosses were not that good, especially the Godskin Duo, up until that I enjoyed everything in this game and I can't wait to play the DLC.

[@rayvinkrossing]

Ngl brother, this kinda just seems like a case of personal preference. Though, I will say, The biggest problems in Elden Ring for me would have to be the lack of any kind of quest log or journal and the weird, random performance issues.

[@mzza]

I have 1000h in the souls trilogy. I was skeptical of the open world so I pirated it first to figure out if I wanted to play it. Game was doodoo and I quit and uninstalled it before 10 hours. It amplified all the worst aspects of the souls series and watered down what was good. This video matches most of my opinions on the game. Disrespectful of your time. Ubisoft style copy paste content, only without map markers. Passive reactive melee combat that is at best a rhythm game and at worst a waiting game. Very little actual gameplay freedom. They have pushed the combat and animation systems past breaking point. enemies and especially bosses move like mushy floaty messes with poor keyframes. I personally among many others criticized DS2 for too many gank fights, fast travel, reusing bosses, bad final boss, open structure affecting the difficulty and questlines too much, etc... Now that shit makes a masterpiece. I ultimately still enjoyed DS2 though. Yes. ER is better than the typical AAA sludge, but it's been a long time since I genuinely thought an AAA game was worth playing. Let alone an open world AAA game.

[@ghostparty2062]

As a souls veteran who tried to play this game twice and quite without finishing both times, i really needed this video 😂 pretty much voiced all my critics. Awsome job.

[@jordanmoreno7481]

What kind of souls games do you play

[@ghostparty2062]

@jordanmoreno7481 all the souls games and bloodborne. Havnt got round to sekiro yet though.

[@jordanmoreno7481]

@@ghostparty2062 so don't like open world 🤔

[@ghostparty2062]

@jordanmoreno7481 iv enjoyed a thew open world games. Elden ring just rubs me the wrong way 😆

[@jordanmoreno7481]

@@ghostparty2062 so you don't like it because it's not dark souls 🥱

[@FatherMulk]

The salt from the souls fanboys in the comments are endlessly funny

[@QuantumTelephone]

All I see are people respecting his opinion?

[@muhammadzariff7075]

@@QuantumTelephoneTrue, but the dude above is referring to the replies of said opinions you spoke of.

[@QuantumTelephone]

@@muhammadzariff7075 I know. They are mostly all super respectful and not salty at all

[@jasonvrba4644]

Nothing better than people still yapping about a game they didn’t like still years later

[@BastianRosenmüller]

Actually almost everyone in this comment section is respectful and not salty at all. But what kills me about such Videos is how those YTèrs vomit their silly opinions about a game. Nobody cares if you liked the game or not and everyone seems to think his or her opinion is objectively true, while its not. Just bc you didnt enjoy a game doesnt meen that it is generally a bad game. Elden Ring objectively is one of the most sucessful games in the last decades. I dont enjoy most of the Sony titles. I dont like GOW or Last of Us or any Far cry. But i dont rant about it in the internet how bad those games are and take my opinion for granted , bc many people enjoy them and they are objectively good games.

[@Solaires_Little_POG_Champ]

I don't know what shift happened at fromsoft that makes them believe that a boss needs to be a spammy mess of moves with combo strings that go on for 30 years thanks to the inconsistent recovery times in beyond me.

[@makia3]

Those are position based combos punishing you for being in front of the boss the entire time. One example of this is Margits double knife attack which only happens when you’re in front of him after a one handed cane attack.

[@lotrfan4237]

You would’ve steamrolled the game and then complain about the easiness of the game if they weren’t designed like that.

[@facundovera3227]

I've broken posture of every single enemy except ancient dragons and I always use colossal swords, the punish windows are _fine._

[@Gelato41_]

⁠@@facundovera3227Dark souls used to be a game in which the only limitation is the human body when it comes to combat, all animations are accounted for and smoothly blended in DS1, plus, this game is just not fun

[@Feardracus]

I just shoot everything with a cross bow. Yes it is repetative, yes it takes long... but I love a game that lets me do it.

[@shanelindimore9418]

Only watched the horseback section. Idk, but I still remember epic horseback battles from my 1st playthrough.

[@HonestGhost21]

I'm not convinced with the roleplaying argument. Say you are the knife wielding wizard character that you mentioned in the video, that doesn't mean that everything in the world can be solved with your toolkit. Forcing you to adapt. Say we are adventurers in a fantasy world and we use sword and board and the other is a priest with no offensive spells. We are sent on a quest to face slimes who are essentially immune to physical damage but extremely vulnerable too fire. Do you think the sword and board adventurer would keep using their normal weapon? Or would they adapt and pick up a torch and oil pots? The priest may pick up a fire spell to acccomplish their task. Adversity doesn't stop roleplay, it nourishes and expands it. This is something I liked with Elden Ring, it feels less like a game because the world isn't catered to what I am used too.

