There is no path. Beyond the scope of light, beyond the reach of Dark... ...what could possibly await us? And yet, we seek it, insatiably... Such is our fate.
By the way I actually changed my mind on the Omen since the time of recording. I do think they're connected to the crucible since Morgott has scales on his face and Mogh grows wings in his second phase.
The fact that George r.r. wrote the backstory, and Miyazaki wrote the rest, might this have messed with his story writing? Probably not but i can't help but feel the sheer expansiveness of the world and the amount of warring factions feels very game of thronesey.
@@merlinkater7756 I believe that Fromsoft never had intention of really making a game based on George RR Martin and really use it as a vague backdrop but still implement their own ideas. If you look at Elden Ring, it is a clear combination of all the souls game ideas including Sekiro. And it looks like those ideas would be there regardless if George RR Martin was involved.
Who's to say Morgott didn't also accidentally stumble upon the formless mother? Who's to say he isn't actively resisting her draw? Maybe he avoids that fate by actively fighting against it because the mother of truth clearly chose the omen. She doesn't have to be responsible for them.
The fact that when you scroll through the comments everyone offers different, extremely detailed, extremely well-sourced, and completely contradictory explanations for things kinda proves the point here. There's an unfalsifiability to the lore here. It's hard to say what ISN'T true once you have enough proper nouns to throw around.
I think one of the major difficulties in interpreting the lore comes from the lack of any real timeline it's why so much of the story feels all over the place
Hopefully the DLC will help fill it in. E.g. The Bloodborne DLC fills in a whole lot of the timeline to the point where you can’t really put together a timeline without it.
I believe I've got the time line even going back to before Marika/golden order, but I think the theory/lore community has interpreted a whole bunch of things in a completely different direction, if I'm right, it's kinda no wonder people are completely stumped, but I could just as easily be wrong you never truly know and we might not ever.
There’s a complete lack of any sense of time at all. It’s like some things feel like they happened a couple years ago and then other times it’s like a thousand years which throws the lore all over the place
The DLC being the key to understanding FromSoft games is something that has pretty consistently been proven true. The main exception, I think, would be Dark Souls 1, which had a very strong central thematic thrust at launch and then the DLC expanded on a side story from the main game, rather than being the lynchpin for the actual main story like it is in pretty much all later games (at least thematically, I mean. I would say that DS3's DLC also didn't really reveal anything about the PLOT of the based game, but it definitely made the THEMES of the main game stand out much more clearly). Bloodborne is probably the most extreme example, where some of the key events in the story, which shaped everything that came after, were completely unknown until the DLC. Based on the "incomplete" feeling of Elden Ring's current lore and story, I think it's going to follow Bloodborne's pattern. I wouldn't be surprised to get the equivalent of the Fishing Village and the corpse of Kos, but for the Omen, or Marika's motives, or the Black Knives, or any number of other such seeming holes in the story.
Bloodborne is completely comprehensible without its dlc. Its dlc simply expands on its basegames ideas and hints to give a satisfying payoff to those who paid attention
"The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters." The god's having unknown or incomprehensible motivations and relationships, their actions sometimes seem contridictary. Everything is linked together, and everything is in conflict (assuming that everything evolved from the Cruicible, this makes sense). Law of Regression, Law of Causality. Then the player realises that the gods themselves are subject to greater powers, the Outer Gods, who are even further removed and even more incomprehensible, and treat the gods the same way the gods treat the mortals. Theortically this chain could continue upwards forever. The story then is basically the story of all the lands between trying to find the new world that is to be born. Hoarah Loux decides that a return to tradation is the only way forward, Goldmask believes in a sort of protestant style reformation, Fia finds meaning in death, Dung Eater becomes an absurdist amoralist, and Gideon basically goes insane and decides that the world must be preserved until he has perfectly decrypted reality and can make the perfect choice. Rani has a sort of athietic humanist perspective. Three fingers in the comfort of oblivion. I think the absurdity of being thrown into a world that you don't fully - and cannot ever fully - understand, struggling for survival, where everything is so vast and overwhelming, and yet you are still ultimately resposible for its future is the main thematic take away I have from the game.
This. A very deep and well-put explanation, ty. Having put over 300 hours into playing and researching the game, I came to the conclusion that the whole of Elden Ring is a metaphor of life itself. And history of the Lands Between resembles the history of mankind. From cavemen to capitalistic christians, socialistic atheists, tribal pagans and so on, still struggling to find peace and prosperity over ourselves, our cultures and our world.
Great take! Also having difficulty interpreting Marikas motivations to me isn't strange if you just keep in mind that she is also Radagon. Of course her actions will seem counterintuitive at points. She seals destined death in Maliketh but then betrays him and steals it via Ranni? Maybe Radagon sealed it, and Marika steals it. We already have the clear example of this of Radagon trying to repair the elden ring while Marika is smashing it. Radagon is trying to keep the current world order going, Marika is trying to bring about a new order by smashing the ring, creating chaos. Divine masculine is order - Divine feminine chaos.
I´d say he loves them! The games vagueness has given them so much opportunity to make money through lore videos and theories. If the story was straightforward then we would not need the videos.
This is most likely the answer. If I had an IP and youtubers were collecting ad revenue by talking about it I would go out of my way to meddle with them.
@@taylorreid5347I personally see it as the greatest troll. Not a way to bone content creators, but to drive them mad as not one can come to a unified idea like in the Dark Souls trilogy. I don’t actually think that, but I do enjoy spreading misinformation.
I like to think of Elden Ring themes as the antithesis to Dark Souls's: a world experiencing change, where Dark Souls was a stagnant universe incapable of changing. The Lands Between are being disputed over by multiple Outer Gods, each of which would dramatically alter the land and the rules of the world if they took over. Every ending ending fundamentally changes the nature of the world and starts a brand new age when it happens, even the most basic ending where you don't use any mending runes starts a new age, the Age of Fracture, so as Maliketh says when he dies ifyou completed his quest: "the Golden Order cannot be restored." There is no going back to the way things were, and there is no preserving the current era by an equivalent of linking the fire. Every demigod also changes in some fundamental way from the previous age to the time we meet them in game: Godwyn becomes the Prince of Death, Godrick engages in grafting, Morgott receives the blessing of Grace and becomes ruler of Leyndell, Mohg becomes the emissary of the Formless Mother and starts his own cult, Radahn rots, Ranni discards her body for a doll, Rykard merges with the snake, Miquella adults himself in the coccoon and Malenia ascends to godhood. As well, we see different characters react differently to the prospect of the world changing: some, like Corhyn or Gideon give in to despair when learn of Goldmask/Marika's plans for the future as they can't conceive of a world without their gods or the Erdtree. Others, like Nepheli completely change their ways, going from a blind follower of Gideon to a ruler of a castle. Yet others, like Enia, despite being a finger reader, concedes that a new age requires new measures and bids you to burn the Erdtree and do what you think is right, cardinal sin or no. Millicent's quest is about a bad actor trying to change her against her will. The Frenzied Flame is an example of being extremely adverse to change, as it seeks to erase all life to return existance to the way it used to be: all clumped together as the One Great, with no difference, and no change. I like to think of Elden Ring as Fromsoft's chance to explore the themes they couldn't with the static world of Dark Souls: an examination of what meaningful change looks like, on large scale and personal as well, while Dark Souls was an exploration of what an extreme inability to change looked like.
Don't you restore and improve the golden order in golden masks ending? Edit: just had a random thought, this is the land between, but the lands between what? It suggests there's a place before and a place after, yet it seems like everything is happening here.
I agree. There's a fair amount of lore that's actually directly contradictory. Godfrey is the first Elden Lord but somehow Placidusax was also an Elden Lord.
I think placidusax was the first elden lord way before Godfrey. They are the first of their "age". Godfrey is the first elden lord under the golden order and placidusax was the first elden lord under a different order, different age. Where he resides is a space outside of time, a place preserved from ancient past beyond the time Godfrey was born
One of the central elements of the story of Elden Ring is that the fundamental laws of reality are not absolute. The basic laws of logic state that 1. A thing is itself, 2. A thing is not something other than itself, and 3. The only possibilities are thingness or not-thingness- there is no middle. In other words, a cat is a cat. A cat can’t be not-a-cat, and nothing exists that is neither a cat nor not-a-cat. These basic rules of logic are *conditional* in Elden Ring. It’s not just that it’s difficult to say who did what in Elden Ring- it’s that we can’t even say what “who” and “what” mean.
Its almost hilarious how obscure the lore is, after hundreds of hours in the game im still totally clueless about the dumbest stuff. For example: "Why tf is there already ash in lyndell before you burn the erdtree!?"
As far as the game suggest, the ash may be caused by Bernahl's maiden burning herself at the Forge but not being strong enough to burn the tree, merely burn some of the branches. Which is why Bernahl turned to Rykard and decided tl say fuck the greater will. However some cut content shows the maiden as an NPC with her own quest so... really, make up your own headcanon. For me, it's Bernahl's maiden.
The ash could also be a remainder of the war against the dragons. More explicitly parts of Gransax or other ancient dragon corpses deteriorating over time, since they already consist of stone like material that could very well spray into fine dust. But in that case it must have been laying there a LOONG time.
It sounds to me, and I say this as a teacher of literary interpretation, like you are getting bogged down in the weeds of thinking about "the" theme, rather than letting yourself interpret and work with "a" theme. Regardless of a creator's intent, good art is going to have multiple ways to interpret it on a thematic level and very rarely will everything "fit neatly" into tidy boxes. And the bigger the work of art, the more true these things are going to be. I've seen this a lot when it comes to interpreting media where folks get into a mindset of trying to make singular what is inherently plural, and I really think Eldren Ring leans so heavily into theme and motif that it's throwing folks for a loop. Why does something happen in Elden Ring? A lot of the time it's not for discrete reasons but rather thematic ones. Just because B is related to A and C is related to A does not mean that B and C necessarily have anything to do with each other. If you try to cover all the bases with a single interpretation, you're going to find - like you have - that you are stretched too thin. Break it down into chunks, and if you want to be more overarching, talk about how some themes clash or mesh with others! I'm not sure how educated or not you are on the process of literary analysis, so I may be speaking to things that you already are familiar, but there are many texts out there about how to use various lenses to aid in thematic interpretation. Perhaps it's partially due to bringing GRRM on board for the project or perhaps this is the kind of thing Miyazaki has wanted to do all along, but for whatever reason, ER is much more literary than the other FromSoft games.
I might argue that great works of art can be distilled into a singular, overarching, theme. It just might be extremely complex and take more than a few months to distill. I expect HM wanted us to puzzle over this for a generation, like GRRM's GoT.
I like dark souls lore more than elden ring. I have a good understanding of DS lore to where I can talk about it and tell the story to someone who hasn't played the game. Is hard to do that with elden ring. A fragmented world, with fragmented lore.
Sometimes I've found "giving up" tells my brain it's ok to relax and take things as inspiration comes. Fromsoft lore has always felt like solving a Rubix cube anyways
One of my teachers told me that "the subconscious thinks faster than the conscious." That is, if you're stumped in finding the solution to a problem, it's better to take your mind off the problem and go do something else. The inspiration will hit you eventually, or you'll find something that will help figure out the solution. The context was software development, but it can applied to this context as well, I think.
Dude, I’m an old man. I was in my twenties when DS1 came out. I distinctly remember me and the boys being baffled by the plot of that game. We had some inkling about the basics, but the plot remained obscured at least until DS2. And didn’t fully mature as a narrative until DS3. I’m sure some of the lore hounds out there will tell me that all the details were that in DS 1. And yeah maybe they were - in hindsight. I think your channel and all the others have done a great job laying it all out all the facts, while also being entertaining. I think what elden ring needs, to fully come together, is a DLC or an interview that puts the details in perspective. I don’t know. Rant over.
This remember me the time of the lanch of DS2 we were all crazy to see how the world changed after possibily thousands of years, how dranliec could be astora and the understending of the cicle of fire and that the chose didnt really mather
I just watched a video explaining the lore behind the cutscene change, for the Morgott fight. It changed from his sword breaking its shell using red hot flames to it just breaking its shell on its own. It was explained as fire being heretical to the Golden Order, which Morgott loves, and he only used it as a last resort. If the Formless Mother spoke to Mohg underground its entirely possible she spoke to Morgott as well, but he rejected her, but upon entering his second phase he sees that you are immensely powerful and have a chance at beating him, so he calls upon the Formless Mother to help beat you, using her as a last resort for more power to prevent you from accessing the Erdtree and defying the Golden Order, which is his main purpose.
I mean, I think the DLC will definitely be needed to fill some holes about the deeper lore, but we definitely can manage a little more than what you've got here. For instance - I think you also really need to consider Blacksmith Hewg's dialogue - about how Marika entrusted/forced him to make a weapon to slay a god. Combined with the description of the Soreseals, it's reasonable to believe that being a god, a vessel of the greater will, is a great burden that Marika wanted to be done with. From Ranni (the mini-doll's) dialogue, we learn that shadows are servants of the fingers - given to Empyreans as both servants, but also to groom Empyreans to become gods. Ranni talks about how Blaidd betrayed the fingers when he remained allied to her despite her betrayal of the Greater Will. Marika clearly did not have such trust in Maliketh, which is why she had to trick him.
Elden Ring seems to be very different, fundamentally, to previous Miyazaki works. It is definitely working towards building a tangible, literal world with layers upon layers of secrets and history. I think Miyazaki saw great potential in the "shared experience" aspect of his philosophy when making the open world. We also have to remember that he did say that, unlike previous works, the story was made before the logic or mechanics of the world itself were made. Dark Souls seems to me as work that tried to say something. And Elden Ring seems to me as if it's trying to TELL something. To tell a story, not to say something with underlying meaning. Maybe we could perceive it, but the more I look into the secrets again and again, everything just seems to be made to connect. Everything seems to connect. Which would make sense, considering the new philosophy. I think it might be trying to say that things evolve, they change and are carrying the legacy of yore. To honour and surpass it. That things should have an order perhaps? It's hard to tell, but the game sure has this immensity to it. It's a joy really, for the community to work together for it. It's funny because it's so secretive, the game, that even Vaati has stayed silent for the most part
Pretty sure Miyazaki just kind of grafts lore together randomly based on whatever he kind of remembers writing about before and however he's feeling in the moment and he waits to start writing until the night before the rest of the team needs to start doing things so he can't even go back to make sure things made sense.
You hit the nail on the head. I felt this problem after finishing Elden Ring. The story is both straightforward in many aspects while being completely unknown in others. The facts of the overall plot are there but many of the motivations aren't even hinted at. This might be something that is resolved with the DLC, not even Sekiro had this problem. I realized the problem is with the plot. A month ago, I had a writing assignment for an English class, it was an analysis paper. I was struggling to either pick an analysis of the lore for Elden Ring or Dark Souls. While pouring over my notes I realized I could not coherently explain the story in a way that was engaging. With about three days left before I had to turn in a rough draft, I dropped Elden Ring and wrote the paper on Dark Souls. After a day of rewatching and re-reading many parts, plots, and elements of Dark Souls, everything came back and clicked. Thoughts and ideas wove together, and I was able to make type up a 15 analysis of the game in a day. I got a 100 on that paper. My point being that even though Dark Souls is older, and the lore has been more thoroughly explore, with Elden Ring I could not even begin to logically connect the dots and explain the lore to a reader. Elden Ring lore is interesting, but it feels disjointed. Edit: there are parts of the map for Elden Ring that have obvious spots where something should be but there is nothing like that whirlpool off the coast to the west of the Altus plateau.
THE INTERPRETABLE LORE OF ELDEN RING IN JEST When we first crossed the fog to the Lands Between we were told we were maidenless. Fated to die in obscurity. It is only after meeting the Two Fingers of the Greater Will and the Three Fingers of the Frenzied Flame that we come to one conclusion. We were never maidenless ever. Throughout our entire journey across the Lands Between we always had... ...our hand. We always had two maidens whenever we needed them! "Ahh, you were at my side, all along." Try fingers, but hole.
the simplest explanation I can come up with for a lot of the frustration with Elden Ring's Lore is: It's been four months. Even Dark Souls Lore Content had its hay day years after the first game came out. What we need isn't just a bigger foundation, but also the patience to build that foundation up slowly and through a lot of theorising and speculation. I imagine dark souls was already such a big host for ideas that you're overwhelmed by the required work of understanding from scratch again, now in an even bigger game with even less of a focused narrative. There's surely a lot of souls lore enthusiasts that are just exhausted by this point. I mean, it's been over ten years and with every new game came a new giant workload basically.
There's one important factor you forgot, while it's true that it's been four months, the amount of players that ER has is overwhelmingly more than the meager amount of players Dark Souls had when it first came out. Also at that time, there was not as close as many people invested in the lore of Dark Souls as you see now with ER lore which most likely played a factor as to why it took awhile to build up the lore content of Dark Souls while ER, much of its lore has been covered already.
All of the other souls games had more coherent lore right out of the gate though. Take the first game - we knew just from item descriptions and what we're told that It went Dragons-Lords, Izalith making Daemons and Gwyn defeating them in a war (notable that Izalith trying to make a new first flame is pure fanon and is outright contradicted by the game), then Gwyn burning himself in the Kiln. DLC filled more things in, but we still had a good idea of what was happening.
I love Elden Rings lore. The fact that it’s initially more forthcoming and direct than Dark Souls yet has far deeper and more mysterious depths. For the face value lore, we still don’t know precisely how much he contributed, but do remember that we’re talking about a world partially crafted by George R R Martin, a man who is very talented when it comes to complex political relationships. Backstabs, alliances breaking and shifting, secret agendas, pieces being moved in secret. He’s very good at this kind of thing. And it’s interesting that unlike ASOIAF, or Game of Thrones, we are not viewing this complex narrative from the perspective of the major players. The tarnished does not take part in the political machinations,, at least not knowingly. All happens before the tarnished arrives to the lands between, offscreen from the tarnished, or is something the tarnished is persuaded or manipulated to do. And I think that’s a neat perspective. As for Elden Rings themes. Their may not be one solid singular concrete message. I think it has a lot to do with struggle, ambition, faith, and the tempering of such things with morality and decency. I think Elden Ring is a cautionary tale of unbridled extremes. Who does the community love? General Radahn. General Radahn, by all that we know so far, is both immensely powerful and a revered man of honor. He is not simply a brutal warrior who stockpiled power for power’s sake. He studied gravity magic to stay with his horse, he waits for Malenia to ready her weapons before engaging her in combat, he is revered by his red mane knights who throw a festival in his honor to grant him a warriors death. He is immense power tempered by code and creed. And his honor did not hold him back, despite all of the underhanded, nefarious and morally dubious actions of the other demigods, it is the honorable Radahn that stands as the strongest of them all. Let’s look now at Radagon and Miquella. We have to speculate a little bit into their personalities but this is at least my interpretation. Radagon is a seemingly unquestionable devoted to the golden order, he abandoned his wife to replace Godfrey and shattered her heart, taking the children he had with her to be demigod step children. He fought wars for the golden order, killed for it, abandoned his love for it, and where does it get him, crucified with his other half within the Erdtree, to serve as a final guard dog for the Elden Ring, and then possibly transformed into a sword for the Elden Beast to wield. Blind faith, extreme unquestionable faith is dangerous. Then you have Miquella, his son, who was once a follower of the Golden Order, even developing spells for this order, offering spells as gifts to his father and I believe it’s implied he loved his extended family enough to mourn Godwyn’s death. But he wasn’t blind in his faith. The Golden Order could not save his sister, through some impurity, some “alloy” in their gold, they couldn’t heal her. And we are told that it is for that reason that Miquella left. He, like Radahn, amassed tremendous power and tried to create a new Erdtree, but it was a decision born out of the desire to heal Malenia. And in time, the Haligtree would become a Haven to the unwanted, a place where Loretta could bring the persecuted Albinaurics. Now there is a potential sinister caveat when it comes to Miquella and his St. Trina connections suggesting that he might have entranced his followers, but at the moment the evidence I think leans more towards Miquella being a rather kind figure to the downtrodden. Miquella doesn’t allow faith to blind him, he chooses compassion for his sister over allegiance. And it might have worked had Mohg not interfered. Finally I want to talk about Rykard. One who does not temper his ambitions at all. Feeding himself to a deity serpent in order to amass power. Becoming so heinous and reviled that even the knights who joined him in his blasphemy sought to assassinate him. Rykard lords over a manor of debauchery, torture and death. The imagery of himself and his manor invoke that of Lucifer. He wanted power at all costs, and where does it get him? Eaten by a snake, ostracized, outcast, and stuck at the bottom of his manor, not even the strongest amongst his kin. Elden Ring, I think, wants us to seek greatness of deed and greatness of self. Be our own person, carve our own path, be powerful, be mighty, be strong. But be careful. Control yourself. Do not follow blindly, but do not cast everything and anything away. Build something worth building. Build something great and good. It’s hard, it’s a struggle, but it’s worth doing. Not because you’re guaranteed a happy ending, but because it’s right. Look at Millicent, who refused to lose herself to another’s vision and decided to die bitter sweetly as herself. Look at Nepheli, who’s world was shattered when she learned of Gideons villainy, but decided to be better and becomes the ruler of Limgrave. Look at Blaidd who refuses to blindly adhere to his programming by the two fingers and pledged himself to Ranni in his final moments of lucidity. Be the best you that you can be. Be mighty, be good, be free. That’s Elden Ring.
Elden Ring, at it's heart, is a tale of the struggle between letting go and holding on. It examines this idea through the lense of duality between pairs of characters. Some examples below. Marika & Radagon: You are spot on that Marika planned the Night of Black knives - she seeks to let go of the current order, it has rotted - golden is a facade for the dark truth beneath, so she shatters the Elden ring and triggers a series of events which ultimately lead to a new age. Radagon, on the other hand, struggles to hold on to the current order. The duality of Marika/Radagon is the centerpiece of the story - the eternal struggle of deciding to let go and move on or hold on to the past and preserve it. Marika represents the positive of letting go while Radagon demonstrates the negative of holding on. Malenia & Millicent: Malenia held on when she would have been defeated by Radahn, abandoning her pride and embracing blossoming Rot. She holds on to her brother's dream even though he is gone, she adamantly holds on to life while continuing to rot from within. Millicent is a direct foil for Malenia as her daughter who traced the same path. She ultimately chooses to let go of the rot, preferring to die as she is than blossom into something she is not. In her choice to let go, she maintained the dignity that Malenia lost. Morgott & Mohg: Morgott held on to his love of Leyndell and the Erdtree, remaining loyal to a world that despised him in return. He suffered until the end as an omen, thinking so little of himself when he bleeds upon the thrones because he is ashamed of his own existence. Mohg let go of his connection to Leyndell, instead treading his own path to form the Mohgwyn dynasty. His methods of reaching that goal may have been vile, but he moved on from his pain while his brother embraced it until the end. Ranni & Godwyn: Ranni let go of her physical connection to the world. She chose a dark and lonely path that would bring a new future for the lands between void of the meddling and control of gods. She sacrificed her own body to achieve this. Godwyn, even in the death of his spirit, continues to hold on to the Golden Order in death. His deathroot spreads everywhere, inflicting undeath as a symbolic manifestation of the decay that has become of the current order. Here we see the contrast between risking it all to let go and move on vs decaying by holding on to a past that should no longer be. All of these dichotomies between characters refer back to the central idea that there will always be those who struggle to hold on to the past, to the current order, or to the way things were and then there will be those who take the risk to move on, to establish a new order, to create a new future. The theme of Elden Ring is closely tied to the main theme of Dark Souls and most of Fromsoft's works.
I actually believe Morgott and Mohg and can be interpreted in reverse (though I prefer your interpretation honestly). Mohg can be seen as holding on to the pain of the ridicule and is always reactively shunning others. In other words, he attempts to escape the world by creating his own dynasty, but in reality, he is still trapped in a position of opposition. He always has to be in a constant state of rebellion, meaning he is still attached to his pain. Meanwhile, Morgott is the inverse of this, and you bring up an excellent point. In some ways, Morgott attempts to confront and embrace his birthright. However, this is after he faces ridicule. This means that he is also escaping his prior reputation and position as best as he can, like Mohg, but instead of escaping it through rebellion, he simply chooses to escape it by way of rising above his station. However, just like Mohg, he is always trapped by the past because he is always trying to prove himself to his subjects. These 2 really are probably amongst my favorite characters in the game. So awesome.
@@swordierre9341 lol he really did. He locked his sister's fate to do so. Another comparison between Radahn and Ranni, holding on to the past at all costs vs letting go and embracing the future.
