Elden Ring is the first FromSoft game I’ve played since my medical trauma. When the trailer was dropped at GeoffCon in June of last year, I could barely contain my excitement. I had all these grand plans as to how I was going to play it. I would have one character who was fire-based and did all the bosses solo, like I played all the games. I would also have another character, a strengthcaster, who would be used in multi play.
All that went out of the window when I ended up unconscious for a week in the hospital–and another week conscious to boot. I woke up with a new attitude about life–and Elden Ring. In general, I’m more able to not sweat the small stuff and find peace with lifelong issues.
The biggest issue is my body (and my face). I have had body issues all my life. It started when I was seven and my mom put me on a diet. She has her own body issues and she sent a constant message that a woman’s worth was one, based on her weight. Two, her ability to spawn children. Three, her ability to please a man. And, yes, it’s definitely a man, not a woman. In other words, the trifecta of sexist beliefs from the 1950s.
I’ve been fat most of my life, with the exception of the two times I was anorectic. Let me amend. I was not fat as a kid. I was chunky, yes, but not fat like I am now. Did my mother’s hyper-concern about my weight ever help me? No. Did it make me want to eat everything in sight? Yes. Did it add to my self-loathing? You bet!
And, no, it wasn’t a concern for my health because she said not a word when I was severely underweight from starving myself and blacking out while walking. OK, the latter only happened once, but once is more than enough.
I struggled with it for decades until I reached the point before going into the hospital where I was mostly neutral about my body. I didn’t hate it any longer, but I certainly didn’t love it. For the most part, I just tried to ignore it existed because I preferred not to think about it. Taiji is what helped move me from hatred to dislike to mostly neutral, but that’s where I was stuck. It was an uneasy detente in which neither of us acknowledged each other.
Then, the medical trauma hit. And I came through it with flying colors. I did not have to do any rehab or physical therapy–and I was able to walk out of the hospital (metaphorically as I had to be wheeled out) under my own power. Within three months, I was doing everything for myself and hardly missing a beat. That was when I realized that my body was fucking amazing and I was full of admiration for what it had gone through. I have nothing but love for it now and I think I’m cute as fuck to boot.
Back to Elden Ring. after I got out of the hospital, my whole idea about how I was going to play it changed. Or rather, my whole plan for it changed. First of all, I realized that having two concurrent characters was not realistic. The game is massive and even though I did not know how massive it was at the time, I still understood that I would probably want to focus on one playthrough.
To that end, I focused on a Faith-based character because that’s where the Pyromancies were. I am all about the fire, which made it frustrating that I did not get my first flame-based incantation until roughly ten hours into the game. Completely my fault, but still frustrating. Well, actually, not completely my fault. The fault of not being able to go to the Roundtable Hold for that long because I did not activate certain Sites of Grace for that long. I really disliked that I did not have any Pyros for the first ten hours and that I did not have any offensive spells at all. Nor a wand/staff. You can’t buy a wand from a vendor so you have to hunt one down. It’s one reason I started as the Prisoner the second time around because I did not want to have to find a staff to do sorceries.
All rules were lifted when I played Elden Ring. For whatever reasons, all the restrictions suddenly seemed silly. Not to mention difficult to uphold. Doing all the bosses solo? Does that include the field bosses? Does it include Spirit Ashes? I had thought I might do all the story bosses solo with only the Spirit Ash summon, but I gave up on that with NPC story summons for a few bosses. Then later on, I just could not be stuffed with–*spoilers for late-game boss*–the Fire Giant and summoned two humans to help me. He is incredibly tall and fucked with my spatial perspective/perception. In addition, I kept getting one-shot, which, as we know, is not fun at all. And he has such massive amounts of health. All the late-game bosses, do, BTW.
In the video I included, Aoife mentioned that she did not use the summoning system at all, but that she did use the Spirit Ashes. She was careful to mention that it was just because that’s how she preferred to play the games while Ian cheerfully admitted that he summoned freely. He said that he bought into the ‘git gud’ mentality when he played the other Souls game, which made them not fun for him.
It’s always funny to me how games journalists are very quick to point out that they never summon, oh no, not them! But it’s fine if other people want to do it, of course. Though there are a few who consider it cheesing/not cricket. I always roll my eyes because it’s in the fucking game. As one games journalist pointed out, he’d rather people ‘cheat’ and finish the games than quit completely.
In addition, how someone wants to play the game is up to them. If they want to run around naked except for their skivvies and never level up anything, have at it! But there are still(!) people who decry others for not playing in the ‘right’ way. It was bullshit before and it’s bullshit now. In part because what constitutes easy mode is so different from person to person. I had to laugh at all the people who gushed about how good magic is in this game because it’s very good in other games as well. But NOT cheesing. Well, to be fair, in Dark Souls III and Elden Ring, it comes as close to cheesing as possible. Because you can have as many mana flasks as possible, you can have almost unlimited magicks. The trade-off is less health, of course. In Dark Souls III, I kept it at 10 Estus Flasks and 5 Ashen (FP) Estus flasks. In Elden Ring, I keep it even. 7 and 7 with my first character and 6 and 6 with this one because I haven’t maxed out yet. But because you can get flasks refilled after killing groups of enemies, I don’t need as many sips from my Flask of Crimson Tears (HP). Flask of Cerulean Tears is the FP one. I do sometimes give myself more Crimson Tears for the boss fights, but in the field, I keep it even. I also find it interesting that there is one less flask overall in this game as compared to DS III. I rarely actually feel like I’m lacking in flasks, though, which means it’s pretty well balanced.
Here’s the crux of the matter. I’m tired of people saying what is and isn’t the proper way to play the games. Play them however you want, but miss me with that noise. The purpose of the games, of any video games, is to have fun. Or rather, to enjoy them in some way or the other. I can’t say I actually enjoy the FromSoft games to the extent of that they make me happy. I rarely feel joy while playing them or have those warm fuzzies. More to the point, though, I am completely absorbed when I play one of these games. I can play for hours with laser-like focus and then I’m thinking about it while I’m not playing it.
I have played Elden Ring every day since it’s been released. I have found it as engrossing and engaging as the first day I played it. It’s a breath of fresh air in the open world genre and it’s the best soulslike to have come out this year. I am looking for a cozy game to counter the intensity of Elden Ring, but I’m sure I’ll be playing the latter for the rest of the year.