A lot of really great points in here. It's sad how many people are calling ER and it's DLC perfect 10/10 master pieces and seem willing to overlook or ignore literally every problem it has.
Everyone knows there are problems. It’s still a masterpiece. Everything is flawed yet wr still find ways to call things masterpieces, elden ring is one such thing.
I like many aspects in this video. Particularly, I realised, too, that torrent destroys in many ways the experience of previous Souls games where it was necessary to make ones way through different levels, always feeling the danger of getting hollow. When Fromsoft decided to make an open world Souls game they had to solve the problem of how to connect the locations in the world with meaningful activities of the player to do. In other open world RPG games, for example, this is often solved by guiding the player by a main quest and (often infinitely many) side quests that are connected to each of the locations on the map. Sometimes one will also be able to unlock certain parts of the map after a certain progression in the game. In Souls games, however, the player is free to decide what to do, there is no quest log that tells him what should be done next. This is why exploration in Elden Ring is so great, I can go anywhere I like, and do everything I want. However, this magical journey can be made only once, namely in the very first playthrough. When starting with a new character or going into NG+ one notices that 90 percent of the world (including all the side dungeons) is, in fact, unimportant for the story progression in the game. It is possible to skip even some of the legacy dungeons (like Volcano Manor or Raia Lucaria) to beat the game. And out of the 165 bosses in the game only a handful need to be actually defeated (12 if going the route Godrick+Radahn before going to the capital). In this sense the actual story of the game feels way too short for the huge world that is presented. They made a story that would fit a typical Dark Souls game but a world that is as huge as the Land's between should have had a much larger number of mandatory activities for the player. As just one example, the random loot in many of the side dungeons could have been replaced by special quest items that are needed for progression. Like, collecting a certain number of these could have allowed one to unlock certain new areas. This would have made everything much more interesting and engaging. But the way it was solved in ER gives the impression of an empty world, much emptier than the worlds of Lordran, Drangleic or Lothric which suffer from the undead curse.
This is by far the best ER critique out there and it's insane it has less than 6k views. While there are many other critics of the game, most tend to devolve into rants about some mechanical elements like never ending comboes, millennium windups and waterfowl. This one instead keeps it cool and dissects even issues others seem to overlook. There are particularly 3 points I find compelling here. 1, how devoid of stakes the open world exploration is. 2, how trivial weapon variety and roleplaying is when a couple of options outclass the rest. And most pressingly, 3. It is genuinely sad that FROM has lost the courage to create meaningful consequences for the player's actions. It's so sad to see them let the player off the hook so easily. It devalues all player interactions and removes all impact from quests. It makes me feel like I don't really have agency when the game will make sure I get everything no matter what I choose to do. No choices feel meaningful anymore.
10:54 this is such an amazing point, especially when you consider the mad brilliance of demon souls. This is absolutely something demon souls would've been willing to do in a heartbeat, and it would've been so amazing. If you betray your level up maiden, she stops leveling you up. Would've honestly been brilliant.
I didn’t get this, Melina swearing to hunt you down is an ending cutscene after the frenzied flame ending, there’s no chance for her to punish your leveling up anyway (at least ingame)
This is truly one of the best ER critiques out there, I agree with all your major points, this game was a huge letdown for me aswell :c While it remains one of the best open world games out there, it just goes to show how this formula can only produce inferior quality games if compared to the classic Fromsoft level design, which i found lacking in here (too few legacy dungeons imho). I feel that we lost so much in exchange for the open world that it wasnt even worth it, and seeing how few people criticize the game at all (and even when they do that it's just for complaining about minor issues like balancing and spirit ashes) is enough to make me fear that FS might continue to chase this direction in the future, considering how well the game sold :/ Fromsoft is my fav developer, I want to see more unique games of theirs, not them trying to omologate to the most popular and mainstream gaming trends. I really hope what we get in the following years will be more bold and experimental as their first projects or sekiro (my favourite game ever!). They surely dont lack the skill to make more masterpieces, I believe in fromsoft but I will continue to criticize this game for as long as i'll live. It's good to see people who share the same disappointment, I was beginning to feel lonely lol.
The open world adds absolutely nothing to the Souls formula, at least not after Limgrave and Weeping Peninsula (the only good and interesting open world areas in the game) Also, the horse and by proxy the jump mechanic take away one of the main aspects that made past Souls games immersive and good; the feeling of being grounded and minuscule Edit: forgot to say something regarding the speed of combat and stamina management Like you said, enemies just have longer "combos" (I myself don't feel this way except for Malenia) but instead I feel like most enemies are too slow for the A/P (average potential) player stamina; actions consume too little stamina, the stamina bar is by default long and it replenishes quickly, literally killing one of the main gameplay aspects of past Souls games - stamina management And like you said, this forces the player to not care about defensive options, just about offense and offense which gets boring after a while I'll quote DS2 here, that game is hella slow and yet the average gameplay loop there is more engaging and immersive because you actually have to care about what you do and when you do it (stamina-wise speaking), this also, by proxy, makes PvP miles better, with the skill floor being high and the ceiling just a bit higher; unlike ER where the floor is absurdly low and the ceiling absurdly high, creating a void in the middle
While I disagree with some stuff, this is a very underrated video. There's a ton of points that seemingly no one else has touched on, like how almost any open world fight can be escaped by Torrent.
You touched upon two great points that I agree with: 1. The need to spam the roll dodge or perish 2. The lands in between don't make much sense as an actual fantasy world due to no cities, people, etc.
The second is pretty much the reason why I could never immerse myself in this. The world never felt real, everything felt so gamey and "made" for us to play around with.
Thats been a huge problem for me in just about every fromsoft game, people brag on and on about the "immersive believable worlds, and the environmental story telling that makes you reflect on what society was like before the downfall" All I can think is "theres no way this world could have ever sustained the absurd population of madmen and zombies I keep killing" Soulsborne worlds are so transparently artificial it makes one wonder why they even bother with the environmental story telling angle in the first place. Theres no signs of ANY agriculture, no livestock, no crops, no SPACE for anyone to live in general. But nothing is more blatantly artificial than the CHARACTERS themselves, most of the appeal fans derive from them is completely built on a fictitious foundation of "Fan Canon", pretending there is more depth and nuance to them than there actually is. All any of these characters do is spout dull monotone expository dialogue while the mute protagonist just sits there in this vapid one sided conversation, regurgitating the same single minded hyperfixation bordering on neurodivergence that motivates their "journey". often rambling about meaningless unrelatable abstract concepts and occasionally referencing the imaginary relationship they might have with another character to which the player is never allowed to catch even a glimpse of, because having two NPC's interact with eachother might result in them either complimenting or- God Forbid CHALLENGING eachothers perspective and forcing them to reconcile with their own character flaws, and thats WAY too much character development for Fromsoft to handle apparently. Better to stick them with some Stoic Mute, Some wandering companion thats constantly evading their presence, a generic lifeless corpse we are supposed to empathize them grieving over despite having zero emotional investment in their relationship, or in Elden Rings case, just put NPC's in different rooms separated by about 15 feet and have the player relay messages between them like its a god damn game of elementary school telephone. "Tell Blaidd and Iiji I love them" how am I supposed to take this line seriously one these characters havent exchanged a SINGLE line of meaningful dialogue between eachother, these are NOT relationships, these are forced and artificial illusions. Its like TellTale games, once you play through enough of them you start seeing through the illusion of choice? Well once you play enough Fromsoft games you start seeing right through the illusion of depth in their story and characters.
Elden Ring's greatest flaw is its open world. I would have enjoyed it much more if it were designed with a central hub like Demon's Souls, or a linear progression with offshoots, like DS3.
This is the most underrated piece of Elden Ring criticism on TH-cam. Your notes on torrent, the mini dungeons, the open world and "boss fights" are spot on 18:17
Yeah, agreed completely. This game wasn't made for the Soulsborne faithful, it was made to be a broad-reaching, mainstream title which it succeeds at very well. Unfortunately, with the sales this game has already achieved (with more to follow when the DLC and GOTY version drops) I fear we'll never see a Souls/Bloodborne ever again. We might get another Souls game, but it'll be in name only. Why make a game 5mil people will buy when you can make one 20mil people will buy, and if they go back to making challenging, arcane, thought-provoking titles those new ER players aren't going to buy it, I fear. Nothing lasts forever, I guess. There are some great overhaul mods dropping in the future built on DS3 so at least the community can keep the spirit of the series alive. Can't wait to see some type of "hardmode" mod for ER that erases the map, shuffles item locations, forces you off of Torrent whenever you approach a camp, erases ash summons, etc (like the game already does when you get invaded) and cuts the player damage by 30-40% across the board. I am a lover of From bosses, in theory, just as much as I love their level design. But they greatly missed the mark with ER. The checkpoints before the boss is a part of it I hadn't considered, but what I saw as the main issue was From WANTS you to fight each boss as a group, either with your friends or by summoning those ash things/NPC's. As someone that plays these games solo it really made the boss mechanics seem sloppy, but maybe less so in a group (don't know as I didn't ever play with people/ashes, just a few times where an NPC summon was available did I use it and only to give the boss more health...). Malenia, whom seems to be the "standout" boss, seems like she should be in a DMC or Bayonetta game, NOT a Soulsborne. The other big issue I had were dual enemy bosses as they were not designed to complement one another. With the dual Crucible fight in one of the catacombs it was painfully obvious this was designed to be a 2v2 or 3v2. "Tough yet fair" never entered their minds when designing these types of encounters. The only "boss" in the game I truly loved was the Bell Bearing Hunter in Upper Caelid. That was a good, tough fight, imo. The legacy dungeons are the saving grace for the game (though they aren't enough to get me to replay it) If this were not an open world and was designed as a Dark Souls game it could have been incredible, but when these dungeons are capped by bosses that fall in 1-2 attempts it was just such a letdown. Idk, ER is a great action game, but its not a very good Souls-like, even though it had the potential to be the defining Souls-like for the genre moving forward.
FROM's combat has ditched fairness, predictability, deliberation and resource management in favor of spectacle and bombast. It's a far cry from what it used to be.
Spot on. I was wholeheartedly disappointed with Elden Ring despite being a From megafan. Elden Ring cured me from being a fan. I will still pay if they continue to provide proper pvp.
This makes a great companion piece to NeverKnowsBest's critique of the game. I felt a very similar way when playing Elden Ring, and I couldn't even finish the game because I lack the patience for some of the design choices. Going open world was a huge mistake in my opinion, and you point out some other very well observed criticisms, some I didn't even think about: your view on whether we should count normal enemies in bosses' clothing as boss enemies felt low-key enlightening, and I probably would have never made the connection between the players' increased base stamina and enemy attack strings. Additionally, even though it was just a short mention, I liked that you pointed out the crafting system (and consumables by extension in my opinion) having issues, which is something I heard noone talk about so far, but feels like a noticeable issue and a huge time waster to me. Overall it helps with my sanity, I really was questioning myself playing it and thinking of all the praise the game got from all sides. I wasn't sure if it's the game or if it was just me lol... Very promising debut video for your channel, I'm looking forward to hopefully seeing some more from you in the future! I wish I could give some you some constructive criticism, but I feel like this video has been speaking to me directly... Hope I can offer something in the future. Side-note, have played or heard of Outward? I'd be really interested to hear your thoughts on that game, as it feels like this would probably in your wheelhouse.
Thanks, glad you liked it. Good point on consumables; crafting makes them feel terrible to use because the limit for how many you can have in your inventory at once can be easily bypassed, but it just results in tedious use of the crafting window between each encounter. About Outward, I haven't played it, but from what I've seen it does look like something I would be interested in.
The crafting system was just implemented to litter the over inflated open world with useless collectibles, and by "useless" I mean they add NOTHING to the game other than just another obnoxious material to farm. I can't stand the artificial scarcity in Elden Rings items, like Arteria leaves, theres literally just ONE enemy in the whole game that drops it naturally at stupid low rates. Miquella and Trina flowers too. Why are you arbitrarily forcing the players to grind and farm RNG for these items, theres already a system in place that keeps them from overstocking on the consumables they produce. Same with Larval Tears and Ancient Smithing Stones, why are these arbitrarily restricted to be finite in each playthrough, if I have the ability to make ONE weapon +25 I should be able to make ANY weapon +25, especially since update balance changes can fundamentally shift the meta in DRASTIC ways. Lore explanations do NOT count, you can change insignificant lore details for quality of life features. Same with larval tears, there are already SO MANY in the game that it makes NO sense to put a cap on them per NG cycle. Stop bullying the player into NG+ and just let them experiment with your systems freely. Especially when we can't even take our great runes to NG+ and we don't even know what kind of DLC might be coming to the game! EDIT: and you know I could tolerate it if there was ANY consistency in the circumstances of these inconvenieces. Like Ashes of War? You let us freely move those from weapon to weapon. The durability mechanic is ALL gone. NPC's have a bunch of kill barriers put on them to prevent players from breaking questlines. You can fast travel from anywhere. We can alot flasks freely, level up freely. We have stakes of marika SOMETIMES. Elden Ring is not like old Dark Souls and Demon's Souls where the game's inconvenieces wanted to challenge you with decisions that actually MATTER. And even if it DID, it was still so much easier to start a new playthrough in the older games because they weren't overly padded out like a teenage training bra. I can't even stomach another playthrough beyond leyndell.