I think a big part of what makes Elden Ring's lore so complicated is its sheer scale in every aspect. We have more characters than ever before, living in a bigger world, with more factions than in past games, every one with a different perspective on the world and on what should happen to it, and so on and so forth. What I like to do is think of the themes and ideas particular characters or factions explore, like Ranni refusing to be controlled by the Two Fingers and the Greater Will, exploring freedom from the current system and seeking independence from those who wish to rule over us. There's also Goldmask, who sees that the current system has problems, but rather than burn it all down and start over (as the Frenzied Flame seeks), wishes to try and do it better next time, even if the change is not a full on revolution from the ground up, he still wishes for things to improve and change the status quo the Lands Between have been on for a while. I haven't really explored everything as deeply as I'd like, as uni and other stuff keeps me busy, but it's what I do to make sense of what I do know for now. Also, English is my second language, so feel free to correct me if anything sounds weird.
Your English is absolutely fine, so far! I didn't even think it was your second language until you said so. Something Ratatoskr missed was Ranni's dialogue as a mini doll. Ranni says that the Shadows of Empyreans (i.e., their beastial followers, like Blaidd and Maliketh) are created for them by the Fingers. Blaidd betrayed the fingers when Ranni did, implying that he was expected to stop her and continue grooming her for godhood. The same was also probably true of Maliketh, and when Marika tired of godhood and wanted to unleash death once more, she didn't trust Maliketh to side with her, and thus she had to trick him.
To put it in one word, I think the theme is “freedom”. Gameplay wise, this is expressed through emphasized open exploration, customization, and the multiple endings. The endings especially seem to reflect different ideologies regarding life and freedom. In one you become consumed by negative nihilism and destroy the world. In one you obey the established order of life. In another you are consumed by positive nihilism, “life is painful/meaningless, but we have the power to choose”. It’s hard to understand if you haven’t felt these feelings irl.
I don't think Elden Ring is trying to tell us something as a whole. It tells us things with characters like Morgott and Radahn, Radagon or Gideon Ofnir. But its story, which is the world we play in, tries to tell us a literal story with probably no underlying meaning behind it. Dark Souls was made to be metatextual, symbolic, deep and compelling than Elden Ring. It's just an entirely different breed. So people who say it's DS4 were absolutely wrong
I like this theme of freedom. I’ve always thought that Marika might have never wanted to be chosen. However, for some reason, she could not escape the binds of the golden order. Perhaps, her motivations are shared by Ranni. Thus, Marika assisted Ranni in doing what she could not; removing the influence of the golden order and reestablishing freedom.
@@yare987 that much is true... though ironically i do think towards the end, Marika and Ranni did not align. Ranni wants an Age of Stars, carrying Order far away. I think Marika wanted a new Elden Lord, the Tarnished. She wanted to keep Order, just maybe not the GOLDEN Order. Which may be why the Black Knives then attacked Iji and Ranni's Rise. Kind of like Templars vs Assassins Order or Freedom?
the black flame on Iji's corpse really feels like a mistake, there are even dead assassins around him suggesting that he died fighting them off, but then the flame should be black and red. It feels more like an error than most things
I suspect the reason why the Black Knives turned against Ranni is because of Iji. He has the ability to seal people into ever gaols, and we find Alecto sealed in an ever gaol in the Carian Lunar Estate. The death of Tiche possibly made him suspect that Alecto would turn on them, so he sealed her away and then didn't tell anyone like when he sealed Blaidd.
It's possible that Elden Ring is currently lacking some very important piece from its story that puts it all together and we will get said piece in the DLC. For example... Miquella seems to be a very crucial person to the story and he's tied to at least Radagon, Malenia, Mohg, Godwyn and of course Marika to name a few. And yet we know little to nothing about him. Another crucial yet ambiguous thing are the many Outer Gods that are very important for the key characters of the story. I don't think it's possible to fully interpret the story in satisfactory way without these things further elaborated. Elden Ring is not like other Souls games. It's way bigger, has way more characters and as such there's more connections between characters and events than ever before. It might need something to truly complete it.
To be honest this has been said before about bloodborne and ds3 and in both cases the DLC was more tangential and thematically-driven than a 'final piece of the puzzle'. They did provide tons of answers, but not to the questions we actually had to begin with, and I kind of prefer it that way.
@@PoolNoodleGundam I agree but I also acknowledge that Elden Ring is not quite like those games. The scale of things is simply different and as such it might need more puzzle pieces rather than another puzzle with the same theme.
1. The "betrayal" described in Malikeths rememberance could also be the fact that she is responsible for guiding the tarnished to him through grace to kill him and take back destined death. Afterall, you get to Farum Azula after Melina, Marika's daughter, fufills her purpose given to her by the latter by doing her role as the kindling maiden (the name for her that is found in the item description of the knife she wields if you summon her to help against Morgott, the Blade of Calling) and sacrificing herself to set fire to the erdtree. 2. I am so glad you brought up Iji's corpse being covered in the black flames, as this had puzzled me greatly as well. It was my belief that the devs had put the wrong particle effect on his corpse. In short, the black flame is a weakened form of the "destined death" reddish-black flame you see Maliketh and the Black Knife assassins wield. The incantation "Scouring Black Flame" says "The black flame could once slay gods. But when Maliketh sealed Destined Death, the true power of the black flame was lost." What do we make of this? The Gloam-Eyed Queen once controlled the The Rune of Death or Destined Death, but Marika desired for her offspring to not be killed, so she had her shadow defeat her. Now the Gloam Eyed queen is stated to be an empyrean, and as you stated in this video, theories and interpretations can quickly go in a spiral. I think the Fromsoftware devs, as they typically do, are trying to convey to us in the most esoteric of ways possible that the Gloam Eyed queen is Melina. Her association with fire, Her dialogue in the frenzy flamed ending, her eyes just seem to convenient. I digress. Iji's body is covered in black flame because he was killed by the Black Knife assassins but by the time you get there, the flame has decayed into the black flame state. Anyways, this was an info dump and probably has holes in it, but I just wanted to get my interpretation out there.
Just like Rataoskr said, people can make very convincing arguments but then I am still in doubt. Allot of the Melina = GEQ makes sense but then... 1.Gloam-Eyed predates or co-existed with Godskins 2.The Erdtree is born and the war of giants starts 3.The black flame is used in the war of the giants 4.The Golden order began when destine death was plucked 5.Godskins and the Gloam Eyed Queen were defeated by Malikleth who then sealed destine death 6.Melina is born at the foot of the Erdtree... at some point??? Likely after all the other demi gods, since she is the sibling of Malinia and Miquella 1. Gloam-Eyed predates Godskins Godskin Swaddling Cloth The Gloam-Eyed Queen cradles newborn apostles swaddled in this cloth. Soon they will grow to become the death of the gods. 2. The Erdtree is born and the war of giants starts Smithing Stone [8]: "Thought to have been used to hone the weapons of the champions of the War against the Giants at the birth of the Erdtree." 3.The black flame is used in the war of the giants Blackflame Monk Amon "Ashen remains in which spirits yet dwell. Use to summon the spirit of Amon, the Blackflame Monk. Amon swore fealty to the god-slaying black flame, and so became the first fire monk to turn traitor. Or perhaps it is better said that he fled from the Giants' Flame-out of cowardice." 4.The Golden order began when destine death was plucked from the elden ring upon the creation of the golden order Finger Reader Enia dialog: "The Rune of Death goes by two names; the other is Destined Death. The forbidden shadow, plucked from the Golden Order upon its creation…" 5.Godskins and the Gloam Eyed Queen were defeated by Malikleth who then destine death was sealed Godskin Apostle Hood: "The apostles, once said to serve Destined Death, are wielders of the god-slaying black flame. But after their defeat by Maliketh, the Black Blade, the source of their power was sealed away." Godslayer's Greatsword "Sacred sword of the Dusk-Eyed Queen who controlled the Godskin Apostles before her defeat at the hands of Maliketh." 6.Melinia was born at the foot of the erdtree Melinia Dialog "The Erdtree...is close. Only a little further till the foot of the Erdtree, and the accord is fulfilled. It takes me back. I was born at the foot of the Erdtree. Where mother gave me my purpose. Though now, everything is lost to me. I...have to ascertain for myself. The reason for which I live, burned and bodiless."
@@pigzy9807 The “birth of the erdtree” is such a confusing term if you know s lot of the context. There is the “great tree” and the “erdtree”. Is the “birth of the erdtree” referring to the physical erdtree or the erdtree’s order, that’s why there is a distinction between the erdtree worship incantations, ancient erdtree incantstions, and golden order incantations.
@@Liam-pi9vi There is a crucible, but I don't think there is a single great tree. Some items were mistranslated, great tree should be plural Great Tree(s). It could still be the case that the erdtree was one of these great trees that was empowered after the elden ring was placed in it or something.
I've definitely felt that lacking consensus in just rudimentary discussions about the happenings of the game. While I feel like I can *make* a somewhat coherent picture for myself, I also realize that there isn't enough support given by the game itself to cement it as convincing for people that put a different amount of weight on certain aspects and look at things from a different angle. Putting the wall of text of some ideas at the bottom as further examples. Expanding on the crucible and Black Knives points of the video: For the crucible: We see this image of a larger Elden Ring in Farum Azula. So possibly the outer gods are not alien gods, but gods kicked out of the Golden Order by the Greater Will over time, which would explain their loose ties to the crucible, as the crucible would then have represented the combination of all these forces conjoined, rather than warring as is shown by each outer force trying to get back in, largely by influencing and manipulating the demi gods. And since every outer god seeks its own "order" in a way, the frenzied flame representing chaos is basically opposing all this struggle in totality due to it tainting the perfection life was supposed to be and would rather have it all end, than continue to suffer, borrowing on nihilistic themes. For the Black Knives: Additionally to what you pointed out. We see Alecto, their leader, impirsoned on the Moonlight Altar. Maybe she was imprisoned by Ranni there after similarly attacking her like Iji and Blaidd were attacked? The Baleful Shadow sent by the two fingers also utilizes Black Flame, which atleast loosely connects it to the same assassination attempts following after you defeat it. Which would imply that they are defenidng the Two Fingers Ranni is hunting down. And from there we could speculate if Ranni was pulled into the plot and merely hijacked it to free herself from the Greater Wills machinations, whether or not it was Marika's will or the greater will's. We also have that one line at the top of castle sol implicating that Miquella was attempting to revive the soulless demigods, be that Godwyn or the ones in the Mausoleums. Which opens up thinking about whether Marika and the Empyreans were plotting against the Greater Will and only after she thought all of them lost she shattered the ring to get the Tarnished to get the job done. But again for one this might make sense, for another it seems farfetched nonsense. For themes we have fire being very important again, nigh every force in this game has their own kind of flames and overturning an age with flames is also pretty central to the story. Conflict is a huge theme in the game, conflict not only between factions but also fundamental beliefs and even conflict about if it is all worth, which ties into this Melina vs Frenzied Flame perspectives you get when you do the questline and dont miss Melina's dialogue options.
I think DLC will definitely help clarify some things about the nature of Death, the crucible, Miquella, and the pre-erdtree civilizations. That being said, it might also help to take a reasoned approach to some bits of lore. For instance - there's this idea that the Black Knife Assassins, after being given the tools of Destined Death, would be allied to Ranni? They've literally been given the power of death itself - something the gods and demigods don't have access to. They're basically accountable to nobody. It would be entirely reasonable speculation that the Night of the Black Knives was a massively chaotic event where the Black Knife assassins went on a demigod killing spree, mostly because they simply could. The black flames of death aren't necessarily an exclusive thing, either. With death's black flame unleashed, flame monks began modifying their arts in defiance of the gods, as well. It seems that anyone with the knowledge of how to inflict death might be able to use it, including Baleful Shadows of the Two Fingers. It's just the tool you need to kill gods and demigods, and they've been unleashed. Now, I know Americans don't like to think of things like this - but if you unleash tools of deadly force to the general public, the result is going to be a lot of death lol. I think the plan was more just to unleash death and hope the ensuing chaos would work out.
Execllent video, thoroughly enjoyed it. Really put into words how I was feeling with so many links between powers, characters, items, places…etc that it was just mind boggling with hardly any concrete proofs so inevitably we all went into crackpot theory space. Your note at the end about DLC’s historically being the best sources gave me a big ray of hope and I thank you. This was my first FromSoft game and I look forward to playing more.
There are definitely big overarching themes you appear to discount: Duality & Oneness, Duty & Desire, Dissonance resultant of binary opposites. There are certainly more overarching broad themes to Elden Ring than "struggle/sacrifice" and Alchemy. The blatant unanswerable things like "Radagon is Marika", Yura/Shabriri and Hyetta/Irina, Greater Will vs Outer God influence, nearly everyone having hidden intentions (and those intentions not being explicit), there are definitely broad stroke themes throughout all this narrative. I'm not pretending to understand the overarching themes more than you, but I feel you have 'thrown in the towel' at a strange narrative point when there are only 'larger concepts' instead of 'smaller stories' to latch onto (particular as someone who self-professes in this video to be interested in the wider lore/thematic implications as opposed to the story happenings minutae). I'm sure as you've said in your video, you will change your opinion on this once DLC gets released.
This is what I believe the true meaning of Elden Ring is. How little can you give until it's finally considered a bad game. Ok. Not really. But something close to that. The true in-game theme of Elden Ring is BLIND FAITH. You are a character who didn't even get a proper origin like previous Souls games. You're a character who blindly follows orders from any NPC without given any answers whatsoever. And those who did give answers were pawn themselves to something bigger. And what little information you do receive is never given any real context.
@@kevinvu5432 I like this interpretation. It's like a lore equivalent of Dark Soul's "hollowing" concept, where you engage with Elden Ring until you are beaten into submission with lack of explanations/clarity etc, and are 'defeated' by how impenetrable the lore is.
I think your issue might be that you're trying to approach Elden Ring as if it were an allegorical text, something with a clear, single meaning coded by the author that can be divined with enough scrutiny (think something like Animal Farm for example). I found it helps to approach it as more as a kind of collection of themes and ideas presented prismatically. All these themes and ideas- change and ambition, duality and doubles, authority and divine right, death and rebirth all play off each other in many, many complex ways, but you can't reduce all of the meaning found therein to a single 'point', like you could with Dark Souls and it's core existential theme. The meaning isn't found in one large theme that disseminates throughout everything in the story, it's found in many smaller themes that all interact with each other. Don't try and force the text to say something, analyze and play close attention to what it's is already saying regardless of how it says it.
I think this is the best approach, and I think the 6 endings as 'responses' to the question the game poses (which let's be honest is once again to do with stagnation and renewal) is your interpretation as response. It basically gives you 6 box ready interpretations, and necessarily must therefore leave space for all of them to fit.
Oh wow, they game vaguely eludes to themes we've been doing for the past 3 souls games, obviously this makes the nonsense lore that only serves to confuse good.
Forgive me for a moment since I'm going to do something that's generally very stupid to do on the Internet, but I think you yourself may have been bogged down by the talk of themes in this video. If we forget about the themes or even trying to interconnect various characters and events beyond what we see, we still don't have a coherent story. Why does Ranni want to kill Godwyn? We know why she wanted to shed her flesh, she didn't want to be a puppet to God. But why does she kill Godwyn and not just literally anyone else? Surely it would have been easier to kill a wandering citizen than to send assassins into the most heavily guarded area in the land and kill one of the most powerful characters in the world. Going further along to when Blaidd and Iji are killed... why are they killed? What thematic purpose is served in this side story by having them die? What is the game telling us by killing them? If Ranni's ending involved the death of everyone and the old system, then this would have been an interesting little hint at her goal. But no, she just wants to remove the influence of the gods and no one else has to die for this to work from the Ending going forwards. So, why do the assassins she worked with suddenly turn on her 5000 years later? And right before her plan is completed? The theme of Ranni's story is spelt out for anyone even half paying attention but the chain of events are not just shrouded under a veil (ha get it) of mystery, they occur without any reason to, thematic or otherwise. Sorry if I, myself, have produced incoherent ramblings, though, that would be pretty funny in an ironic way. I do genuinely want to know your thoughts on this, I'm not trying to le epic own you on the Internet or assert I'm right or anything like that. I think your interpretation of the overarching themes present is spot on, it's just your thoughts in the events I'd like to hear more of. Hope you are having a good day
I think that the difficulty of understanding the themes and metaphorical interpretations stems from the fact that those aren't the focus of the game. It may be presumptuous of me to say, but when it comes to the most basic elements of storytelling - plot, setting, character, and themes - Elden Ring chooses to place its primary focus on its characters, the drama that occurs between them, and the influence of outer gods mucking up their designs. Consider how many of the demigods have highly personal motivations for what they do, which often lead them to pursue goals with world-changing implications. Mohg wants to create the Mohgwyn Dynasty, partially motivated by the embrace of the Formless Mother, which puts him in conflict with Miquella's own plans. Rykard gives himself over to the God-Devouring Serpent, of which there has been a vision that it will eventually swallow the world. (Though I'm not certain this is meant to be taken literally.) Malenia is cursed by an outer god known to us only as the incarnation of rot itself, which would likely have the entire world look something like Caelid, and seeks to transform Malenia into the Goddess of Rot for its own ends. The list goes on a fair bit, but in all of these examples, it can be shown that there is a desire, whether by the demigods themselves or the outer forces working through them, to not only influence the world, but completely reshape it. As each character wants fundamentally different things, they come into opposition with each other frequently, creating a complex, interwoven character drama that makes it unclear who is on whose side, who betrayed who, or even exactly what any character's concrete plans are to achieve their goals. Because the characters are driving the story, and no singular one has enough control over the vast moving parts of Elden Ring's world for things to revolve around them. The few constants that I think everyone can agree on are that the most recent Order to exist in the world was the Golden Order. Marika shattered the Elden Ring, and in so doing, the Tarnished and Demigods now all have the chance to introduce their own Order. Morgott alone clings to the prior order, exactly as it was, and sees all those following their own ambitions as willful traitors, or fools. Morgott is, in essence, the lone character seeking to preserve this game's "Age of Fire", refusing to acknowledge it has already gone and can never return as it once was. However, there is no "Age of Darkness" equivalent. There is the Mohgwyn Dynasty, the devouring of the gods, the Scarlet Rot, the Age of Stars, the Haligtree. There is supplanting the power vacuum left by the fracturing of the Golden Order with, well, whatever the demigods and their adherents damn well please. So for me, to analyze it on a broader scale, I think Ranni's quest and ending present the best perspective. People say her dialogue makes it more clear when translated more literally, but even as-is, her motivations imply that the concept of "Order" itself, an imposed will that shapes the world and defines its rules, is something she wants to remove from The Lands Between entirely. That maybe the fighting of the demigods amounts only to power-hungry nonsense that benefits no one. This might not be strictly "canon" but I think her lines in the story trailer are very interesting. She asks what the demigods could ever hope to achieve through warring with each other, and describes the Shattering as a war that wrought "only chaos". Interesting choice of words there.... Obviously the demigods each have their own designs for the world beyond the Shattering, and characters like Mohg and Rykard make that very clear. But Ranni's philosophy takes on the perspective that it all amounts to nothing, and that the only path forward is to keep The Lands Between untouched by those forces. The truth is that Elden Ring is a character drama, with countless characters having countless visions to reshape the world, using the power vacuum created by the Shattering to attempt to do so. And the fundamental question of it all, did any of it truly amount to anything?
amazing post, the ambiguity of Elden Ring's story is fascinating and this ties with lorelost's post above that maybe searching for an overarching theme is not how you should interpret it, but looking at each story within it
I think the main theme is ambition. Every single thing that happens is because of it. Everyone wants a piece, and how for each one it affects them in a different way. Some people were destroyed by their own ambitions, others were destroyed by other people ambitions. The outer gods are mindless concepts the greatest players in this game twist to their own design. If you notice, every outer god is basically just a concept. Order, Chaos, Rot and Rebirth, Formlessness, Cold Darkness. For example Order divides, and you can see how Order, no matter who uses it, will always leave marginalized people. If you give the world to the Omen, or the undead, regular people will be displaced. The ambition of the few will affect the others. I think the unifying theme is ambition.
Someone else on here talked about a large parallel to the Old Testament. And that could be a great source of inspiration. The Devil, once an angel begins the tale of scripture with ambition. He's the catalyst for all of God's responses to humankind and other spirit creatures such as angels, Demons and Christ. Power and ambition is exchanged and this trickles down even to Kings and Governments of the earth. The lore is dense because it makes it more interesting and vast. So in my opinion while the pieces of information make *connecting* the lore difficult as there are likely intentional holes...I don't think the theme and setting are incomprehensible.
*I forgot to also mention the Holy Trinity...Almighty God, Christ and The Holy Spirit different forms of the same being. How these interactions can be explained is mythological so what we imagine needs to fill in the gaps. I think it's easy to see where I'm going with this...
The thing is I don't think the lore of ER should be that obscure. The world is not dead yet, most of the important demigods are still alive, there are still armies fighting, there are finger readers who interpret the greater will, and Sir Gideon has a library full of lore. So most of the lore should be common knowledge, not lost ancient history, but it seems the players are the only ones not knowing it. We don't even have the option to ask Melina who she actually is or does she have a boyfriend. I am not sure if it is good storytelling or not.
Respectfully Ratatoskr, you're looking too deep. The theme of Elden Ring is in our faces from the very start: "Make of thyselves that which ye desire. Be it a Lord. Be it a God. But should ye fail to become aught at all, ye will be forsaken. Amounting only to sacrifices." The theme of Elden Ring is AMBITION, as well as the associated sacrifices and even the hubris one experiences from pursuing it. Never before in a FromSoft game have the characters been so driven to succeed and reach their own goals, indecipherable as they are. In Dark Souls, the game and it's mechanics are a vehicle to deliver the theme of stagnation vs change. In Elden Ring, the game uses it's lore and mechanics to push you and your ambitions forward. All of the shardbearers want (or did want) something. Godrick just wanted to go home. Rykard wanted to ascend. Morgott wanted to be loved. Radahn aspired to be the greatest warrior, even fighting Malenia to meet that goal. Even the friendly NPCs have their ambitions. Millicent wants to live freely, Diallos wants to measure up, Goldmask wants the truth, and Melina wants to fulfill her destiny. And all the characters in the game pay the price to meet their goals. Alexander dies for glory, Hewg loses himself in the effort to help you slay a god. And even Patches, with his possibly bugged storyline, lets himself get hurt to try and snap Tanith out of her obsession. What does Melina want to know from you when you level up? When you sacrifice your Runes to get stronger? She wants to know what your goals and motives are. What does Morgott call you out on? Your ambitions. Why did Marika shatter the Elden Ring? We might not know for 100% sure, but she wanted something and was willing to shatter the Elden Ring and break the world for it. Ambition, sacrifices, and hubris.
That's a cool interpretation actually, but personally I don't think I would ever take a story as multifaceted as Elden Ring and say of it "clearly, THE theme of it is X". That seems arrogant and reductive. There could be infinite other very similar or very different Themes one could choose and even the words used and examples provided have a level of subjectivity, like all art does, that makes it hard to pinpoint something as "THE" definitive answer. An answer yes, and one with value, maybe even great value, but not all value possible.
I personally believe there are 3 reasons why the lore is tough to nail down. Compared to other FromSoft games anyway. -Time: We don’t know when things happened. We have a rough understanding of the sequence of historical events but he have no real idea of when some of these things happen. We don’t know when our Tarnished shows up in the lands between, compared to, say, the Old Tarnished we get the Scaled Armor set from. We have no clue how long Godwin’s death has been corrupting the lands or how long ago Melenia Nuked Calid. -The Intro: while it’s probably one of my favs and gets me hyped every time I see it, it doesn’t tell us much. Tells us the gods that (may)have died, the Elden Ring Broke and the tarnished who we may meet. Other than that, it’s really to hype up a lowly tarnished to fuck some shit up in the Lands Between. It’s not like Dark Souls intros that show the bosses but also get you to understand where the world is at the current moment. -Open World: I don’t believe the open world formula was bad for ER but I do feel it affected it’s story telling. Not negatively in my personal opinion, but the story hints probably had to become more vague since the game structure is not linear, for the most part. Because of this approach we often get questlines that branch from say, bloodyfinger hunting escalating to the Flame of Frenzy quest line or from Helping homeboy Rogier with a castle to hugging Fia next to her dead boyfriend Godwin. I didn’t mean for this to be so long but I can’t help but feel that because of these points I’ve mentioned, the storytelling for ER had to change as opposed to past FromSoft games.