[@kurtcobane1762]

34:17 "I mean every dragon in the game because they all have the same moveset except for different colours or whatever" Borealis the freezing fog has a unique glacial roar move and its stomps add freeze Glintstone dragon Adula has a unique move "Adula's moonblade" Decaying Ezkykes has a unique move "Rotting Miasma" where it fires the rot underneath it and the only safe place to stand is by the tip of its tail Magma wyrm Makar has different sword swing moves So every dragon has a unique attack, but every dragon also has no variation? which one is it? this is without even mentoning the ancient dragons Lichdragon fortissax has both death lightning and Fortisaxx's lightning spear both unique to him Dragonlord Placidusax has placidusaxx's ruin, teleports and various lightning attacks Lannesaxx has two different forms of her unique lightning move the only two dragons who share the same moveset without absolutletly any variation or change are Greyoll and Agheel, these two dragons use mostly the same moveset with no differences i believe the lesser dragons have a similar moveset to and you did state a few notable exceptions, but that's comparing a boss to a basic enemy should the basic enemies have unique attacks to? every unique named dragon has a unique ability but is also copy pasted?

[@henry2823]

Thank you for being there and thinking for yourself, and for speaking your mind regardless of fanboys that can not analyze and see connections by themselves. It is interesting that you bring up many more problems than the ones people usually address, ie undoable quests, having to look things up online to actually play, the meta vs do it yourself and lose kind of unfair mentality. One of my "favorite" events was when an npc actually gave me wrong directions to a certain other npc.

[@jpx_frd7015]

Finally someone with a brain in the comment section.

[@hectorparks8618]

@@jpx_frd7015ironic

[@Ih8theleft-q8x]

Fanboys,"you cant criticize a game unless you played it all the way through and played it on ultra hard, or wearing no armor and not leveling up health". "Thats really beating these games". Also fanboys." why is he crying about the game he played for 200 hours"......

[@coacobro1690]

IQ check. What is it.

[@DooDoo-f4v]

Hell I have about 700-600 hrs and wish I could get my time back. Now I just play Bloodborne. No fat. Just lean and mean. No hand holding and the limited weapon selection has more charm and intrigue than every lame weapon that infests this half assed money laundering project.

[@Zeusexxy]

Open world is just not their thing. I hope they go back to the roots and actually design levels.

[@Ragitsu]

Getting George Martin to write the story for a Souls-esque game (where the details are released in dribs and drabs) is like hiring a world class chef to prepare the club sandwiches and pretzels for your casual get-together; sure, you're getting quality, but it's not very fulfilling (plus, it's overkill).

[@everettzarnick2323]

Makes me wonder just how much he truly had to do with the story. I mean its so close to the Dark Souls template, did he really alter much? Did he really just happen to flop right into making a DS story 2.0? Genuine curiosity. Im sure officially speaking he had a large part to play, but I'm not so sure.

[@Ragitsu]

@@everettzarnick2323 Ultimately, the man's name was chiefly used for marketing.

[@marchmelloow]

@@Ragitsu Dude, Miyazaki's _dream_ was to get Martin to work on a project with him. When Miyazaki called him up, he never thought Martin would actually agree. So, no, it's clear that Martin actually made the world and its history, and that Miyazaki really wanted him to do so.

[@Ragitsu]

@@marchmelloowHis contribution aside (to whatever extent it exists), the overall experience primarily feels "Western fantasy viewed through an Eastern lens" (the same as the _Dark Souls_ entries).

[@marchmelloow]

@@Ragitsu Yeah, because it was still From Software writing the story of the game. Martin just wrote the world and its history.

[@deetsitmeisterjd]

If Elden Ring was rebuilt, got rid of Caelid, and everything after Stormveil Castle. They could have put Raya Lucaria Academy in the region south of Limgrave, made those two legacy dungeons much bigger, took out all the duplicate bosses, made each dungeon, longer and more custom. You could still include all the underground parts due to the well in Limgrave and, controversially, got rid of Torrent. Add Caelid Castle and the beach to castle in the south region so you can still fight Radahn. At the end of Stormveil Castle you fight Godfrey and then the final boss is a much harder Radagon and scrap the Elden Beast entirely. I think making Stormveil Castle locked until you've helped Ranni in Raya Lucaria, then behind the throne of Stormveil leads up to a brazier that does the same thing as the Forge of the Giants, personally I'd scrap Faram Azul aswell, and just have you wake up in StormVeil that's burnt to the ground. Now that's the Elden Ring I want, a much tighter complete game. Not only is it the worst From Software, it is probably the single worst game in terms of filler crap ever, even over Assassin's Creed.... Not even joking I'd rather do towers and camps in those games than do the 5th cave with another cat gargoyle at the end for a shit item I don't want.

[@elithegoat581]

just admit that you're bad at the game and your parents dont love you

[@everettzarnick2323]

Some harsh statements. I'm not sure I'd agree that ER is /that/ bad in terms of filler content, but it sure is bad. Thanks for the comment, I like the theoretical.

[@elithegoat581]

@@everettzarnick2323 why u ignoring my comment huh?

[@greenbrickbox3392]

​@@elithegoat581lmao there's not much in your content to respond to, Elden Ring is probably the most approachable game and aside for a few challenging bosses it has many more methods of making the game easier than previous Souls games. Fromsoft fans are more likely to notice that Elden Ring has rehashed most of the game from other Souls game assets and concepts and put them into a pretty but empty open world. I'd say the 1st half of the game is great while the 2nd half is mediocre and that Elden Ring is a very good but also very overrated game that is different from other AAA open world games but just formulaic in a different way.