Ditto on the crafting… There’s lots of consumables to craft but very few that are useful. The truly useful consumables are bottlenecked by “exceedingly rare to find” materials that can only be farmed by killing enemies with a 1-3% drop rate, effectively non-renewable. So items that could open up new play styles like the bewitching branch, sleep pots, luring pots, iron jar aromatics, and drawstring greases are relegated to the “I don’t want to waste it so I forget about using it” category. But don’t worry, you’ll never run out of rowa raisins!
I mean relative to other open world games (with the exception of GTA) I think it’s a solid first try. I do think FromSoft players have gotten a bit spoilt, I mean if you get a great first play through at about 100 hours is poor replay-ability THAT big a deal? I mean sure, it may not be as exciting as your first go round, but when is a game ever as good as your first play through? You make some fair points, but yeah, I’m more willing to shrug and put this down to a solid first attempt, that FromSoft will no doubt learn from thanks to constructive critiques like this.
I completely agree. The exhausting comparisons to the previous Dark Souls saga is just tiring. One has to come into this game into what it is. It’s not Dark Souls. And all the complaints about the game being to huge, well it’s not meant to complete the game in one day. This game takes time. Many souls fans wanted to play this game as it was a linear game like before. Play the game a couple of hours a day - and take a break. Come back to it later.
I used to hate Dark Souls 3, like REALLY hate it, I thought the enemies were cheap, the bossfights were terrible and just ridiculously fast and aggressive for your characters toolset with absurd DPS, I dropped the game for YEARS after my first playthrough. Then I played Elden Ring, and suffering that entire game shifted my whole perspective on DS3, I saw the pauses in the bosses aggression, the telegraphs in their attack animations, and most importantly I took the lessons from Elden Ring and started leveling my *passive* stats, something I never had to do in DS1. Elden Ring made me realize how fair and awesome DS3 actually was by comparison, I've finished 3 different playthroughs in just this past year.
@@sasaki999pro my criticisms with ds3 isn’t the game play it’s more the atmosphere and over all way it was designed doesn’t feel like a souls game it feels like bloodborne 2 with a dark souls skin on top of it. It’s not a bad game but it lacks a whimsical quality ds1 and ds2 and even demons souls had.
If you think this is bad, I felt similar, but went back to my unfinished DS2 playthrough and actually liked it. After the bullet train of bs that Elden Ring's combat was, sluggish and awkward DS2 with heavy emphasis on stamina management felt incredibly refreshing (when encounters were designed around it, which is mainly in DLCs). Fighting fume knight was way more thrilling than any ER boss because needed to constantly think ahead on how much stamina I'm gonna use for dodge, how much for attacking and how much I will leave in case I screw up. Maybe DS2 combat wasn't that hopeless after all.
if ds3 was better it would be bigger. in my opinion elden ring is more fun. more tools to play with. games are about fun. you have on rose tinted glasses.
It’s just a big open world with nothing in it. These games work much better in linear path form like demons souls or ds2 or ds1 etc etc it becomes boring and tedious
Finally found someone honest about the open world. The praise of the lack of markers everyone and their dog gives the game is ridiculous. The game is great, but the open world is the same thing as all those other open world games.
I agree with everything you said 100%. I especially hate how Torrent kills almost all the tension in the game with his mobility. It really makes traversing the game unfulfilling. Thanks for the great video.
It's totally a pretty standard ubisoft map, let's be real. From fans are the most pretentious of b^%es, I swear. "Revolutionary designs, baby. I could wander for hours 10/10" 😂 I mean the views are nice, the world *is* beautiful... 🤨
It’s personally so funny for me that most of your critiques I did not face at all simply because I play games like a psychopath (I never: used Torrent to skip enemies or skip enemies in general, over-levelled myself (I think I was always under levelled 😂) or checked the map much, whilst theory-crafting why odd things existed (such as the mentioned traps in the catacombs) even if they were clearly just mechanics). Elden Ring is truely my niche game, and I think it’s the same for other likewise gamer-sadists. That’s why the Elden Ring fandom is so dedicated.
''The map would've been removed entirely.'' Are you insane? The open world is already a mess and 99% of people don't have 1000 hours to put it in to figure out where to go next. You also hate the horse? You'd want to WALK through the entire thing?!
I'll start by saying you do an excellent job explaining your opinions. You've thought through what it is you don't enjoy and are not just simply restating what many other critiques have already covered. Personally I don't agree with much of what you said but there are a few spots we see eye to eye.
Whether people agree or not with your options, I have to say this is one of the better Critiques I've seen. Some may just say (because it was not purely positive outside of the allowed critiques, maybe a fair point here or there or lacked an overdone background with music) that your opinion is bad, but I feel that you make some good points that should be taken into account. I, myself, feel that a game called 10 out of 10 or innovative should be in some way... innovative, outside of its Open World being a "first-time" creation for the people making it. Of course, it is an okay game. But with how people act like it can do no wrong (outside of the things they allow people to point out without getting upset, angry or immediately telling them that they're wrong), I do have to shake my head. People can have their options, but some "Fans" do strike me as strange when they shoot down any idea of how they (Fromsoft) could possibly make the game more enjoyable unless they agree. Overall, Elden Ring suffers from what I call Miyazaki-ism. If he is making the game or plays a bit part in its creation, there will always be that segment of players that will overlook the lack of overall innovation the Mainline Games (So, not counting Bloodborne or Sekiro) have had for a while now. That is not to say they are bad, but more that they are showing their age and need an overhaul to keep working if they want to keep making these games innovative. Adding a jump button that allows you to do it whenever you want, and a half-baked stealth system will not fix the problems that come for games that chose to change nothing important. Of course, games like DS1, 2, 3, Sekiro, Bloodborne and Elden Ring will always be praised. But I feel that Fromsoft will never be able to truly be innovative again, until Fromsoft and the Fans understand that gameplay being hard no matter the cost only hurts the ability for the ideas that helped make the games work in the first play to continue working. As long as they go out of their way to make overly hard games like Elden Ring, where bosses are so over tuned that it can kill a good amount of the fun that comes from fighting them, nothing new (as in ideas) can be created. I mainly hope they try and make games unlinked to the Souls' Style for a bit, in order for them to try new ideas that then can be taken back to make a better Souls game. But, who knows, maybe their next game blows us all out of the water and all my points are put to rest? We can only hope. Sorry for the wall-of-text. I just wanted to get this point off my chest, and to the people who just want to comment that my, or some else's opinions sucks, can you at least give an as detailed reason as to why, like I have here on my opinion? Not saying you have to, there is no reason you have to, but it would be nice to read.
Interesting and well thought out review! I definitely disagree with some of the stuff here but this is a good, concise video. I'm coming here from your SoTE review so I might copy and paste this review into that video since this comment is essentially commenting on ER as a whole, but either way I figured I'd put my thoughts out there. This'll be sectioned into three parts, what this video made me realize, what I already agreed with, and what I disagree with. I'll just mark this with a simple (1) (2) and (3) for anyone who wants to read one specific part, I'll also mark parts that are more specific to the SoTE review in (DLC) brackets too, although I haven't gotten to the DLC myself so feel free to just disregard everything I say because honestly I would probably do the same. This will also probably be split up into multiple comments so if this ends abruptly just check the replies. (1) I know this sounds dumb but I genuinely didn't even think of the fact that even though the game doesn't give you an explicit waypoint for stuff like churches or evergaols. You can still see it clearly on the map so it has the same effect. It's extra dumb because I found myself looking for those exact markings on a map for whenever I wanted to find them and yet the idea that they were just functionally the same, pretty stupid of me but also pretty funny thinking about it. I never really though about how artifical when and when you can't summon Torrent is, I just accepted it as "well that's how the game wants it to be so ok" but you're right it doesn't make sense in the context of the world or the situation. Also the summoning signs telegraphing when a boss was gonna show up was something I kinda clocked into in the base game but didn't fully analyze until now, again, stupid of me, but kinda funny. (2) The re-usage of bosses has always been something that annoyed me, I don't mind when it comes to stuff like the Tree sentinals, Erdtree Avatars, or the dragons because with the Tree sentinels it makes sense and the dragon, while being a much more egregious example, usually have some small distinction to make themselves different (even if ideally the distinctions should be much larger) but I can't excuse the game just slapping boss health bars onto random enemies and acting like it's a new boss without any tweaks or changes, this is more egregious with the Erdtree avatars because I feel like the avatars should have had different abilities depending on which minor erdtree they were defending, they do this with the Caelid one but that's the only one as far as I'm aware, like why not have the one by Raya Lucaria incorperate some Glintstone magic into it's moveset? maybe give it a staff instead of a hammer? (DLC) I actually noticed that the red rune bear you show in the DLC footage seems to have new attacks and things going for it so despite you citing it as a negative, I actually would consider that a fairly well done reuse of an asset, even if I would have preferred it to be more distinct, same with the GhostFlame dragon you showed which seemed to have a handful of new things to go along with it, basically I don't have a huge problem with reuse of assets aslong as the assets are different enough to stand out, and the red rune bear and Ghost dragon seemed to do that while regular enemies and to an extent, regular dragons and Erdtree avatars don't. I think the only (semi) regular enemy I think this actually works with is the Crucible knights, as they already feel like minibosses in and of themselves and aren't overused and enjoyable to fight. Also in terms of major Bosses like Astel or godfrey that's just straight up BS. And genuinely bad design, they should have just made it so there's a way to refight bosses you've already fought in an arena or a practise sort of way, like, think of some way to "relive your greatest fights" or something like that, I think some mods do that but it's baffling that they didn't do that in base game. There's actually a mod that I've been playing and enjoying alot so far called "Convergance" which actually enhances this issue in an attempt to fix it, instead of fighting regular Erdtree avatars, they just put a random enemy there and call it a boss, those weird cockroach thing's in Caelid, one's a boss now, a Grafted Scion? While actually excusable as the Scion was already a miniboss, it's a boss now. A random Erdtree gaurd? He's a boss now! It's definitely strange because otherwise Convergance has been great so far, just an odd choice to me. They also attempted to add more variety to field boss encounters but so far the only one I've found is a crystal crab boss who just shoots glintstone projectiles instead of water, maybe he did more but that's the only attack he used before I killed him, very dissapointing since it's quite a cool concept. This isn't me slagging on Convergance btw, the new spells and weapons you can play with in that mod are amazing and make it worth it imo. The lack of consequences in ER is also something that has bugged me, it just makes the character and by extension, the world, feel static in a way. I wish there were more diverging paths. More actual consequences, having bell bearings would be fine if the game didn't try so hard to push the illusion of consequences onto you, Convergance just makes the bell bearings something that each merchant gives you which helps this issue. But it shouldn't be in the base game. Characters should react to you doing bad or good things, give you items, treat you differently, have lasting impressions and impact, the characters aren't bad by any means, far from it, I just wish we got to see more of them rather than the static portraits we see throughout the game. I wish the catacombs and ruins were more unique. they serve their purpose and they're alright and kinda fun overall but god are they bland, and the only thing you really think when finding them is "Okay, where's the boss and loot." and I could do just fine without ever seeing another one of those imps. Like I still kill all the enemies in and around them and there are some kinda unique bosses like those shadow monsters and those erdtree statues, but they could have been so much more. Convergance actually does try and fix this by tweaking most catacombs to feel more unique by including different enemies and altering textures and layouts, so one point for Convergance. (DLC) Oh my god the Scadutree fragments are worse than I thought, I admit I initally thought that it was a nice system that made sure players of every skill level had a challenge, and also encouraged exploration, but that was under the assumption that they would be locked behind actually important areas or bosses, not just scattered around the place, and the fact they don't even have a unique glow for when they haven't been picked up yet, my god. And now that I think about it it's kind of counter-intuitive since as you mentioned, you can gauge and catch up with an area because of the runes dropped by enemies, so even if you are underlevelled, you can still get a chance to grow, the fragments don't do that, GOOD THING CONVERGANCE REMOVES THEM ENTIRELY BABYYYYYY ANOTHER POINT FOR CONVERGANCE YEAH LET'S GO, MODDERS FIXING A GAME FOR THE DEVELOPERS WE'VE REALLY REACHED BETHESDA LEVELS LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO Crafting wasn't needed What, you want more? I'll give as much explanation on this opinion on par with the amount of relevance crafting had. No seriously this isn't even a build thing. (Cont)