I kind of came to the same conclusion and kind of created my own head cannon I liked. Would be excited to have DLC that started addressing a lot of those questions though, and returned removed quests that have been removed. One thing to keep in mind is Martin's involvement with the historical lore. Martin's stories (not just ASOIAF) can be quite cryptic and leave you very unsettled. I think even with answers, you'd run into a similar messy situation.
I'll be honest, ever since Dark Souls II onwards, it's become easier and easier to "solve" Miyazaki's stories because we know where to look (item descriptions) and exactly what to pay attention to (item location, environment, etc). I'm actually loving that for the first time in over 10 years, I'm having to just flat-out guess at the meaning of context clues and accepting my own "headcanon" as Miyazaki intended when he took inspiration from reading western fantasy novels and having to do the same when he encountered words he couldn't interpret. It's honestly better in my head that Solaire was Gwyn's outcast son even though I know in hindsight that can't be the case because of so much contradictory information and later retcons to the lore.
Exactly! There are many things that seem much cooler in my head than if it were fully explained or debunked. In my mind, Godefroy is not a real character that exists and nobody can convince me otherwise.
So this pretentious fuck expects you to write his game for him... And that's a good thing? Even Kojima, as much of a fucking hack as he is, actually bothers to write a story in the first place. This is Destiny all over again, only this time around, the gameplay is actually good.
@@TurboMintyFresh Maybe. But it's certainly interesting since it's a method that can only be implemented in video games. Years from now we might view this as archaic storytelling tropes, but it's still in it's infancy. We're seeing more and more titles adopt this item description/environment approach to world building. Some to great effect, others to utter bewilderment.
Case in point: watch 2 videos about the same aspect of Elden Ring lore by 2 different TH-camrs and marvel at how wildly different their ideas of what is considered fact is. If that type of ambiguity exists even at the core of the story then every successive abstraction made from the story itself can miss the mark by greater distance while maintaining "plausibility". It leaves room for fun speculation I suppose, but if the DLC doesn't deliver any real answers then I fear Miyazaki may have been watching too much David Lynch. I can't help but to wonder if bringing in George Martin to lay the foundation for the story may have made them overconfident in the ammount of bricks they could pull from it before the structure is unrecognizable.
You are doing a very good job despite how convoluted the lore is. I enjoy your videos and appreciate your takes, while you explain what the lore means to the best of your ability. Especially when you take those risks for certain videos. Like the Frenzied Flame video you put out. While I was doing research of my own. I was recommended your video. And included a short shout out to you within my own Frenzied Flame video, because I felt it was deserved. Keep up the good work. And don't be too hard on yourself. The lore is difficult to follow and we need to the whole community to understand even a fraction of it. The developers leave holes in the story so the lore divers and community as a whole can try to piece things together like a puzzle. After all, our imaginations are far more powerful than anything they could try to show us in game. My respects to you again. Here is the video I made regarding the Frenzied Flame in case you care to see it. Have a good day and enjoy the lands between th-cam.com/video/yslWwKN-fY8/w-d-xo.html
As far as an overarching theme for Elden Ring though, i'm with you. It's possibly not meant to be interpreted. Is it possible then, the idea it's not meant to be interpreted works into the theme? Sometimes, life is more complicated than we can understand. Despite our efforts we will never understand life, or peoples motivations within it. But we should still try our best in life, even if we do not succeed. Is the story of Elden Ring asking, "what is the meaning of life?" A parallel to our own world. A possible theme heavily inspired by the idea of cosmism developed by H.P. Lovecraft. Just a thought
I appreciate your intense desire to connect the dots or find deeper meaning. It’s seems that the intent is to convey the futility of knowing this as facts or to make sense. The illusive existence that cannot be grasped or understood as the mind attempts to do
I actually think the overarching theme of Elden Ring is moving on, letting go and dissolving attachments that no longer are of benefit, that which now cause stagnation, much like the age of Dark ending for Dark Souls 3. Creating something new and better (yes even the flame of frenzy) giving up on holding those attachments that now Bind and shackle you to a life of unhappiness and strife (i.e. returning destined death to the world, when removing it giving all eternal life in one sense or another)
Not really, because this literally yeets the entire thread and pattern of layers of kingdoms that add on the legacies of previous ones, which follow a natural Order (Eternal Cities, Dragons, Crucible, Erdtree, and Golden Order in... In that order)
Flame of Frenzy isn't letting go and creating something new and better. It's the end of everything... forever. I don't understand how that can be construed as 'better'. The game is quite explicit about that.
I agree with you about the overall point here and the thematic aspects, but some quibbles on the specifics: I don’t think anything in-game implies the Formless Mother is the source of the accursed blood to begin with, only that she favors and empowers it. The Omen Curse seems to be more of a Crucible thing than a Formless Mother thing, with the Formless Mother simply finding it a worthy vessel. Also Omen do have scales (see: Morgott’s face) and Mohg sprouts wings in his 2nd phase. I have more in-depth ideas about what exactly Omen are which I might do a video on at some point. When Malekith dies as Gurranq, he follows up “why wouldst thou gull me” with “why shatter”, so I’m pretty sure the betrayal is Marika’s shattering of the Elden Ring rather than orchestrating the Night of the Black Knives.
I am confused, too. I was really looking forward to have this kind of 'Frampt moment' like in first playtrough of DS1, when I was suddenly able to understand much more about what's my purpose and what I am actually doing in the world. But at some point in Elden Ring I just gave up and enjoyed playing. I'd love to have a better understanding of all the events and the world, tho.
What we know for sure about the Black Knife Assassins is that Alecto was their leader, but is found trapped in an evergaol in the Moonlight Altar area (which is connected to Ranni and her 2-fingers). My version of events as of right now: Marika, Ranni, Renna and Alecto (with Rykard peripherally involved) conspired to orchestrate the Night of the Black Knives. Ranni did this to get rid of her empyrean body and resist the Greater Will. Marika did it because many of her children were "unwanted" for whatever reason (including Godwyn) and assassinating them was just her modus operandi. This probably _also_ had something to do with resisting the Greater Will. But since Marika still wanted Destined Death sealed away, she and Ranni turned on the assassins afterwards. Alecto was imprisoned and the other surviving ones went into hiding in various caves and catacombs. When Ranni leaves to "go to her order" or whatever after her questline, the BKAs opportunistically go after Blaidd and Iji. Much later, Marika broke the Elden Ring and distributed the pieces (great runes) among her children. She told them to become lords or gods or die trying. The Greater Will punished Marika by having the Elden Beast impale and shackle her in the Erdtree. Radagon (Marika) sealed the entrance to the Erdtree, possibly while pretending to try to repair the Ring (so the GW/EB wouldn't stop him). That's because Marika doesn't want anyone to repair the ring or become her new consort -- she wants some of her demigod children to reach godhood and/or lordship without her (and without the Greater Will or the Elden Beast). This is not what the Greater Will and the 2-Fingers want, so they revive the tarnished and use Grace to guide them towards Greatrunes and lordship.
@@MangoMeoww Maybe? It did before she shattered the Elden Ring, for sure. But if it still does, it might suggest that it was Marika and Radagon that were of opposing minds (somehow, despite being the same person). Perhaps it was Radagon that conspired with Ranni to kill Godwyn, which would make the Numen-thread and the ties between Marika and the BKAs a false lead. Would explain the connection between death of Godwyn and Marika’s breaking of the Ring.
The foundation of the lore in Elden Ring is more vague and unclear than any other Soulsgame. The timeline is vague, the motivation behind major plot points is so unclear that you can make a case for opposing standpoints. All this ambiguity is intensified by the plot points tying together and depending on your interpretation the stroyline/characters can do a complete 180. As you said it is not necessarily a bad thing but at this point of the game we cannot come to a satisfying conclusion of the lore and its further metaphorical interpretation. The DLC will have to do a heck of a job to tie things together.
Please more lore videos, even if they are just speculation it helps my understanding so much, I relisten to these all the time and I'm still so engulfed in figuring it all out. I know I have no say or even any relevance to lore hunting but I think I speak for many people when I say that your lore videos are amazing and greatly help our understanding. Either way thank you ratatoskar
I like to think that From just leaves some questions unanswered, so that you form your own opinions on what the "lore" truly is. You can write a story from beginning to end, and it might be a good story, with a few different ways to interpret the meaning of it all, but ultimately, it'll only convey one take on how things went down. However, if you leave things open, and you dont share all the info. You leave a lot more up to interpretation. Which, in my opinion, can be a good thing. Its like when you hear a song that doesnt really plainly explain what its about. People will guess what the meaning is themselves. Which sometimes makes it better, because it can mean something different to each person who hears it. I think Elden Ring works the same way. Youre supposed to take the lore scraps and build your own opinion on what the meaning truly is. If you cant find any meaning, maybe that's where you've naturally come to after all you've seen. Maybe you dont see any meaning at all, and for all you know, that might just be the right answer...
I don't think Elden Ring is any more or less interpretable than other From Software games. It just depends on how specific/general you require the lore to be in your own head. For example, in DS1, we never learn who Velka is, or how Gwynevere running off with the Flame God Flan introduces Gods who do not have Lord Souls, or how you are able to permanently kill npcs despite them all being undead. There has always been a certain amount of ambiguity we just have to accept when we try to construct our version of events. To me, I feel like the themes of Elden Ring are an expansion of the themes of Dark Souls. In Dark Souls, the Flame which brings disparity to the universe is clearly a natural process which the Lord's are attempting to extend or recreate through artificial means and thus bring about their own downfall and eventual burning of the universe to ash. It's about the Lord's hubris in attempting to control natural cycles. In Elden Ring, instead of the First Flame, we get the Erdtree and the Golden Order. But unlike the Flame, the Golden Order is imposed by the Greater Will and it's representatives. The Golden Order did not die out on its own, Marika/Radagon's regime was overthrown by conspiracy and war. It is less about nature than it is about social systems. We can see in the story that the Golden Order was a social hierarchy that needed to be maintained through more and more draconian means. We see constantly in the lore characters and factions resentful of the Golden Order and Marika's rule. The central theme of Elden Ring is this: In order for any social system to last, be it a nation state or a political system, it needs to change. It's the same theme of stagnation from older games, just applied to a different domain.
Partial agree. The thing is, the central theme of every Miyazaki game except maybe Demon's Souls and Bloodborne is basically the same (though I am less familiar with the lore of those games, perhaps they are more similar than I think) - the futile attempt to fight back against the inevitable. In Dark Souls its Linking the Fire, in Sekiro its attaining Immortality, in Elden Ring its sealing Destined Death. They all attempt the same thing, to resist change. Whats interesting in Elden Ring (of course in my own interpretation, yours may differ) is that Marika seems to have progressed past the villains of the prior games in that shes realised her mistake, partially. She shatters the Elden Ring and leads the Tarnished to Destined Death through Melina because she has realised that the Age of the Erdtree is decaying, and seeks to make a new world. Her error comes in trying to be at the head of this new world too, and I think her fractured body in the non-Ranni, non-Frenzy endings is meant to communicate that. Sure, she retains her position as vessel of the Elden Ring, but she doesn't look all that alive. Her new age will be an Age of Fracture, because she remains Eternal.
@@saulgoneman What I find brilliant about Elden Ring, is how the break down of the Golden Order wasn't inevitable, and was clearly the fault of Marika and the Demigods.
The reason the DS series didn't feel like this was because the major events were few and far between, so a timeline wasn't really warranted, like a mythology. This is totally different, between GRRM leaving holes for plot and FS doing the same, we are missing half the book. Hopefully the DLC will round out most of this info. If its in the likeness of DS, it'll be brand new info that we wouldn't have been able to piece out with the old information. If its like GRRM we may have been able to. Either way, this story is a puzzle with all middle pieces missing.
I think that something every single lore channel has been and continues to miss is GRRM's contributions to the world. We as a community need to move beyond the "this is big dark souls" understanding of the game, and that's not just in terms of gameplay(no summons, no bleed, no spells, no fun) but also the world. The foundation of the world is based on Martin's ideas, I suggest looking at David Lightbringer for the themes/mythology that Martin works with, and Preston Jacobs for a deep exploration of the complexity of schemes and plots, as well as his sci-fi works. GRRM is a heavyweight(no pun intended) in world building, and has been working with worlds at the size for ER for decades. It's foolish to try to understand ER only looking at it from a Miyazaki POV.
Just from a literary standpoint, so much of the text in-game is just completely misunderstood and somehow attributed to “translation issues”. It’s mind-boggling at times.
@@gorge3030 let’s use an example from the video.. The text says the formless mother 'bestows power on accursed blood' - accursed can mean condemned…and is not solely synonymous with evil. The Mother of Truth can be interpreted as being an outer God, who grants power to those who call out to her (with the condition being that those who call out her are facing unjust suffering due to being deemed other/lesser-than e.g. “needing a wound”) This does not mean that the “omens” are inherently evil, or that this Outer God has always been tied to their existence.
I read an interesting tweet a while ago about the over arching theme of ER: "Elden Ring is pretty blatantly about the development of natural philosophy, its transmutation into modern science and the associated golden age, and its eventual fragmentation and collapse as it became its own epistemological grounding" I think that's one of the best descriptions about the metaphor that ER presents that I've read.
@@ronzacharias5497 OK nvm upon rewatching that video I'm realizing I've steered you wrong. It's still an interesting video but it's less focused on natural history and epistemology and more on the sense of living in the time after the golden age and being haunted by that time. They basically draw a parallel to the shattering in Elden Ring to the widespread sense in our current time that we live in a world without a future.
While people tend to believe that more people discussing lore would naturally lead to better and more fruitful speculation simply thanks to more eyes, ears, and minds being invested at once, I think in Elden Ring's this has actually caused problems through the sheer noise of everyone clamoring and rushing to get out videos that'll cement them as authorities to be respected and cited in all discussions about the lore. People like Ratatoskr and Crunchy OTOH, have taken a more deliberate, meditative approach to patiently working through the lore so as to avoid unnecessary confusion that could get the conversation around lore twisted in a tangled mess of knots. Sadly, the same can't be said for most lore channels as most people aren't comfortable with the uncertainty of taking things slowly. I think the slow buildup of lore channels over the years, combined with the explosive popularity of Elden Ring, and the incredibly hyperdefensive babysitter "everybody and everything is valid" attitude that's become more and more prevalent among the real gatekeepers in this community, all combined to make it so the discussion surrounding the most confusing lore From have ever put together got off to an even rockier and more muddled start than what was necessary. The process will doubtless repeat once DLC enters the discussion, but hopefully, with time, all the noise will give way to measured discussion once all the content-craving masses have moved on to something else. Side note, I have some ideas about ranni, specifically in terms of her connections to Eastern mythologies, that I'll be sharing with you and crunchy in your comments. Might lead to some newer insights, especially wrt the stars.
If I remember correctly, there's actually post somewhere about how butchered the English translation for the game is. Ranni's story is reportedly highly altered from the Japanese version of the game, along with many other questlines.
Yeah, and on a similar note, I have been looking into Radahn's lore because I find it honestly confusing, and the Gravesword inscription explicitly says he challenged the stars to protect Sellia, it is more blunt and direct and unambiguous in the OG Japanese, and seemingly has nothing to do with the Golden Order... which just makes his motivations even more confusing.
@@saulgoneman The Stars already ruined the Eternal City, seen in the form of Astel and the Lake of Rot, a ruined Eternal City. Additionally, there is literally a Fallingstar Beast in the Sellia Tunnel, evidently crashed in via a meteor from above. The source for the translation was in Vaati's video actually, where he then proceeds to bring up the only direct connection to the Golden Order and Radahn, which is that damn Telescope description, which doesn't even name Radahn explicitly. Godfrey has nothing to do with the Golden Order, so that armor description doesn't convince me, plus it is explicitly stated he admired Godfrey as the "Lion of the Battlefield", meaning as a warrior, Isshin-style. All I can really say concretely about Radahn is that he sought to be a mighty warrior, like Godfrey, and everything else was just an excuse to face the greatest opponents. Godfrey followed a similar path and loved fighting and bloodshed, seemingly less honorably than Radahn, actually. The motivations of Radahn are never really stated outside of that one Gravesword. Also, why would a strict Golden Order adherent still accept weapons from the Carian Blacksmith? Why doesn't he employ Leyndell nobles, even the exiled ones? He instead relies on Jerren, who is loyal to the Carian Family. There is a Carian astronomy device still in Redmane Castle. Why didn't Radahn study incantations, which his father did. Why emulate Godfrey, the exiled ex of your Golden Order preacher-man's new woman, who the Greater Will had no use of anymore evidently, compared to your incantations practicing biological father. Why dare to use fire, when the Golden Order despises all forms of fire as directly opposed to the Erdtree. Hell, Radahn is proud of his red hair while his father was ashamed of it, because of its "fire" connotations. Finally, why would Radahn accept Rykard's help during the war in the form of the Abductor Virgins, which Malenia's Cleanrots destroyed in great numbers based on that one cave. Rykard is the Lord of Blasphemy and is violently despised by the Golden Order, and vice versa. Also, there is the Radahn portrait hanging very prominently in Rykard's own mansion. Between Radahn's actions regarding the Stars and the seemingly lack of concrete connections between him and the Golden Order types, never even mentioned in Golden Order item descriptions, I am honestly just confused. It is more frustrating because he is basically a beast when we meet him, and never actually speaks, so unlike, say, Ranni or Morgott or Rykard, we don't even know his motivations.
How can that be when the main writer is grrm an english speaker. The community just has blown some stuff that could be translated a bit diffrent so out of porportions that people say stuff like you.
@@xeibei4804 Martin didn't write the game dude. He wrote the basic mythology, sent it over, and FromSoft and Miyazaki actually wrote the game in Japanese and then it was translated. There literally were localizers on the game. Link to Zio's video on the Ranni translation stuff, with a comment in the comment section from somebody in the very company who localized the damn game. Do your own research before commenting on anything at all, thanks pal: th-cam.com/video/sS08xpL0m8U/w-d-xo.html
@@xeibei4804 I never made the assertion that what I claimed was the exact case. My claim was that there was a post that said the English version of the game is not a 1:1 match with the Japanese version.
I have been very open about Dark Souls II being my favorite of the trilogy. I enjoyed the story beats in the game where our character entered memories of the past and were in fact players in those events. While there is no mention in Elden Ring of an unknown maidenless one playing some important role, I still wonder at the possibility that in some DLC we are able to explore the past of this world by actually witnessing turning points in it. I think that would be quite exciting, and it might answer some questions as well as organize events in time. I think about the chalice dungeons being informative about eras in time just by giving them in a particular order; cues as subtle as that are what could be in store.
It can be interpreted but it requires knowing most of the universe and universes and most of creation, even if it's just from a spiritual perspective. Only then can one grasp what elden ring represents.
I feel like Ranni and the Assassins being allies of convenience is what fits the best . We know Ranni's goal and motivations (to free herself of her Empyrean flesh and the Two Fingers so that she can establish a new Order outside the purview of them Two Fingers and presumably Greater Will), but that doesn't then imply that the Assassins have the same goals or motivations. What we do know is that the *actions* that they undertook served both their ends. I think its telling that Godwyn is the *only* of the Demigods to die "wrong", and we also know that Godwyn dying in Soul only seemed to allow Ranni to die in Body only. From this it isn't hard to infer that this is the specific goal for the Night of Black Knives for Ranni, but the fact that we can also be fairly certain that the Assassins killed many other Demigods instead of just Godwyn (which was all that Ranni needed for her ends) suggests they had their own goals and motivations. I think the fact that the Black Knives come for Iji and Blaidd after Ranni slays her Two Fingers suggests that the Assassins are actually working for the Two Fingers. Put a pin this, I'll get back to it. While Marika's exact motives are unclear, I think her goals are one of the things we can be absolutely sure of in the game: She wants the Tarnished to slay the Elden Beast. Hewg and Gideon's dialogue combined with the GOD SLAIN victory splash pretty much confirm this. The dialogue from Melina at the Churches seems to show a progression of Marika beginning to question the Golden Order, to finally deciding to shatter the Elden Ring. We know the Elden Beast is closely associated with the Ring, and we know the Elden Beast to be an incarnation of Capital-O Order. From there it isn't hard to imagine a faction of the Numen who perhaps became more loyal to the Golden Order than to Marika herself that, perhaps at the behest of the Two Fingers sought to punish Marika and her children for questioning (or even acting against) the Golden Order. (Another note, but this is even more in speculation territory is that its interesting that Godwyn befriended the Dragons instead of Genociding them as did Godfrey/Marika did with the Fire Giants, so perhaps the Two Fingers weren't exactly happy about it?) This brings us back to the Night of the Black Knives and the Assassins. As for "How did Ranni know about the Rune of Death and Malekith or how to steal it?" I mean - I honestly don't understand the need for a detailed explanation here. Ranni is shown as one of the more canny characters. She's Radagon's daughter. Is it really that hard to imagine a scenario where she figures this out somehow? As for the act of stealing - the game definitely shows her as being a very powerful actor in her own right - from how bad she ultimately fucks up her Two Fingers (and the giant crater she apparently made in doing it), to her instakilling you if you ignore her warnings after giving her the Amber Draught. I, again, don't understand how her stealing a fragment of Destined Death on her own is really that far fetched.
I agree and disagree. For me, I can clearly see many overarching themes, sub themes and motifs; I think the most important is, as you say in the video, that of struggle- but I think it’s more than that, in that that same theme is explored as evolution (the crucible, Farum Azula beastmen and their fingers, societies that were once flourishing have since gone and new life/society has replaced it, literally on top of it), disease (Scarlet Rot, Caelid), problems with having children (this is a common one with Miyazaki, all of Bloodborne is a miscarriage/pregnancy metaphor), Yin vs Yang, light versus dark and on and on. But I also think you’re right. Because I think Elden Ring is high art, full stop. And you can interpret it as you wish, just as with any art.
The questions you were asking about the Black Knife Assassins aren’t unhinged at all my friend - they’re spot on. They’ve plagued me for weeks and you didn’t even dive into half the conundrums they present when examining their allegiances. The Night of the Black Knives is so central to the game’s story that it’s very strange to me that the game was released in a state that made it so unintelligible. I appreciate this video wholeheartedly because I pretty much agree with all of it. I could maybe explain away your Omen example, but there’s no need because your point stands strong regardless. We’re missing something(s) and the DLC will have to solve it. I’m very much looking forward to that moment.
The Black Knives are intentionally a mystery. I hope they will get expanded on in DLC, but I think Miyazaki just likes these annoyingly important mysteries.
The central theme I found in Elden Ring was this: Destiny, and people being born into, or searching for, finding, accepting or rejecting their destinies depending on what they think/feel is best... Morgott was an Omen, a being of the Crucible with Horns, Scales and a Tail born into The Mother of Truth's "religion"... but he rejected his destiny, his cursed blood and the Mother of Truth, all in favour of the Erdtree and the Golden Order. Mohg, on the other hand, found his destiny when The Mother of Truth revealed herself to him: His choice stood between living the lowly life he was seemingly destined for as a bewinged Omen, or becoming the founder of a great dynasty. Malenia, Miquella and Ranni were all born as Empyreans, but they, much like Morgott, considered the divine blessings/destinies they were born into (Scarlet Rot, Eternal Youth, safety under the Golden Order's rigid systems,) as something more akin to curses to be rejected -- Miquella researched methods to cure him and his sister of the influence of Outer Gods, while Ranni instead elected for outright casting aside her body and life, just so she could become the master of her own destiny. Melina spends most of the game looking for her purpose, her destiny, and embraces the destiny she finds wholeheartedly, even though it'll kill her, because she sees that the world is in dire need of the change her destiny will bring about. It's no coincidence that she is closely associated with Destined Death, hence the ease with which she accepts her own. Shabriri, and the entire faction of the Chaos Flame, in the meantime, reject everything: Either their innate destinies were so horrid that they eventually came to desire burning down the entire world, or they were just so guffin' crazy that they was born into the burn-everything destiny and were totally into that... which would explain why Shabriri is so omniloathed... Marika herself seems to have an agenda geared towards rejecting her destiny through a very convoluted plot necessarily imposed upon her by her position: She basically had to betray herself/Radagon, who was all for embracing their destiny and maintaining the Golden Order, as well as Maliketh, her half-brother Shadow Beast, AND the Greater Will, _while still being the vessel of its Elden Ring,_ all without letting suspicion slip until the very last moment... It's implied that she managed to get a few co-conspirators in on her plan as well, (or that she is just that good a mastermind to have set up several pieces working independently,) such as Melina, the God-skins, the Black Knife Assassins, Ranni and possibly also Miquella. Either way, I do not agree with you that Elden Ring's lore is uninterpretable, or even that it's impossible for all of these seemingly all-over-the-place plot threads to somehow be a part of a greater whole. Quite the contrary, in fact: I think I have a pretty good grasp of what went down in the backstory. But much like how we're still making new discoveries about Bloodborne, we're going to be analysing and gaining understanding of and putting together the plot puzzle of the events in Elden Ring for many years yet to come. Have patience.
