It’s Only February, But Elden Ring Might Already Be The Game Of The Year
The Souls game, set in a world created by George R. R. Martin, is just as good as you expected.
Hidetaka Miyazaki and FromSoftware — the makers of the Dark Souls series, Demon Souls, Sekiro and, of course, Bloodborne — have released a staggering new fantasy action RPG, Elden Ring.
But, this time, they’ve pivoted away from their typical gothic nightmare fodder into full-blown fantasy.
Now, how exactly did this happen? Well, they asked someone with writing chops to build a world for them. Something new. Something big. Something truly ambitious. Who’d they saddle with this Herculean task? George R. R. Martin.
Yes, that George R. R. Martin — the one who keeps getting side-tracked while working on the sixth Game of Thrones novel. Not content with getting lapped by the TV show (or having it absolutely shit the bed once it ran out of source material to work with), George took a call from Miyazaki. He was offered a fascinating job: build a world for Miyazaki and co. to create their story within.
Martin ended up creating the history of the fictional world of Elden Ring, filling out all corners of it in incredible detail. But the dialogue, plot, and in-game text are all the genius of FromSoftware. And just like when two extremely complicated people with terrifying, warren-like brains hook up and have kids, this project was always going to be a a weird one.
What Are Souls Games?
If you’re a fan of George R. R. Martin but don’t play games, you’re probably wondering what Souls games are. Well, Souls games are hard. Very hard. They’re named after Demon Souls and Dark Souls, the first two games from Miyazaki and FromSoftware, which quickly caught the attention of the gaming world.
Like Bill Murray knowing to avoid that puddle or punch Ned Ryerson in Groundhog Day, you develop a routine.
These games will kick the shit out of you. But if you possess the stamina, you can and will prevail. In order to become incrementally more powerful by levelling up or buying new gear, you kill bad guys, gaining “souls” — or runes, in Elden Ring. Every time you die, all your runes are dumped where you died, and every bad guy you already killed respawns, leaving you to sneak and stab your way back to your corpse to regain your lost progress. If you die en route? The runes disappear forever.
This isn’t particularly kind, nor is it forgiving, but it does imbue the committed (or psychotic) player with an almost superhuman focus. Every turn, every corner, every filthy alleyway becomes etched in your memory.
Like Bill Murray knowing to avoid that puddle or punch Ned Ryerson in Groundhog Day, you develop a routine. You get into a groove. Your motor skills and muscle memory begin to work in unison, and even though you still die a lot, you begin to become a better player. Most games give your character godlike auto-kill superpowers; Souls games make you, the player, step up and do the work yourself. Ten times the pain, sure — but you also get 10 times the gratification.
What The Hell Is Elden Ring Even About?
Elden Ring takes place in a world where a Queen — Queen Marika — possesses a ring blessed by the gods and imbued with the power to bring life and to keep the world running.
The ring, however, is broken. The Queen is missing, her retinue betrayed one night, and the remaining scraps of the ring divvied up by Marika’s treacherous demigod offspring. This ill-gotten transfer of power triggers something called “the shattering”, a war so abhorrent that the Gods abandon the world entirely. But the Erdtree — likely a metaphor for mother nature — brings you, a dead warrior from The Shattering, back to life, in the hopes that you’ll rise up and become the Elden Lord, wrestling power back from Marika’s nightmarish relatives, and bringing order to the chaos once again.
Now, I haven’t seen Succession, but this sounds exactly like the plot of Succession.
How Does Elden Ring Measure Up?
Souls games, as a rule, are not all sunshine and lollipops. You’re typically wandering around a desiccated husk of a city, with no soundtrack whatsoever, clutching a rusted sword and waiting for some scaly bastard to leap out of the rafters and kill you.