(3) Let's start with the bosses themselves, the ones that aren't just regular enemies with a health bar, but stuff like the Gargoyles, (most of) the Evergaols, you get what I'm going for. You mentioned that the only difference between each boss is " a samey slog, only differnent by how annoying each of them are" but I don't see it that way, I find learning each bosses moveset and patters, finding the ideal places to dodge and jump in so I can get an extra hit, and the overall experience of the bosses unique and interesting enough to keep me engaged, you mention in the DLC review that since every player is the same due to respec (which I disagree with but more on that later) that every boss is the same, but I disagree even with the examples you were showing while talking about it, that big shadowflame boss with all the fire, forcing you to space yourself out, is nowhere near the same as Morgott or Astel, granted this could be me taking a phrase far too literally when you meant something else but you get what I mean, I don't think all the bosses are great obviously, but there aren't any of these unique bosses that I haven't outright not enjoyed. One thing I do agree on is the arena thing, more arena variety would be nice. I do agree that there should be more attacks that require you to jump, the crucible knights ground stomp and most ground slamds should fall under this category but they just dont...Until Fromsoft decides they do for some reason, like yeah I'm glad jumping actually makes a difference but come on, give the circle button a break. The point i'm about to make is incredibly subjective but I don't mind Torrent, I'll mainly touch on the fighting enemies part of your argument. I find the combat enjoyable so I don't bother riding past enemies with torrent as a first solution, plus you need the runes to level up and get stronger so to me running past the enemies has always felt counter-productive unless you're just trying to get to a specific spot or just don't enjoy the combat as much as I do, which is fine, there have been plenty of instances where I've ran past enemies but I've always made sure to kill them atleast once so I get an understanding of how they work since again, I find that enjoyable. So when you asked "Who fights the rune bears? Nobody, not me! not you!" Me. I am the one singular person who fights that bear. This puffed up Paddington has nothing on me and my large variety of magical purple rocks. Despite your grievances with the map and exploration, I don't mind it as much. I agree that finding stuff on your own is more rewarding, and a reason as to why the Souls games became so popular, I think it makes sense for ER to have a map although I wish it either had everything laid out or nothing at all (yet another point to convergance for laying it all out at the start) I do agree it's not breaking convention by any means, but I kind of understand what people mean when they say that, I think what people mean is that, unlike most open worlds, think of Ubisoft, each open world area is so distinct and pretty that they don't feel like they have to use a map whatsoever, as there are plenty of landmarks to go off of. This is fine, I do think the world of ER is decently crafted for the most part, but just because the demand to use the map isn't as high in other open world games doesn't mean that the map or exploration system in and of itself is innovating, it's not, it's just more enjoyable to explore. For this reason I also don't mind Torrent that much but that's just due to how I play, it doesn't make the way you played invalid just like how it doesn't make the way I played invalid. It also makes the catacombs less egregious because I'm doing it half for the loot and half because I genuinely enjoy the exploration and combat. Also I'd argue the sacred tears and golden seeds are fine because like you said, you don't need all of them and they're much less crucial and only dictate how much health you recover, not everything like the Scadutree fragments, plus they're actually quite clear and distinct in placement so they don't take you for a ride or anything like that, I think it's the right level of encouraging exploration without making it tedious or monotonous. I'm mixed on Spirit ashes but I lean more on liking them, but their main problem is definitely how buggy they make bosses, if the bosses reacted more uniquely to there being multiple targets then it would be alot better but I totally see why you think they hinder more than help. I think there should be direct drawbacks to using them rather just damaging you a bit, and I don't think they should be able to be upgraded to the same level as weapons, but I think they don't incentivize you to disengage with the game as much as you say, because unless you're running something like maxed out mimic tear (Which I agree is busted) Spirit ashes, atleast to my understanding, won't last for long, so by going into attack while the ashes are effective, you take the attention off of them and onto you, allowing them to stay alive longer, thus dealing more damage, think of it like playing with a friend, so depending on how you play it they could make you engage or disengage. Not particularly strong reasoning or justification I know, but you see where I'm coming from surely. I think respeccing is fine. If a player is doing it purely to go for a meta build then yeah I can see the issue but I think the vast majority of players do it simply just to try different build or strats, atleast that's what I do it for. I admit this is by far my weakest defense because I do entirely understand where you're coming from and do agree with you for the most part, but it ultimately doesn't make each boss "the same boss" or make every character "the same character" to me, I see it like pizza, yeah some people are gonna indulge in it too much, but for the vast majority of people, they're just gonna use it like a regular meal or a reward of sorts, so I think it's fine personally but honestly I can totally see my argument here getting dismantled, I just don't think it's as big of an issue like you say it is. I've never abided by meta builds so that could be the reason why it doesn't affect me so much but that's a me thing only. Ashes of war, again I see where you're coming from but inevitably when you make systems like this, some are gonna be bound to be better than others, doesn't make the others invalid, I don't think it leads to less variety like you said, since some ashes are gonna be better or just straight up more fun or interesting to use on other builds, but some should probably be nerfed Overall, pretty good review! I still enjoy ER alot despite this (although I am playing with a mod right now so that may say more than this entire text catacomb LMAO) but it's not perfect or a masterpiece, no game is a masterpiece, nothing can be perfect, but that doesn't mean you can't enjoy it. Elden ring does have glaring flaws, but I still love the game despite that. There's nothing wrong with liking a flawed product or piece of media, you literally wouldn't be able to enjoy any piece of media if that were the case, to any fromsoft defender or fanboy reading this, when people state things or opinions in a negative or positive review like this, they aren't saying it like it's fact, they are simply giving their perspective and opinion. Just because they say things you disagree with does not make the game, or your experience, invalid, and similarly, it does not make their experience invalid. I don't think someone relying on the gun in BloodBorne is a good way to get the most out of the games combat, but that doesn't mean their experience with the game was any less valid than my experience of going full throttle into the combat with saws and axes and sparingly using the gun. They are not trying to sway you one way or the other, they are simply giving their opinion. If you enjoyed the games exploration, bosses, combat, dungeons, dragons, whatever, good for you, they aren't telling you not to enjoy what you enjoyed, they are simply telling you what they thought about the game and the parts you enjoyed. Telling people to "git gud" is not meaningful discussion, attacking people for not liking something you do or liking something that you don't is not meaningful discussion, my advice? just talk. express what you like about the game in a non hostile way, engage with their points and express why you feel differently. One thing you'll learn quickly is that there's alot more nuance when it comes to discussions like this, so please, just have a conversation. If you think a point is outright wrong or deceitful, then point it out, but otherwise, just talk. that's all you gotta do, don't tie your self worth to games either, that's lame (and gay) Until next time.
This is a pretty good video. The introduction was kind of meh and cliche with the 'Elden Ring is a game that needs no introduction' but your video is actually pretty engaging and examines interesting points that I don't think I've seen other people point out. The only criticism to give is that it doesn't feel that segments between points flow well to the next point at times, and it can feel like a checklist of things you want to talk about rather than a united thesis. I do like how you pinpointed the core of Elden Ring being about being an open world and how its game mechanics caused lesser emotions.
25:00 You didn't have Torrent but you did have the lucerne? Either you made one hell of a trek before stopping at Gatefront or this is a dramatic reenactment. Either way, funny. I mention this because I have nothing else to add to your review, it's well done and has some fresh takes.
39:59 excuse me, I invade other Tarnished all the time, some of those npcs do seem to care, I've been called slurs and all sorts xD Nice job on the video! Miyazaki can't write a good quest, I'd say he can't write a good believable character if he wanted to and to give you an extra hot take - Fromsoft just can't write for sh^% but "It's post apocalyptic, you just don't understand it and... and something I heard about environmental storytelling as well" Oh, fuck off and trot along, will ya? btw I subbed 'cause watching 4k views and no respect for the content is just painful. Irl npcs, man. Downvotes were hidden so their numbers stay hidden too.
It’s the worst part if it was linear i would have enjoyed it more. Still a good game but that’s one of the aspects I didn’t like about it, big open world with nothing in it.
Its an incredible open world compared to other open world games, but i still dont really think it makes the game better than if they kept it more linear like their previous games
@@elididde3377 because open world is not a design most of the time. It is more like a way of production, diferent teams doing their own thing and puting together at the final of the development.
I kinda like "gamy" maps. One of the most memorable features in RE2 remake for me, was the color of the rooms on a map 😂 But... I agree about your first point. Can't say i never look at the words, but i definitely abused map at first play throughout. I wonder what game it would be, if we just had a "fog of war" on top of unexplored parts of the map. It's such an ancient, but effective concept, i always surprised if developers refuse to use it. Like... Why?! It's literally better of both words. Detailed map for people who like it, and terra incognita for those who don't.
I disagree on a solid amount of this, but only really your opinions of how some of these things affect the player's experience. I think you did an absolutely incredible job analyzing so many aspects of the game, and you described many things i agreed with but never really thought of them or why i felt certain ways
I mean no disrespect. A lot of points made are lose - lose situations, subjective opinions, or non issues/self created issues occasionally sprinkled with things that most people can agree with. There’s a few valid criticisms but tends to exaggerate either the problem or your solutions/changes. For example, most would agree Melina should have more of a role but imo if she showed up every time you rest/lvl then it would be just as negative to her impact on the story. It’d be overkill or turn her into just a tool for leveling up similar to how you call torrent a tool. I’d prefer she appear when the player enters a new region for the first time to offer insight into the history or current state of that area. They could even make her speak to the player like latenna does when you enter the snowfields. That way even though she isn’t always visible it’d feel like she’s watching over or traveling with us and isn’t just a tool. It’d also add extra lore and narrative. An example of created issues is how you can ride torrent to collect items without fighting. It is true but also loses effect when we consider that enemies drop armor, weapons, unique drops, and runes needed to level up. No one is forcing anyone to play that way and while it’s the best way to collect items without fighting it’s also a great way to miss items. I also don’t think there’s anything wrong with using it in moderation, it’s perfectly fine to ride past the troll at the beginning of the game. It isn’t going to ruin anyones experience, if anything it adds to it as you must decide whether to stand and fight or to run and pick your battles wisely. An example of a lose - lose situation is not being able to kill certain npcs or the markers telling where the nokron meteor fell or other quest lines. While I lean on the side of agreeing that the game should have more consequences and the markers are unneeded I recognize that people will complain regardless of what fromsoft chooses. Plenty of people complained that the quests were hard to follow and on the flip side people complain that there’s markers now. Also the part where he says you shouldn’t be able to respec would be far more detrimental to the quality of the game. Let’s say I start a Guts build and come across dark moon greatsword 50 hours in and want to use it but don’t have the stats. Should I be forced to start a new character with those required stats in mind? My new character then would be less about playing the game organically and more about filling out my required stat list. This would also make ng+ less enjoyable as you’d be locked into using the same build or having to massively level up to make up the difference.
holy shit dude your review is amazing , you are laying out such a streamlined and fundamental understanding of good game design and how er lacks it , in fact you're saying many of the same things i said in my own review of a different game i just finished yesterday lol..... yes YES YES!! exactly it! it's the element of imagination that has been gradually eroded from modern trippleA gaming , of course because the devs have no soul.....