For an answer to 11:20 , or maybe some insight. It might be important to recognize that death has taken different forms in a somewhat linear way the ghostflame->Black Flame-> and finally the Black Blade, irrespective of what each is exactly, they are the purest forms of death, perhaps the black knives use several rituals of death. Perhaps something separate and interesting for you, the deathbirds who serve as keepers of the ghostflame were said to be children of the twinbird (Twinbird shield description) although it is only speculation perhaps the deathbirds were the retainers of death created by placudisax in his period of dragon rule.
I never even thought of that interpretation of the Deathbirds, but birds in general seem associated with the Dragons based on the Storm themes and the Stormhawks presence in Farum Azula, near an Ancient Dragon no less, so that is possible.
@@TheStruggler-wb7mk In general I think the connections between certain animals based on features is pretty relevant to any discussion regarding Dragons and the Nature of the crucible, considering that nearly all dragons have wings, fire breath, and even most "flying dragons" have horns, but at this point in our understanding of the lore, I think people are going to have to speculate without concrete evidence. You bring up an interesting point about the birds in farum azula so I figure this reading of "Law of Regression" and "Law of Causality" might prove further insight into whatever ideas you might entertain th-cam.com/video/5oPNC2qpF4k/w-d-xo.html
@@hi_austin i just checked up on his channel and 5 years later he seems to still be busy with bloodborne so something tells me who ever does take up the endeavor they are gonna be in for a challenge
Yup. Just look at Ranni's entire ending and thus motivations and that whole mess. Same thing happened to Radahn's Gravesword about protecting Sellia, makes his actions way more heroic in the OG Japanese.
One: I am glad that someone else sees the lore as near uninterpretable, 2: I like the MH trap symbol you have in the vid, and finally I started wondering about if things could be interpreted without contradiction (I know there are contradictions in all souls games) when I saw the rock snakes outside of the Evergauls. Been trying to figure out who made those and sees thru them but cant
@@fastenedcarrot9570 I thought that too until I saw their organization. A number pointed towards a number pointed out. Also the groups of them you find in random areas like Cahlid that have explosive ones before one of the multifaced orbs.
It is also an hermetic reference (related to alchemy), The foundations of Magicka: Seek knowledge, but mind your Freedom of thought from dogma and follow your own principles, but in simbiosis with the laws of nature, opposed to the laws of men or the so called "power", like rich families and countries, big clusters of greed in general. Also: Runes are just Souls, but transformed in the crucible (with the hammer of marika), to shape their owns desires and ambitions, thats why the Elden Ring is so powerful, because the souls and wills of those who are intertwined in the Great Rune create a will powerful enough to be called a GOD (basically a colective soul), and feeds on the souls of those who follow and pray them in form of a erdtree (parasite). Basically Elden Ring is "we live in a society" but in a pretty game. Do what thou wilt, in a beautiful open world.
I think Miyazaki wanted to fundamentally change his approach to storytelling in Elden Ring due to it being an open world. Rather than filling a world with npcs, dialogue, and quests, Miyazaki crafted lore and history in Elden Ring specifically to create the sense of a world vaster than it actually is. Fundamentally, he does this by creating layers that intertwine. As different elements are made connect, each point of intersection creates its own sub-story and questions and raise our curiosity. The dungeater comes in contact with the omen, perhaps then creating the seedbed curse. The cursed blood of the omen derives from the formless mother who perhaps had some prior interaction with the crucible. Marika's plan doesn't make sense because all we see are the outcomes of betrayals, misunderstandings, and mistakes all woven into one another. The problem (and the genius) of it is that we want to have one story where all the pieces fit together. I'd wager that even Miyazaki himself doesn't have an answer to all of the lore and questions that we have about Elden Ring. To have a story surpass one's own capability of telling it I think is a hallmark of a true narrative genius.
I thought I'd seem someone post Miyazaki has said there is a cohesive story and he's deliberately removed information from the game to make it ambiguous. Whether that is true or not is up for debate.
I agree with everything you said except the last sentence. "To have a story surpass one's own capability of telling it is the hallmark of a true narrative genius." I definitely disagree, I think it's more difficult to tell a story than to understand it yourself. Having a story make sense in your head, versus communicating that story to another person, are completely different things. And they require completely different skillsets. Some people are better at one, and some are better at the other. For example, I find it very difficult to efficiently / concisely explain complicated things. I tend to stumble over my words or over-explain. Communicating my ideas is the hard part - they exist perfectly fine within my own head, because the brain can simultaneously access many individual concepts and combine them in real time to build a generalized understanding. But in order to communicate those concepts, you need to compress them into the very limited tools we call words. You need to sequence those words in a very specific order so that others can understand them, and you need to remain conscious of THEIR interpretation. Telling a story requires you to understand it yourself first and foremost. But then on top of that, you need the additional skills to share that understanding via a common language. I don't think coming up with the story in the first place is the limiting factor most of the time - I think the limiting factor is communicating that story in a way that effectively and efficiently conveys the ideas to another person. The complexity of the ideas within our head can be infinite, but in order to share them, we must go through the narrow bottleneck of language. Or art. Or whatever you want to call it. But no matter how you look at it, transferring an idea from my brain to yours, without any of the information being distorted or misunderstood, is much more difficult than generating the idea in your own head in the first place.
Crackpot Theory: Gideon is upset about the player becoming Elden lord because he's figured out that the player is a mimic. Furthermore, he knows this was Marika's plan all along. "No man may kill a god" after all.
My central interpretation is that Elden Ring is about reform vs revolution. The most in-depth debates I've had are about whether or not the Golden Order is inherently corrupt or salvagable. I hold that it isn't worth saving. My conclusions are from the lore that we do know. The Greater Will is an ideology of hierarchy, wrought through coercion and violence. It wants to put people in their place by any means necessary. Ethics and morals are irrelevant to this question. Its grand narrative filters down and informs every bit of the culture we see. The important lore events is that the Greater Will came to the Lands Between via the Elden Beast and its Fingers and took hold of the Elden Ring, which is the big magic "way the world works". It gave the boot to the previous deity/Elden Lord and empowered its own, Marika. Marika empowered her own Elden Lord, as she was empowered. Through campaigns of imperialism, the Erdtree took over the crucible/Great Tree, and natural death was sealed away into the Elden Ring, and those that weren't brought to heel (the dragons) were exterminated (the giants) or excised from grace (nomads, omen, etc) to live on the periphary. The Age of the Erdtree began, with Marika acting in accordance with the Greater Will's designs. Everything existed to serve the Erdtree and Golden Order, with the only reciprocation being blessings that literally trickling down, in the form of Crystal Tears and Crimson/Cerulean tears, benefitting only the chosen of the G.O. Everyone else gets to pound sand, their life and death beholden to the Greater Will utterly. Then Marika decided to rebel, with all the catalyst plot events. This is the crux of my arugment: Marika committed acts of oppression and genocide across the Lands Between, and the Greater Will never blinked. Only when she stepped out of line and disrupted the Golden Order was she punished. The nasty stuff we see in the Lands Between, the slavery and genocide and oppression, this was all well and good to the Greater Will because it fit into its grand order. That is what the essence of the Golden Order is. Hierachy with no regard to ethics. The debate comes into effect as to whether you also agree with this, or you think that someone like Goldmask can "fix" the Golden Order by inversing its very nature into some vague "Perfection", or you believe in burning it down via the Frenzied Flame, or you believe in discarding it entirely with Ranni's ending, or simply continuing on with it as is. To me, the item "Gold Tinged Excrement" is symbolic of the Golden Order, and every bit of worldbuilding we see asks us to interrogate whether the glittering spires we see are in fact truly good or just false monuments.
"It wants to put people in their place by any means necessary. Ethics and morals are irrelevant to this question." Aside from not having any citation for this, because such citations simply do not exist, there seems to be a misunderstanding about ethics and morals. The notion of hierarchy that it is trying to impose *is* a set of ethics and morals. Your objection isn't that they don't have ethics or morals. Your objection is that you do not like the ones that they have. That's a pretty reasonable objection but the problem that comes back 'round from a theological perspective is, who is it that gets to decide on the appropriate set of morals in The Lands Between? This is a universe not just with one god that is objectively real, whose motives and thinking are unknowable, and whose proper authority is impossible from a mortal's perspective to interpret, but several. To walk in and say "This deity is evil based on standards and concepts that literally do not exist in this fictional world" is not to make a point against the Greater Will, but just to tell us that you aren't reading the story on its own terms. "Through campaigns of imperialism, the Erdtree took over the crucible/Great Tree, and natural death was sealed away into the Elden Ring, and those that weren't brought to heel (the dragons) were exterminated (the giants) or excised from grace (nomads, omen, etc) to live on the periphary. " The implication here is that all these are maniacally evil acts, but you've removed them all from their context, because you don't know the context, because the game doesn't tell you the context. Why is that important? Well, if I told you the American North invaded and conquered the American South for the purpose of imposing its sense of hierarchy on others no matter the cost, it SOUNDS like the North are the bad guys doesn't it? Its only within the details of the conflict, the slavery, that makes the North into the heroes. We don't have the details for any of these conflicts, or the personal motivations of those that initiated them, and so you can't make any moral determination about them whatsoever. " Everything existed to serve the Erdtree and Golden Order, with the only reciprocation being blessings that literally trickling down, in the form of Crystal Tears and Crimson/Cerulean tears, benefitting only the chosen of the G.O" Nearly every religion on planet Earth works similarly. This isn't an objective criticism. This is an argument against the beliefs and morality of most real people that have ever lived, including most every historical figure that you likely admire. "Marika committed acts of oppression and genocide across the Lands Between, and the Greater Will never blinked." You're literally making this up. There's no evidence whatsoever to what the Greater Will did or did not do, and did or did not believe about Marika's actions. "Only when she stepped out of line and disrupted the Golden Order was she punished." You don't know if that's true or not, and you don't know to what degree the Greater Will has the capacity to punish her. Quit making things up. "The nasty stuff we see in the Lands Between, the slavery and genocide and oppression, this was all well and good to the Greater Will because it fit into its grand order. That is what the essence of the Golden Order is. Hierachy with no regard to ethics." Pure fantasy. You have absolutely no idea what the Greater Will's opinion was on any of this. Even its single direct link to the world, the Fingers, are not themselves directly linked to the G.W. as evidenced by them needing to spend ages in an attempt to speak to the G.W. If I'm wrong, please, show the in-game direct evidence, not evidence through an intermediary who might be wrong or lying, for the Greater Will's opinion on *ANYTHING*, anything at all. You aren't giving lore. You're repeating your own bias back to us, and using your bias as the reference for your conclusions. You might be right about everything you say. You might be wildly wrong about everything you say. Your theory is entirely dependent on conjecture on the innermost personal thoughts of characters we never even meet in the game. It is objectively ridiculous to call the debate about whether the Golden Order is salvagable when you can't even show what exactly it is that you're salvaging or destroying.
Step 1: be cursed by the dung eater Step 2: When reborn, born as an Omen. Step 3: if ya nasty, like Mohg, you make a deal with the devil, who bestows power on Omens who turn to her. It seems totally consistent to me
Yeah I'm not sure why hes so hung up on this. There is nothing (that I know of) to suggest the Mother of Truth has anything to do with any other Omen aside from Morgott and Mohg. It makes sense that they are just cursed brothers (from Morgott's perspective at least), like Miquella and Malenia. Double cursed, if you will.
Returning to this video post dlc. This will be interesting to see if will your questions were answered. Lol Now that I've finished the video, I believe it's central theme is about the hypocrisy that exists in a world that is supposedly governed in a world of order. Both Marika and Ranni are hypocrites, and even the motives of the Golden order can now be put into question since it is implied that the fingers has lost their connection to the Golden Order for some time. Every being that governs this world seems to live in hypocrisy, yet there's supposed to be some kind of order going on here. lol With so much of the lore relying on hypocrisy as it's centeal theme, it makes no wonder you came to the conclusion that it was uninterpretable when this video was released.
Elden Ring seems to be primarily concerned with ideology, meaning, identity. All things in the world have a naturalistic state to them that gets fed through a prism of ideology and transformed physically as such. For example the Erdtree is just a big tree in a naturalistic sense but trees also provide shelter and food and in this emotional relationship we have with it we grant it meaning as a radiant golden beacon at the center of religious worship. As for Queen Marika, I don't think she makes sense as a character with wants and motivations. She really only makes sense to me as a thematic object, the avatar of the Golden Order. Her "children" shouldn't necessarily be thought of as blood offspring but are the people of the world that carry the influence of the Golden Order and through living and struggling in the world discover their own identity and meaning. These competing ideas bend and twist the established Order. So Marika herself shattered the Elden Ring as her own influence was shattered. On the opposite end you have Marika's "husbands" who in marrying the Golden Order annihilated themselves. Godfrey losing the meaning he once had and Radagon losing his very identity. "Amounting only to sacrifices"
@@johncra8982 I'm just pointing something out I have noticed a lot recently. I'm just trying to make some kind of metaphor to get my point across. I'm still subbed and don't feel personally attacked or anything. I feel there is a certain power in saying what you see. Than maybe others will notice these peculiar paterns forming in everyday speech online and boom it loses a lot of it's power.... for some people.
"Everything rots and stagnates. There are always people that will cling to the rotting carcass of something and there are always people that are trying to burn it away." That's so deep. I've always liked the meaning of dark souls. I highly sympathize with Solaire for he is the only happy guy in a dark world. But that quote yu made there. It's exactly how I see our world, our politics. It's so fascinating to me that those games resonate so much with what I believe and like. Thank you very much for that.
I think that the "cursed blood" of the omens, to give an analogy to programming imo, is like an abstract class, witch means it is something with undefined behaviour of a certain function and the association with an outer god bestows such powers to the omen kind. So the curse of the Dung Eater basically disassociates the afflicted from the influence of any outer god, but the outer god can, if the owner of the blood so desire re-associate with that person. This would explain why the omen are born without grace, but Morgot and Mogh are able to connect in the end with different outer gods. And also, that would give meaning to the "BLESSING OF DESPAIR ENDING" and the name of said ending as it is a BLESSING because it frees The Lands Between from all outer good influence and also DESPAIR because by the strength of the "shielding from outer goods" it kills any possibility of faith, hence everything falls to despair.
I wonder what made Marika’s lesser children “unwanted”? Were they lacking a certain desired attribute? Perhaps the attribute that makes one an Empyrean? And this is dark, but were they children that were forced upon her or perhaps she resented? The word “misbegotten” comes to mind, in that context but I have no firm theory around this. Her unwanted children seem to perhaps have served as sacrifices to whatever her ends were in the night of black knives. Similar to the way Melina’s relayed words of Marika spoke about the tarnished; “become a lord or a god, but should thou fail to become anything thou will amount only to sacrifice” Maybe someone more intelligent can pull on that very dark thread.
In Marika's own words. Hear me, Demigods. My children beloved. Make of thyselves that which ye desire. Be it a Lord. Be it a God. But should ye fail to become aught at all, ye will be forsaken. Amounting only to sacrifices...
@@pigzy9807 -Just that alone tells me Marika was an asshole. Selfish to the very end- I take it back, someone pointed out a piece of evidence (that I forgot) that 3 of Marika/Radagon's children were worthy successors to take over Queen Marika's control/rule. Ranni, Miquella, Melaina. Yeah, if anything, now I see the Greater Will, Erdtree/Elden beast as a complete parasite. -All she ever saw were pawns. Even from her own children- (But she still did do.. Whatever it took to free herself from the Greater Will's reign.) I wouldn't be surprised if the Erdtree/Elden beast are parasites, that came from Queen Marika's world. Looking for a new land to control. (In the fight with the Elden beast, you could see plenty of other Erdtrees off in the distance.) Queen Marika saw an opportunity in the Lands Between with the Giants and orchestrated a long-winded scheme to have enough freedom (or reason, after Godwyn's death) to shatter the Elden Ring with the hammer she brought from her own realm. Overall? It's a pretty cool and interesting story for me. I was very entertained with what i managed to scrape together. (And continue to scrape & gather together.)
@@introvertedwall44 Marika wanted to free herself from the Greater Will's grip because she is rotting away and wants to die. I know not of the reasons why'd she removed the Destined Death from the Elden Ring but other than letting her kin live an immortal life and prevent Godwyn's death. Without Destined Death governing over the balance of the world, there can only be suffering and stagnation as the result. Marika wanted to bring back and guide the Tarnished to The Lands Between in order to seek the Elden Ring but gave them the freedom of choice into what they would want to do with it once they stand before the Elden Ring. Should they become a Lord to become her consort despite her wanting release, or aid Ranni, the next empyrean for the coming of the new age, or burn it down altogether by the all-consuming yellow fires of the Frenzied Flame.
You have a great mind, and I love your videos. However I think it’s a mistake to assume that everything is metaphorical. In many ways Elden Ring is so big that it takes the post-modern approach of intentionally being incomprehensible. It’s possible that there isn’t a deeper meaning at all beyond the fact that it’s so big that it represents a real world. Stories often tell deeper meanings without being metaphors, and I think DS is a great example. Regardless, I think you bring up an interesting point
The storytelling in From games is like somebody wrote a story then tore all the pages out of the book and then scattered them on the floor. You then read what you find in or out of order
Keep I mind, JJ is the one who made and co conceptualized ERs base lore and characters (the world, demigods and what they did/want), and then Miyazaki added to it for gameplay. This is probably why it feels like a weird mishmash of lore and concepts, as you have 2 writers doing work that directly affects the other but doing it separately
I had a lot of fun figuring out the story of dark souls I don't get anything about elden ring, the story is beyond nonsensical, there's elements of dark souls, bloodborne and hell even sekiro in a way, but there's no real cohesion to any of it- it's a mess
A youtube comment isn't the best place to expound on this so I'll try to be succinct - if you understand DS3 to the point of being able to sum up its themes into a two word statement 'everything rots' then I feel as though I understand Elden Ring to the point of being able to do so in one word: revolt. The only two endings which are more than the same cutscene with a different skybox and voiceover require a dedicated bit of work yet are decidedly revolutionary while the others are reformist. This is just one of many subtle examples that give me the same reaction you had to the Omen guarding the Crucible talismen - these things weren't done by accident. Maybe another developer could do something like that by coincidence but Fromsoft is more deliberate than that. Every time I've had that reaction it's been in a situation where I am trying to rein in my own wild interpretations - because I *want* more revolutionary art to exist - but there is absolutely no other conclusion I can draw from the fact that the literal changes that you make to this world's unifying theory of physics made manifest got a fraction of the effort that the two endings where you leave everyone alone so hard you fuck off of the planet entirely (after a quest that revolves entirely around killing your masters btw) or burn everything down got.
Personally, for me, the main theme is the consequences of removing "death" from the world. When Marika sealed death away, she didn't stop actual deaths, she just chained the spirits to the terrestrial plane, so that they may never go to the afterlife. That is why the lands between are swarmed by ghosts and spirits, despite supposedly not having death. To do that, to avoid the unevitable death, "destined death", she had to meddle with time. This stopped fate and destiny overall. It made things rot because the cycle of life was stopped (Malenia). It made Miquella be a child forever. It made rebirth and erdtree burial a necessity to alleviate stagnation, yet omen and other beings could never return, etc The only way to make the world "move forward", is to bring "death" back into the world. Let things end, so the new can start. In my opinion, it's very similar to the message of the painted world of Ariandel.
I think the core metaphor you seem to be missing is the Elden Ring itself. It's the "logic" of the world. It seems to control how people are born and die, how society functions, and how people interact with their "destiny." Everyone is trying to effect that logic in some way to their own ends. Some people want to create a certainty of "Order," some want anarachy where all are equal and chaotic, some want to embrace uncertainty and make a world where everyone is free to explore their destiny without the oppression of the Ring's "Order," some wish to flip the Order, and some want to simply maintain the status quo. Everyone is fighting for their own vision of how they think things should be run. Just look at how the game starts with Limgrave. It explicitly shows you a land that is crushed under the heel of a tyrant who exploits those living under him, and pushes you to overthrow him. Then we move on to Raya Lucaria, where the aristocrats have literally walled themselves off and left their land to fend for itself. Again, we're pushed toward a sort of rebellion against this. But then, we get our second Great Rune, and we go speak to the Two Fingers, and now it's "Hey, maybe YOU should be the king." and every faction is suddenly vying for your attention, pushing you to enact their idea of "Freedom," or "Order," or "Chaos," or "Justice." The theme is the "Rule of Law" and "Governance," and the responsibility of "Leadership." In Dark Souls and Bloodborne, we weren't the ones who chose the system, only how we interacted with it. In Elden Ring, From is asking us, what would we choose if we were Gwynn?" At least, this is what I got out of it, maybe DLC will age this comment poorly.
By the way I actually changed my mind on the Omen since the time of recording. I do think they're connected to the crucible since Morgott has scales on his face and Mogh grows wings in his second phase.
The fact that George r.r. wrote the backstory, and Miyazaki wrote the rest, might this have messed with his story writing? Probably not but i can't help but feel the sheer expansiveness of the world and the amount of warring factions feels very game of thronesey.
Now we are removing all that divides and distinguishes (between similar but slightly different thematic concepts)
Yup, and Morgott has a dragon-like tail too. So, horns, tails/scales, and feathers/wings are all covered by the Omen we meet in some shape or form.
@@merlinkater7756 I believe that Fromsoft never had intention of really making a game based on George RR Martin and really use it as a vague backdrop but still implement their own ideas.
If you look at Elden Ring, it is a clear combination of all the souls game ideas including Sekiro. And it looks like those ideas would be there regardless if George RR Martin was involved.
Who's to say Morgott didn't also accidentally stumble upon the formless mother? Who's to say he isn't actively resisting her draw? Maybe he avoids that fate by actively fighting against it because the mother of truth clearly chose the omen. She doesn't have to be responsible for them.
The fact that when you scroll through the comments everyone offers different, extremely detailed, extremely well-sourced, and completely contradictory explanations for things kinda proves the point here. There's an unfalsifiability to the lore here. It's hard to say what ISN'T true once you have enough proper nouns to throw around.
EXACTLY
True
I think one of the major difficulties in interpreting the lore comes from the lack of any real timeline it's why so much of the story feels all over the place
Yeah there’s not a lot to go on as of yet. Apart from a rough timeline of the shattering everything is ambiguous.
Hopefully the DLC will help fill it in. E.g. The Bloodborne DLC fills in a whole lot of the timeline to the point where you can’t really put together a timeline without it.
I believe I've got the time line even going back to before Marika/golden order, but I think the theory/lore community has interpreted a whole bunch of things in a completely different direction, if I'm right, it's kinda no wonder people are completely stumped, but I could just as easily be wrong you never truly know and we might not ever.
The flow of the timeline is convoluted, with theories young and old, phasing in and out of existence.
There’s a complete lack of any sense of time at all. It’s like some things feel like they happened a couple years ago and then other times it’s like a thousand years which throws the lore all over the place
The DLC being the key to understanding FromSoft games is something that has pretty consistently been proven true. The main exception, I think, would be Dark Souls 1, which had a very strong central thematic thrust at launch and then the DLC expanded on a side story from the main game, rather than being the lynchpin for the actual main story like it is in pretty much all later games (at least thematically, I mean. I would say that DS3's DLC also didn't really reveal anything about the PLOT of the based game, but it definitely made the THEMES of the main game stand out much more clearly).
Bloodborne is probably the most extreme example, where some of the key events in the story, which shaped everything that came after, were completely unknown until the DLC. Based on the "incomplete" feeling of Elden Ring's current lore and story, I think it's going to follow Bloodborne's pattern. I wouldn't be surprised to get the equivalent of the Fishing Village and the corpse of Kos, but for the Omen, or Marika's motives, or the Black Knives, or any number of other such seeming holes in the story.
I hope you are right!
DeS and Sekiro's lore are ten times more comprehensible then any of ds/bb lore with or without dlcs
Bloodborne is completely comprehensible without its dlc. Its dlc simply expands on its basegames ideas and hints to give a satisfying payoff to those who paid attention
@@user-jn8dm8yl3e Demon’s Souls and Sekiro ‘lore’ are rudimentary at best, and absent at worst.
Well, I thought that this time around, by having the help of GRR Martin, it would have been different...
"The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters."
