Elden Ring

[RumHam]

We were talking about FOMO before so I figured I'd create a thread.

I'm sitting here trying to decide which keepsake to take. Problem is I don't know what anything is yet. I'll go with the golden seen because I at least understand "reinforce flask."

Edit: I couldn't figure out how to level up. Apparently I went the wrong way and missed unlocking it. I probably shouldn't have chased after those squirrels. Anyway just a warning you need to find a specific early on bonfire to unlock it. 

[Fez]

I ended up buying it on PC and played almost two hours. My initial non-spoiler thoughts, bearing in mind that Dark Souls 3 was the last From game I played:

• The game seems kind of incredible. And perhaps overwhelming.
• There are some performance issues, especially when weather effects kick in.
• There's a dedicated jump button!
• It's feels more like a traditional RPG in its systems than past games. I've been able to be a pure magic user straight from the get-go and its totally viable. Maybe even an easy-mode. I've fought one enemy that kept its shield up at all times and dodged my spells. But everyone else, including the first named boss I found, is very vulnerable to getting sniped at range. Just gotta make sure to dodge in time when they come for you. Seems like stealth builds are viable too, at least for the open world; not sure they'd fare against bosses.
• Related to that, there totally are mostly quiet areas where you can admire the landscape, collect crafting ingredients, and slaughter peaceful wildlife for more ingredient. It's not an endless gauntlet of action.
• It feels more like a traditional RPG in its storytelling than past games. It's no old-school Bioware game or anything, but so far it feels much less esoteric and more lived in than I expected. The introduction was straightforward (and did feel like GRRM's take on From's go-to game setup. I've already met 5 characters to talk with. I've had 2 more cutscenes after the opening.

[Fez]

I've twice now had enemies in the open world drop out of the sky to start fighting me. I'm not sure if this is the game failing to load them properly (I have seen this behavior in other games where I know that's the case) or if it's their intended entrance. It's not like they were winged enemies or anything, one was a pack of wolves the other was some kind of giant.

I haven't had the kind of terrible PC performance that I've seen some people talk about, but there do seem to be some issues.

[aceluby]

I have already heard that PC performance is not great compared to the consoles.  Will have mine in about 1/2 hour and report if there are issues on the PS5 version

[RumHam]

This is my first non-dark souls one of these. I was shocked how much it seemed like dark souls IV. 

I've had lag at one point near the start playing on Xbox one:

Spoiler

Near that gate where you get the ability to level up there's a guard who will blow a horn and summon reinforcements. If they show up it gets laggy. 

 

[Fez]

As I've continued exploring the open world I've found more and more performance issues. Most remain small, but there was one time now where the game hitched when I tried rolling and I got killed. So that was very annoying.

Besides that though, I remain incredibly impressed by the game. It's size is kind of unbelievable already, and I know I'm still just scratching the surface. I've definitely encountered a few areas that I shouldn't be at yet (and one tiny area that I got to very a surprising manner that I know I'm not ready for), but mostly there seem to be a ton of different directions I can go.

[RumHam]

Is the online component working for you? It always fails to connect for me but other multiplayer games work fine. 

[Fez]

1 minute ago, RumHam said:

Is the online component working for you? It always fails to connect for me but other multiplayer games work fine. 

Partially. I see the ghosts and the messages. Bloodstains don't seem to work though. I haven't tried summoning (and am not entirely sure how yet; other than NPC summoning, which I have done in two different ways).

[aceluby]

Here are my first impressions after a few hours. There is no hand holding here and I think it really stresses the differences in previous titles by encouraging sneaking and non-combat early. Because enemies are hard and there can be a lot of them. I got to the first major boss without any leveling and got curb stomped. So now I’m back just exploring regions I ran through before.

Graphically it is pretty good at 60 FPS, but glitches when moving through terrain - but plays just awful at 30FPS and still glitches in the terrain. Pretty sure dudes falling from the sky is also a feature, not a bug. 

Gonna put this sleeping baby down now and see if I can’t do a bit more

[mcbigski]

Playing on xbox one x.  

Did run into a bug where enemies spawn inside of a rock and you have to go stab them through the rock to get things moving.

So far, I'm 4 out of 5 stars.  It's lovely.  It's basically Dark Souls 2 or 3, mechanics wise.  Though it's got better in game explainations, not quite as brutal.  Plenty of save points.  Just seem a little bit lost.  I feel like the OG Dark Souls you knew you had to go ring the bells so it kept you focused.  Here, I feel like it's hey almost random pigmy so easily forgetten, go kill all the older demi gods that grabbed power before you got there.  So maybe I should be following the light more, but not getting hooked on the story, mostly just 3-4 levels up going around murder hoboing.

Craft system seems nice, I think.  

I like the flask replenishment idea, lets you make longer explorations, but is only marginal difference in a difficult boss fight.  Can't remember if they did some version of that in DS3.  And nice they have more spawn points.

Couldn't figure out why, but I couldnt start in the online version.  So I turned this playthrough to offline by default.

Also, was stuck for a name, went with Tormund, decided I wanted to play a sorcerer type, and then got the option to have an appearance distinct from class, so of course I went northern.

[Slurktan]

I have no idea what a major boss is but I've cleared a couple of the "chalice dungeons". Yes they aren't called that in game but literally just a chalice dungeon where I had to go somewhat deep in pull a lever for a gate to open at the start which led to the boss. One was a cat statue that had really wonky hit boxes and patterns.

I dont like open world games that have no direction so dark souls 4 isn't that good to me at the moment. Sure looks pretty though.