Great video but I tend to disagree about the ulcerated tree spirit. It didn’t need to be reused 12 times but I actually think it’s one of the better bosses in the game. It’s fair and gives you ample punish windows which I appreciated since most bosses don’t give you many opportunities to attack them. I hated it at first but after getting good at fighting him I actually kinda started to like it. But fighting the tree spirit 12 times really hurts the appeal of course
I'm not annoyed that much by Torrent, just don't take him into battles. I like him and feel rather sad for him. He's treated just as a convenient tool and a useful idiot for the open-world propaganda 🤣
I already have a comment 2 min in 😅 ER's world is much more enjoyable WITHOUT picking up the map fragments - try for yourself Tarnished. Now you have only your position on the map and nearby Sites of Grace that you already discovered. It's still useful for orientation and actually rewards looking AT THE FREAKING MAP and comparing it with your character's POV. It just might put a tiny bit of intrigue on exploration even on your second, much dreaded otherwise, playthrough. My takeaway form this observation is that Lands Between would be far better with some kind "fog of war" style of discovering *the map* ...but that kind of mechanic would be far too tedious if you wanted to uncover map everywhere and would expose just how vast and ultimately empty this world is. So... the map isn't a problem imo, it's the fact that ER *is an open world MAP* in the first place. Open Map does not equal an Open World, shit, you could start DS2 with 11 different bosses or so... There are ways to build a world that's very much open and without any maps 🤔
Elden Ring is a souls game where common crating materials are locked in treasure chests and flask upgrades lay out in the open. My question is, how casual do you have to be to enjoy that type of nonsense? 😂 Catacombs = Chalices. Abysmal use of a brilliant mechanic. Chalices were awesome, nearly endless. It nicely padded my experience, not the world itself. (edit. lmao, I leave a comment about chalices and you get to the same exact point shortly there after)
The fact that your health flasks upgrades are clearly shown on the map is 1) Laughable from a stand point of any souls player with any self dignity left within them... 2) Shows that Open Map design can't really work with any well designed, damage and difficulty curves. Forget about balanced progress at this point.
Over a month ago I watched this and left a really short comment that expressed that I found this critique to be very poor but didn't list any reasons but then someone left a reply about it, so here it is. This critique either has alot of things I disagree with or things that are straight up wrong. This is coming from someone who is a very experienced, high level and knowledgeable player of the game. I'm not an Elden Ring fanboy either, tbh the amount I've bashed on this game in the past has made many people think I genuinely hate the game, but these "critiques" hardly ever comment on the real issues and instead focus on non issues instead. Well he was too lazy to timestamp any of his points so I had to rewatch the whole thing but that's besides the point. There was some other things I disagreed with but didn't want to comment on. 5:58 What? Should you only be allowed to move around on foot? Going through the whole world on foot would be an absolute slog and also horse can provide more combat variety. 9:05 These borders are here specifically here so you play the level in the intended way and don't either skip everything with the horse or use the horse to break the level in some way. 10:46 Not being able to level up again just because you picked another ending would be horrendous, sometimes not messing with the mechanics like that is better than making it make sense for story. 12:34 Why does everything need a lore reason to exist, it's just something different in it. 13:40 They don't have rewards for every single build in the game per dungeon, each reward has a purpose for someone. The dungeons shouldn't be in the game at all? They're a part of exploration to see which bosses items and other things they contain, getting rid of them would ruin that and remove alot of content. 18:28 Tf, did he just compare Radahn to Maiden Astraea and Micolash? A knight that just does some attacks then Astraea she just sits there and a man that just runs around and talks a bit Vs. Radahn a visually stunning boss and arena, has epic music, starts at ranged and you can summon an army while hiding behind debris or dodging the arrows, then when you get close he has alot of moves and also launched down on you on a meteor, also has a big buildup to him. 18:49 Delayed attacks just require you learn the timing and adds variety to the combat and it's not like many are that egregiously long anyway. Not many bosses actually have super long combos that can't be punished, most of the time you can either attack during the combo or you can position properly so they don't do it or that they stop doing it. The highly evasive actions most can also be prevented with positioning or most you can literally just run to them in basically no time. "I don't even need to show examples" what an absolute joke. 20:28 I think most of the main bosses differ in gameplay alot and are not "just a difference in how annoying they are". 22:14 Some, Wdym some? Why didn't he list any? The only true one I can think of is Mohg Nihil, I know there's is a lot of unavoidable attacks in the game but they're if you get unlucky and are obscure attacks majority of players will not know about, probably not him either. 31:27 Inconsistent? It's called learning how much posture they have and the timer, also how much posture they have and how much time it takes for it to start regening is consistent, whether it be for the boss or in general. 31:46 Which attacks can you not roll but jump? The one he showed you can roll aswell. 32:05 Crafting is irrelevant at best? There's many useful things you can craft: all the different pots, bottles, greases, arrows just to name a few. 33:55 Summoning spirits can carry players through Every boss in the game and provide No challenge??? No. 35:42 Those examples also happen solo, it's nothing to do with the summoning. 41:59 Respecting is an amazing feature that allows more customizability and makes it so you don't have to make a completely new character for a specific build and can instead spend hundreds of hours onto one character. You also only have a limited amount of respects per NG cycle so there is some decision making.
@@Oneiric_Benevolence Alot of people genuinely think I hate the game because of how much I've shlt on it elsewhere, I think the game has a ton of problems that really drive me away from playing the game, but are problems that wouldn't effect a casual player. I Haven't played in over 2 months because I got sick of it, so Fanboy? Nah. Also I'm an adult.
@@Oneiric_Benevolence I'm gonna to assume you meant ER. I think The game is quite buggy. Input dropping. Some variable hitboxes. Some Bosses being able to animation cancel. Some terribly designed moves on some Bosses. Hitboxes being able to linger in an arena. Some bad hitboxes. Sometimes you have to run way too far to get to the next Boss. Pivots being a thing for no reason. Horrendous Ganks. Plus some more but those are top of my head. But there were some aspects I really like and mixed with the fact that it was new were the main reasons I became one of the best Elden Ring players of all time atleast for pve. I just know when the game is being treated unfaily with alot of points that aren't really issues.
Man, your "rebuttals" are so slimy I don't even know whether I should bother replying myself. Not to mention your own "real" critique goes only to most just mechanical elements. Which is pretty shallow imo, considering how much issues other parts of the game have. I'm also not sure about you getting called ER hater (why is it even relevant here? Are we tribals operating on us vs them mentality), but then again I myself got a ton of hate from certain people for just doubting Miyazaki's genius when the game came out.
I was about ready to turn off the video after the first few minutes when you were basically just complaining about good QOL changes for Elden ring BUT then pretty much every point after that was so great and agreeable. Especially the logistical nonsense of Elden ring. Elden ring takes place in a world where people haven’t died since the Erd Tree began it’s abundance era thousands of years ago AND YET somehow there’s no city or area big enough to even house a few hundred people lol. Great video. Definitely didn’t agree with anything for the first few minutes though but that’s just me
I just don’t understand how the open world fails this game. Elden Ring does a masterfully job in environmental story telling. Even the Dark Souls saga does it just as well.
He has good points and remarks. U maybe dont like it cuz he doesnt shout and yell and do idiot thing like many ppl on yt, he just talking as a normal person what is a big plus.
Are you capable of talking about some argument covered in the video? instead of saying a false and totally subjective sentence like that? becasue for me I agree on almost everything he said in the video, and this is his "FIRST" video on the channel and this guy nailed it because he know what he is talking about, with respect for the opera, developers and players.
@@kaioshinon5954 Fine. Well he was too lazy to timestamp any of his points so I had to rewatch the whole thing but that's besides the point. 5:58 What? Should you only be allowed to move around on foot? Going through the whole world on foot would be an absolute slog and also horse can provide more combat variety. 9:05 These borders are here specifically here so you play the level in the intended way and don't either skip everything with the horse or use the horse to break the level in some way. 10:46 Not being able to level up again just because you picked another ending would be horrendous, sometimes not messing with the mechanics like that is better than making it make sense for story. 12:34 Why does everything need a lore reason to exist, it's just something different in it. 13:40 They don't have rewards for every single build in the game per dungeon, each reward has a purpose for someone. The dungeons shouldn't be in the game at all? They're a part of exploration to see which bosses items and other things they contain, getting rid of them would ruin that and remove alot of content. 18:28 Tf, did he just compare Radahn to Maiden Astraea and Micolash? A knight that just does some attacks then Astraea she just sits there and a man that just runs around and talks a bit Vs. Radahn a visually stunning boss and arena, has epic music, starts at ranged and you can summon an army while hiding behind debris or dodging the arrows, then when you get close he has alot of moves and also launched down on you on a meteor, also has a big buildup to him. 18:49 Delayed attacks just require you learn the timing and adds variety to the combat and it's not like many are that egregiously long anyway. Not many bosses actually have super long combos that can't be punished, most of the time you can either attack during the combo or you can position properly so they don't do it or that they stop doing it. The highly evasive actions most can also be prevented with positioning or most you can literally just run to them in basically no time. "I don't even need to show examples" what an absolute joke. 20:28 I think most of the main bosses differ in gameplay alot and are not "just a difference in how annoying they are". 22:14 Some, Wdym some? Why didn't he list any? The only true one I can think of is Mohg Nihil, I know there's is a lot of unavoidable attacks in the game but they're if you get unlucky and are obscure attacks majority of players will not know about, probably not him either. 25:55 Imagine if you have bosses chase you across the entire map... 31:27 Inconsistent? It's called learning how much posture they have and the timer, also how much posture they have and how much time it takes for it to start regening is consistent, whether it be for the boss or in general. 31:46 Which attacks can you not roll but jump? The one he showed you can roll aswell. 32:05 Crafting is irrelevant at best? There's many useful things you can craft: all the different pots, bottles, greases, arrows just to name a few. 33:55 Summoning spirits can carry players through Every boss in the game and provide No challenge??? No. 35:42 Those examples also happen solo, it's nothing to do with the summoning. 41:49 Respecting is an amazing feature that allows more customizability and makes it so you don't have to make a completely new character for a specific build and can instead spend hundreds of hours onto one character. You also only have a limited amount of respects per NG cycle so there is some decision making. There was some other things I disagreed with but didn't want to comment on. I'm not a Elden Ring fanboy either, tbh the amount I've bashed on this game in the past has made many people think I genuinely hate the game, but these "critiques" hardly ever comment on the real issues and instead focus on non issues instead.
Elden ring was terrible. Practically nothing for a story. If you want what they do have you have to read the 1000 weapon descriptions. Perfect game for idiots. Shit story, but as long as there's 115 weapons, everyone's happy.
No, Elden Ring HAS a story, but FromSoft challenges us to puzzle it out and there isn’t anything wrong with this approach either, as forensic teams have to glean what happened to people and places from wreckage IRL. “A perfect game for idiots”? NOT EVEN. Idiots give up on FromSoft's games and hate them because they suck at them.
@@asdergold1 I read plenty, thanks. Anyway, what is lore but the story of the setting? FromSoft make game worlds akin to crime scenes, telling in the wreckage the stories of the traumas that befell the people and places. Like investigators, it falls to us to solve the mysteries if we want.
Its a "perfect game for idiots" yet it requires a lot of reading obscure item descriptions to understand anything? If anything that sounds like a game for nerds to me lol. One would expect a game for idiots to take a far more direct approach with its story, i think
You can't blame fans for the bosses. Since the beginning, the only reward in these games are the bosses themselves. There's no story to speak of and a plethora of garbage wrappings and flowers and armor nobody will ever wear. It's a boss fight simulator in an empty world
No, FROM games weren't always about the bosses. They used to be about exploration, fighting through the levels and larger world just as much as any particular enemy. You made your way through, found the way forward. Nowadays they only have levels as excuses, with the real deal being the big boss at the end. It's a glorified boss rush.
A lot of really great points in here. It's sad how many people are calling ER and it's DLC perfect 10/10 master pieces and seem willing to overlook or ignore literally every problem it has.
I think most people acknowledge the problems but don’t think it bogs the game down that much
Everyone knows there are problems. It’s still a masterpiece. Everything is flawed yet wr still find ways to call things masterpieces, elden ring is one such thing.
@@Kevin-bh3dl I think it does bog down the game like crazy though. Like most of these issues are very fundamental.
@@arisumego I disagree but it’s ur opinion and im cool with it I’m also biased as fuck cause I’m a huge fromsoft Stan
Ive had people defending the final boss' undodgable attack and Metyr's undodgable laser attack. Fucking mind boggling
I like many aspects in this video. Particularly, I realised, too, that torrent destroys in many ways the experience of previous Souls games where it was necessary to make ones way through different levels, always feeling the danger of getting hollow.
When Fromsoft decided to make an open world Souls game they had to solve the problem of how to connect the locations in the world with meaningful activities of the player to do. In other open world RPG games, for example, this is often solved by guiding the player by a main quest and (often infinitely many) side quests that are connected to each of the locations on the map. Sometimes one will also be able to unlock certain parts of the map after a certain progression in the game. In Souls games, however, the player is free to decide what to do, there is no quest log that tells him what should be done next. This is why exploration in Elden Ring is so great, I can go anywhere I like, and do everything I want. However, this magical journey can be made only once, namely in the very first playthrough. When starting with a new character or going into NG+ one notices that 90 percent of the world (including all the side dungeons) is, in fact, unimportant for the story progression in the game. It is possible to skip even some of the legacy dungeons (like Volcano Manor or Raia Lucaria) to beat the game. And out of the 165 bosses in the game only a handful need to be actually defeated (12 if going the route Godrick+Radahn before going to the capital). In this sense the actual story of the game feels way too short for the huge world that is presented. They made a story that would fit a typical Dark Souls game but a world that is as huge as the Land's between should have had a much larger number of mandatory activities for the player. As just one example, the random loot in many of the side dungeons could have been replaced by special quest items that are needed for progression. Like, collecting a certain number of these could have allowed one to unlock certain new areas. This would have made everything much more interesting and engaging. But the way it was solved in ER gives the impression of an empty world, much emptier than the worlds of Lordran, Drangleic or Lothric which suffer from the undead curse.
