FromSoftware’s ‘Elden Ring’ is Studio’s ‘Richest and Most Detailed’ Experience

That Elden Ring release date draws ever closer, and with its nearness, more details arise surrounding the game, from form to function. At the Taipei Game Show 2022, FromSoftware's Yasuhuio Kitao sat down to discuss everything from the in-game story to the Yakul-looking Spirit Steads.

Several key details have come forth from the interview, highlighting how Elden Ring will function in terms of open-world gameplay. Although positioning itself throughout its marketing as an open world, the first of its kind via the legendary FromSoft team, Kitao elects to call its world design more in line with the open-field approach. This means while exploration is still wholly free, the map is stitched together with several major open points, allowing for varied traversal and environments.

In terms of size, the Elden Ring map doesn't necessarily have a set number attached to it. Kitao explains, "Well, we haven't measured it in terms of square kilometers, or anything, but we can definitely state that it is significantly larger than anything we've made before."

These are rather enlightening words coming from the creators of Dark Souls 3 and Bloodborne, both of which have pretty extensive map sizes, despite being linear in nature. With Elden Ring, though, freedom is at the very forefront of the theme here. Where previous games set players on a burdened-set path, this next experience will instead challenge players with their own self-made quest, one that can have ever-alternative branches for each player and each cycle.

Still, while players might be able to do practically anything and go almost anywhere, not everything can be holistically finished in one playthrough. When asked if one can see the totality of the experience in a single run, Kitao relays, "Not quite. Technically, it's impossible to reach 100 percent due to the fact that there are branching points near the end, but you can certainly get pretty close."

The aforementioned Dark Souls 3 and Bloodborne both are renowned for their difficulty, as are nearly all of the 'Souls-like' games made by FromSoftware. Despite this legacy, Elden Ring seems to be a bit less daunting in terms of its difficulty curve. Kitao tells fans that Elden Ring "is the perfect title" for those who have previously shunned FromSoft experiences due to "concerns about the games being too difficult."

However that's not to say that Elden Ring won't have its fair share of major inconveniences to overcome. Its scope, at least on the surface, is unheard of. Kitao remarks that there will be far more in-game items in Elden Ring as opposed to previous experiences, so at least players will have a plentitude of tools to protect themselves with in this dark wonderland.

Celebrated Game of Thrones author George R.R. Martin assisted in the development of what FromSoft coined the 'mythology' of Elden Ring. This entails most of the background histories and narrative bits that have led to the game scenario itself. Despite the predestined path, however, and mirroring the Dark Souls series to some extent, Elden Ring will be shaped constructively through the player's own imagination, style, and explorative measures.

Kitao says it best:

"Rather than using movies and cut-scenes to explicitly inform the player of the storyline, we have tried instead to provide the player with small fragments and let them use their own imagination to construct the story."

The main story path of the game will supposedly take around 30 hours to beat, yet conceals within this a melting pot of wonder and surprise riddled throughout the Lands Between. In all, Kitao considers Elden Ring a major turning point for the studio, "I'd say this is probably the richest and most detailed world we have ever created."

Elden Ring went gold last December, meaning it has been printed and awaits its day one patch upon release. The team at FromSoft still has a ton of work ahead of them, mainly QA testing. Fans have waited a long time for this experience, nearly three years since it was originally announced, including a month-long delay that would have seen the game already out and playable.

For now, said fans can merely gawk at the marketing or wait in the darkness of no-spoiler territory as the February 25th release date closes in.