[RumHam]

8 hours ago, mcbigski said:

Couldn't figure out why, but I couldnt start in the online version.  So I turned this playthrough to offline by default.

Glad it's not just me. It's like they forgot to turn the servers on for last-gen xbox.

I've gotta start using the map markers those seem useful. I've still yet to craft anything.

One thing I liked

Spoiler

So there's that huge guy who jumps down at that gate. I killed him but it took all my flasks. I figured he wouldn't respawn but he did. So I couldn't get through but then I wandered a bit and found a way around by spirit horse jumping.

There's two more of those huge enemies pulling a cart somewhere. I avoided them for a while but they're movement is super limited. 1000 souls each + the treasure in the cart.

 

 

[sifth]

I got my copy last night. Fun game, but it sucks that it doesn't have 4 player co-op like Dark Souls 1, 2 and 3. It means me and my friends have to take turns.

[Fez]

4 hours ago, Slurktan said:

I have no idea what a major boss is but I've cleared a couple of the "chalice dungeons". Yes they aren't called that in game but literally just a chalice dungeon where I had to go somewhat deep in pull a lever for a gate to open at the start which led to the boss. One was a cat statue that had really wonky hit boxes and patterns.

I dont like open world games that have no direction so dark souls 4 isn't that good to me at the moment. Sure looks pretty though.

To me, there's 4 tiers of bosses. But I dunno what the community will settle on:

1. Tough guys out in the field who will not respawn

2. Random boss arena guys. They have unique names and closed off areas to fight. But aren't directly connected to the story (though maybe there's some deep, hidden lore stuff). That cat boss you mentioned, who I also fought, would be one of those.

3. Story bosses. I've only encountered/beaten one so far. But if he's the standard, it means being introduced via a cutscene and having dialogue during the fight. And being way tougher than the random bosses. I'd call these "major bosses"

4. Lords (and maybe some other bosses, I dunno; I'm spoiler-free beyond what I've played). I've gotten to the first one; haven't beaten him yet. All the same traits as the story bosses, but (I suspect) beating one causes major changes in the game state. I've been told directly by NPCs some of things that will happen if I can beat my first Lord.

 

Lords are possibly harder than other bosses, I'm not sure yet. I actually think this first lord has easier patterns to follow then the first story boss I beat, but he has so much more health. Which is a problem as a magic user. I simply ran out of FP when he had about 1/3rd of his health left. So far I've been able to beat every other boss I've faced as a pure magic user, so I suspect I can here too. I think I probably just got to him too fast and should explore to find some more golden seeds and maybe also level up a few more times.

 

Also, if you want direction, follow the golden arcs leading way from the sites of grace (you'll see them on the map too) they point in the direction of major things to do.

[RumHam]

The cat boss was a dog, I'm pretty sure. I thought cat too but I remember the name had dog in it.

I wish the open world bosses had like level indicators. I don't feel like trying each one to see if I'm supposed to be fighting them yet or not.

I've killed cat-dog and two other random cave bosses. Still can't beat the first story boss, but I just found an item that should help.

Spoiler

It seems to exist just for stunning that specific boss. cost 5k but I need the help.

 

[Fez]

6 minutes ago, RumHam said:

The cat boss was a dog, I'm pretty sure. I thought cat too but I remember the name had dog in it.

I wish the open world bosses had like level indicators. I don't feel like trying each one to see if I'm supposed to be fighting them yet or not.

I've killed cat-dog and two other random cave bosses. Still can't beat the first story boss, but I just found an item that should help.

  Hide contents

It seems to exist just for stunning that specific boss. cost 5k but I need the help.

 

Do you mean

Spoiler

Margit, the Fell Omen?

If so, I didn't buy any item; instead

Spoiler

I used the golden summon sign and also one of my own ash summons, to keep his aggro. And so I was able to safely keep my distance for about 75% of the fight. After they were dead, the biggest thing for me was getting the timing right on that delay he has between swings of the glowing sword; and recognizing that I shouldn't try sneaking in any attacks then.

 

[RumHam]

Yeah

26 minutes ago, Fez said:

Do you mean

  Hide contents

Margit, the Fell Omen?

If so, I didn't buy any item; instead

  Hide contents

I used the golden summon sign and also one of my own ash summons, to keep his aggro. And so I was able to safely keep my distance for about 75% of the fight. After they were dead, the biggest thing for me was getting the timing right on that delay he has between swings of the glowing sword; and recognizing that I shouldn't try sneaking in any attacks then.

 

Yeah.

Spoiler

I was close but the summoned guy died fast. I'm thinking use the summon guy and then summon the ash once he's dead. Plus the item should help.

I have lots of the item to strengthen the ash summons but haven't found out how to use them yet.

 

[briantw]

*Walks out onto the field in Limgrave for the first time.*

"I'm going to go check out that big armored guy riding the horse."

"Tree Sentinal?  Inter-"

*Dead.*

[Fez]

So I decided to just go exploring for a while and got into a whole bunch of areas where I couldn't possibly beat the enemies. However big you think the map is, it's way bigger. OTOH, there do seem to be some pretty vast areas that are almost completely empty of enemies or loot as well.

[Mexal]

What are ash summons? I have one summon thing that’s 3 wolves. You mean that?

Still haven’t killed Margit, not sure how I could at my level really. I’m like level 20. I got him down 3/4ths if the way with some summoned players but died. I hate how they limit my flasks in there. I went from 5 to 2 when I enter his area abs that’s brutal as a magic user at this level.

So far, definitely the longest I’ve played a FromSoftware game so there is that.