This is by far the best ER critique out there and it's insane it has less than 6k views. While there are many other critics of the game, most tend to devolve into rants about some mechanical elements like never ending comboes, millennium windups and waterfowl. This one instead keeps it cool and dissects even issues others seem to overlook.
There are particularly 3 points I find compelling here. 1, how devoid of stakes the open world exploration is. 2, how trivial weapon variety and roleplaying is when a couple of options outclass the rest.
And most pressingly, 3. It is genuinely sad that FROM has lost the courage to create meaningful consequences for the player's actions. It's so sad to see them let the player off the hook so easily. It devalues all player interactions and removes all impact from quests. It makes me feel like I don't really have agency when the game will make sure I get everything no matter what I choose to do. No choices feel meaningful anymore.
10:54 this is such an amazing point, especially when you consider the mad brilliance of demon souls. This is absolutely something demon souls would've been willing to do in a heartbeat, and it would've been so amazing. If you betray your level up maiden, she stops leveling you up. Would've honestly been brilliant.
I didn’t get this, Melina swearing to hunt you down is an ending cutscene after the frenzied flame ending, there’s no chance for her to punish your leveling up anyway (at least ingame)
This is truly one of the best ER critiques out there, I agree with all your major points, this game was a huge letdown for me aswell :c
While it remains one of the best open world games out there, it just goes to show how this formula can only produce inferior quality games if compared to the classic Fromsoft level design, which i found lacking in here (too few legacy dungeons imho).
I feel that we lost so much in exchange for the open world that it wasnt even worth it, and seeing how few people criticize the game at all (and even when they do that it's just for complaining about minor issues like balancing and spirit ashes) is enough to make me fear that FS might continue to chase this direction in the future, considering how well the game sold :/
Fromsoft is my fav developer, I want to see more unique games of theirs, not them trying to omologate to the most popular and mainstream gaming trends. I really hope what we get in the following years will be more bold and experimental as their first projects or sekiro (my favourite game ever!).
They surely dont lack the skill to make more masterpieces, I believe in fromsoft but I will continue to criticize this game for as long as i'll live. It's good to see people who share the same disappointment, I was beginning to feel lonely lol.
The open world adds absolutely nothing to the Souls formula, at least not after Limgrave and Weeping Peninsula (the only good and interesting open world areas in the game)
Also, the horse and by proxy the jump mechanic take away one of the main aspects that made past Souls games immersive and good; the feeling of being grounded and minuscule
Edit: forgot to say something regarding the speed of combat and stamina management
Like you said, enemies just have longer "combos" (I myself don't feel this way except for Malenia) but instead I feel like most enemies are too slow for the A/P (average potential) player stamina; actions consume too little stamina, the stamina bar is by default long and it replenishes quickly, literally killing one of the main gameplay aspects of past Souls games - stamina management
And like you said, this forces the player to not care about defensive options, just about offense and offense which gets boring after a while
I'll quote DS2 here, that game is hella slow and yet the average gameplay loop there is more engaging and immersive because you actually have to care about what you do and when you do it (stamina-wise speaking), this also, by proxy, makes PvP miles better, with the skill floor being high and the ceiling just a bit higher; unlike ER where the floor is absurdly low and the ceiling absurdly high, creating a void in the middle
While I disagree with some stuff, this is a very underrated video. There's a ton of points that seemingly no one else has touched on, like how almost any open world fight can be escaped by Torrent.
You touched upon two great points that I agree with:
1. The need to spam the roll dodge or perish
2. The lands in between don't make much sense as an actual fantasy world due to no cities, people, etc.
The second is pretty much the reason why I could never immerse myself in this. The world never felt real, everything felt so gamey and "made" for us to play around with.
Thats been a huge problem for me in just about every fromsoft game, people brag on and on about the "immersive believable worlds, and the environmental story telling that makes you reflect on what society was like before the downfall"
All I can think is "theres no way this world could have ever sustained the absurd population of madmen and zombies I keep killing" Soulsborne worlds are so transparently artificial it makes one wonder why they even bother with the environmental story telling angle in the first place.
Theres no signs of ANY agriculture, no livestock, no crops, no SPACE for anyone to live in general.
But nothing is more blatantly artificial than the CHARACTERS themselves, most of the appeal fans derive from them is completely built on a fictitious foundation of "Fan Canon", pretending there is more depth and nuance to them than there actually is.
All any of these characters do is spout dull monotone expository dialogue while the mute protagonist just sits there in this vapid one sided conversation, regurgitating the same single minded hyperfixation bordering on neurodivergence that motivates their "journey". often rambling about meaningless unrelatable abstract concepts and occasionally referencing the imaginary relationship they might have with another character to which the player is never allowed to catch even a glimpse of, because having two NPC's interact with eachother might result in them either complimenting or- God Forbid CHALLENGING eachothers perspective and forcing them to reconcile with their own character flaws, and thats WAY too much character development for Fromsoft to handle apparently.
Better to stick them with some Stoic Mute, Some wandering companion thats constantly evading their presence, a generic lifeless corpse we are supposed to empathize them grieving over despite having zero emotional investment in their relationship, or in Elden Rings case, just put NPC's in different rooms separated by about 15 feet and have the player relay messages between them like its a god damn game of elementary school telephone. "Tell Blaidd and Iiji I love them" how am I supposed to take this line seriously one these characters havent exchanged a SINGLE line of meaningful dialogue between eachother, these are NOT relationships, these are forced and artificial illusions.
Its like TellTale games, once you play through enough of them you start seeing through the illusion of choice? Well once you play enough Fromsoft games you start seeing right through the illusion of depth in their story and characters.
1. Spamrolling is actively punished, so the point is invalid.
2. It’s a ruined world, not an isekai.
Elden Ring's greatest flaw is its open world. I would have enjoyed it much more if it were designed with a central hub like Demon's Souls, or a linear progression with offshoots, like DS3.
A really good analysis here. Great stuff man.
This is the most underrated piece of Elden Ring criticism on TH-cam.
Your notes on torrent, the mini dungeons, the open world and "boss fights" are spot on
18:17
Yeah, agreed completely. This game wasn't made for the Soulsborne faithful, it was made to be a broad-reaching, mainstream title which it succeeds at very well. Unfortunately, with the sales this game has already achieved (with more to follow when the DLC and GOTY version drops) I fear we'll never see a Souls/Bloodborne ever again. We might get another Souls game, but it'll be in name only. Why make a game 5mil people will buy when you can make one 20mil people will buy, and if they go back to making challenging, arcane, thought-provoking titles those new ER players aren't going to buy it, I fear. Nothing lasts forever, I guess. There are some great overhaul mods dropping in the future built on DS3 so at least the community can keep the spirit of the series alive. Can't wait to see some type of "hardmode" mod for ER that erases the map, shuffles item locations, forces you off of Torrent whenever you approach a camp, erases ash summons, etc (like the game already does when you get invaded) and cuts the player damage by 30-40% across the board.
I am a lover of From bosses, in theory, just as much as I love their level design. But they greatly missed the mark with ER. The checkpoints before the boss is a part of it I hadn't considered, but what I saw as the main issue was From WANTS you to fight each boss as a group, either with your friends or by summoning those ash things/NPC's. As someone that plays these games solo it really made the boss mechanics seem sloppy, but maybe less so in a group (don't know as I didn't ever play with people/ashes, just a few times where an NPC summon was available did I use it and only to give the boss more health...). Malenia, whom seems to be the "standout" boss, seems like she should be in a DMC or Bayonetta game, NOT a Soulsborne. The other big issue I had were dual enemy bosses as they were not designed to complement one another. With the dual Crucible fight in one of the catacombs it was painfully obvious this was designed to be a 2v2 or 3v2. "Tough yet fair" never entered their minds when designing these types of encounters. The only "boss" in the game I truly loved was the Bell Bearing Hunter in Upper Caelid. That was a good, tough fight, imo.
The legacy dungeons are the saving grace for the game (though they aren't enough to get me to replay it)
If this were not an open world and was designed as a Dark Souls game it could have been incredible, but when these dungeons are capped by bosses that fall in 1-2 attempts it was just such a letdown.
Idk, ER is a great action game, but its not a very good Souls-like, even though it had the potential to be the defining Souls-like for the genre moving forward.
FROM's combat has ditched fairness, predictability, deliberation and resource management in favor of spectacle and bombast. It's a far cry from what it used to be.
Spot on. I was wholeheartedly disappointed with Elden Ring despite being a From megafan. Elden Ring cured me from being a fan. I will still pay if they continue to provide proper pvp.
So you want Dark Souls 4? New ideas are always welcome.
Yk what… you souls vets can stay away. Stains on the community
This makes a great companion piece to NeverKnowsBest's critique of the game. I felt a very similar way when playing Elden Ring, and I couldn't even finish the game because I lack the patience for some of the design choices. Going open world was a huge mistake in my opinion, and you point out some other very well observed criticisms, some I didn't even think about: your view on whether we should count normal enemies in bosses' clothing as boss enemies felt low-key enlightening, and I probably would have never made the connection between the players' increased base stamina and enemy attack strings.
Additionally, even though it was just a short mention, I liked that you pointed out the crafting system (and consumables by extension in my opinion) having issues, which is something I heard noone talk about so far, but feels like a noticeable issue and a huge time waster to me. Overall it helps with my sanity, I really was questioning myself playing it and thinking of all the praise the game got from all sides. I wasn't sure if it's the game or if it was just me lol...
Very promising debut video for your channel, I'm looking forward to hopefully seeing some more from you in the future! I wish I could give some you some constructive criticism, but I feel like this video has been speaking to me directly... Hope I can offer something in the future.
Side-note, have played or heard of Outward? I'd be really interested to hear your thoughts on that game, as it feels like this would probably in your wheelhouse.
Thanks, glad you liked it. Good point on consumables; crafting makes them feel terrible to use because the limit for how many you can have in your inventory at once can be easily bypassed, but it just results in tedious use of the crafting window between each encounter.
About Outward, I haven't played it, but from what I've seen it does look like something I would be interested in.
The crafting system was just implemented to litter the over inflated open world with useless collectibles, and by "useless" I mean they add NOTHING to the game other than just another obnoxious material to farm.
I can't stand the artificial scarcity in Elden Rings items, like Arteria leaves, theres literally just ONE enemy in the whole game that drops it naturally at stupid low rates.
Miquella and Trina flowers too.
Why are you arbitrarily forcing the players to grind and farm RNG for these items, theres already a system in place that keeps them from overstocking on the consumables they produce.
Same with Larval Tears and Ancient Smithing Stones, why are these arbitrarily restricted to be finite in each playthrough, if I have the ability to make ONE weapon +25 I should be able to make ANY weapon +25, especially since update balance changes can fundamentally shift the meta in DRASTIC ways.
Lore explanations do NOT count, you can change insignificant lore details for quality of life features.
Same with larval tears, there are already SO MANY in the game that it makes NO sense to put a cap on them per NG cycle.
Stop bullying the player into NG+ and just let them experiment with your systems freely.
Especially when we can't even take our great runes to NG+ and we don't even know what kind of DLC might be coming to the game!
EDIT: and you know I could tolerate it if there was ANY consistency in the circumstances of these inconvenieces. Like Ashes of War? You let us freely move those from weapon to weapon. The durability mechanic is ALL gone. NPC's have a bunch of kill barriers put on them to prevent players from breaking questlines. You can fast travel from anywhere. We can alot flasks freely, level up freely. We have stakes of marika SOMETIMES.
Elden Ring is not like old Dark Souls and Demon's Souls where the game's inconvenieces wanted to challenge you with decisions that actually MATTER.
And even if it DID, it was still so much easier to start a new playthrough in the older games because they weren't overly padded out like a teenage training bra.
I can't even stomach another playthrough beyond leyndell.
Ditto on the crafting… There’s lots of consumables to craft but very few that are useful. The truly useful consumables are bottlenecked by “exceedingly rare to find” materials that can only be farmed by killing enemies with a 1-3% drop rate, effectively non-renewable. So items that could open up new play styles like the bewitching branch, sleep pots, luring pots, iron jar aromatics, and drawstring greases are relegated to the “I don’t want to waste it so I forget about using it” category. But don’t worry, you’ll never run out of rowa raisins!