The god's having unknown or incomprehensible motivations and relationships, their actions sometimes seem contridictary. Everything is linked together, and everything is in conflict (assuming that everything evolved from the Cruicible, this makes sense). Law of Regression, Law of Causality.
Then the player realises that the gods themselves are subject to greater powers, the Outer Gods, who are even further removed and even more incomprehensible, and treat the gods the same way the gods treat the mortals. Theortically this chain could continue upwards forever.
The story then is basically the story of all the lands between trying to find the new world that is to be born. Hoarah Loux decides that a return to tradation is the only way forward, Goldmask believes in a sort of protestant style reformation, Fia finds meaning in death, Dung Eater becomes an absurdist amoralist, and Gideon basically goes insane and decides that the world must be preserved until he has perfectly decrypted reality and can make the perfect choice. Rani has a sort of athietic humanist perspective. Three fingers in the comfort of oblivion.
I think the absurdity of being thrown into a world that you don't fully - and cannot ever fully - understand, struggling for survival, where everything is so vast and overwhelming, and yet you are still ultimately resposible for its future is the main thematic take away I have from the game.
Nice Gramsci quote
Beautiful interpretation.
I really like your interpretation!
This. A very deep and well-put explanation, ty. Having put over 300 hours into playing and researching the game, I came to the conclusion that the whole of Elden Ring is a metaphor of life itself. And history of the Lands Between resembles the history of mankind. From cavemen to capitalistic christians, socialistic atheists, tribal pagans and so on, still struggling to find peace and prosperity over ourselves, our cultures and our world.
Great take!
Also having difficulty interpreting Marikas motivations to me isn't strange if you just keep in mind that she is also Radagon. Of course her actions will seem counterintuitive at points.
She seals destined death in Maliketh but then betrays him and steals it via Ranni? Maybe Radagon sealed it, and Marika steals it. We already have the clear example of this of Radagon trying to repair the elden ring while Marika is smashing it.
Radagon is trying to keep the current world order going, Marika is trying to bring about a new order by smashing the ring, creating chaos. Divine masculine is order - Divine feminine chaos.
Miyazaki might just hate Loretubers and is trying to drive them all mad.
God bless Miyazaki, now if only he can target the speedrunning and twitch player community next 🙏
I´d say he loves them! The games vagueness has given them so much opportunity to make money through lore videos and theories. If the story was straightforward then we would not need the videos.
This is most likely the answer. If I had an IP and youtubers were collecting ad revenue by talking about it I would go out of my way to meddle with them.
@@taylorreid5347I personally see it as the greatest troll. Not a way to bone content creators, but to drive them mad as not one can come to a unified idea like in the Dark Souls trilogy.
I don’t actually think that, but I do enjoy spreading misinformation.
I like to think of Elden Ring themes as the antithesis to Dark Souls's: a world experiencing change, where Dark Souls was a stagnant universe incapable of changing.
The Lands Between are being disputed over by multiple Outer Gods, each of which would dramatically alter the land and the rules of the world if they took over.
Every ending ending fundamentally changes the nature of the world and starts a brand new age when it happens, even the most basic ending where you don't use any mending runes starts a new age, the Age of Fracture, so as Maliketh says when he dies ifyou completed his quest: "the Golden Order cannot be restored." There is no going back to the way things were, and there is no preserving the current era by an equivalent of linking the fire.
Every demigod also changes in some fundamental way from the previous age to the time we meet them in game: Godwyn becomes the Prince of Death, Godrick engages in grafting, Morgott receives the blessing of Grace and becomes ruler of Leyndell, Mohg becomes the emissary of the Formless Mother and starts his own cult, Radahn rots, Ranni discards her body for a doll, Rykard merges with the snake, Miquella adults himself in the coccoon and Malenia ascends to godhood.
As well, we see different characters react differently to the prospect of the world changing: some, like Corhyn or Gideon give in to despair when learn of Goldmask/Marika's plans for the future as they can't conceive of a world without their gods or the Erdtree. Others, like Nepheli completely change their ways, going from a blind follower of Gideon to a ruler of a castle. Yet others, like Enia, despite being a finger reader, concedes that a new age requires new measures and bids you to burn the Erdtree and do what you think is right, cardinal sin or no. Millicent's quest is about a bad actor trying to change her against her will.
The Frenzied Flame is an example of being extremely adverse to change, as it seeks to erase all life to return existance to the way it used to be: all clumped together as the One Great, with no difference, and no change.
I like to think of Elden Ring as Fromsoft's chance to explore the themes they couldn't with the static world of Dark Souls: an examination of what meaningful change looks like, on large scale and personal as well, while Dark Souls was an exploration of what an extreme inability to change looked like.
I'm going to need a reminder to read this reply in full...
Incredible
That's a great comment and insight.
Now if the atmosphere and feeling of the gane matched your comment, all would be well.
Would.
This makes sense.
Don't you restore and improve the golden order in golden masks ending?
Edit: just had a random thought, this is the land between, but the lands between what? It suggests there's a place before and a place after, yet it seems like everything is happening here.
I agree. There's a fair amount of lore that's actually directly contradictory. Godfrey is the first Elden Lord but somehow Placidusax was also an Elden Lord.
I think placidusax was the first elden lord way before Godfrey. They are the first of their "age". Godfrey is the first elden lord under the golden order and placidusax was the first elden lord under a different order, different age. Where he resides is a space outside of time, a place preserved from ancient past beyond the time Godfrey was born
One of the central elements of the story of Elden Ring is that the fundamental laws of reality are not absolute. The basic laws of logic state that 1. A thing is itself, 2. A thing is not something other than itself, and 3. The only possibilities are thingness or not-thingness- there is no middle. In other words, a cat is a cat. A cat can’t be not-a-cat, and nothing exists that is neither a cat nor not-a-cat. These basic rules of logic are *conditional* in Elden Ring. It’s not just that it’s difficult to say who did what in Elden Ring- it’s that we can’t even say what “who” and “what” mean.
By the way, great video. 100% agree.
"King Miyazaki has high hopes for us. That we continue to try and decipher lore, unto eternity."
-Sir Giddyman Offguy, the all-blowing
Its almost hilarious how obscure the lore is, after hundreds of hours in the game im still totally clueless about the dumbest stuff. For example: "Why tf is there already ash in lyndell before you burn the erdtree!?"
As far as the game suggest, the ash may be caused by Bernahl's maiden burning herself at the Forge but not being strong enough to burn the tree, merely burn some of the branches. Which is why Bernahl turned to Rykard and decided tl say fuck the greater will.
However some cut content shows the maiden as an NPC with her own quest so... really, make up your own headcanon.
For me, it's Bernahl's maiden.
The ash could also be a remainder of the war against the dragons. More explicitly parts of Gransax or other ancient dragon corpses deteriorating over time, since they already consist of stone like material that could very well spray into fine dust. But in that case it must have been laying there a LOONG time.
It sounds to me, and I say this as a teacher of literary interpretation, like you are getting bogged down in the weeds of thinking about "the" theme, rather than letting yourself interpret and work with "a" theme. Regardless of a creator's intent, good art is going to have multiple ways to interpret it on a thematic level and very rarely will everything "fit neatly" into tidy boxes. And the bigger the work of art, the more true these things are going to be.
I've seen this a lot when it comes to interpreting media where folks get into a mindset of trying to make singular what is inherently plural, and I really think Eldren Ring leans so heavily into theme and motif that it's throwing folks for a loop. Why does something happen in Elden Ring? A lot of the time it's not for discrete reasons but rather thematic ones. Just because B is related to A and C is related to A does not mean that B and C necessarily have anything to do with each other.
If you try to cover all the bases with a single interpretation, you're going to find - like you have - that you are stretched too thin. Break it down into chunks, and if you want to be more overarching, talk about how some themes clash or mesh with others!
I'm not sure how educated or not you are on the process of literary analysis, so I may be speaking to things that you already are familiar, but there are many texts out there about how to use various lenses to aid in thematic interpretation. Perhaps it's partially due to bringing GRRM on board for the project or perhaps this is the kind of thing Miyazaki has wanted to do all along, but for whatever reason, ER is much more literary than the other FromSoft games.
This is exactly what he's running into. Great post!
100% agree. Great post.
I might argue that great works of art can be distilled into a singular, overarching, theme.
It just might be extremely complex and take more than a few months to distill.
I expect HM wanted us to puzzle over this for a generation, like GRRM's GoT.
Well said 👏👏👏
I like dark souls lore more than elden ring. I have a good understanding of DS lore to where I can talk about it and tell the story to someone who hasn't played the game. Is hard to do that with elden ring. A fragmented world, with fragmented lore.
Sometimes I've found "giving up" tells my brain it's ok to relax and take things as inspiration comes. Fromsoft lore has always felt like solving a Rubix cube anyways
One of my teachers told me that "the subconscious thinks faster than the conscious." That is, if you're stumped in finding the solution to a problem, it's better to take your mind off the problem and go do something else. The inspiration will hit you eventually, or you'll find something that will help figure out the solution.
The context was software development, but it can applied to this context as well, I think.
A Rubix cube with missing colors lol
Dude, I’m an old man. I was in my twenties when DS1 came out. I distinctly remember me and the boys being baffled by the plot of that game. We had some inkling about the basics, but the plot remained obscured at least until DS2. And didn’t fully mature as a narrative until DS3. I’m sure some of the lore hounds out there will tell me that all the details were that in DS 1. And yeah maybe they were - in hindsight.
I think your channel and all the others have done a great job laying it all out all the facts, while also being entertaining.
I think what elden ring needs, to fully come together, is a DLC or an interview that puts the details in perspective.
I don’t know. Rant over.
This remember me the time of the lanch of DS2 we were all crazy to see how the world changed after possibily thousands of years, how dranliec could be astora and the understending of the cicle of fire and that the chose didnt really mather
Your like, 40 at most lol
Just hit 36 last month. Brother we've become Elden Lords IRL.
@@liquidrufus "Thy strength befits a crown"
Vereor Nox \[T]/
I just watched a video explaining the lore behind the cutscene change, for the Morgott fight. It changed from his sword breaking its shell using red hot flames to it just breaking its shell on its own. It was explained as fire being heretical to the Golden Order, which Morgott loves, and he only used it as a last resort. If the Formless Mother spoke to Mohg underground its entirely possible she spoke to Morgott as well, but he rejected her, but upon entering his second phase he sees that you are immensely powerful and have a chance at beating him, so he calls upon the Formless Mother to help beat you, using her as a last resort for more power to prevent you from accessing the Erdtree and defying the Golden Order, which is his main purpose.
I mean, I think the DLC will definitely be needed to fill some holes about the deeper lore, but we definitely can manage a little more than what you've got here. For instance - I think you also really need to consider Blacksmith Hewg's dialogue - about how Marika entrusted/forced him to make a weapon to slay a god. Combined with the description of the Soreseals, it's reasonable to believe that being a god, a vessel of the greater will, is a great burden that Marika wanted to be done with. From Ranni (the mini-doll's) dialogue, we learn that shadows are servants of the fingers - given to Empyreans as both servants, but also to groom Empyreans to become gods. Ranni talks about how Blaidd betrayed the fingers when he remained allied to her despite her betrayal of the Greater Will. Marika clearly did not have such trust in Maliketh, which is why she had to trick him.
Elden Ring seems to be very different, fundamentally, to previous Miyazaki works. It is definitely working towards building a tangible, literal world with layers upon layers of secrets and history. I think Miyazaki saw great potential in the "shared experience" aspect of his philosophy when making the open world. We also have to remember that he did say that, unlike previous works, the story was made before the logic or mechanics of the world itself were made. Dark Souls seems to me as work that tried to say something. And Elden Ring seems to me as if it's trying to TELL something. To tell a story, not to say something with underlying meaning. Maybe we could perceive it, but the more I look into the secrets again and again, everything just seems to be made to connect. Everything seems to connect. Which would make sense, considering the new philosophy. I think it might be trying to say that things evolve, they change and are carrying the legacy of yore. To honour and surpass it. That things should have an order perhaps? It's hard to tell, but the game sure has this immensity to it. It's a joy really, for the community to work together for it. It's funny because it's so secretive, the game, that even Vaati has stayed silent for the most part
He said that the story was made before the logic or mechanics of the world itself? when did he say that? that's pretty interesting
This man gonna type a 5 page MLA format on elden ring
Well put my guy
Pretty sure Miyazaki just kind of grafts lore together randomly based on whatever he kind of remembers writing about before and however he's feeling in the moment and he waits to start writing until the night before the rest of the team needs to start doing things so he can't even go back to make sure things made sense.
@@Vexas345 This paragraph didn't make sense
You hit the nail on the head. I felt this problem after finishing Elden Ring. The story is both straightforward in many aspects while being completely unknown in others. The facts of the overall plot are there but many of the motivations aren't even hinted at. This might be something that is resolved with the DLC, not even Sekiro had this problem. I realized the problem is with the plot.
A month ago, I had a writing assignment for an English class, it was an analysis paper. I was struggling to either pick an analysis of the lore for Elden Ring or Dark Souls. While pouring over my notes I realized I could not coherently explain the story in a way that was engaging. With about three days left before I had to turn in a rough draft, I dropped Elden Ring and wrote the paper on Dark Souls. After a day of rewatching and re-reading many parts, plots, and elements of Dark Souls, everything came back and clicked. Thoughts and ideas wove together, and I was able to make type up a 15 analysis of the game in a day. I got a 100 on that paper.
My point being that even though Dark Souls is older, and the lore has been more thoroughly explore, with Elden Ring I could not even begin to logically connect the dots and explain the lore to a reader. Elden Ring lore is interesting, but it feels disjointed.
Edit: there are parts of the map for Elden Ring that have obvious spots where something should be but there is nothing like that whirlpool off the coast to the west of the Altus plateau.
THE INTERPRETABLE LORE OF ELDEN RING
IN JEST
When we first crossed the fog to the Lands Between we were told we were maidenless.
Fated to die in obscurity.
It is only after meeting the Two Fingers of the Greater Will and the Three Fingers of the Frenzied Flame that we come to one conclusion.
We were never maidenless ever. Throughout our entire journey across the Lands Between we always had...
...our hand.
We always had two maidens whenever we needed them!
"Ahh, you were at my side, all along."
Try fingers, but hole.
Seek hole, then offer seed
💀
10/10 lore better than the original game lmfao 😭😭😭
the simplest explanation I can come up with for a lot of the frustration with Elden Ring's Lore is: It's been four months. Even Dark Souls Lore Content had its hay day years after the first game came out. What we need isn't just a bigger foundation, but also the patience to build that foundation up slowly and through a lot of theorising and speculation.
I imagine dark souls was already such a big host for ideas that you're overwhelmed by the required work of understanding from scratch again, now in an even bigger game with even less of a focused narrative. There's surely a lot of souls lore enthusiasts that are just exhausted by this point. I mean, it's been over ten years and with every new game came a new giant workload basically.
There's one important factor you forgot, while it's true that it's been four months, the amount of players that ER has is overwhelmingly more than the meager amount of players Dark Souls had when it first came out. Also at that time, there was not as close as many people invested in the lore of Dark Souls as you see now with ER lore which most likely played a factor as to why it took awhile to build up the lore content of Dark Souls while ER, much of its lore has been covered already.
And no dlc yet
@@arcanefire7511 yeah that too
All of the other souls games had more coherent lore right out of the gate though.
Take the first game - we knew just from item descriptions and what we're told that It went Dragons-Lords, Izalith making Daemons and Gwyn defeating them in a war (notable that Izalith trying to make a new first flame is pure fanon and is outright contradicted by the game), then Gwyn burning himself in the Kiln.
DLC filled more things in, but we still had a good idea of what was happening.
@@GoldenSunAlex Where is Izalith trying to recreate the first flame contradicted?
I love Elden Rings lore. The fact that it’s initially more forthcoming and direct than Dark Souls yet has far deeper and more mysterious depths.
For the face value lore, we still don’t know precisely how much he contributed, but do remember that we’re talking about a world partially crafted by George R R Martin, a man who is very talented when it comes to complex political relationships. Backstabs, alliances breaking and shifting, secret agendas, pieces being moved in secret. He’s very good at this kind of thing. And it’s interesting that unlike ASOIAF, or Game of Thrones, we are not viewing this complex narrative from the perspective of the major players. The tarnished does not take part in the political machinations,, at least not knowingly. All happens before the tarnished arrives to the lands between, offscreen from the tarnished, or is something the tarnished is persuaded or manipulated to do. And I think that’s a neat perspective.
As for Elden Rings themes. Their may not be one solid singular concrete message. I think it has a lot to do with struggle, ambition, faith, and the tempering of such things with morality and decency. I think Elden Ring is a cautionary tale of unbridled extremes.
Who does the community love? General Radahn. General Radahn, by all that we know so far, is both immensely powerful and a revered man of honor. He is not simply a brutal warrior who stockpiled power for power’s sake. He studied gravity magic to stay with his horse, he waits for Malenia to ready her weapons before engaging her in combat, he is revered by his red mane knights who throw a festival in his honor to grant him a warriors death. He is immense power tempered by code and creed. And his honor did not hold him back, despite all of the underhanded, nefarious and morally dubious actions of the other demigods, it is the honorable Radahn that stands as the strongest of them all.
Let’s look now at Radagon and Miquella. We have to speculate a little bit into their personalities but this is at least my interpretation. Radagon is a seemingly unquestionable devoted to the golden order, he abandoned his wife to replace Godfrey and shattered her heart, taking the children he had with her to be demigod step children. He fought wars for the golden order, killed for it, abandoned his love for it, and where does it get him, crucified with his other half within the Erdtree, to serve as a final guard dog for the Elden Ring, and then possibly transformed into a sword for the Elden Beast to wield. Blind faith, extreme unquestionable faith is dangerous.
Then you have Miquella, his son, who was once a follower of the Golden Order, even developing spells for this order, offering spells as gifts to his father and I believe it’s implied he loved his extended family enough to mourn Godwyn’s death. But he wasn’t blind in his faith. The Golden Order could not save his sister, through some impurity, some “alloy” in their gold, they couldn’t heal her. And we are told that it is for that reason that Miquella left. He, like Radahn, amassed tremendous power and tried to create a new Erdtree, but it was a decision born out of the desire to heal Malenia. And in time, the Haligtree would become a Haven to the unwanted, a place where Loretta could bring the persecuted Albinaurics. Now there is a potential sinister caveat when it comes to Miquella and his St. Trina connections suggesting that he might have entranced his followers, but at the moment the evidence I think leans more towards Miquella being a rather kind figure to the downtrodden. Miquella doesn’t allow faith to blind him, he chooses compassion for his sister over allegiance. And it might have worked had Mohg not interfered.
Finally I want to talk about Rykard. One who does not temper his ambitions at all. Feeding himself to a deity serpent in order to amass power. Becoming so heinous and reviled that even the knights who joined him in his blasphemy sought to assassinate him. Rykard lords over a manor of debauchery, torture and death. The imagery of himself and his manor invoke that of Lucifer. He wanted power at all costs, and where does it get him? Eaten by a snake, ostracized, outcast, and stuck at the bottom of his manor, not even the strongest amongst his kin.
Elden Ring, I think, wants us to seek greatness of deed and greatness of self. Be our own person, carve our own path, be powerful, be mighty, be strong. But be careful. Control yourself. Do not follow blindly, but do not cast everything and anything away. Build something worth building. Build something great and good. It’s hard, it’s a struggle, but it’s worth doing. Not because you’re guaranteed a happy ending, but because it’s right.
Look at Millicent, who refused to lose herself to another’s vision and decided to die bitter sweetly as herself. Look at Nepheli, who’s world was shattered when she learned of Gideons villainy, but decided to be better and becomes the ruler of Limgrave. Look at Blaidd who refuses to blindly adhere to his programming by the two fingers and pledged himself to Ranni in his final moments of lucidity.
Be the best you that you can be. Be mighty, be good, be free. That’s Elden Ring.
A most excellent comment, thanks for sharing your thoughts
I really like this
nobody is gonna read your thesis. it’s a video game that’s left intentionally incomplete. it’s not that deep man.
@@fulltimeslackerii8229 nah I read it punk
A beautiful and surprisingly wholesome interpretation! Good read.
Miyazaki obviously more pissed at Loremasters rather than Pvp'ers to give them this entangled web.
I can just imagine a FromSoft developer watching these kinds of videos like “lmao these guys put way more thought into the lore than we do”
Elden Ring, at it's heart, is a tale of the struggle between letting go and holding on. It examines this idea through the lense of duality between pairs of characters. Some examples below.
Marika & Radagon: You are spot on that Marika planned the Night of Black knives - she seeks to let go of the current order, it has rotted - golden is a facade for the dark truth beneath, so she shatters the Elden ring and triggers a series of events which ultimately lead to a new age. Radagon, on the other hand, struggles to hold on to the current order. The duality of Marika/Radagon is the centerpiece of the story - the eternal struggle of deciding to let go and move on or hold on to the past and preserve it. Marika represents the positive of letting go while Radagon demonstrates the negative of holding on.
Malenia & Millicent: Malenia held on when she would have been defeated by Radahn, abandoning her pride and embracing blossoming Rot. She holds on to her brother's dream even though he is gone, she adamantly holds on to life while continuing to rot from within. Millicent is a direct foil for Malenia as her daughter who traced the same path. She ultimately chooses to let go of the rot, preferring to die as she is than blossom into something she is not. In her choice to let go, she maintained the dignity that Malenia lost.
Morgott & Mohg: Morgott held on to his love of Leyndell and the Erdtree, remaining loyal to a world that despised him in return. He suffered until the end as an omen, thinking so little of himself when he bleeds upon the thrones because he is ashamed of his own existence. Mohg let go of his connection to Leyndell, instead treading his own path to form the Mohgwyn dynasty. His methods of reaching that goal may have been vile, but he moved on from his pain while his brother embraced it until the end.
Ranni & Godwyn: Ranni let go of her physical connection to the world. She chose a dark and lonely path that would bring a new future for the lands between void of the meddling and control of gods. She sacrificed her own body to achieve this. Godwyn, even in the death of his spirit, continues to hold on to the Golden Order in death. His deathroot spreads everywhere, inflicting undeath as a symbolic manifestation of the decay that has become of the current order. Here we see the contrast between risking it all to let go and move on vs decaying by holding on to a past that should no longer be.
All of these dichotomies between characters refer back to the central idea that there will always be those who struggle to hold on to the past, to the current order, or to the way things were and then there will be those who take the risk to move on, to establish a new order, to create a new future. The theme of Elden Ring is closely tied to the main theme of Dark Souls and most of Fromsoft's works.
I actually believe Morgott and Mohg and can be interpreted in reverse (though I prefer your interpretation honestly).
Mohg can be seen as holding on to the pain of the ridicule and is always reactively shunning others. In other words, he attempts to escape the world by creating his own dynasty, but in reality, he is still trapped in a position of opposition. He always has to be in a constant state of rebellion, meaning he is still attached to his pain.
Meanwhile, Morgott is the inverse of this, and you bring up an excellent point. In some ways, Morgott attempts to confront and embrace his birthright. However, this is after he faces ridicule. This means that he is also escaping his prior reputation and position as best as he can, like Mohg, but instead of escaping it through rebellion, he simply chooses to escape it by way of rising above his station. However, just like Mohg, he is always trapped by the past because he is always trying to prove himself to his subjects.
These 2 really are probably amongst my favorite characters in the game. So awesome.
THis also ties back into the themes of regression and causality.
Radahn literally learned gravity magic, stopped the stars, and resisted the scarlet rot itself, just to hold on to the past.
@@swordierre9341 lol he really did. He locked his sister's fate to do so. Another comparison between Radahn and Ranni, holding on to the past at all costs vs letting go and embracing the future.
I think a big part of what makes Elden Ring's lore so complicated is its sheer scale in every aspect. We have more characters than ever before, living in a bigger world, with more factions than in past games, every one with a different perspective on the world and on what should happen to it, and so on and so forth.
What I like to do is think of the themes and ideas particular characters or factions explore, like Ranni refusing to be controlled by the Two Fingers and the Greater Will, exploring freedom from the current system and seeking independence from those who wish to rule over us. There's also Goldmask, who sees that the current system has problems, but rather than burn it all down and start over (as the Frenzied Flame seeks), wishes to try and do it better next time, even if the change is not a full on revolution from the ground up, he still wishes for things to improve and change the status quo the Lands Between have been on for a while.
I haven't really explored everything as deeply as I'd like, as uni and other stuff keeps me busy, but it's what I do to make sense of what I do know for now. Also, English is my second language, so feel free to correct me if anything sounds weird.
Your English is absolutely fine, so far! I didn't even think it was your second language until you said so.
