Multiplat Elden Ring

[BOMBERS 4 LIFE!!!!]

Would have been handy if the game told you if you are under levelled for a boss.

Not like Assasins Creed where areas are level gated on the map but a warning like “you are too unpowered” something along those lines.

 

[mickelboy182]

Would have been handy if the game told you if you are under levelled for a boss.

Not like Assasins Creed where areas are level gated on the map but a warning like “you are too unpowered” something along those lines.

Part of the design is for you to make these calls for yourself. If it seems impossible, go elsewhere and level up/improve your gear.

The Ubisoft open world games like Horizon are so tired and bloated and simply unfun to explore. Elden Ring is actually quite aligned with Breath of the Wild in the sense that a lot of the fun IS in the exploration, not just going from marker to marker.

 

[BOMBERS 4 LIFE!!!!]

Part of the design is for you to make these calls for yourself. If it seems impossible, go elsewhere and level up/improve your gear.

The Ubisoft open world games like Horizon are so tired and bloated and simply unfun to explore. Elden Ring is actually quite aligned with Breath of the Wild in the sense that a lot of the fun IS in the exploration, not just going from marker to marker.

Love exploring in Elden Ring favourite thing about the game. In Breath of the Wild you can place beacons via looking around would be great if Elden Ring had something similar.

Breath of the wild got the mix right in how open world games should be designed and it seems FS learnt from that

Going to be interesting what Nintendo have in store with BOTW 2 if anyone can out do Elden Ring it’s Nintendo imo

 

[mickelboy182]

Love exploring in Elden Ring favourite thing about the game. In Breath of the Wild you can place beacons via looking around would be great if Elden Ring had something similar.

Breath of the wild got the mix right in how open world games should be designed and it seems FS learnt from that

While not exactly the same mechanism, you can place beacons on the map (as well as mark locations similar to BotW).

I certainly get the appeal of being told if you aren't strong enough, but obfuscating the 'gamey' elements is fairly important to the feel of these games IMO. A lot of Souls fans were even a little worried when they saw a map being introduced, but I think they have the right balance.

 

[Party Gull]

Holy cow you were massively overlevelled and overpowered haha, that would have been a cakewalk.

Yeah obviously.

 

[BOMBERS 4 LIFE!!!!]

While not exactly the same mechanism, you can place beacons on the map (as well as mark locations similar to BotW).

I certainly get the appeal of being told if you aren't strong enough, but obfuscating the 'gamey' elements is fairly important to the feel of these games IMO. A lot of Souls fans were even a little worried when they saw a map being introduced, but I think they have the right balance.

Surprised at some of the comments form hard core Soul fans saying they don’t like the open world are they crazy? this game should be every souls fan dream

 

[mickelboy182]

Surprised at some of the comments form hard core Soul fans saying they don’t like the open world are they crazy? this game should be every souls fan dream

I'll be honest I had reservations over the open world, but reality is it's a very fun hub world and the same winding interconnected dungeons still exist throughout. Really well executed for old and new fans IMO.

 

[Party Gull]

Would have been handy if the game told you if you are under levelled for a boss.

While under and over levelled obviously have numerical values attached to them, people do level one runs in these games and some overlevelled people will still struggle to the end. The true level in souls is skill level.

 

[Red Black and Blue]

Uchigatana strip naked. Assassins Crimsons Dagger + Blue Dancer Charm and you're golden.

​

 

[BOMBERS 4 LIFE!!!!]

While under and over levelled obviously have numerical values attached to them, people do level one runs in these games and some overlevelled people will still struggle to the end. The true level in souls is skill level.

At the end of of the day it dosent bother me but if they want to make the game more accessible then things like I mentioned would be ok

 

[Party Gull]

Uchigatana strip naked. Assassins Crimsons Dagger + Blue Dancer Charm and you're golden.

​

Moonveil Katana is also really good.