I mean relative to other open world games (with the exception of GTA) I think it’s a solid first try. I do think FromSoft players have gotten a bit spoilt, I mean if you get a great first play through at about 100 hours is poor replay-ability THAT big a deal? I mean sure, it may not be as exciting as your first go round, but when is a game ever as good as your first play through? You make some fair points, but yeah, I’m more willing to shrug and put this down to a solid first attempt, that FromSoft will no doubt learn from thanks to constructive critiques like this.
I completely agree. The exhausting comparisons to the previous Dark Souls saga is just tiring. One has to come into this game into what it is. It’s not Dark Souls. And all the complaints about the game being to huge, well it’s not meant to complete the game in one day. This game takes time. Many souls fans wanted to play this game as it was a linear game like before. Play the game a couple of hours a day - and take a break. Come back to it later.
People are WAY too harsh on this game.
After 250 hours in Elden ring, I need to go back to DS3 to heal myself from all the bullshit
I used to hate Dark Souls 3, like REALLY hate it, I thought the enemies were cheap, the bossfights were terrible and just ridiculously fast and aggressive for your characters toolset with absurd DPS, I dropped the game for YEARS after my first playthrough.
Then I played Elden Ring, and suffering that entire game shifted my whole perspective on DS3, I saw the pauses in the bosses aggression, the telegraphs in their attack animations, and most importantly I took the lessons from Elden Ring and started leveling my *passive* stats, something I never had to do in DS1.
Elden Ring made me realize how fair and awesome DS3 actually was by comparison, I've finished 3 different playthroughs in just this past year.
Weird because while I agree elden ring isn’t the best “souls” game I don’t think ds3 is either but than again it comes down to preference
@@sasaki999pro my criticisms with ds3 isn’t the game play it’s more the atmosphere and over all way it was designed doesn’t feel like a souls game it feels like bloodborne 2 with a dark souls skin on top of it. It’s not a bad game but it lacks a whimsical quality ds1 and ds2 and even demons souls had.
If you think this is bad, I felt similar, but went back to my unfinished DS2 playthrough and actually liked it. After the bullet train of bs that Elden Ring's combat was, sluggish and awkward DS2 with heavy emphasis on stamina management felt incredibly refreshing (when encounters were designed around it, which is mainly in DLCs). Fighting fume knight was way more thrilling than any ER boss because needed to constantly think ahead on how much stamina I'm gonna use for dodge, how much for attacking and how much I will leave in case I screw up. Maybe DS2 combat wasn't that hopeless after all.
if ds3 was better it would be bigger. in my opinion elden ring is more fun. more tools to play with. games are about fun. you have on rose tinted glasses.
my thoughts exactly on the exploration/lack thereof
It’s just a big open world with nothing in it. These games work much better in linear path form like demons souls or ds2 or ds1 etc etc it becomes boring and tedious
Finally found someone honest about the open world. The praise of the lack of markers everyone and their dog gives the game is ridiculous. The game is great, but the open world is the same thing as all those other open world games.
15:15 OMG, yes, I've been thinking so much about that. Thank you for pointing it out.
I agree with everything you said 100%. I especially hate how Torrent kills almost all the tension in the game with his mobility. It really makes traversing the game unfulfilling.
Thanks for the great video.
excellent critique. i agree with its flaws, and yet i still like to play it.
i hope Miyazaki's team watch this video.
It's totally a pretty standard ubisoft map, let's be real. From fans are the most pretentious of b^%es, I swear. "Revolutionary designs, baby. I could wander for hours 10/10" 😂
I mean the views are nice, the world *is* beautiful... 🤨
The first time I found the eternal cities and saw their sky I was like damn this is fire
It’s personally so funny for me that most of your critiques I did not face at all simply because I play games like a psychopath (I never: used Torrent to skip enemies or skip enemies in general, over-levelled myself (I think I was always under levelled 😂) or checked the map much, whilst theory-crafting why odd things existed (such as the mentioned traps in the catacombs) even if they were clearly just mechanics).
Elden Ring is truely my niche game, and I think it’s the same for other likewise gamer-sadists. That’s why the Elden Ring fandom is so dedicated.
''The map would've been removed entirely.''
Are you insane? The open world is already a mess and 99% of people don't have 1000 hours to put it in to figure out where to go next. You also hate the horse? You'd want to WALK through the entire thing?!
I'll start by saying you do an excellent job explaining your opinions. You've thought through what it is you don't enjoy and are not just simply restating what many other critiques have already covered. Personally I don't agree with much of what you said but there are a few spots we see eye to eye.
What made me really stop with should is when they released dark souls again and fixed absolutely nothing. They act like Bethesda and get away with it
One of the best elden ring critiques there is
I hate the horse combat like a lot, I also hate how much traveling there is. It’s a good game but… for a souls game I prefer a more linear experience.
Whether people agree or not with your options, I have to say this is one of the better Critiques I've seen. Some may just say (because it was not purely positive outside of the allowed critiques, maybe a fair point here or there or lacked an overdone background with music) that your opinion is bad, but I feel that you make some good points that should be taken into account. I, myself, feel that a game called 10 out of 10 or innovative should be in some way... innovative, outside of its Open World being a "first-time" creation for the people making it.
Of course, it is an okay game. But with how people act like it can do no wrong (outside of the things they allow people to point out without getting upset, angry or immediately telling them that they're wrong), I do have to shake my head. People can have their options, but some "Fans" do strike me as strange when they shoot down any idea of how they (Fromsoft) could possibly make the game more enjoyable unless they agree.
Overall, Elden Ring suffers from what I call Miyazaki-ism. If he is making the game or plays a bit part in its creation, there will always be that segment of players that will overlook the lack of overall innovation the Mainline Games (So, not counting Bloodborne or Sekiro) have had for a while now. That is not to say they are bad, but more that they are showing their age and need an overhaul to keep working if they want to keep making these games innovative. Adding a jump button that allows you to do it whenever you want, and a half-baked stealth system will not fix the problems that come for games that chose to change nothing important.
Of course, games like DS1, 2, 3, Sekiro, Bloodborne and Elden Ring will always be praised. But I feel that Fromsoft will never be able to truly be innovative again, until Fromsoft and the Fans understand that gameplay being hard no matter the cost only hurts the ability for the ideas that helped make the games work in the first play to continue working. As long as they go out of their way to make overly hard games like Elden Ring, where bosses are so over tuned that it can kill a good amount of the fun that comes from fighting them, nothing new (as in ideas) can be created.
I mainly hope they try and make games unlinked to the Souls' Style for a bit, in order for them to try new ideas that then can be taken back to make a better Souls game. But, who knows, maybe their next game blows us all out of the water and all my points are put to rest? We can only hope.
Sorry for the wall-of-text. I just wanted to get this point off my chest, and to the people who just want to comment that my, or some else's opinions sucks, can you at least give an as detailed reason as to why, like I have here on my opinion? Not saying you have to, there is no reason you have to, but it would be nice to read.
Interesting and well thought out review! I definitely disagree with some of the stuff here but this is a good, concise video. I'm coming here from your SoTE review so I might copy and paste this review into that video since this comment is essentially commenting on ER as a whole, but either way I figured I'd put my thoughts out there.
This'll be sectioned into three parts, what this video made me realize, what I already agreed with, and what I disagree with. I'll just mark this with a simple (1) (2) and (3) for anyone who wants to read one specific part, I'll also mark parts that are more specific to the SoTE review in (DLC) brackets too, although I haven't gotten to the DLC myself so feel free to just disregard everything I say because honestly I would probably do the same.
This will also probably be split up into multiple comments so if this ends abruptly just check the replies.
(1)
I know this sounds dumb but I genuinely didn't even think of the fact that even though the game doesn't give you an explicit waypoint for stuff like churches or evergaols. You can still see it clearly on the map so it has the same effect. It's extra dumb because I found myself looking for those exact markings on a map for whenever I wanted to find them and yet the idea that they were just functionally the same, pretty stupid of me but also pretty funny thinking about it.
I never really though about how artifical when and when you can't summon Torrent is, I just accepted it as "well that's how the game wants it to be so ok" but you're right it doesn't make sense in the context of the world or the situation. Also the summoning signs telegraphing when a boss was gonna show up was something I kinda clocked into in the base game but didn't fully analyze until now, again, stupid of me, but kinda funny.
(2)
The re-usage of bosses has always been something that annoyed me, I don't mind when it comes to stuff like the Tree sentinals, Erdtree Avatars, or the dragons because with the Tree sentinels it makes sense and the dragon, while being a much more egregious example, usually have some small distinction to make themselves different (even if ideally the distinctions should be much larger) but I can't excuse the game just slapping boss health bars onto random enemies and acting like it's a new boss without any tweaks or changes, this is more egregious with the Erdtree avatars because I feel like the avatars should have had different abilities depending on which minor erdtree they were defending, they do this with the Caelid one but that's the only one as far as I'm aware, like why not have the one by Raya Lucaria incorperate some Glintstone magic into it's moveset? maybe give it a staff instead of a hammer? (DLC) I actually noticed that the red rune bear you show in the DLC footage seems to have new attacks and things going for it so despite you citing it as a negative, I actually would consider that a fairly well done reuse of an asset, even if I would have preferred it to be more distinct, same with the GhostFlame dragon you showed which seemed to have a handful of new things to go along with it, basically I don't have a huge problem with reuse of assets aslong as the assets are different enough to stand out, and the red rune bear and Ghost dragon seemed to do that while regular enemies and to an extent, regular dragons and Erdtree avatars don't. I think the only (semi) regular enemy I think this actually works with is the Crucible knights, as they already feel like minibosses in and of themselves and aren't overused and enjoyable to fight. Also in terms of major Bosses like Astel or godfrey that's just straight up BS. And genuinely bad design, they should have just made it so there's a way to refight bosses you've already fought in an arena or a practise sort of way, like, think of some way to "relive your greatest fights" or something like that, I think some mods do that but it's baffling that they didn't do that in base game.
There's actually a mod that I've been playing and enjoying alot so far called "Convergance" which actually enhances this issue in an attempt to fix it, instead of fighting regular Erdtree avatars, they just put a random enemy there and call it a boss, those weird cockroach thing's in Caelid, one's a boss now, a Grafted Scion? While actually excusable as the Scion was already a miniboss, it's a boss now. A random Erdtree gaurd? He's a boss now! It's definitely strange because otherwise Convergance has been great so far, just an odd choice to me. They also attempted to add more variety to field boss encounters but so far the only one I've found is a crystal crab boss who just shoots glintstone projectiles instead of water, maybe he did more but that's the only attack he used before I killed him, very dissapointing since it's quite a cool concept. This isn't me slagging on Convergance btw, the new spells and weapons you can play with in that mod are amazing and make it worth it imo.
The lack of consequences in ER is also something that has bugged me, it just makes the character and by extension, the world, feel static in a way. I wish there were more diverging paths. More actual consequences, having bell bearings would be fine if the game didn't try so hard to push the illusion of consequences onto you, Convergance just makes the bell bearings something that each merchant gives you which helps this issue. But it shouldn't be in the base game. Characters should react to you doing bad or good things, give you items, treat you differently, have lasting impressions and impact, the characters aren't bad by any means, far from it, I just wish we got to see more of them rather than the static portraits we see throughout the game.
I wish the catacombs and ruins were more unique. they serve their purpose and they're alright and kinda fun overall but god are they bland, and the only thing you really think when finding them is "Okay, where's the boss and loot." and I could do just fine without ever seeing another one of those imps. Like I still kill all the enemies in and around them and there are some kinda unique bosses like those shadow monsters and those erdtree statues, but they could have been so much more. Convergance actually does try and fix this by tweaking most catacombs to feel more unique by including different enemies and altering textures and layouts, so one point for Convergance.
(DLC) Oh my god the Scadutree fragments are worse than I thought, I admit I initally thought that it was a nice system that made sure players of every skill level had a challenge, and also encouraged exploration, but that was under the assumption that they would be locked behind actually important areas or bosses, not just scattered around the place, and the fact they don't even have a unique glow for when they haven't been picked up yet, my god. And now that I think about it it's kind of counter-intuitive since as you mentioned, you can gauge and catch up with an area because of the runes dropped by enemies, so even if you are underlevelled, you can still get a chance to grow, the fragments don't do that, GOOD THING CONVERGANCE REMOVES THEM ENTIRELY BABYYYYYY ANOTHER POINT FOR CONVERGANCE YEAH LET'S GO, MODDERS FIXING A GAME FOR THE DEVELOPERS WE'VE REALLY REACHED BETHESDA LEVELS LET'S GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Crafting wasn't needed
What, you want more? I'll give as much explanation on this opinion on par with the amount of relevance crafting had.