Something Ratatoskr missed was Ranni's dialogue as a mini doll. Ranni says that the Shadows of Empyreans (i.e., their beastial followers, like Blaidd and Maliketh) are created for them by the Fingers. Blaidd betrayed the fingers when Ranni did, implying that he was expected to stop her and continue grooming her for godhood. The same was also probably true of Maliketh, and when Marika tired of godhood and wanted to unleash death once more, she didn't trust Maliketh to side with her, and thus she had to trick him.
To put it in one word, I think the theme is “freedom”. Gameplay wise, this is expressed through emphasized open exploration, customization, and the multiple endings. The endings especially seem to reflect different ideologies regarding life and freedom. In one you become consumed by negative nihilism and destroy the world. In one you obey the established order of life. In another you are consumed by positive nihilism, “life is painful/meaningless, but we have the power to choose”. It’s hard to understand if you haven’t felt these feelings irl.
I like this interpretation a lot
Well yeah the endings. But this doesn't make clearer anything he discussed in the video
I don't think Elden Ring is trying to tell us something as a whole. It tells us things with characters like Morgott and Radahn, Radagon or Gideon Ofnir. But its story, which is the world we play in, tries to tell us a literal story with probably no underlying meaning behind it. Dark Souls was made to be metatextual, symbolic, deep and compelling than Elden Ring. It's just an entirely different breed. So people who say it's DS4 were absolutely wrong
I like this theme of freedom. I’ve always thought that Marika might have never wanted to be chosen. However, for some reason, she could not escape the binds of the golden order. Perhaps, her motivations are shared by Ranni. Thus, Marika assisted Ranni in doing what she could not; removing the influence of the golden order and reestablishing freedom.
@@yare987 that much is true... though ironically i do think towards the end, Marika and Ranni did not align.
Ranni wants an Age of Stars, carrying Order far away. I think Marika wanted a new Elden Lord, the Tarnished. She wanted to keep Order, just maybe not the GOLDEN Order. Which may be why the Black Knives then attacked Iji and Ranni's Rise.
Kind of like Templars vs Assassins
Order or Freedom?
the black flame on Iji's corpse really feels like a mistake, there are even dead assassins around him suggesting that he died fighting them off, but then the flame should be black and red. It feels more like an error than most things
I suspect the reason why the Black Knives turned against Ranni is because of Iji. He has the ability to seal people into ever gaols, and we find Alecto sealed in an ever gaol in the Carian Lunar Estate. The death of Tiche possibly made him suspect that Alecto would turn on them, so he sealed her away and then didn't tell anyone like when he sealed Blaidd.
It's possible that Elden Ring is currently lacking some very important piece from its story that puts it all together and we will get said piece in the DLC. For example...
Miquella seems to be a very crucial person to the story and he's tied to at least Radagon, Malenia, Mohg, Godwyn and of course Marika to name a few. And yet we know little to nothing about him. Another crucial yet ambiguous thing are the many Outer Gods that are very important for the key characters of the story. I don't think it's possible to fully interpret the story in satisfactory way without these things further elaborated.
Elden Ring is not like other Souls games. It's way bigger, has way more characters and as such there's more connections between characters and events than ever before. It might need something to truly complete it.
To be honest this has been said before about bloodborne and ds3 and in both cases the DLC was more tangential and thematically-driven than a 'final piece of the puzzle'. They did provide tons of answers, but not to the questions we actually had to begin with, and I kind of prefer it that way.
@@PoolNoodleGundam I agree but I also acknowledge that Elden Ring is not quite like those games. The scale of things is simply different and as such it might need more puzzle pieces rather than another puzzle with the same theme.
i feel this way too atm
1. The "betrayal" described in Malikeths rememberance could also be the fact that she is responsible for guiding the tarnished to him through grace to kill him and take back destined death. Afterall, you get to Farum Azula after Melina, Marika's daughter, fufills her purpose given to her by the latter by doing her role as the kindling maiden (the name for her that is found in the item description of the knife she wields if you summon her to help against Morgott, the Blade of Calling) and sacrificing herself to set fire to the erdtree.
2. I am so glad you brought up Iji's corpse being covered in the black flames, as this had puzzled me greatly as well. It was my belief that the devs had put the wrong particle effect on his corpse. In short, the black flame is a weakened form of the "destined death" reddish-black flame you see Maliketh and the Black Knife assassins wield. The incantation "Scouring Black Flame" says "The black flame could once slay gods. But when Maliketh sealed Destined Death, the true power of the black flame was lost." What do we make of this? The Gloam-Eyed Queen once controlled the The Rune of Death or Destined Death, but Marika desired for her offspring to not be killed, so she had her shadow defeat her. Now the Gloam Eyed queen is stated to be an empyrean, and as you stated in this video, theories and interpretations can quickly go in a spiral. I think the Fromsoftware devs, as they typically do, are trying to convey to us in the most esoteric of ways possible that the Gloam Eyed queen is Melina. Her association with fire, Her dialogue in the frenzy flamed ending, her eyes just seem to convenient. I digress. Iji's body is covered in black flame because he was killed by the Black Knife assassins but by the time you get there, the flame has decayed into the black flame state.
Anyways, this was an info dump and probably has holes in it, but I just wanted to get my interpretation out there.
Just like Rataoskr said, people can make very convincing arguments but then I am still in doubt. Allot of the Melina = GEQ makes sense but then...
1.Gloam-Eyed predates or co-existed with Godskins
2.The Erdtree is born and the war of giants starts
3.The black flame is used in the war of the giants
4.The Golden order began when destine death was plucked
5.Godskins and the Gloam Eyed Queen were defeated by Malikleth who then sealed destine death
6.Melina is born at the foot of the Erdtree... at some point??? Likely after all the other demi gods, since she is the sibling of Malinia and Miquella
1. Gloam-Eyed predates Godskins
Godskin Swaddling Cloth
The Gloam-Eyed Queen cradles newborn apostles swaddled in this cloth. Soon they will grow to become the death of the gods.
2. The Erdtree is born and the war of giants starts
Smithing Stone [8]:
"Thought to have been used to hone the weapons of the champions of the War against the Giants at the birth of the Erdtree."
3.The black flame is used in the war of the giants
Blackflame Monk Amon
"Ashen remains in which spirits yet dwell. Use to summon the spirit of Amon, the Blackflame Monk.
Amon swore fealty to the god-slaying black flame, and so became the first fire monk to turn traitor. Or perhaps it is better said that he fled from the Giants' Flame-out of cowardice."
4.The Golden order began when destine death was plucked from the elden ring upon the creation of the golden order
Finger Reader Enia dialog:
"The Rune of Death goes by two names; the other is Destined Death.
The forbidden shadow, plucked from the Golden Order upon its creation…"
5.Godskins and the Gloam Eyed Queen were defeated by Malikleth who then destine death was sealed
Godskin Apostle Hood:
"The apostles, once said to serve Destined Death, are wielders of the god-slaying black flame. But after their defeat by Maliketh, the Black Blade, the source of their power was sealed away."
Godslayer's Greatsword
"Sacred sword of the Dusk-Eyed Queen who controlled the Godskin Apostles before her defeat at the hands of Maliketh."
6.Melinia was born at the foot of the erdtree
Melinia Dialog
"The Erdtree...is close.
Only a little further till the foot of the Erdtree, and the accord is fulfilled.
It takes me back.
I was born at the foot of the Erdtree.
Where mother gave me my purpose.
Though now, everything is lost to me.
I...have to ascertain for myself.
The reason for which I live, burned and bodiless."
@@pigzy9807 The “birth of the erdtree” is such a confusing term if you know s lot of the context. There is the “great tree” and the “erdtree”. Is the “birth of the erdtree” referring to the physical erdtree or the erdtree’s order, that’s why there is a distinction between the erdtree worship incantations, ancient erdtree incantstions, and golden order incantations.
@@Liam-pi9vi There is a crucible, but I don't think there is a single great tree. Some items were mistranslated, great tree should be plural Great Tree(s).
It could still be the case that the erdtree was one of these great trees that was empowered after the elden ring was placed in it or something.
hey other people who also think blackflame is a weakened destined death flame :)
@@pigzy9807 Yes there are multiple giant trees, the root resin indicates a distinction between the Great Tree and the Erdtree
I've definitely felt that lacking consensus in just rudimentary discussions about the happenings of the game. While I feel like I can *make* a somewhat coherent picture for myself, I also realize that there isn't enough support given by the game itself to cement it as convincing for people that put a different amount of weight on certain aspects and look at things from a different angle.
Putting the wall of text of some ideas at the bottom as further examples.
Expanding on the crucible and Black Knives points of the video:
For the crucible:
We see this image of a larger Elden Ring in Farum Azula. So possibly the outer gods are not alien gods, but gods kicked out of the Golden Order by the Greater Will over time, which would explain their loose ties to the crucible, as the crucible would then have represented the combination of all these forces conjoined, rather than warring as is shown by each outer force trying to get back in, largely by influencing and manipulating the demi gods. And since every outer god seeks its own "order" in a way, the frenzied flame representing chaos is basically opposing all this struggle in totality due to it tainting the perfection life was supposed to be and would rather have it all end, than continue to suffer, borrowing on nihilistic themes.
For the Black Knives:
Additionally to what you pointed out. We see Alecto, their leader, impirsoned on the Moonlight Altar. Maybe she was imprisoned by Ranni there after similarly attacking her like Iji and Blaidd were attacked? The Baleful Shadow sent by the two fingers also utilizes Black Flame, which atleast loosely connects it to the same assassination attempts following after you defeat it. Which would imply that they are defenidng the Two Fingers Ranni is hunting down.
And from there we could speculate if Ranni was pulled into the plot and merely hijacked it to free herself from the Greater Wills machinations, whether or not it was Marika's will or the greater will's. We also have that one line at the top of castle sol implicating that Miquella was attempting to revive the soulless demigods, be that Godwyn or the ones in the Mausoleums. Which opens up thinking about whether Marika and the Empyreans were plotting against the Greater Will and only after she thought all of them lost she shattered the ring to get the Tarnished to get the job done.
But again for one this might make sense, for another it seems farfetched nonsense. For themes we have fire being very important again, nigh every force in this game has their own kind of flames and overturning an age with flames is also pretty central to the story. Conflict is a huge theme in the game, conflict not only between factions but also fundamental beliefs and even conflict about if it is all worth, which ties into this Melina vs Frenzied Flame perspectives you get when you do the questline and dont miss Melina's dialogue options.
I think DLC will definitely help clarify some things about the nature of Death, the crucible, Miquella, and the pre-erdtree civilizations. That being said, it might also help to take a reasoned approach to some bits of lore. For instance - there's this idea that the Black Knife Assassins, after being given the tools of Destined Death, would be allied to Ranni?
They've literally been given the power of death itself - something the gods and demigods don't have access to. They're basically accountable to nobody. It would be entirely reasonable speculation that the Night of the Black Knives was a massively chaotic event where the Black Knife assassins went on a demigod killing spree, mostly because they simply could.
The black flames of death aren't necessarily an exclusive thing, either. With death's black flame unleashed, flame monks began modifying their arts in defiance of the gods, as well. It seems that anyone with the knowledge of how to inflict death might be able to use it, including Baleful Shadows of the Two Fingers. It's just the tool you need to kill gods and demigods, and they've been unleashed.
Now, I know Americans don't like to think of things like this - but if you unleash tools of deadly force to the general public, the result is going to be a lot of death lol. I think the plan was more just to unleash death and hope the ensuing chaos would work out.
tldr
Execllent video, thoroughly enjoyed it. Really put into words how I was feeling with so many links between powers, characters, items, places…etc that it was just mind boggling with hardly any concrete proofs so inevitably we all went into crackpot theory space. Your note at the end about DLC’s historically being the best sources gave me a big ray of hope and I thank you. This was my first FromSoft game and I look forward to playing more.
You've just been R.R Martined
Bollocks. GRR Martn's stories and lore are a thousand times more well executed than any of the narratives that Fromsoft have ever told.
There are definitely big overarching themes you appear to discount: Duality & Oneness, Duty & Desire, Dissonance resultant of binary opposites. There are certainly more overarching broad themes to Elden Ring than "struggle/sacrifice" and Alchemy. The blatant unanswerable things like "Radagon is Marika", Yura/Shabriri and Hyetta/Irina, Greater Will vs Outer God influence, nearly everyone having hidden intentions (and those intentions not being explicit), there are definitely broad stroke themes throughout all this narrative.
I'm not pretending to understand the overarching themes more than you, but I feel you have 'thrown in the towel' at a strange narrative point when there are only 'larger concepts' instead of 'smaller stories' to latch onto (particular as someone who self-professes in this video to be interested in the wider lore/thematic implications as opposed to the story happenings minutae).
I'm sure as you've said in your video, you will change your opinion on this once DLC gets released.
I believe we shouldn't need elden ring to enjoy the base game.
Great post.
This is what I believe the true meaning of Elden Ring is.
How little can you give until it's finally considered a bad game.
Ok. Not really. But something close to that. The true in-game theme of Elden Ring is BLIND FAITH.
You are a character who didn't even get a proper origin like previous Souls games.
You're a character who blindly follows orders from any NPC without given any answers whatsoever. And those who did give answers were pawn themselves to something bigger.
And what little information you do receive is never given any real context.
@@kevinvu5432 I like this interpretation. It's like a lore equivalent of Dark Soul's "hollowing" concept, where you engage with Elden Ring until you are beaten into submission with lack of explanations/clarity etc, and are 'defeated' by how impenetrable the lore is.
Intentionally convoluted, got it
I think your issue might be that you're trying to approach Elden Ring as if it were an allegorical text, something with a clear, single meaning coded by the author that can be divined with enough scrutiny (think something like Animal Farm for example).
I found it helps to approach it as more as a kind of collection of themes and ideas presented prismatically. All these themes and ideas- change and ambition, duality and doubles, authority and divine right, death and rebirth all play off each other in many, many complex ways, but you can't reduce all of the meaning found therein to a single 'point', like you could with Dark Souls and it's core existential theme.
The meaning isn't found in one large theme that disseminates throughout everything in the story, it's found in many smaller themes that all interact with each other. Don't try and force the text to say something, analyze and play close attention to what it's is already saying regardless of how it says it.
I think this is the best approach, and I think the 6 endings as 'responses' to the question the game poses (which let's be honest is once again to do with stagnation and renewal) is your interpretation as response.
It basically gives you 6 box ready interpretations, and necessarily must therefore leave space for all of them to fit.
Nah Bro GRR Martin farted out a garbled mess cause he’s overrated and cant be arsed.
It's just bad writing
Oh wow, they game vaguely eludes to themes we've been doing for the past 3 souls games, obviously this makes the nonsense lore that only serves to confuse good.
Forgive me for a moment since I'm going to do something that's generally very stupid to do on the Internet, but I think you yourself may have been bogged down by the talk of themes in this video. If we forget about the themes or even trying to interconnect various characters and events beyond what we see, we still don't have a coherent story. Why does Ranni want to kill Godwyn? We know why she wanted to shed her flesh, she didn't want to be a puppet to God. But why does she kill Godwyn and not just literally anyone else? Surely it would have been easier to kill a wandering citizen than to send assassins into the most heavily guarded area in the land and kill one of the most powerful characters in the world.
Going further along to when Blaidd and Iji are killed... why are they killed? What thematic purpose is served in this side story by having them die? What is the game telling us by killing them? If Ranni's ending involved the death of everyone and the old system, then this would have been an interesting little hint at her goal. But no, she just wants to remove the influence of the gods and no one else has to die for this to work from the Ending going forwards. So, why do the assassins she worked with suddenly turn on her 5000 years later? And right before her plan is completed?
The theme of Ranni's story is spelt out for anyone even half paying attention but the chain of events are not just shrouded under a veil (ha get it) of mystery, they occur without any reason to, thematic or otherwise.
Sorry if I, myself, have produced incoherent ramblings, though, that would be pretty funny in an ironic way. I do genuinely want to know your thoughts on this, I'm not trying to le epic own you on the Internet or assert I'm right or anything like that. I think your interpretation of the overarching themes present is spot on, it's just your thoughts in the events I'd like to hear more of.
Hope you are having a good day
I think that the difficulty of understanding the themes and metaphorical interpretations stems from the fact that those aren't the focus of the game. It may be presumptuous of me to say, but when it comes to the most basic elements of storytelling - plot, setting, character, and themes - Elden Ring chooses to place its primary focus on its characters, the drama that occurs between them, and the influence of outer gods mucking up their designs.
Consider how many of the demigods have highly personal motivations for what they do, which often lead them to pursue goals with world-changing implications. Mohg wants to create the Mohgwyn Dynasty, partially motivated by the embrace of the Formless Mother, which puts him in conflict with Miquella's own plans. Rykard gives himself over to the God-Devouring Serpent, of which there has been a vision that it will eventually swallow the world. (Though I'm not certain this is meant to be taken literally.) Malenia is cursed by an outer god known to us only as the incarnation of rot itself, which would likely have the entire world look something like Caelid, and seeks to transform Malenia into the Goddess of Rot for its own ends.
The list goes on a fair bit, but in all of these examples, it can be shown that there is a desire, whether by the demigods themselves or the outer forces working through them, to not only influence the world, but completely reshape it. As each character wants fundamentally different things, they come into opposition with each other frequently, creating a complex, interwoven character drama that makes it unclear who is on whose side, who betrayed who, or even exactly what any character's concrete plans are to achieve their goals. Because the characters are driving the story, and no singular one has enough control over the vast moving parts of Elden Ring's world for things to revolve around them.
The few constants that I think everyone can agree on are that the most recent Order to exist in the world was the Golden Order. Marika shattered the Elden Ring, and in so doing, the Tarnished and Demigods now all have the chance to introduce their own Order. Morgott alone clings to the prior order, exactly as it was, and sees all those following their own ambitions as willful traitors, or fools. Morgott is, in essence, the lone character seeking to preserve this game's "Age of Fire", refusing to acknowledge it has already gone and can never return as it once was. However, there is no "Age of Darkness" equivalent. There is the Mohgwyn Dynasty, the devouring of the gods, the Scarlet Rot, the Age of Stars, the Haligtree. There is supplanting the power vacuum left by the fracturing of the Golden Order with, well, whatever the demigods and their adherents damn well please.
So for me, to analyze it on a broader scale, I think Ranni's quest and ending present the best perspective. People say her dialogue makes it more clear when translated more literally, but even as-is, her motivations imply that the concept of "Order" itself, an imposed will that shapes the world and defines its rules, is something she wants to remove from The Lands Between entirely. That maybe the fighting of the demigods amounts only to power-hungry nonsense that benefits no one. This might not be strictly "canon" but I think her lines in the story trailer are very interesting. She asks what the demigods could ever hope to achieve through warring with each other, and describes the Shattering as a war that wrought "only chaos". Interesting choice of words there....
Obviously the demigods each have their own designs for the world beyond the Shattering, and characters like Mohg and Rykard make that very clear. But Ranni's philosophy takes on the perspective that it all amounts to nothing, and that the only path forward is to keep The Lands Between untouched by those forces.
The truth is that Elden Ring is a character drama, with countless characters having countless visions to reshape the world, using the power vacuum created by the Shattering to attempt to do so. And the fundamental question of it all, did any of it truly amount to anything?
amazing post, the ambiguity of Elden Ring's story is fascinating and this ties with lorelost's post above that maybe searching for an overarching theme is not how you should interpret it, but looking at each story within it
i disagree
Brilliant analysis
I think the main theme is ambition. Every single thing that happens is because of it. Everyone wants a piece, and how for each one it affects them in a different way. Some people were destroyed by their own ambitions, others were destroyed by other people ambitions. The outer gods are mindless concepts the greatest players in this game twist to their own design. If you notice, every outer god is basically just a concept. Order, Chaos, Rot and Rebirth, Formlessness, Cold Darkness. For example Order divides, and you can see how Order, no matter who uses it, will always leave marginalized people. If you give the world to the Omen, or the undead, regular people will be displaced. The ambition of the few will affect the others. I think the unifying theme is ambition.
Yes. The theme is ambition and the setting is the lore itself.
Someone else on here talked about a large parallel to the Old Testament. And that could be a great source of inspiration. The Devil, once an angel begins the tale of scripture with ambition. He's the catalyst for all of God's responses to humankind and other spirit creatures such as angels, Demons and Christ. Power and ambition is exchanged and this trickles down even to Kings and Governments of the earth. The lore is dense because it makes it more interesting and vast.
So in my opinion while the pieces of information make *connecting* the lore difficult as there are likely intentional holes...I don't think the theme and setting are incomprehensible.
*I forgot to also mention the Holy Trinity...Almighty God, Christ and The Holy Spirit different forms of the same being. How these interactions can be explained is mythological so what we imagine needs to fill in the gaps.
I think it's easy to see where I'm going with this...
Truly the dark souls of dark souls lore.
top comment
The thing is I don't think the lore of ER should be that obscure. The world is not dead yet, most of the important demigods are still alive, there are still armies fighting, there are finger readers who interpret the greater will, and Sir Gideon has a library full of lore. So most of the lore should be common knowledge, not lost ancient history, but it seems the players are the only ones not knowing it. We don't even have the option to ask Melina who she actually is or does she have a boyfriend. I am not sure if it is good storytelling or not.
Grant us eyes! Grant us Eyes!
Respectfully Ratatoskr, you're looking too deep. The theme of Elden Ring is in our faces from the very start:
"Make of thyselves that which ye desire. Be it a Lord. Be it a God. But should ye fail to become aught at all, ye will be forsaken. Amounting only to sacrifices."
The theme of Elden Ring is AMBITION, as well as the associated sacrifices and even the hubris one experiences from pursuing it. Never before in a FromSoft game have the characters been so driven to succeed and reach their own goals, indecipherable as they are.
In Dark Souls, the game and it's mechanics are a vehicle to deliver the theme of stagnation vs change. In Elden Ring, the game uses it's lore and mechanics to push you and your ambitions forward.
All of the shardbearers want (or did want) something. Godrick just wanted to go home. Rykard wanted to ascend. Morgott wanted to be loved. Radahn aspired to be the greatest warrior, even fighting Malenia to meet that goal.
Even the friendly NPCs have their ambitions. Millicent wants to live freely, Diallos wants to measure up, Goldmask wants the truth, and Melina wants to fulfill her destiny.
And all the characters in the game pay the price to meet their goals. Alexander dies for glory, Hewg loses himself in the effort to help you slay a god. And even Patches, with his possibly bugged storyline, lets himself get hurt to try and snap Tanith out of her obsession.
What does Melina want to know from you when you level up? When you sacrifice your Runes to get stronger? She wants to know what your goals and motives are.
What does Morgott call you out on? Your ambitions.
Why did Marika shatter the Elden Ring? We might not know for 100% sure, but she wanted something and was willing to shatter the Elden Ring and break the world for it.
Ambition, sacrifices, and hubris.
> The theme of Elden Ring is AMBITION
I hadn't seen this angle and I really like it.
-aMbItIoN
Wow great theme
@@buffoonustroglodytus4688 good chat
@@themmeatsweats I don’t agree
That's a cool interpretation actually, but personally I don't think I would ever take a story as multifaceted as Elden Ring and say of it "clearly, THE theme of it is X". That seems arrogant and reductive. There could be infinite other very similar or very different Themes one could choose and even the words used and examples provided have a level of subjectivity, like all art does, that makes it hard to pinpoint something as "THE" definitive answer. An answer yes, and one with value, maybe even great value, but not all value possible.
I personally believe there are 3 reasons why the lore is tough to nail down. Compared to other FromSoft games anyway.
-Time: We don’t know when things happened. We have a rough understanding of the sequence of historical events but he have no real idea of when some of these things happen. We don’t know when our Tarnished shows up in the lands between, compared to, say, the Old Tarnished we get the Scaled Armor set from. We have no clue how long Godwin’s death has been corrupting the lands or how long ago Melenia Nuked Calid.
-The Intro: while it’s probably one of my favs and gets me hyped every time I see it, it doesn’t tell us much. Tells us the gods that (may)have died, the Elden Ring Broke and the tarnished who we may meet. Other than that, it’s really to hype up a lowly tarnished to fuck some shit up in the Lands Between. It’s not like Dark Souls intros that show the bosses but also get you to understand where the world is at the current moment.
-Open World: I don’t believe the open world formula was bad for ER but I do feel it affected it’s story telling. Not negatively in my personal opinion, but the story hints probably had to become more vague since the game structure is not linear, for the most part. Because of this approach we often get questlines that branch from say, bloodyfinger hunting escalating to the Flame of Frenzy quest line or from Helping homeboy Rogier with a castle to hugging Fia next to her dead boyfriend Godwin.
