Dark Souls With a HORSE

Elden Ring is now one of my all-time favorites. If you are looking for that feeling of anticipation and excitement from starting up a new game, and delving in to a new world. This one hits all the buttons.

It's got a bit of everything. Great fights, cinematic experiences, jump scares, holes in the floor to find your doom, and it rewards exploration like I always hope for in games, even weird areas that make you think "can i get over there?" (Why yes, you can!) and there is quite often something awesome to find there, not just empty map space making it worth the time and effort getting there (not always, but often).

Good rpg progression of zero to hero, and though the difficulty of enemies might be all over the place depending on which direction you travel from the starting point, well that's just part of the magic.

This was my second souls game experience (well, full experience) - I started with Demon's Souls back in the day on my roomates playstation, and boy, that was just one of the greatest experiences of single player gaming history, for me. I skipped dark souls 1-3, after spending 40 hours in DS 1 fighting the same skeletons over and over to grind for runes to get strong enough to go anywhere. (More of an understanding issue on my part, equating it to demon's souls progression was an incorrect assumption).

Anyway, Elden Ring grabbed me right away, I was in love with the overwhelmingly huge world and the exploration available to me. Though I was maidenless at the beginning, I bagged the baddest witch by the end of it. Nice.

Combat is typical for soul's games, mostly rolling, some attacking. Has the added bonus of mounted travel and combat with a sick double jumping spirit horse that opens up a lot of options for how to get from point A to point B.

Let's go back to talking about how huge and beautiful the world is... What you think to be a hidden side area will turn in to full blown game scale maps that make it feel like several games worth of content, don't want to spoil too much here so ill shut up. Even though I really wanna talk about it.

As with all souls games, you can spend time grinding for runes to get as strong as possible, or you can run around lvl 1 and finesse every boss in the game (if you are a psychopath). I opted for the grinding from time to time, once - right before the first major boss, and again, and again, for subsequent difficult boss fights. It's pretty easy to get to an area that seems way too unforgiving and difficult, but you can just explore in a different direction and come back stronger, and with better gear.

There are a few crutches to lean on if things get too dismal, you can summon things to help you through hard fights, which I definitely abused my first time through the game. Also, there are a few weapons and spells you can find that will make it much easier sailing, if you so cheese.

By the time I beat the game, I was pretty much a souls-like master, and I wouldn't dream of abusing the summons or cheese weapons a second time through. Maybe? Still holding off on a second full completion - as I wanted it to be a fresh experience again when I do. Didn't want to get tired of one of the best games ever, since I tend to get bored of things, and almost never beat games twice. I'll definitely be back for more, at some point, and I still have the expansion to look forward to. Excited about that, hell, writing this review might be the thing that triggers my next play-through. It's tempting.

Im purposefully holding off on giving much detail, because I recommend just jumping in and experiencing it for yourself. Explore everything, twice, three times is better. Circle back and talk to NPCs as many times as you can, something cool might happen. The game rewards and punishes curiosity - in equal measure. You are guaranteed to miss things your first time through an area, and some of those things might very well be worth the time spent going through them again. If you get hung up on a fight or area in general, go somewhere else and come back to it later, it can be rather frustrating if you try and will-power through things.

Definitely one of the best games ever, in my mind, and a right of passage for hardcore gamers. After completing it I decided to circle back and play the Dark Souls trilogy, which im nearly finished with. Same with Sekiro, and ill probably go after Bloodbourne now at somepoint as well. I'm pretty well hooked, thanks to Elden Ring.