 

[Deathly]

The Ubisoft open world games like Horizon

You clearly haven't played HFW, because coming off that game into ER, ER is a complete downgrade as an open world game in terms of design.

 

[mickelboy182]

You clearly haven't played HFW, because coming off that game into ER, ER is a complete downgrade as an open world game in terms of design.

I haven't to be fair, bounced off the first because of the reasons I described.

I am definitely shocked to hear you say that though from all reports I've heard.

 

[Supersuns]

You clearly haven't played HFW, because coming off that game into ER, ER is a complete downgrade as an open world game in terms of design.

Nah, I like HFW a lot but it is a bit overcrowded like a ubisoft game. The world is great and the story is good(side story's better) but it isn't as good as Elden Ring.
2 completely different types of games though.

 

[Sixpence]

Nah, I like HFW a lot but it is a bit overcrowded like a ubisoft game. The world is great and the story is good(side story's better) but it isn't as good as Elden Ring.
2 completely different types of games though.

AC Valhalla isn't overcrowded and exploring in that is boring as shit. It's unfair to label HFW as simply a Ubisoft style OW as it's done significantly better than any Ubisoft game I've played. It really balances a decent sized map that doesn't take 5 hours to traverse with meaningful finds (sidequests/big mofo Machines/interesting tertiary collectables/etc).

BotW exploration has always been extremely overrated.

Haven't played ER so can't compare. Does look nice though (map wise).

 

[mickelboy182]

The Witcher 3 is arguably my favourite game of all time and a tremendous open world achievement... Yet I think ER has a better open world design. Not a slight, simply I think the level design of From is worlds above the rest.

 

[Deathly]

I have been having a lot of fun with Elden Ring don't get me wrong, that's why I have 35 hours on the game already and will 100% it - but the open world seriously isn't anything special. The design of it is very tacky and underwhelming.

The map has your traditional dungeon-crawling FromSoft areas (which are shorter and have much less problem solving) split up across the map as your main areas. Then in between the mandatory locations all you have to do is repeat field bosses & collect crafting materials and items (which they just took out of the main dungeons and mindlessly placed into the open world). So they've already dumb downed on item gathering there and don't even get me started on the copy and pasted but even more boring & repetitive marked mini-dungeons / locations that either have joke bosses or an item that has a 95% chance of being irrelevant in your play-through.

Elden Ring repeats a lot of bosses and enemy types, in some case just repackaging them in a "spirit form" coat of paint.

The biomes of the map transition too seamlessly, which just means nothing really seems unique in the world design unless you go underground. If Elden Ring had it's own aesthetic and identity like Bloodborne or Sekiro did then it could have covered the design cracks. But when the game literally looks worse than next-gen DS3 and takes mechanics from previous titles and shallowly incorporates them then it's a bit disappointing.

 

[Supersuns]

I have been having a lot of fun with Elden Ring don't get me wrong, that's why I have 35 hours on the game already and will 100% it - but the open world seriously isn't anything special. The design of it is very tacky and underwhelming.

The map has your traditional dungeon-crawling FromSoft areas (which are shorter and have much less problem solving) split up across the map as your main areas. Then in between the mandatory locations all you have to do is repeat field bosses & collect crafting materials and items (which they just took out of the main dungeons and mindlessly placed into the open world). So they've already dumb downed on item gathering there and don't even get me started on the copy and pasted but even more boring & repetitive marked mini-dungeons / locations that either have joke bosses or an item that has a 95% chance of being irrelevant in your play-through.

Elden Ring repeats a lot of bosses and enemy types, in some case just repackaging them in a "spirit form" coat of paint.

The biomes of the map transition too seamlessly, which just means nothing really seems unique in the world design unless you go underground. If Elden Ring had it's own aesthetic and identity like Bloodborne or Sekiro did then it could have covered the design cracks. But when the game literally looks worse than next-gen DS3 and takes mechanics from previous titles and shallowly incorporates them then it's a bit disappointing.