No seriously this isn't even a build thing. (Cont)
(3)
Let's start with the bosses themselves, the ones that aren't just regular enemies with a health bar, but stuff like the Gargoyles, (most of) the Evergaols, you get what I'm going for. You mentioned that the only difference between each boss is " a samey slog, only differnent by how annoying each of them are" but I don't see it that way, I find learning each bosses moveset and patters, finding the ideal places to dodge and jump in so I can get an extra hit, and the overall experience of the bosses unique and interesting enough to keep me engaged, you mention in the DLC review that since every player is the same due to respec (which I disagree with but more on that later) that every boss is the same, but I disagree even with the examples you were showing while talking about it, that big shadowflame boss with all the fire, forcing you to space yourself out, is nowhere near the same as Morgott or Astel, granted this could be me taking a phrase far too literally when you meant something else but you get what I mean, I don't think all the bosses are great obviously, but there aren't any of these unique bosses that I haven't outright not enjoyed. One thing I do agree on is the arena thing, more arena variety would be nice. I do agree that there should be more attacks that require you to jump, the crucible knights ground stomp and most ground slamds should fall under this category but they just dont...Until Fromsoft decides they do for some reason, like yeah I'm glad jumping actually makes a difference but come on, give the circle button a break.
The point i'm about to make is incredibly subjective but I don't mind Torrent, I'll mainly touch on the fighting enemies part of your argument. I find the combat enjoyable so I don't bother riding past enemies with torrent as a first solution, plus you need the runes to level up and get stronger so to me running past the enemies has always felt counter-productive unless you're just trying to get to a specific spot or just don't enjoy the combat as much as I do, which is fine, there have been plenty of instances where I've ran past enemies but I've always made sure to kill them atleast once so I get an understanding of how they work since again, I find that enjoyable. So when you asked "Who fights the rune bears? Nobody, not me! not you!" Me. I am the one singular person who fights that bear. This puffed up Paddington has nothing on me and my large variety of magical purple rocks.
Despite your grievances with the map and exploration, I don't mind it as much. I agree that finding stuff on your own is more rewarding, and a reason as to why the Souls games became so popular, I think it makes sense for ER to have a map although I wish it either had everything laid out or nothing at all (yet another point to convergance for laying it all out at the start) I do agree it's not breaking convention by any means, but I kind of understand what people mean when they say that, I think what people mean is that, unlike most open worlds, think of Ubisoft, each open world area is so distinct and pretty that they don't feel like they have to use a map whatsoever, as there are plenty of landmarks to go off of. This is fine, I do think the world of ER is decently crafted for the most part, but just because the demand to use the map isn't as high in other open world games doesn't mean that the map or exploration system in and of itself is innovating, it's not, it's just more enjoyable to explore. For this reason I also don't mind Torrent that much but that's just due to how I play, it doesn't make the way you played invalid just like how it doesn't make the way I played invalid. It also makes the catacombs less egregious because I'm doing it half for the loot and half because I genuinely enjoy the exploration and combat. Also I'd argue the sacred tears and golden seeds are fine because like you said, you don't need all of them and they're much less crucial and only dictate how much health you recover, not everything like the Scadutree fragments, plus they're actually quite clear and distinct in placement so they don't take you for a ride or anything like that, I think it's the right level of encouraging exploration without making it tedious or monotonous.
I'm mixed on Spirit ashes but I lean more on liking them, but their main problem is definitely how buggy they make bosses, if the bosses reacted more uniquely to there being multiple targets then it would be alot better but I totally see why you think they hinder more than help. I think there should be direct drawbacks to using them rather just damaging you a bit, and I don't think they should be able to be upgraded to the same level as weapons, but I think they don't incentivize you to disengage with the game as much as you say, because unless you're running something like maxed out mimic tear (Which I agree is busted) Spirit ashes, atleast to my understanding, won't last for long, so by going into attack while the ashes are effective, you take the attention off of them and onto you, allowing them to stay alive longer, thus dealing more damage, think of it like playing with a friend, so depending on how you play it they could make you engage or disengage. Not particularly strong reasoning or justification I know, but you see where I'm coming from surely.
I think respeccing is fine. If a player is doing it purely to go for a meta build then yeah I can see the issue but I think the vast majority of players do it simply just to try different build or strats, atleast that's what I do it for. I admit this is by far my weakest defense because I do entirely understand where you're coming from and do agree with you for the most part, but it ultimately doesn't make each boss "the same boss" or make every character "the same character" to me, I see it like pizza, yeah some people are gonna indulge in it too much, but for the vast majority of people, they're just gonna use it like a regular meal or a reward of sorts, so I think it's fine personally but honestly I can totally see my argument here getting dismantled, I just don't think it's as big of an issue like you say it is. I've never abided by meta builds so that could be the reason why it doesn't affect me so much but that's a me thing only.
Ashes of war, again I see where you're coming from but inevitably when you make systems like this, some are gonna be bound to be better than others, doesn't make the others invalid, I don't think it leads to less variety like you said, since some ashes are gonna be better or just straight up more fun or interesting to use on other builds, but some should probably be nerfed
Overall, pretty good review! I still enjoy ER alot despite this (although I am playing with a mod right now so that may say more than this entire text catacomb LMAO) but it's not perfect or a masterpiece, no game is a masterpiece, nothing can be perfect, but that doesn't mean you can't enjoy it. Elden ring does have glaring flaws, but I still love the game despite that. There's nothing wrong with liking a flawed product or piece of media, you literally wouldn't be able to enjoy any piece of media if that were the case, to any fromsoft defender or fanboy reading this, when people state things or opinions in a negative or positive review like this, they aren't saying it like it's fact, they are simply giving their perspective and opinion. Just because they say things you disagree with does not make the game, or your experience, invalid, and similarly, it does not make their experience invalid. I don't think someone relying on the gun in BloodBorne is a good way to get the most out of the games combat, but that doesn't mean their experience with the game was any less valid than my experience of going full throttle into the combat with saws and axes and sparingly using the gun. They are not trying to sway you one way or the other, they are simply giving their opinion. If you enjoyed the games exploration, bosses, combat, dungeons, dragons, whatever, good for you, they aren't telling you not to enjoy what you enjoyed, they are simply telling you what they thought about the game and the parts you enjoyed. Telling people to "git gud" is not meaningful discussion, attacking people for not liking something you do or liking something that you don't is not meaningful discussion, my advice? just talk. express what you like about the game in a non hostile way, engage with their points and express why you feel differently. One thing you'll learn quickly is that there's alot more nuance when it comes to discussions like this, so please, just have a conversation. If you think a point is outright wrong or deceitful, then point it out, but otherwise, just talk. that's all you gotta do, don't tie your self worth to games either, that's lame (and gay)
Until next time.
This is a pretty good video. The introduction was kind of meh and cliche with the 'Elden Ring is a game that needs no introduction' but your video is actually pretty engaging and examines interesting points that I don't think I've seen other people point out. The only criticism to give is that it doesn't feel that segments between points flow well to the next point at times, and it can feel like a checklist of things you want to talk about rather than a united thesis. I do like how you pinpointed the core of Elden Ring being about being an open world and how its game mechanics caused lesser emotions.
First rational comment-review on TH-cam has been found
Fantastic video. Plz make more
25:00 You didn't have Torrent but you did have the lucerne? Either you made one hell of a trek before stopping at Gatefront or this is a dramatic reenactment. Either way, funny. I mention this because I have nothing else to add to your review, it's well done and has some fresh takes.
quality insights, great video mate
39:59 excuse me, I invade other Tarnished all the time, some of those npcs do seem to care, I've been called slurs and all sorts xD Nice job on the video! Miyazaki can't write a good quest, I'd say he can't write a good believable character if he wanted to and to give you an extra hot take - Fromsoft just can't write for sh^% but "It's post apocalyptic, you just don't understand it and... and something I heard about environmental storytelling as well" Oh, fuck off and trot along, will ya?
btw I subbed 'cause watching 4k views and no respect for the content is just painful. Irl npcs, man. Downvotes were hidden so their numbers stay hidden too.
Elden Ring definetely fail to justify the open world.
It’s the worst part if it was linear i would have enjoyed it more. Still a good game but that’s one of the aspects I didn’t like about it, big open world with nothing in it.
Its an incredible open world compared to other open world games, but i still dont really think it makes the game better than if they kept it more linear like their previous games
@Eli Didde not really. It's the same but more empty. The lack of a map for most of the game isn't innovative, it's annoying
@John Dodo i cant think of many games with a better open world lol
@@elididde3377 because open world is not a design most of the time. It is more like a way of production, diferent teams doing their own thing and puting together at the final of the development.
I kinda like "gamy" maps. One of the most memorable features in RE2 remake for me, was the color of the rooms on a map 😂
But... I agree about your first point. Can't say i never look at the words, but i definitely abused map at first play throughout. I wonder what game it would be, if we just had a "fog of war" on top of unexplored parts of the map. It's such an ancient, but effective concept, i always surprised if developers refuse to use it. Like... Why?! It's literally better of both words. Detailed map for people who like it, and terra incognita for those who don't.
agreed
I disagree on a solid amount of this, but only really your opinions of how some of these things affect the player's experience. I think you did an absolutely incredible job analyzing so many aspects of the game, and you described many things i agreed with but never really thought of them or why i felt certain ways
I mean no disrespect. A lot of points made are lose - lose situations, subjective opinions, or non issues/self created issues occasionally sprinkled with things that most people can agree with. There’s a few valid criticisms but tends to exaggerate either the problem or your solutions/changes. For example, most would agree Melina should have more of a role but imo if she showed up every time you rest/lvl then it would be just as negative to her impact on the story. It’d be overkill or turn her into just a tool for leveling up similar to how you call torrent a tool.
I’d prefer she appear when the player enters a new region for the first time to offer insight into the history or current state of that area. They could even make her speak to the player like latenna does when you enter the snowfields. That way even though she isn’t always visible it’d feel like she’s watching over or traveling with us and isn’t just a tool. It’d also add extra lore and narrative.
An example of created issues is how you can ride torrent to collect items without fighting. It is true but also loses effect when we consider that enemies drop armor, weapons, unique drops, and runes needed to level up. No one is forcing anyone to play that way and while it’s the best way to collect items without fighting it’s also a great way to miss items. I also don’t think there’s anything wrong with using it in moderation, it’s perfectly fine to ride past the troll at the beginning of the game. It isn’t going to ruin anyones experience, if anything it adds to it as you must decide whether to stand and fight or to run and pick your battles wisely.
An example of a lose - lose situation is not being able to kill certain npcs or the markers telling where the nokron meteor fell or other quest lines. While I lean on the side of agreeing that the game should have more consequences and the markers are unneeded I recognize that people will complain regardless of what fromsoft chooses. Plenty of people complained that the quests were hard to follow and on the flip side people complain that there’s markers now. Also the part where he says you shouldn’t be able to respec would be far more detrimental to the quality of the game. Let’s say I start a Guts build and come across dark moon greatsword 50 hours in and want to use it but don’t have the stats. Should I be forced to start a new character with those required stats in mind? My new character then would be less about playing the game organically and more about filling out my required stat list. This would also make ng+ less enjoyable as you’d be locked into using the same build or having to massively level up to make up the difference.
holy shit dude your review is amazing , you are laying out such a streamlined and fundamental understanding of good game design and how er lacks it , in fact you're saying many of the same things i said in my own review of a different game i just finished yesterday lol.....
yes YES YES!! exactly it! it's the element of imagination that has been gradually eroded from modern trippleA gaming , of course because the devs have no soul.....
Great video but I tend to disagree about the ulcerated tree spirit. It didn’t need to be reused 12 times but I actually think it’s one of the better bosses in the game. It’s fair and gives you ample punish windows which I appreciated since most bosses don’t give you many opportunities to attack them. I hated it at first but after getting good at fighting him I actually kinda started to like it. But fighting the tree spirit 12 times really hurts the appeal of course
I'm not annoyed that much by Torrent, just don't take him into battles. I like him and feel rather sad for him.
He's treated just as a convenient tool and a useful idiot for the open-world propaganda 🤣
I already have a comment 2 min in 😅 ER's world is much more enjoyable WITHOUT picking up the map fragments - try for yourself Tarnished. Now you have only your position on the map and nearby Sites of Grace that you already discovered. It's still useful for orientation and actually rewards looking AT THE FREAKING MAP and comparing it with your character's POV. It just might put a tiny bit of intrigue on exploration even on your second, much dreaded otherwise, playthrough.