[@elithegoat581]

@greenbrickbox3392 sorry bro but elden ring is underrated

[@Olliecksdee]

I've full completed the game on two saves about 5 months apart from each other, I've got plenty to say about it but I'll leave it at this: Lies of P is a better soulslike and if you simply swapped the name of the developer between the two games Lies of P would have 10/10's and Elden Ring would be roundly criticised for the absolute steaming pile of shit the game is. If they simply removed the open world, scaled back some boss behaviour, and didn't copy and paste bosses it would be great. Dark souls 1 has 16 unique boss encounters out of 22 total encounters I think, whereas Elden Ring has 8 unique encounters out of 165, inexcusable. It's open world slop for the masses, this is the moment Fromsoftware goes downhill.

[@amwazdraws6890]

ER has 9 unique bosses. The open world is the best part about it. Don't like it? Go and play Dark Souls.

[@drphilsranch6782]

You're very clearly trying to be reductive when saying Elden Ring only has 8 unique bosses. If you mean unique as in the boss only appears once, then technically you would be correct, but just because a boss appears multiple times doesn't mean that the first encounter you have with them is automatically bad or made worse retroactively somehow. There are at the very least double, if not triple the number of different bosses in this game than there has been in any previous soulsborne game. are many of them reused? Yes. Can that get annoying if you're trying to do literally every single thing you can do in the game in one playthrough? Also yes, but on a normal playthrough it has little to no effect on the experience, and it is a massively overblown issue. As for "scaling back boss behavior", whatever that might mean, I don't really know which bosses you could be referring to. The only remembrance/main bosses that are slightly overtuned are the Godskin Duo and Elden Beast. Elden Beast's only unfair attack is elden stars, and while it would be completely fair to criticize Godskin Duo (and any duo fight in the game really), this is more of a Fromsoft issue rather than an Elden Ring issue, because they've only been able to design 2 genuinely enjoyable duo fights in the entire series. If you dislike Elden Ring and its open world aspects, that's fine, but don't try to act like its objectively dogshit when every single one of your points can be easily refuted if you actually understand the mechanics of the game.

[@Olliecksdee]

​@drphilsranch6782 I mean unique by the definition of the word unique: one of a kind. As for does it ruin previous encounters, yes it does because someone like Astel is retroactively not as memorable or interesting because actually there's multiple of them it's not a unique thing you have seen because it's appeared twice. As for it only being a problem if you want to see everything, I paid for the game so I want to see the full game, that is a normal playthrough to me I want to see everything so to find out so much of the game is copy pasted was very disappointing. Every time I play through the game I kill every boss, why wouldn't you. Late game bosses are so incredibly aggressive that some playstyles aren't viable which is what I mean by they should scale back some boss behaviours. And I understand perfectly how the game works I'm open for a genuine discussion if you wish to refute my points which you said are easy to refute. I enjoy the game and it's an objectively good game, but it isn't great due to many factors and unfortunately SotE suffers from many of the same problems base game does.

[@Olliecksdee]

​@@amwazdraws6890 if you didn't like my comment just don't reply to it? See we can both post pointless comments.

[@TheSandkastenverbot]

DS fanbois begin to sound like punk fans who argue that 3 chords is the objectively best number of chords in a song

[@everettzarnick2323]

I can't hate on people who like the repetition, but it aint for me.

[@rGGdom]

I think that in order to understand where you are coming from, it would be wise to affirm how much of an seasoned Souls player you are. This will give the appropiate context to your critiques. From the start I could tell you are experienced in the franchise, but your expertise is full display in your playthrough footage.

[@looselygaming6130]

wow...i literally beat this game and thought about the same but everyne else was saying it was the greatest game ever, so i kept replaying it thinking maybe i missed something but was bored out of my mind, glad im not the only one that thought it's a bad game

[@everettzarnick2323]

Not a bad game. But not nearly as great as everyone makes it out to be, in my opinion. Cheers.

[@24thompsona]

Everybody is annoyed but he didn't call elden ring a bad game, he called it a bad from software game

[@DellikkilleD]

which is objectively false. its better then every AC, and all the souls adjacents. DS3 is the only one equivalent

[@quemf222]

the discription is literally "Hollow, fundamentally flawed, and lazily designed, Elden Ring is a cheap laugh dressed up as the game of the year." I feel like thats pretty synonymous with "bad"

[@rudepea3371]

​@@DellikkilleD what measure are you basing that 'objective' view off?

[@DellikkilleD]

@@rudepea3371 facts and logic? by every metric, elden ring exceeds its predecessors

[@rudepea3371]

@@DellikkilleD Let me ask you again how are you measuring the emotional impact of art? Sure there are objective factors to everything, but when reviewing something such as a game or a movie you can't possibly define something as better or worse as everybody has different values and preferences. You can't measure art without personal bias because art is based on personal experience, so it is impossible to objectively judge anything that is designed to cause emotion