Miyazaki loves exploring what happens when power corrupts and empires fall into decay; his worlds are brimming with the warped, busted remnants of kings who succumbed to the dark arts to extend their rule, to brainless hordes of cultists vainly begging long-dead gods to throw them the occasional sandwich. Every oligarch delved too deep in pursuit of power, and the common man always failed to establish a union in time. These are beautiful, ruined worlds long past their prime, and almost everyone there wants to kill you, or has a fantastic British accent and wants to talk at you about how much everyone else wants to kill you.
Elden Ring, it’s true, takes place in a broken world, but there’s life everywhere you look. The open world of Elden Ring is buzzing with animals, herds of which gallop across green, undulating grass. Huge, golden ghost-like trees fill the sky with amber light, and there’s a day/night cycle which, combined with varying weather patterns, sloughs off the Souls games’ perpetual air of entropy. You’re running about in a world filled with mad kings who’ve absolutely driven the world into the toilet — but they haven’t finished the job. There’s life everywhere, and though you’re a dead warrior of no regard brought back for a creepy post-mortem adventure, you’ve been brought back by a big magic tree that seems to need your help. George’s world, it seems, is not entirely screwed… yet.
From a gameplay perspective, it feels like a Souls game, but is so polished it’s twice as much fun to play. You can jump! In fact, traversal turns fights into games of three-dimensional chess, forcing you to use terrain to get an edge over tougher enemies. You can sneak, meaning Elden Ring can often be played in full stealth mode. Your magical horse, Torrent, can double-jump, meaning traversal and travel frequently becomes a joy rather than a chore.
The world is peppered with mini dungeons, hidden encounters, and roaming events, but all imbued with that trademark “pay attention lest ye be stomped” Souls quality. If game worlds can be run over roughshod, it’s less likely you’ll spend the time paying attention to your surroundings, meaning games like Far Cry or Assassins Creed can (not always, but often) become very pretty and very indistinct. I know every inch of Elden Ring, because I’ve had to have my eyes unblinkingly open if I want to avoid getting curb-stomped.
Oh, and it’s pretty. Unbearably pretty. From the architecture to the costume designs, Elden Ring is Tudor meets Dante’s Inferno. Fashion in games is an oft neglected area, but Jesus, they’ve taken some big swings in Elden Ring.
There’s even a certain point in the game where, after obtaining a sewing needle, you can modify outfits to access cool variant looks. Because looks can kill — and so can you.
Will I Like It?
Souls games are an acquired taste. Many people have been calling for them to get difficulty modes added — the option to scale back the health and damage of bad guys, for example. There’s real worth, however, to mastery through repetition.
It’s Miyazaki’s best work yet and makes me all the more furious that Martin hasn’t turned his gargantuan imagination towards the remaining books in the Game of Thrones saga.
Actually becoming better at a thing, rather than just being handed god-like powers and chewing your way through a game with little to no challenge, isn’t fun. One of the themes in Elden Ring, however, is what happens when the offspring of a god betray said god, covet her power, and turn into tyrannical demi-gods. When you finally face off against the warped offspring running this shit-show, they feel like gods. They’re terrifying. They’re very, very hard to kill, and when you do finally bump one off, the sense of accomplishment… well, it’s not like taking drugs, but it’s not far off.
The world Miyazaki and Martin have crafted is one which longs for a nobody to prove their worth. If it was easy, you wouldn’t be a nobody. You’d be a cosmically infused chosen one. But in 2022, after all we’ve lived through over the past few years, can you imagine anything more gratifying than the everyman being the one the gods deem worthy over the bloated, rotten elite? Because I can’t.
Elden Ring is superb. It’s Miyazaki’s best work yet and makes me all the more furious that Martin hasn’t turned his gargantuan imagination towards the remaining books in the Game of Thrones saga. It’s game of the year material through and through.
Paul Verhoeven is an author, broadcaster and TV presenter. His books Electric Blue and Loose Units are out now through Penguin, and he hosts the podcasts Dish Island and Loose Units. You can find him on Twitter, Instagram, and in person, if you can (he’s very good at hiding).