I didn’t mean for this to be so long but I can’t help but feel that because of these points I’ve mentioned, the storytelling for ER had to change as opposed to past FromSoft games.
I kind of came to the same conclusion and kind of created my own head cannon I liked. Would be excited to have DLC that started addressing a lot of those questions though, and returned removed quests that have been removed. One thing to keep in mind is Martin's involvement with the historical lore. Martin's stories (not just ASOIAF) can be quite cryptic and leave you very unsettled. I think even with answers, you'd run into a similar messy situation.
I'll be honest, ever since Dark Souls II onwards, it's become easier and easier to "solve" Miyazaki's stories because we know where to look (item descriptions) and exactly what to pay attention to (item location, environment, etc). I'm actually loving that for the first time in over 10 years, I'm having to just flat-out guess at the meaning of context clues and accepting my own "headcanon" as Miyazaki intended when he took inspiration from reading western fantasy novels and having to do the same when he encountered words he couldn't interpret.
It's honestly better in my head that Solaire was Gwyn's outcast son even though I know in hindsight that can't be the case because of so much contradictory information and later retcons to the lore.
Exactly! There are many things that seem much cooler in my head than if it were fully explained or debunked. In my mind, Godefroy is not a real character that exists and nobody can convince me otherwise.
@@friendoftheoyster3906 lmao godefroy the lord of re-used assets
So this pretentious fuck expects you to write his game for him... And that's a good thing? Even Kojima, as much of a fucking hack as he is, actually bothers to write a story in the first place. This is Destiny all over again, only this time around, the gameplay is actually good.
Thats not good storytelling though
@@TurboMintyFresh Maybe. But it's certainly interesting since it's a method that can only be implemented in video games. Years from now we might view this as archaic storytelling tropes, but it's still in it's infancy.
We're seeing more and more titles adopt this item description/environment approach to world building. Some to great effect, others to utter bewilderment.
Case in point: watch 2 videos about the same aspect of Elden Ring lore by 2 different TH-camrs and marvel at how wildly different their ideas of what is considered fact is. If that type of ambiguity exists even at the core of the story then every successive abstraction made from the story itself can miss the mark by greater distance while maintaining "plausibility". It leaves room for fun speculation I suppose, but if the DLC doesn't deliver any real answers then I fear Miyazaki may have been watching too much David Lynch. I can't help but to wonder if bringing in George Martin to lay the foundation for the story may have made them overconfident in the ammount of bricks they could pull from it before the structure is unrecognizable.
You are doing a very good job despite how convoluted the lore is. I enjoy your videos and appreciate your takes, while you explain what the lore means to the best of your ability.
Especially when you take those risks for certain videos. Like the Frenzied Flame video you put out.
While I was doing research of my own. I was recommended your video. And included a short shout out to you within my own Frenzied Flame video, because I felt it was deserved.
Keep up the good work. And don't be too hard on yourself. The lore is difficult to follow and we need to the whole community to understand even a fraction of it. The developers leave holes in the story so the lore divers and community as a whole can try to piece things together like a puzzle.
After all, our imaginations are far more powerful than anything they could try to show us in game. My respects to you again.
Here is the video I made regarding the Frenzied Flame in case you care to see it. Have a good day and enjoy the lands between th-cam.com/video/yslWwKN-fY8/w-d-xo.html
As far as an overarching theme for Elden Ring though, i'm with you. It's possibly not meant to be interpreted. Is it possible then, the idea it's not meant to be interpreted works into the theme?
Sometimes, life is more complicated than we can understand. Despite our efforts we will never understand life, or peoples motivations within it. But we should still try our best in life, even if we do not succeed. Is the story of Elden Ring asking, "what is the meaning of life?" A parallel to our own world. A possible theme heavily inspired by the idea of cosmism developed by H.P. Lovecraft. Just a thought
Since GRRM was involved in this, we will have to wait a hundred years for a DLC that will never come to get some a answer.
I appreciate your intense desire to connect the dots or find deeper meaning. It’s seems that the intent is to convey the futility of knowing this as facts or to make sense. The illusive existence that cannot be grasped or understood as the mind attempts to do
I actually think the overarching theme of Elden Ring is moving on, letting go and dissolving attachments that no longer are of benefit, that which now cause stagnation, much like the age of Dark ending for Dark Souls 3. Creating something new and better (yes even the flame of frenzy) giving up on holding those attachments that now Bind and shackle you to a life of unhappiness and strife (i.e. returning destined death to the world, when removing it giving all eternal life in one sense or another)
Not really, because this literally yeets the entire thread and pattern of layers of kingdoms that add on the legacies of previous ones, which follow a natural Order (Eternal Cities, Dragons, Crucible, Erdtree, and Golden Order in... In that order)
Flame of Frenzy isn't letting go and creating something new and better. It's the end of everything... forever. I don't understand how that can be construed as 'better'. The game is quite explicit about that.
@@TheSuperRatt the Flame of Frenzy is basically a return to the Age of Ancients.
Surely a better option than any of the Golden Order endings
I agree with you about the overall point here and the thematic aspects, but some quibbles on the specifics:
I don’t think anything in-game implies the Formless Mother is the source of the accursed blood to begin with, only that she favors and empowers it. The Omen Curse seems to be more of a Crucible thing than a Formless Mother thing, with the Formless Mother simply finding it a worthy vessel. Also Omen do have scales (see: Morgott’s face) and Mohg sprouts wings in his 2nd phase. I have more in-depth ideas about what exactly Omen are which I might do a video on at some point.
When Malekith dies as Gurranq, he follows up “why wouldst thou gull me” with “why shatter”, so I’m pretty sure the betrayal is Marika’s shattering of the Elden Ring rather than orchestrating the Night of the Black Knives.
I am confused, too. I was really looking forward to have this kind of 'Frampt moment' like in first playtrough of DS1, when I was suddenly able to understand much more about what's my purpose and what I am actually doing in the world. But at some point in Elden Ring I just gave up and enjoyed playing. I'd love to have a better understanding of all the events and the world, tho.
What we know for sure about the Black Knife Assassins is that Alecto was their leader, but is found trapped in an evergaol in the Moonlight Altar area (which is connected to Ranni and her 2-fingers).
My version of events as of right now:
Marika, Ranni, Renna and Alecto (with Rykard peripherally involved) conspired to orchestrate the Night of the Black Knives. Ranni did this to get rid of her empyrean body and resist the Greater Will. Marika did it because many of her children were "unwanted" for whatever reason (including Godwyn) and assassinating them was just her modus operandi. This probably _also_ had something to do with resisting the Greater Will.
But since Marika still wanted Destined Death sealed away, she and Ranni turned on the assassins afterwards. Alecto was imprisoned and the other surviving ones went into hiding in various caves and catacombs. When Ranni leaves to "go to her order" or whatever after her questline, the BKAs opportunistically go after Blaidd and Iji.
Much later, Marika broke the Elden Ring and distributed the pieces (great runes) among her children. She told them to become lords or gods or die trying. The Greater Will punished Marika by having the Elden Beast impale and shackle her in the Erdtree.
Radagon (Marika) sealed the entrance to the Erdtree, possibly while pretending to try to repair the Ring (so the GW/EB wouldn't stop him). That's because Marika doesn't want anyone to repair the ring or become her new consort -- she wants some of her demigod children to reach godhood and/or lordship without her (and without the Greater Will or the Elden Beast).
This is not what the Greater Will and the 2-Fingers want, so they revive the tarnished and use Grace to guide them towards Greatrunes and lordship.
Doesn't grace come from Marika though?
@@MangoMeoww Maybe? It did before she shattered the Elden Ring, for sure. But if it still does, it might suggest that it was Marika and Radagon that were of opposing minds (somehow, despite being the same person). Perhaps it was Radagon that conspired with Ranni to kill Godwyn, which would make the Numen-thread and the ties between Marika and the BKAs a false lead. Would explain the connection between death of Godwyn and Marika’s breaking of the Ring.
@@lol101lol101lol10199 I have no idea, all I think about is that a big theme in this game is blind faith.
The foundation of the lore in Elden Ring is more vague and unclear than any other Soulsgame.
The timeline is vague, the motivation behind major plot points is so unclear that you can make a case for opposing standpoints.
All this ambiguity is intensified by the plot points tying together and depending on your interpretation the stroyline/characters can do a complete 180.
As you said it is not necessarily a bad thing but at this point of the game we cannot come to a satisfying conclusion of the lore and its further metaphorical interpretation.
The DLC will have to do a heck of a job to tie things together.
Please more lore videos, even if they are just speculation it helps my understanding so much, I relisten to these all the time and I'm still so engulfed in figuring it all out. I know I have no say or even any relevance to lore hunting but I think I speak for many people when I say that your lore videos are amazing and greatly help our understanding. Either way thank you ratatoskar
We love your content! Thank you for teaching us some psychology with the Theory of Mind.
Thank you.
I like to think that From just leaves some questions unanswered, so that you form your own opinions on what the "lore" truly is.
You can write a story from beginning to end, and it might be a good story, with a few different ways to interpret the meaning of it all, but ultimately, it'll only convey one take on how things went down.
However, if you leave things open, and you dont share all the info. You leave a lot more up to interpretation. Which, in my opinion, can be a good thing.
Its like when you hear a song that doesnt really plainly explain what its about. People will guess what the meaning is themselves. Which sometimes makes it better, because it can mean something different to each person who hears it.
I think Elden Ring works the same way. Youre supposed to take the lore scraps and build your own opinion on what the meaning truly is.
If you cant find any meaning, maybe that's where you've naturally come to after all you've seen. Maybe you dont see any meaning at all, and for all you know, that might just be the right answer...
Ok but this is not a song. It's a game which is placed in the RPG genre. You can't be that vague with the story.
It's just lazy.
@@evacody1249 except you can, cause they were, and it succeeded.
I don't think Elden Ring is any more or less interpretable than other From Software games. It just depends on how specific/general you require the lore to be in your own head.
For example, in DS1, we never learn who Velka is, or how Gwynevere running off with the Flame God Flan introduces Gods who do not have Lord Souls, or how you are able to permanently kill npcs despite them all being undead. There has always been a certain amount of ambiguity we just have to accept when we try to construct our version of events.
To me, I feel like the themes of Elden Ring are an expansion of the themes of Dark Souls. In Dark Souls, the Flame which brings disparity to the universe is clearly a natural process which the Lord's are attempting to extend or recreate through artificial means and thus bring about their own downfall and eventual burning of the universe to ash. It's about the Lord's hubris in attempting to control natural cycles.
In Elden Ring, instead of the First Flame, we get the Erdtree and the Golden Order. But unlike the Flame, the Golden Order is imposed by the Greater Will and it's representatives. The Golden Order did not die out on its own, Marika/Radagon's regime was overthrown by conspiracy and war. It is less about nature than it is about social systems. We can see in the story that the Golden Order was a social hierarchy that needed to be maintained through more and more draconian means. We see constantly in the lore characters and factions resentful of the Golden Order and Marika's rule. The central theme of Elden Ring is this: In order for any social system to last, be it a nation state or a political system, it needs to change.
It's the same theme of stagnation from older games, just applied to a different domain.
Partial agree. The thing is, the central theme of every Miyazaki game except maybe Demon's Souls and Bloodborne is basically the same (though I am less familiar with the lore of those games, perhaps they are more similar than I think) - the futile attempt to fight back against the inevitable. In Dark Souls its Linking the Fire, in Sekiro its attaining Immortality, in Elden Ring its sealing Destined Death. They all attempt the same thing, to resist change.
Whats interesting in Elden Ring (of course in my own interpretation, yours may differ) is that Marika seems to have progressed past the villains of the prior games in that shes realised her mistake, partially. She shatters the Elden Ring and leads the Tarnished to Destined Death through Melina because she has realised that the Age of the Erdtree is decaying, and seeks to make a new world. Her error comes in trying to be at the head of this new world too, and I think her fractured body in the non-Ranni, non-Frenzy endings is meant to communicate that. Sure, she retains her position as vessel of the Elden Ring, but she doesn't look all that alive. Her new age will be an Age of Fracture, because she remains Eternal.
@@saulgoneman What I find brilliant about Elden Ring, is how the break down of the Golden Order wasn't inevitable, and was clearly the fault of Marika and the Demigods.
The reason the DS series didn't feel like this was because the major events were few and far between, so a timeline wasn't really warranted, like a mythology. This is totally different, between GRRM leaving holes for plot and FS doing the same, we are missing half the book. Hopefully the DLC will round out most of this info. If its in the likeness of DS, it'll be brand new info that we wouldn't have been able to piece out with the old information. If its like GRRM we may have been able to. Either way, this story is a puzzle with all middle pieces missing.
So, basically, the lore is incoherent & you'd have to headcanon in order to make sense of it.
I think that something every single lore channel has been and continues to miss is GRRM's contributions to the world. We as a community need to move beyond the "this is big dark souls" understanding of the game, and that's not just in terms of gameplay(no summons, no bleed, no spells, no fun) but also the world. The foundation of the world is based on Martin's ideas, I suggest looking at David Lightbringer for the themes/mythology that Martin works with, and Preston Jacobs for a deep exploration of the complexity of schemes and plots, as well as his sci-fi works. GRRM is a heavyweight(no pun intended) in world building, and has been working with worlds at the size for ER for decades. It's foolish to try to understand ER only looking at it from a Miyazaki POV.
Thank you! This is what people are missing.
Just from a literary standpoint, so much of the text in-game is just completely misunderstood and somehow attributed to “translation issues”. It’s mind-boggling at times.
@@letsgitcrackin which texts are you referring to?
@@gorge3030 let’s use an example from the video..
The text says the formless mother
'bestows power on accursed blood' - accursed can mean condemned…and is not solely synonymous with evil.
The Mother of Truth can be interpreted as being an outer God, who grants power to those who call out to her (with the condition being that those who call out her are facing unjust suffering due to being deemed other/lesser-than e.g. “needing a wound”)
This does not mean that the “omens” are inherently evil, or that this Outer God has always been tied to their existence.
@@letsgitcrackin good catch!
I read an interesting tweet a while ago about the over arching theme of ER:
"Elden Ring is pretty blatantly about the development of natural philosophy, its transmutation into modern science and the associated golden age, and its eventual fragmentation and collapse as it became its own epistemological grounding"
I think that's one of the best descriptions about the metaphor that ER presents that I've read.
The philosophy oriented TH-cam channel Wisecrack did a video that explained this analysis pretty well if people wanna learn more!
@@BaldurL I'll definitely check that out, thank you! they make great videos, I'm surprised I missed that one.
@@ronzacharias5497 OK nvm upon rewatching that video I'm realizing I've steered you wrong. It's still an interesting video but it's less focused on natural history and epistemology and more on the sense of living in the time after the golden age and being haunted by that time. They basically draw a parallel to the shattering in Elden Ring to the widespread sense in our current time that we live in a world without a future.
Everytime I hear the Majula theme kick in 😫 so good
Elden Ring has “Game of Thrones” written all over it.
While people tend to believe that more people discussing lore would naturally lead to better and more fruitful speculation simply thanks to more eyes, ears, and minds being invested at once, I think in Elden Ring's this has actually caused problems through the sheer noise of everyone clamoring and rushing to get out videos that'll cement them as authorities to be respected and cited in all discussions about the lore. People like Ratatoskr and Crunchy OTOH, have taken a more deliberate, meditative approach to patiently working through the lore so as to avoid unnecessary confusion that could get the conversation around lore twisted in a tangled mess of knots. Sadly, the same can't be said for most lore channels as most people aren't comfortable with the uncertainty of taking things slowly.
I think the slow buildup of lore channels over the years, combined with the explosive popularity of Elden Ring, and the incredibly hyperdefensive babysitter "everybody and everything is valid" attitude that's become more and more prevalent among the real gatekeepers in this community, all combined to make it so the discussion surrounding the most confusing lore From have ever put together got off to an even rockier and more muddled start than what was necessary. The process will doubtless repeat once DLC enters the discussion, but hopefully, with time, all the noise will give way to measured discussion once all the content-craving masses have moved on to something else.
Side note, I have some ideas about ranni, specifically in terms of her connections to Eastern mythologies, that I'll be sharing with you and crunchy in your comments. Might lead to some newer insights, especially wrt the stars.
Crunchy.
@@ratatoskr6324 Hopefully savoury
If I remember correctly, there's actually post somewhere about how butchered the English translation for the game is. Ranni's story is reportedly highly altered from the Japanese version of the game, along with many other questlines.
Yeah, and on a similar note, I have been looking into Radahn's lore because I find it honestly confusing, and the Gravesword inscription explicitly says he challenged the stars to protect Sellia, it is more blunt and direct and unambiguous in the OG Japanese, and seemingly has nothing to do with the Golden Order... which just makes his motivations even more confusing.
@@saulgoneman The Stars already ruined the Eternal City, seen in the form of Astel and the Lake of Rot, a ruined Eternal City. Additionally, there is literally a Fallingstar Beast in the Sellia Tunnel, evidently crashed in via a meteor from above. The source for the translation was in Vaati's video actually, where he then proceeds to bring up the only direct connection to the Golden Order and Radahn, which is that damn Telescope description, which doesn't even name Radahn explicitly. Godfrey has nothing to do with the Golden Order, so that armor description doesn't convince me, plus it is explicitly stated he admired Godfrey as the "Lion of the Battlefield", meaning as a warrior, Isshin-style. All I can really say concretely about Radahn is that he sought to be a mighty warrior, like Godfrey, and everything else was just an excuse to face the greatest opponents. Godfrey followed a similar path and loved fighting and bloodshed, seemingly less honorably than Radahn, actually.
The motivations of Radahn are never really stated outside of that one Gravesword. Also, why would a strict Golden Order adherent still accept weapons from the Carian Blacksmith? Why doesn't he employ Leyndell nobles, even the exiled ones? He instead relies on Jerren, who is loyal to the Carian Family. There is a Carian astronomy device still in Redmane Castle. Why didn't Radahn study incantations, which his father did. Why emulate Godfrey, the exiled ex of your Golden Order preacher-man's new woman, who the Greater Will had no use of anymore evidently, compared to your incantations practicing biological father. Why dare to use fire, when the Golden Order despises all forms of fire as directly opposed to the Erdtree. Hell, Radahn is proud of his red hair while his father was ashamed of it, because of its "fire" connotations. Finally, why would Radahn accept Rykard's help during the war in the form of the Abductor Virgins, which Malenia's Cleanrots destroyed in great numbers based on that one cave. Rykard is the Lord of Blasphemy and is violently despised by the Golden Order, and vice versa. Also, there is the Radahn portrait hanging very prominently in Rykard's own mansion. Between Radahn's actions regarding the Stars and the seemingly lack of concrete connections between him and the Golden Order types, never even mentioned in Golden Order item descriptions, I am honestly just confused. It is more frustrating because he is basically a beast when we meet him, and never actually speaks, so unlike, say, Ranni or Morgott or Rykard, we don't even know his motivations.
How can that be when the main writer is grrm an english speaker. The community just has blown some stuff that could be translated a bit diffrent so out of porportions that people say stuff like you.
@@xeibei4804 Martin didn't write the game dude. He wrote the basic mythology, sent it over, and FromSoft and Miyazaki actually wrote the game in Japanese and then it was translated. There literally were localizers on the game.
Link to Zio's video on the Ranni translation stuff, with a comment in the comment section from somebody in the very company who localized the damn game. Do your own research before commenting on anything at all, thanks pal: th-cam.com/video/sS08xpL0m8U/w-d-xo.html
@@xeibei4804 I never made the assertion that what I claimed was the exact case. My claim was that there was a post that said the English version of the game is not a 1:1 match with the Japanese version.
I have been very open about Dark Souls II being my favorite of the trilogy. I enjoyed the story beats in the game where our character entered memories of the past and were in fact players in those events. While there is no mention in Elden Ring of an unknown maidenless one playing some important role, I still wonder at the possibility that in some DLC we are able to explore the past of this world by actually witnessing turning points in it. I think that would be quite exciting, and it might answer some questions as well as organize events in time. I think about the chalice dungeons being informative about eras in time just by giving them in a particular order; cues as subtle as that are what could be in store.
It can be interpreted but it requires knowing most of the universe and universes and most of creation, even if it's just from a spiritual perspective. Only then can one grasp what elden ring represents.
to me, it is really simple.
is it really simple? Or have you drawn false and/or simple conclusions.
@@dugglebay3483 its honestly pretty easy
I feel like Ranni and the Assassins being allies of convenience is what fits the best . We know Ranni's goal and motivations (to free herself of her Empyrean flesh and the Two Fingers so that she can establish a new Order outside the purview of them Two Fingers and presumably Greater Will), but that doesn't then imply that the Assassins have the same goals or motivations. What we do know is that the *actions* that they undertook served both their ends.
I think its telling that Godwyn is the *only* of the Demigods to die "wrong", and we also know that Godwyn dying in Soul only seemed to allow Ranni to die in Body only. From this it isn't hard to infer that this is the specific goal for the Night of Black Knives for Ranni, but the fact that we can also be fairly certain that the Assassins killed many other Demigods instead of just Godwyn (which was all that Ranni needed for her ends) suggests they had their own goals and motivations.
I think the fact that the Black Knives come for Iji and Blaidd after Ranni slays her Two Fingers suggests that the Assassins are actually working for the Two Fingers. Put a pin this, I'll get back to it.
While Marika's exact motives are unclear, I think her goals are one of the things we can be absolutely sure of in the game: She wants the Tarnished to slay the Elden Beast. Hewg and Gideon's dialogue combined with the GOD SLAIN victory splash pretty much confirm this. The dialogue from Melina at the Churches seems to show a progression of Marika beginning to question the Golden Order, to finally deciding to shatter the Elden Ring. We know the Elden Beast is closely associated with the Ring, and we know the Elden Beast to be an incarnation of Capital-O Order.
From there it isn't hard to imagine a faction of the Numen who perhaps became more loyal to the Golden Order than to Marika herself that, perhaps at the behest of the Two Fingers sought to punish Marika and her children for questioning (or even acting against) the Golden Order. (Another note, but this is even more in speculation territory is that its interesting that Godwyn befriended the Dragons instead of Genociding them as did Godfrey/Marika did with the Fire Giants, so perhaps the Two Fingers weren't exactly happy about it?)
This brings us back to the Night of the Black Knives and the Assassins.
As for "How did Ranni know about the Rune of Death and Malekith or how to steal it?" I mean - I honestly don't understand the need for a detailed explanation here. Ranni is shown as one of the more canny characters. She's Radagon's daughter. Is it really that hard to imagine a scenario where she figures this out somehow? As for the act of stealing - the game definitely shows her as being a very powerful actor in her own right - from how bad she ultimately fucks up her Two Fingers (and the giant crater she apparently made in doing it), to her instakilling you if you ignore her warnings after giving her the Amber Draught. I, again, don't understand how her stealing a fragment of Destined Death on her own is really that far fetched.
tldr
"Something something Elden Ring... blah blah blah now Tarnished go kill everything"
-What new players hear
You can also tie the misbegotten to the crucible as well since they have scales, tails and wings. Yup, it's a mess!
I agree and disagree. For me, I can clearly see many overarching themes, sub themes and motifs; I think the most important is, as you say in the video, that of struggle- but I think it’s more than that, in that that same theme is explored as evolution (the crucible, Farum Azula beastmen and their fingers, societies that were once flourishing have since gone and new life/society has replaced it, literally on top of it), disease (Scarlet Rot, Caelid), problems with having children (this is a common one with Miyazaki, all of Bloodborne is a miscarriage/pregnancy metaphor), Yin vs Yang, light versus dark and on and on.
But I also think you’re right. Because I think Elden Ring is high art, full stop. And you can interpret it as you wish, just as with any art.
Everything created by someone is art. But just because everything is art doesn't mean they're objectively good or bad. Art is just expression.
nice pfp
The questions you were asking about the Black Knife Assassins aren’t unhinged at all my friend - they’re spot on. They’ve plagued me for weeks and you didn’t even dive into half the conundrums they present when examining their allegiances. The Night of the Black Knives is so central to the game’s story that it’s very strange to me that the game was released in a state that made it so unintelligible.
I appreciate this video wholeheartedly because I pretty much agree with all of it. I could maybe explain away your Omen example, but there’s no need because your point stands strong regardless. We’re missing something(s) and the DLC will have to solve it. I’m very much looking forward to that moment.
The Black Knives are intentionally a mystery. I hope they will get expanded on in DLC, but I think Miyazaki just likes these annoyingly important mysteries.