 

[Footy_Fan2007]

Man I love this game but it’s giving me motion sickness.

 

[eaglespremiers]

The Witcher 3 is arguably my favourite game of all time and a tremendous open world achievement... Yet I think ER has a better open world design. Not a slight, simply I think the level design of From is worlds above the rest.

That may be the case (although it is debatable).
However, having put about 20 hours into this game so far it just feels like a shell of a game compared to The Witcher 3 which had these tremendous human (or non-human?) interactions and a deep lore to explore. While there is still lore here, it is, at best, detached and almost robotic. As to the protagonist, a blank slate without meaningful personality. Fair to say I was under no illusions as to the type of game I was buying, however, every game similar to Witcher always seems to rekindle my love for that game.

 

[Red Black and Blue]

Googled who the wolf dude was from the loading screen.

Absolutely near zero chance you come across Blaidd organically.

 

[Party Gull]

That may be the case (although it is debatable).
However, having put about 20 hours into this game so far it just feels like a shell of a game compared to The Witcher 3 which had these tremendous human (or non-human?) interactions and a deep lore to explore. While there is still lore here, it is, at best, detached and almost robotic. As to the protagonist, a blank slate without meaningful personality. Fair to say I was under no illusions as to the type of game I was buying, however, every game similar to Witcher always seems to rekindle my love for that game.

I guess that's the beauty of individual experience, it's so wildly changes from person to person . For sure The Witcher is a masterpiece, there's no doubting that, but id have to agree that the world design is "better" that TW³. In saying that, I don't think the two should be compared in any way whatsoever. The witcher series and the Souls series very much differ in terms of their world building. Obviously in Witcher Geralt is a legendary person with years and years of stories and experience behind him, informing how the world interacts with him. In the souls games you're very much a nobody (which could be debated, but any legend is rendered pointless by the world circumstances) and you're largely insignificant. The character development comes from you, the player, overcoming that crushing insignificance.

As for it feeling like a shell, if that's how it feels for you then fair enough, but I haven't felt this way about a game ever. Even the most beautifully crafted parts of the witcher weren't as impressive personally.

The two games, or how their story is told is also geared towards largely different types of people. There will be crossover, sure, but you don't go into the witcher for a story that feels detached, nebulous or hazy, where as that's a large part of what fromsoft ********s like myself are after. I can fully understand how it comes across as robotic though.

The witcher is special in that even talking about it makes me want to go back, and I often do.

Googled who the wolf dude was from the loading screen.

Absolutely near zero chance you come across Blaidd organically.

As someone who came across him organically I'd very much disagree.

 

[Party Gull]

A power outage just set me back 3 main bosses, 2 optional bosses and two new areas discovered. Fml.

 

[mickelboy182]

That may be the case (although it is debatable).
However, having put about 20 hours into this game so far it just feels like a shell of a game compared to The Witcher 3 which had these tremendous human (or non-human?) interactions and a deep lore to explore. While there is still lore here, it is, at best, detached and almost robotic. As to the protagonist, a blank slate without meaningful personality. Fair to say I was under no illusions as to the type of game I was buying, however, every game similar to Witcher always seems to rekindle my love for that game.

I think you're not quite grasping my point and conflating story content and world building with world design. The Witcher's breadth and depth of story content is second to none IMO, and exploring the open world to find this content is a joy. Helps I'm also a massive fantasy nerd who has read all the books.

Exploring the world of ER is a joy just to see how things are interwoven and layered on top of each other. The design of the areas themselves is fascinating.
I certainly don't find it hollow but I am a long time Souls player who knows part of the fun of learning the lore is the fact you have to slowly reconstruct it yourself and hypothesise through things like item descriptions. Certainly not a story-telling device that hits the mark for everyone, but I appreciate it for doing something different to the norm.

 

[mickelboy182]

A power outage just set me back 3 main bosses, 2 optional bosses and two new areas discovered. Fml.

What on earth!? How does that even happen?