My takeaway form this observation is that Lands Between would be far better with some kind "fog of war" style of discovering *the map* ...but that kind of mechanic would be far too tedious if you wanted to uncover map everywhere and would expose just how vast and ultimately empty this world is. So... the map isn't a problem imo, it's the fact that ER *is an open world MAP* in the first place.
Open Map does not equal an Open World, shit, you could start DS2 with 11 different bosses or so... There are ways to build a world that's very much open and without any maps 🤔
Elden Ring is a souls game where common crating materials are locked in treasure chests and flask upgrades lay out in the open. My question is, how casual do you have to be to enjoy that type of nonsense? 😂 Catacombs = Chalices. Abysmal use of a brilliant mechanic. Chalices were awesome, nearly endless. It nicely padded my experience, not the world itself.
(edit. lmao, I leave a comment about chalices and you get to the same exact point shortly there after)
The fact that your health flasks upgrades are clearly shown on the map is 1) Laughable from a stand point of any souls player with any self dignity left within them... 2) Shows that Open Map design can't really work with any well designed, damage and difficulty curves. Forget about balanced progress at this point.
Over a month ago I watched this and left a really short comment that expressed that I found this critique to be very poor but didn't list any reasons but then someone left a reply about it, so here it is.
This critique either has alot of things I disagree with or things that are straight up wrong.
This is coming from someone who is a very experienced, high level and knowledgeable player of the game.
I'm not an Elden Ring fanboy either, tbh the amount I've bashed on this game in the past has made many people think I genuinely hate the game, but these "critiques" hardly ever comment on the real issues and instead focus on non issues instead.
Well he was too lazy to timestamp any of his points so I had to rewatch the whole thing but that's besides the point.
There was some other things I disagreed with but didn't want to comment on.
5:58 What? Should you only be allowed to move around on foot? Going through the whole world on foot would be an absolute slog and also horse can provide more combat variety.
9:05 These borders are here specifically here so you play the level in the intended way and don't either skip everything with the horse or use the horse to break the level in some way.
10:46 Not being able to level up again just because you picked another ending would be horrendous, sometimes not messing with the mechanics like that is better than making it make sense for story.
12:34 Why does everything need a lore reason to exist, it's just something different in it.
13:40 They don't have rewards for every single build in the game per dungeon, each reward has a purpose for someone. The dungeons shouldn't be in the game at all? They're a part of exploration to see which bosses items and other things they contain, getting rid of them would ruin that and remove alot of content.
18:28 Tf, did he just compare Radahn to Maiden Astraea and Micolash? A knight that just does some attacks then Astraea she just sits there and a man that just runs around and talks a bit Vs. Radahn a visually stunning boss and arena, has epic music, starts at ranged and you can summon an army while hiding behind debris or dodging the arrows, then when you get close he has alot of moves and also launched down on you on a meteor, also has a big buildup to him.
18:49 Delayed attacks just require you learn the timing and adds variety to the combat and it's not like many are that egregiously long anyway. Not many bosses actually have super long combos that can't be punished, most of the time you can either attack during the combo or you can position properly so they don't do it or that they stop doing it. The highly evasive actions most can also be prevented with positioning or most you can literally just run to them in basically no time. "I don't even need to show examples" what an absolute joke.
20:28 I think most of the main bosses differ in gameplay alot and are not "just a difference in how annoying they are".
22:14 Some, Wdym some? Why didn't he list any? The only true one I can think of is Mohg Nihil, I know there's is a lot of unavoidable attacks in the game but they're if you get unlucky and are obscure attacks majority of players will not know about, probably not him either.
31:27 Inconsistent? It's called learning how much posture they have and the timer, also how much posture they have and how much time it takes for it to start regening is consistent, whether it be for the boss or in general.
31:46 Which attacks can you not roll but jump? The one he showed you can roll aswell.
32:05 Crafting is irrelevant at best? There's many useful things you can craft: all the different pots, bottles, greases, arrows just to name a few.
33:55 Summoning spirits can carry players through Every boss in the game and provide No challenge??? No.
35:42 Those examples also happen solo, it's nothing to do with the summoning.
41:59 Respecting is an amazing feature that allows more customizability and makes it so you don't have to make a completely new character for a specific build and can instead spend hundreds of hours onto one character. You also only have a limited amount of respects per NG cycle so there is some decision making.
Just some wild speculation but I am inclined to believe that you are an Elden Ring fanboy AND that you are quite young.
@@Oneiric_Benevolence Alot of people genuinely think I hate the game because of how much I've shlt on it elsewhere, I think the game has a ton of problems that really drive me away from playing the game, but are problems that wouldn't effect a casual player. I Haven't played in over 2 months because I got sick of it, so Fanboy? Nah.
Also I'm an adult.
@@NathanSavageDamage If you disagree so much with this review, then what are your problems with ED?
@@Oneiric_Benevolence I'm gonna to assume you meant ER. I think The game is quite buggy. Input dropping. Some variable hitboxes. Some Bosses being able to animation cancel. Some terribly designed moves on some Bosses. Hitboxes being able to linger in an arena. Some bad hitboxes. Sometimes you have to run way too far to get to the next Boss. Pivots being a thing for no reason. Horrendous Ganks. Plus some more but those are top of my head.
But there were some aspects I really like and mixed with the fact that it was new were the main reasons I became one of the best Elden Ring players of all time atleast for pve. I just know when the game is being treated unfaily with alot of points that aren't really issues.
Man, your "rebuttals" are so slimy I don't even know whether I should bother replying myself. Not to mention your own "real" critique goes only to most just mechanical elements. Which is pretty shallow imo, considering how much issues other parts of the game have. I'm also not sure about you getting called ER hater (why is it even relevant here? Are we tribals operating on us vs them mentality), but then again I myself got a ton of hate from certain people for just doubting Miyazaki's genius when the game came out.
I was about ready to turn off the video after the first few minutes when you were basically just complaining about good QOL changes for Elden ring BUT then pretty much every point after that was so great and agreeable. Especially the logistical nonsense of Elden ring. Elden ring takes place in a world where people haven’t died since the Erd Tree began it’s abundance era thousands of years ago AND YET somehow there’s no city or area big enough to even house a few hundred people lol. Great video. Definitely didn’t agree with anything for the first few minutes though but that’s just me
Keep up the good work pal!
"Elden Ring is all about watching a horse butt and picking up items" duh, it's called build-making, hello? 😂
I just don’t understand how the open world fails this game. Elden Ring does a masterfully job in environmental story telling. Even the Dark Souls saga does it just as well.
The combat is really bad honestly. I thought they were heading the right direction with bloodborne then sekiro. Now we're back with the same old shit
Elden Ring is truly the most underrated game of our generation.
It's not really underrated at all though is it.
@@NathanSavageDamage I think that's the joke, mate.
@@macrou not really
@@NathanSavageDamage Just because you don't think it's funny doesn't mean it isn't a joke.
@@macrou well I've seen too many people unironicly say these things.
One of the worst video game critiques I've ever watched.
He has good points and remarks. U maybe dont like it cuz he doesnt shout and yell and do idiot thing like many ppl on yt, he just talking as a normal person what is a big plus.
@@CoffeeGameMovie Yeah that was about the only good thing about it.
Yeah this critique is not very good lmao. Especially the section from 16:56 - 24:16
Are you capable of talking about some argument covered in the video? instead of saying a false and totally subjective sentence like that? becasue for me I agree on almost everything he said in the video, and this is his "FIRST" video on the channel and this guy nailed it because he know what he is talking about, with respect for the opera, developers and players.
@@kaioshinon5954
Fine.
Well he was too lazy to timestamp any of his points so I had to rewatch the whole thing but that's besides the point.
5:58 What? Should you only be allowed to move around on foot? Going through the whole world on foot would be an absolute slog and also horse can provide more combat variety.
9:05 These borders are here specifically here so you play the level in the intended way and don't either skip everything with the horse or use the horse to break the level in some way.
10:46 Not being able to level up again just because you picked another ending would be horrendous, sometimes not messing with the mechanics like that is better than making it make sense for story.
12:34 Why does everything need a lore reason to exist, it's just something different in it.
13:40 They don't have rewards for every single build in the game per dungeon, each reward has a purpose for someone. The dungeons shouldn't be in the game at all? They're a part of exploration to see which bosses items and other things they contain, getting rid of them would ruin that and remove alot of content.
18:28 Tf, did he just compare Radahn to Maiden Astraea and Micolash? A knight that just does some attacks then Astraea she just sits there and a man that just runs around and talks a bit Vs. Radahn a visually stunning boss and arena, has epic music, starts at ranged and you can summon an army while hiding behind debris or dodging the arrows, then when you get close he has alot of moves and also launched down on you on a meteor, also has a big buildup to him.
18:49 Delayed attacks just require you learn the timing and adds variety to the combat and it's not like many are that egregiously long anyway. Not many bosses actually have super long combos that can't be punished, most of the time you can either attack during the combo or you can position properly so they don't do it or that they stop doing it. The highly evasive actions most can also be prevented with positioning or most you can literally just run to them in basically no time. "I don't even need to show examples" what an absolute joke.
20:28 I think most of the main bosses differ in gameplay alot and are not "just a difference in how annoying they are".
22:14 Some, Wdym some? Why didn't he list any? The only true one I can think of is Mohg Nihil, I know there's is a lot of unavoidable attacks in the game but they're if you get unlucky and are obscure attacks majority of players will not know about, probably not him either.
25:55 Imagine if you have bosses chase you across the entire map...
31:27 Inconsistent? It's called learning how much posture they have and the timer, also how much posture they have and how much time it takes for it to start regening is consistent, whether it be for the boss or in general.
31:46 Which attacks can you not roll but jump? The one he showed you can roll aswell.
32:05 Crafting is irrelevant at best? There's many useful things you can craft: all the different pots, bottles, greases, arrows just to name a few.
33:55 Summoning spirits can carry players through Every boss in the game and provide No challenge??? No.
35:42 Those examples also happen solo, it's nothing to do with the summoning.
41:49 Respecting is an amazing feature that allows more customizability and makes it so you don't have to make a completely new character for a specific build and can instead spend hundreds of hours onto one character. You also only have a limited amount of respects per NG cycle so there is some decision making.
There was some other things I disagreed with but didn't want to comment on.
I'm not a Elden Ring fanboy either, tbh the amount I've bashed on this game in the past has made many people think I genuinely hate the game, but these "critiques" hardly ever comment on the real issues and instead focus on non issues instead.
Elden ring was terrible. Practically nothing for a story. If you want what they do have you have to read the 1000 weapon descriptions. Perfect game for idiots. Shit story, but as long as there's 115 weapons, everyone's happy.
It’s no Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 but there’s a story in Elden Ring if you’re willing to slow down and pay attention.
No, Elden Ring HAS a story, but FromSoft challenges us to puzzle it out and there isn’t anything wrong with this approach either, as forensic teams have to glean what happened to people and places from wreckage IRL.
“A perfect game for idiots”? NOT EVEN. Idiots give up on FromSoft's games and hate them because they suck at them.
@@MrJordwalk That's lore. A story is not told in Elden Ring. Read more.
@@asdergold1
I read plenty, thanks. Anyway, what is lore but the story of the setting?
FromSoft make game worlds akin to crime scenes, telling in the wreckage the stories of the traumas that befell the people and places. Like investigators, it falls to us to solve the mysteries if we want.
Its a "perfect game for idiots" yet it requires a lot of reading obscure item descriptions to understand anything? If anything that sounds like a game for nerds to me lol. One would expect a game for idiots to take a far more direct approach with its story, i think
You can't blame fans for the bosses. Since the beginning, the only reward in these games are the bosses themselves. There's no story to speak of and a plethora of garbage wrappings and flowers and armor nobody will ever wear. It's a boss fight simulator in an empty world
I always thought of them as RPGs
No, FROM games weren't always about the bosses. They used to be about exploration, fighting through the levels and larger world just as much as any particular enemy. You made your way through, found the way forward. Nowadays they only have levels as excuses, with the real deal being the big boss at the end. It's a glorified boss rush.
So in summary u don't like elden ring! Ok.
He literally starts by saying he does like Elden Ring. Is this a joke?
Does everyone need to sacrifice their firstborn to fromsoftware to be able to criticize it?
Brent OntarioCanada Is it that much to ask that you Elden Ring fanboys actually watch the video first before commenting? Apparently so.
L take
Thank you