The dlc will explain nothing and only give us more questions, like they always did.
The central theme I found in Elden Ring was this: Destiny, and people being born into, or searching for, finding, accepting or rejecting their destinies depending on what they think/feel is best...
Morgott was an Omen, a being of the Crucible with Horns, Scales and a Tail born into The Mother of Truth's "religion"... but he rejected his destiny, his cursed blood and the Mother of Truth, all in favour of the Erdtree and the Golden Order.
Mohg, on the other hand, found his destiny when The Mother of Truth revealed herself to him: His choice stood between living the lowly life he was seemingly destined for as a bewinged Omen, or becoming the founder of a great dynasty.
Malenia, Miquella and Ranni were all born as Empyreans, but they, much like Morgott, considered the divine blessings/destinies they were born into (Scarlet Rot, Eternal Youth, safety under the Golden Order's rigid systems,) as something more akin to curses to be rejected -- Miquella researched methods to cure him and his sister of the influence of Outer Gods, while Ranni instead elected for outright casting aside her body and life, just so she could become the master of her own destiny.
Melina spends most of the game looking for her purpose, her destiny, and embraces the destiny she finds wholeheartedly, even though it'll kill her, because she sees that the world is in dire need of the change her destiny will bring about. It's no coincidence that she is closely associated with Destined Death, hence the ease with which she accepts her own.
Shabriri, and the entire faction of the Chaos Flame, in the meantime, reject everything: Either their innate destinies were so horrid that they eventually came to desire burning down the entire world, or they were just so guffin' crazy that they was born into the burn-everything destiny and were totally into that... which would explain why Shabriri is so omniloathed...
Marika herself seems to have an agenda geared towards rejecting her destiny through a very convoluted plot necessarily imposed upon her by her position: She basically had to betray herself/Radagon, who was all for embracing their destiny and maintaining the Golden Order, as well as Maliketh, her half-brother Shadow Beast, AND the Greater Will, _while still being the vessel of its Elden Ring,_ all without letting suspicion slip until the very last moment... It's implied that she managed to get a few co-conspirators in on her plan as well, (or that she is just that good a mastermind to have set up several pieces working independently,) such as Melina, the God-skins, the Black Knife Assassins, Ranni and possibly also Miquella.
Either way, I do not agree with you that Elden Ring's lore is uninterpretable, or even that it's impossible for all of these seemingly all-over-the-place plot threads to somehow be a part of a greater whole. Quite the contrary, in fact: I think I have a pretty good grasp of what went down in the backstory. But much like how we're still making new discoveries about Bloodborne, we're going to be analysing and gaining understanding of and putting together the plot puzzle of the events in Elden Ring for many years yet to come. Have patience.
For an answer to 11:20 , or maybe some insight. It might be important to recognize that death has taken different forms in a somewhat linear way the ghostflame->Black Flame-> and finally the Black Blade, irrespective of what each is exactly, they are the purest forms of death, perhaps the black knives use several rituals of death. Perhaps something separate and interesting for you, the deathbirds who serve as keepers of the ghostflame were said to be children of the twinbird (Twinbird shield description) although it is only speculation perhaps the deathbirds were the retainers of death created by placudisax in his period of dragon rule.
I never even thought of that interpretation of the Deathbirds, but birds in general seem associated with the Dragons based on the Storm themes and the Stormhawks presence in Farum Azula, near an Ancient Dragon no less, so that is possible.
@@TheStruggler-wb7mk In general I think the connections between certain animals based on features is pretty relevant to any discussion regarding Dragons and the Nature of the crucible, considering that nearly all dragons have wings, fire breath, and even most "flying dragons" have horns, but at this point in our understanding of the lore, I think people are going to have to speculate without concrete evidence. You bring up an interesting point about the birds in farum azula so I figure this reading of "Law of Regression" and "Law of Causality" might prove further insight into whatever ideas you might entertain th-cam.com/video/5oPNC2qpF4k/w-d-xo.html
i guarantee you that this will become a lot more clear when someone does some literal translations the eng translators dont seem to do the best job
Yes. What we need is a literal translator. Someone message Aruki Mania right now.
Yeah as mundane as it sounds this is actually true
@@hi_austin i just checked up on his channel and 5 years later he seems to still be busy with bloodborne so something tells me who ever does take up the endeavor they are gonna be in for a challenge
Yup. Just look at Ranni's entire ending and thus motivations and that whole mess. Same thing happened to Radahn's Gravesword about protecting Sellia, makes his actions way more heroic in the OG Japanese.
One: I am glad that someone else sees the lore as near uninterpretable, 2: I like the MH trap symbol you have in the vid, and finally I started wondering about if things could be interpreted without contradiction (I know there are contradictions in all souls games) when I saw the rock snakes outside of the Evergauls. Been trying to figure out who made those and sees thru them but cant
I thought that they maintained the Evergaols but if you kill them all nothing happens. Although that could just be an oversight.
@@fastenedcarrot9570 I thought that too until I saw their organization. A number pointed towards a number pointed out. Also the groups of them you find in random areas like Cahlid that have explosive ones before one of the multifaced orbs.
My man has taken some frenzy damage
It is also an hermetic reference (related to alchemy), The foundations of Magicka: Seek knowledge, but mind your Freedom of thought from dogma and follow your own principles, but in simbiosis with the laws of nature, opposed to the laws of men or the so called "power", like rich families and countries, big clusters of greed in general. Also: Runes are just Souls, but transformed in the crucible (with the hammer of marika), to shape their owns desires and ambitions, thats why the Elden Ring is so powerful, because the souls and wills of those who are intertwined in the Great Rune create a will powerful enough to be called a GOD (basically a colective soul), and feeds on the souls of those who follow and pray them in form of a erdtree (parasite). Basically Elden Ring is "we live in a society" but in a pretty game. Do what thou wilt, in a beautiful open world.
I think Miyazaki wanted to fundamentally change his approach to storytelling in Elden Ring due to it being an open world. Rather than filling a world with npcs, dialogue, and quests, Miyazaki crafted lore and history in Elden Ring specifically to create the sense of a world vaster than it actually is. Fundamentally, he does this by creating layers that intertwine. As different elements are made connect, each point of intersection creates its own sub-story and questions and raise our curiosity. The dungeater comes in contact with the omen, perhaps then creating the seedbed curse. The cursed blood of the omen derives from the formless mother who perhaps had some prior interaction with the crucible. Marika's plan doesn't make sense because all we see are the outcomes of betrayals, misunderstandings, and mistakes all woven into one another. The problem (and the genius) of it is that we want to have one story where all the pieces fit together. I'd wager that even Miyazaki himself doesn't have an answer to all of the lore and questions that we have about Elden Ring. To have a story surpass one's own capability of telling it I think is a hallmark of a true narrative genius.
I thought I'd seem someone post Miyazaki has said there is a cohesive story and he's deliberately removed information from the game to make it ambiguous. Whether that is true or not is up for debate.
I agree with everything you said except the last sentence. "To have a story surpass one's own capability of telling it is the hallmark of a true narrative genius." I definitely disagree, I think it's more difficult to tell a story than to understand it yourself. Having a story make sense in your head, versus communicating that story to another person, are completely different things. And they require completely different skillsets. Some people are better at one, and some are better at the other.
For example, I find it very difficult to efficiently / concisely explain complicated things. I tend to stumble over my words or over-explain. Communicating my ideas is the hard part - they exist perfectly fine within my own head, because the brain can simultaneously access many individual concepts and combine them in real time to build a generalized understanding. But in order to communicate those concepts, you need to compress them into the very limited tools we call words. You need to sequence those words in a very specific order so that others can understand them, and you need to remain conscious of THEIR interpretation.
Telling a story requires you to understand it yourself first and foremost. But then on top of that, you need the additional skills to share that understanding via a common language. I don't think coming up with the story in the first place is the limiting factor most of the time - I think the limiting factor is communicating that story in a way that effectively and efficiently conveys the ideas to another person.
The complexity of the ideas within our head can be infinite, but in order to share them, we must go through the narrow bottleneck of language. Or art. Or whatever you want to call it. But no matter how you look at it, transferring an idea from my brain to yours, without any of the information being distorted or misunderstood, is much more difficult than generating the idea in your own head in the first place.
@whirlwind872 Ture...
Crackpot Theory: Gideon is upset about the player becoming Elden lord because he's figured out that the player is a mimic. Furthermore, he knows this was Marika's plan all along. "No man may kill a god" after all.
The Story of ER definitely deserved more polish. It got so lost while I was playing.
"aspirations for loreship" got me, good one king
My central interpretation is that Elden Ring is about reform vs revolution. The most in-depth debates I've had are about whether or not the Golden Order is inherently corrupt or salvagable. I hold that it isn't worth saving. My conclusions are from the lore that we do know. The Greater Will is an ideology of hierarchy, wrought through coercion and violence. It wants to put people in their place by any means necessary. Ethics and morals are irrelevant to this question. Its grand narrative filters down and informs every bit of the culture we see.
The important lore events is that the Greater Will came to the Lands Between via the Elden Beast and its Fingers and took hold of the Elden Ring, which is the big magic "way the world works". It gave the boot to the previous deity/Elden Lord and empowered its own, Marika. Marika empowered her own Elden Lord, as she was empowered. Through campaigns of imperialism, the Erdtree took over the crucible/Great Tree, and natural death was sealed away into the Elden Ring, and those that weren't brought to heel (the dragons) were exterminated (the giants) or excised from grace (nomads, omen, etc) to live on the periphary. The Age of the Erdtree began, with Marika acting in accordance with the Greater Will's designs. Everything existed to serve the Erdtree and Golden Order, with the only reciprocation being blessings that literally trickling down, in the form of Crystal Tears and Crimson/Cerulean tears, benefitting only the chosen of the G.O. Everyone else gets to pound sand, their life and death beholden to the Greater Will utterly.
Then Marika decided to rebel, with all the catalyst plot events. This is the crux of my arugment: Marika committed acts of oppression and genocide across the Lands Between, and the Greater Will never blinked. Only when she stepped out of line and disrupted the Golden Order was she punished. The nasty stuff we see in the Lands Between, the slavery and genocide and oppression, this was all well and good to the Greater Will because it fit into its grand order. That is what the essence of the Golden Order is. Hierachy with no regard to ethics.
The debate comes into effect as to whether you also agree with this, or you think that someone like Goldmask can "fix" the Golden Order by inversing its very nature into some vague "Perfection", or you believe in burning it down via the Frenzied Flame, or you believe in discarding it entirely with Ranni's ending, or simply continuing on with it as is. To me, the item "Gold Tinged Excrement" is symbolic of the Golden Order, and every bit of worldbuilding we see asks us to interrogate whether the glittering spires we see are in fact truly good or just false monuments.
"It wants to put people in their place by any means necessary. Ethics and morals are irrelevant to this question."
Aside from not having any citation for this, because such citations simply do not exist, there seems to be a misunderstanding about ethics and morals. The notion of hierarchy that it is trying to impose *is* a set of ethics and morals. Your objection isn't that they don't have ethics or morals. Your objection is that you do not like the ones that they have. That's a pretty reasonable objection but the problem that comes back 'round from a theological perspective is, who is it that gets to decide on the appropriate set of morals in The Lands Between? This is a universe not just with one god that is objectively real, whose motives and thinking are unknowable, and whose proper authority is impossible from a mortal's perspective to interpret, but several. To walk in and say "This deity is evil based on standards and concepts that literally do not exist in this fictional world" is not to make a point against the Greater Will, but just to tell us that you aren't reading the story on its own terms.
"Through campaigns of imperialism, the Erdtree took over the crucible/Great Tree, and natural death was sealed away into the Elden Ring, and those that weren't brought to heel (the dragons) were exterminated (the giants) or excised from grace (nomads, omen, etc) to live on the periphary. "
The implication here is that all these are maniacally evil acts, but you've removed them all from their context, because you don't know the context, because the game doesn't tell you the context. Why is that important? Well, if I told you the American North invaded and conquered the American South for the purpose of imposing its sense of hierarchy on others no matter the cost, it SOUNDS like the North are the bad guys doesn't it? Its only within the details of the conflict, the slavery, that makes the North into the heroes. We don't have the details for any of these conflicts, or the personal motivations of those that initiated them, and so you can't make any moral determination about them whatsoever.
" Everything existed to serve the Erdtree and Golden Order, with the only reciprocation being blessings that literally trickling down, in the form of Crystal Tears and Crimson/Cerulean tears, benefitting only the chosen of the G.O"
Nearly every religion on planet Earth works similarly. This isn't an objective criticism. This is an argument against the beliefs and morality of most real people that have ever lived, including most every historical figure that you likely admire.
"Marika committed acts of oppression and genocide across the Lands Between, and the Greater Will never blinked."
You're literally making this up. There's no evidence whatsoever to what the Greater Will did or did not do, and did or did not believe about Marika's actions.
"Only when she stepped out of line and disrupted the Golden Order was she punished."
You don't know if that's true or not, and you don't know to what degree the Greater Will has the capacity to punish her. Quit making things up.
"The nasty stuff we see in the Lands Between, the slavery and genocide and oppression, this was all well and good to the Greater Will because it fit into its grand order. That is what the essence of the Golden Order is. Hierachy with no regard to ethics."
Pure fantasy. You have absolutely no idea what the Greater Will's opinion was on any of this. Even its single direct link to the world, the Fingers, are not themselves directly linked to the G.W. as evidenced by them needing to spend ages in an attempt to speak to the G.W. If I'm wrong, please, show the in-game direct evidence, not evidence through an intermediary who might be wrong or lying, for the Greater Will's opinion on *ANYTHING*, anything at all.
You aren't giving lore. You're repeating your own bias back to us, and using your bias as the reference for your conclusions. You might be right about everything you say. You might be wildly wrong about everything you say. Your theory is entirely dependent on conjecture on the innermost personal thoughts of characters we never even meet in the game. It is objectively ridiculous to call the debate about whether the Golden Order is salvagable when you can't even show what exactly it is that you're salvaging or destroying.
@@JD-xz1mx I was gonna respond with a well thought out argument, but you're just some pompous stranger online. You don't deserve engagement, bye.
wrong!
Step 1: be cursed by the dung eater
Step 2: When reborn, born as an Omen.
Step 3: if ya nasty, like Mohg, you make a deal with the devil, who bestows power on Omens who turn to her.
It seems totally consistent to me
Yeah I'm not sure why hes so hung up on this. There is nothing (that I know of) to suggest the Mother of Truth has anything to do with any other Omen aside from Morgott and Mohg. It makes sense that they are just cursed brothers (from Morgott's perspective at least), like Miquella and Malenia. Double cursed, if you will.
Returning to this video post dlc. This will be interesting to see if will your questions were answered. Lol
Now that I've finished the video, I believe it's central theme is about the hypocrisy that exists in a world that is supposedly governed in a world of order. Both Marika and Ranni are hypocrites, and even the motives of the Golden order can now be put into question since it is implied that the fingers has lost their connection to the Golden Order for some time. Every being that governs this world seems to live in hypocrisy, yet there's supposed to be some kind of order going on here. lol
With so much of the lore relying on hypocrisy as it's centeal theme, it makes no wonder you came to the conclusion that it was uninterpretable when this video was released.
10:40 I think the black knives killed Iji in retaliation for Ranni abandoning them after the deed was done and they were chased.
Elden Ring seems to be primarily concerned with ideology, meaning, identity. All things in the world have a naturalistic state to them that gets fed through a prism of ideology and transformed physically as such. For example the Erdtree is just a big tree in a naturalistic sense but trees also provide shelter and food and in this emotional relationship we have with it we grant it meaning as a radiant golden beacon at the center of religious worship.
As for Queen Marika, I don't think she makes sense as a character with wants and motivations. She really only makes sense to me as a thematic object, the avatar of the Golden Order. Her "children" shouldn't necessarily be thought of as blood offspring but are the people of the world that carry the influence of the Golden Order and through living and struggling in the world discover their own identity and meaning. These competing ideas bend and twist the established Order. So Marika herself shattered the Elden Ring as her own influence was shattered. On the opposite end you have Marika's "husbands" who in marrying the Golden Order annihilated themselves. Godfrey losing the meaning he once had and Radagon losing his very identity. "Amounting only to sacrifices"
Beautiful. Thanks for this.
Unhinged , Unhinged... Imagination is Un hinged people. Language wielded like a sword swung by those who aren't aware they are being used.
Whoa
Somebody call a medic, my guy here's been stabbed by the video 😂
Shut up lmao
@@johncra8982 I'm just pointing something out I have noticed a lot recently. I'm just trying to make some kind of metaphor to get my point across. I'm still subbed and don't feel personally attacked or anything.
I feel there is a certain power in saying what you see. Than maybe others will notice these peculiar paterns forming in everyday speech online and boom it loses a lot of it's power.... for some people.
@@SJDSH777 😶👍
"Everything rots and stagnates. There are always people that will cling to the rotting carcass of something and there are always people that are trying to burn it away."
That's so deep. I've always liked the meaning of dark souls. I highly sympathize with Solaire for he is the only happy guy in a dark world.
But that quote yu made there. It's exactly how I see our world, our politics. It's so fascinating to me that those games resonate so much with what I believe and like.
Thank you very much for that.
I think that the "cursed blood" of the omens, to give an analogy to programming imo, is like an abstract class, witch means it is something with undefined behaviour of a certain function and the association with an outer god bestows such powers to the omen kind. So the curse of the Dung Eater basically disassociates the afflicted from the influence of any outer god, but the outer god can, if the owner of the blood so desire re-associate with that person. This would explain why the omen are born without grace, but Morgot and Mogh are able to connect in the end with different outer gods.
And also, that would give meaning to the "BLESSING OF DESPAIR ENDING" and the name of said ending as it is a BLESSING because it frees The Lands Between from all outer good influence and also DESPAIR because by the strength of the "shielding from outer goods" it kills any possibility of faith, hence everything falls to despair.
i disagree
@@globebaby ok, why?
your wrong
@@globebaby wow, with those argumentative skills you might as well run for presidency. That lvl 100 speech really paying dividend.
I wonder what made Marika’s lesser children “unwanted”? Were they lacking a certain desired attribute? Perhaps the attribute that makes one an Empyrean? And this is dark, but were they children that were forced upon her or perhaps she resented? The word “misbegotten” comes to mind, in that context but I have no firm theory around this. Her unwanted children seem to perhaps have served as sacrifices to whatever her ends were in the night of black knives. Similar to the way Melina’s relayed words of Marika spoke about the tarnished; “become a lord or a god, but should thou fail to become anything thou will amount only to sacrifice” Maybe someone more intelligent can pull on that very dark thread.
In Marika's own words.
Hear me, Demigods. My children beloved.
Make of thyselves that which ye desire. Be it a Lord. Be it a God.
But should ye fail to become aught at all, ye will be forsaken.
Amounting only to sacrifices...
@@pigzy9807
-Just that alone tells me Marika was an asshole. Selfish to the very end-
I take it back, someone pointed out a piece of evidence (that I forgot) that 3 of Marika/Radagon's children were worthy successors to take over Queen Marika's control/rule. Ranni, Miquella, Melaina.
Yeah, if anything, now I see the Greater Will, Erdtree/Elden beast as a complete parasite.
-All she ever saw were pawns. Even from her own children- (But she still did do.. Whatever it took to free herself from the Greater Will's reign.)
I wouldn't be surprised if the Erdtree/Elden beast are parasites, that came from Queen Marika's world. Looking for a new land to control. (In the fight with the Elden beast, you could see plenty of other Erdtrees off in the distance.)
Queen Marika saw an opportunity in the Lands Between with the Giants and orchestrated a long-winded scheme to have enough freedom (or reason, after Godwyn's death) to shatter the Elden Ring with the hammer she brought from her own realm.
Overall? It's a pretty cool and interesting story for me. I was very entertained with what i managed to scrape together. (And continue to scrape & gather together.)
@@introvertedwall44
Marika wanted to free herself from the Greater Will's grip because she is rotting away and wants to die.
I know not of the reasons why'd she removed the Destined Death from the Elden Ring but other than letting her kin live an immortal life and prevent Godwyn's death.
Without Destined Death governing over the balance of the world, there can only be suffering and stagnation as the result.
Marika wanted to bring back and guide the Tarnished to The Lands Between in order to seek the Elden Ring but gave them the freedom of choice into what they would want to do with it once they stand before the Elden Ring.
Should they become a Lord to become her consort despite her wanting release, or aid Ranni, the next empyrean for the coming of the new age, or burn it down altogether by the all-consuming yellow fires of the Frenzied Flame.
You have a great mind, and I love your videos. However I think it’s a mistake to assume that everything is metaphorical. In many ways Elden Ring is so big that it takes the post-modern approach of intentionally being incomprehensible. It’s possible that there isn’t a deeper meaning at all beyond the fact that it’s so big that it represents a real world. Stories often tell deeper meanings without being metaphors, and I think DS is a great example. Regardless, I think you bring up an interesting point
The storytelling in From games is like somebody wrote a story then tore all the pages out of the book and then scattered them on the floor. You then read what you find in or out of order
Keep I mind, JJ is the one who made and co conceptualized ERs base lore and characters (the world, demigods and what they did/want), and then Miyazaki added to it for gameplay.
This is probably why it feels like a weird mishmash of lore and concepts, as you have 2 writers doing work that directly affects the other but doing it separately
I had a lot of fun figuring out the story of dark souls
I don't get anything about elden ring, the story is beyond nonsensical, there's elements of dark souls, bloodborne and hell even sekiro in a way, but there's no real cohesion to any of it- it's a mess
A youtube comment isn't the best place to expound on this so I'll try to be succinct - if you understand DS3 to the point of being able to sum up its themes into a two word statement 'everything rots' then I feel as though I understand Elden Ring to the point of being able to do so in one word: revolt.
The only two endings which are more than the same cutscene with a different skybox and voiceover require a dedicated bit of work yet are decidedly revolutionary while the others are reformist. This is just one of many subtle examples that give me the same reaction you had to the Omen guarding the Crucible talismen - these things weren't done by accident. Maybe another developer could do something like that by coincidence but Fromsoft is more deliberate than that. Every time I've had that reaction it's been in a situation where I am trying to rein in my own wild interpretations - because I *want* more revolutionary art to exist - but there is absolutely no other conclusion I can draw from the fact that the literal changes that you make to this world's unifying theory of physics made manifest got a fraction of the effort that the two endings where you leave everyone alone so hard you fuck off of the planet entirely (after a quest that revolves entirely around killing your masters btw) or burn everything down got.
Genius
love this videos, i get lost but very interesting
Personally, for me, the main theme is the consequences of removing "death" from the world.
When Marika sealed death away, she didn't stop actual deaths, she just chained the spirits to the terrestrial plane, so that they may never go to the afterlife. That is why the lands between are swarmed by ghosts and spirits, despite supposedly not having death.
To do that, to avoid the unevitable death, "destined death", she had to meddle with time. This stopped fate and destiny overall. It made things rot because the cycle of life was stopped (Malenia). It made Miquella be a child forever. It made rebirth and erdtree burial a necessity to alleviate stagnation, yet omen and other beings could never return, etc
The only way to make the world "move forward", is to bring "death" back into the world. Let things end, so the new can start.
In my opinion, it's very similar to the message of the painted world of Ariandel.
I think the core metaphor you seem to be missing is the Elden Ring itself. It's the "logic" of the world. It seems to control how people are born and die, how society functions, and how people interact with their "destiny." Everyone is trying to effect that logic in some way to their own ends. Some people want to create a certainty of "Order," some want anarachy where all are equal and chaotic, some want to embrace uncertainty and make a world where everyone is free to explore their destiny without the oppression of the Ring's "Order," some wish to flip the Order, and some want to simply maintain the status quo. Everyone is fighting for their own vision of how they think things should be run. Just look at how the game starts with Limgrave. It explicitly shows you a land that is crushed under the heel of a tyrant who exploits those living under him, and pushes you to overthrow him. Then we move on to Raya Lucaria, where the aristocrats have literally walled themselves off and left their land to fend for itself. Again, we're pushed toward a sort of rebellion against this. But then, we get our second Great Rune, and we go speak to the Two Fingers, and now it's "Hey, maybe YOU should be the king." and every faction is suddenly vying for your attention, pushing you to enact their idea of "Freedom," or "Order," or "Chaos," or "Justice." The theme is the "Rule of Law" and "Governance," and the responsibility of "Leadership." In Dark Souls and Bloodborne, we weren't the ones who chose the system, only how we interacted with it. In Elden Ring, From is asking us, what would we choose if we were Gwynn?" At least, this is what I got out of it, maybe DLC will age this comment poorly.