Elden Ring
Directed by Hidetaka Miyazaki, Elden Ring is FromSoftware's open-world take on the Souls formula. The Lands Between used to be held together by the Elden Ring, an artifact Queen Marika shattered into pieces now scattered among the realm's ruling demigods. Players take on the role of a Tarnished, an exile dragged back into the fog to hunt those pieces down and become Elden Lord. Fantasy author George R.R. Martin worked out the mythology and family history behind the world before FromSoftware turned it into an actual map to walk across. Elden Ring came out February 25, 2022 on PC, PlayStation, and Xbox, and picked up Game of the Year at The Game Awards that same year.
Top 3 Reasons to Play
The map rewards going off-route. Stormveil Castle and Leyndell are the big, hand-built legacy dungeons, but they sit inside a much bigger overworld full of catacombs, hidden caves, and whole regions, Liurnia, Caelid, the Altus Plateau, that nobody forces you to visit. Wander off the main quest and there's gear, spells, and lore to find that you'd otherwise miss.
Boss fights people still argue about. Malenia and Starscourge Radahn come up constantly in "hardest FromSoftware boss" debates, and it's not just hype: both fights are built on tricky movesets, not bigger health bars. If that sounds like too much, Spirit Ash summons and co-op bring the difficulty down without changing what the fight actually is.
Builds that actually change how you play. The ten starting classes are starting points, not a cage. Eight core stats, sorceries and incantations to choose between, and Ashes of War that let you put a new skill or elemental effect on almost any weapon. Later on, an item called a Larval Tear lets you respec your stats a set number of times, so one bad early build doesn't have to follow you the whole run.
Story and Lore
The Lands Between fell apart after Queen Marika shattered the Elden Ring following the death of her son, Godwyn. The pieces, called Great Runes, ended up scattered among her children and the realm's strongest lords, who then went to war with each other in what's remembered as the Shattering. Grace stopped guiding the Tarnished not long after, and they were exiled from the land. The game picks up once that exile ends and the player gets called back.
Melina and the Two Fingers point the player toward the demigods holding those Great Runes: Godrick the Grafted at Stormveil Castle, Rennala at the Raya Lucaria Academy, Starscourge Radahn in Caelid, Rykard in Volcano Manor, Morgott in Leyndell, Mohg at his palace, and others besides. Malenia and Maliketh stand between the player and the final stretch, which ends with Radagon and the Elden Beast. FromSoftware tells most of this through item descriptions and NPC questlines instead of cutscenes. Which ending you get, Elden Lord, the Frenzied Flame, or one of several others, comes down to what you did across the whole run.
Gameplay and Mechanics
Sites of Grace do triple duty as checkpoints, fast-travel points, and level-up stations, scattered across the whole map. Torrent, the spectral steed, speeds up travel and is mandatory for a handful of boss fights. Eight stats run the build: Vigor, Mind, Endurance, Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, Faith, and Arcane cover health, stamina, and how well a character handles a given weapon or spell type.
- Ashes of War: attachments that give almost any weapon a chosen skill or elemental affinity
- Spirit Ashes: summonable allies usable in most fights, including many boss encounters
- Sorceries and incantations: two separate spellcasting paths, each tied to different stats
- Great Runes: buffs unlocked by defeating a demigod and activating a Rune Arc
- Torrent: the double-jumping spectral steed used for exploration and some boss fights
There's no matchmaking browser for multiplayer. Players connect using passwords or specific items, and can summon help for co-op or leave themselves open to PvP invasions from other Tarnished. There's also no difficulty slider. Leveling up, gear, Spirit Ash summons, and playing with others are the tools available for making a fight easier. A completed save can carry into New Game Plus for a tougher second run.
Characters and Factions
The Roundtable Hold is the player's home base, staffed by NPCs like Enia, attendant to the Two Fingers, the blind maiden Fia, and the merchant Hyetta, several of whom run their own questlines. Melina travels with the player for most of the game and is directly tied to one of the major endings. Ranni the Witch, exiled from the Carian royal family over her own ambitions, runs the longest and most involved questline in the game, with her wolf-warrior companion Blaidd and the blacksmith Iji along for it.
Leyndell has the Golden Order loyalists defending it, but Volcano Manor is its own thing: a group of assassins secretly working for Rykard, taking contracts on other NPCs across the map. There's also a separate path built around the Three Fingers and the Frenzied Flame, pulling the story in a direction that has nothing to do with the Golden Order. None of this gets spelled out directly. Item descriptions, dialogue, and the environment itself do most of the explaining.
Editions, DLC & Related Titles
- Standard Edition: the base game, available on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S
- Deluxe Edition: adds a digital artbook and the game's original soundtrack
- Collector's Edition: includes physical items such as a statue, cloth map, and pin badge, with contents varying by region
- Shadow of the Erdtree: a paid expansion that arrived June 21, 2024, requiring the base game and introducing a new region, the Land of Shadow, along with new bosses, weapons, and Spirit Ashes
- Elden Ring Tarnished Edition: bundles the base game and Shadow of the Erdtree with new armor sets and Torrent customization options; built as the Nintendo Switch 2 port that launched August 28, 2026, with the same bonus content also made available on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam.