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We've put together guide to help your mindset when playing Elden Ring, because how you approach this game, mentally and emotionally, is as important as anything logical. A guide unlike any other!
George RR Martin has spent the last decade doing anything and everything but finishing his epic fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire — the books that inspired Game of Thrones (but only the good seasons). He's been writing short stories, producing TV series, working on comic books… if it doesn't involve writing that sixth book, you can rest easy knowing he's done it.
His most successful effort in the realm of positive procrastination, however, has to be in teaming up with Hidetaka Miyazaki and From Software on the new epic fantasy RPG Elden Ring.
Best known for their deliciously challenging and brutally punishing "Dark Souls" series, From Software has spent the last five years taking that formula and expanding it. Elden Ring casts off the shackles of linearity that loosely bound the Souls games and delivers an open-world title like you've never seen before. One without quest markers or a map filled with question marks, where you can go anywhere and do anything provided you're up to the task of killing a dragon or two along the way.
And where the Souls games featured a widely acclaimed 'minimalist' writing style (in the sense that the Emperor had minimalist clothes), Elden Ring's story is coherent, epic, interwoven with familial treachery and full of ye olde words, which is how you can tell old Georgie boy was in the writer's room.
Still, if you're coming into this fresh, having never played a "Souls" game before, there are some things you need to know. Bear in mind this isn't your average "beginner's guide" type thing — we know you're probably pretty good at games, and you can pick up the basics, so you've already found your horse, and you've probably got access to the Round Table Hold already. Instead, we've compiled a bunch of things to help you get into the right frame of mind for mastering Elden Ring. Things that will help you through what's to come — because in a From Software game, it's not just the night that is dark, and full of terrors.
The Right Way
The right way to play is whatever allows you to win...
One of the things you'll read and hear about Elden Ring is that there is a "right" way to play. What's tricky about this is that every single person has their own definition of correct. Some people never summon, some never use magic, some never even level up.
But the truth about Elden Ring is that the right way to play is whatever allows you to win. Anything you do to beat a boss is permissible — if it wasn't, From wouldn't have included it in the game. Do you want to spend Grave Gloveworts to power up your three Wolves so they can do most of the fighting for you? Not only is that allowed, it's one of the key ways From has made Elden Ring its easiest game yet.
Do you want to convince your two high-level friends to drop summoning signs so the three of you can wallop a boss? You should definitely do it. But you might want to keep in mind that Elden Ring borrows a trick from Dark Souls 2's playbook. When you finish Elden Ring and head into New Game Plus (NG+), where you start again with all your items still intact, you'll notice that the bosses play a little different. They have more moves. And they have yet more moves when you hit New Game Plus Plus (NG++). The reason this matters to you is because when you summon two other players, you'll be taking on the NG++ version of that boss — they will hit harder, take less damage, have more hit points and do moves you would never ever see if you fought them on your own.
The Mother of Dragons
Ok, we know we said no basic tips, and this one is pushing the boundaries of that idea. First up, you need to acquire Torrent, your Spirit Steed, by sitting at the "Gatefront Ruins" Site of Grace. Then head East. Any time you see anything nasty, you tell Torrent to ride like the wind, and you keep heading East until you hit somewhere called "Fort Faroth".
Just West of Fort Faroth is the Elder Dragon Greyoll, but having travelled East you'll already know that because it's the biggest dragon you'll ever see. If you sneak around her, however, and approach from the Fort Faroth side, you'll be able to attack her — and she'll do nothing at all about it. Provided you've got a weapon with Bleed or Frostbite on it, she'll die after a cool four to five minutes of attacking — and you'll net a cool 74,000 Runes, plus five Dragon Hearts for your efforts. If your weapon doesn't stack a status effect, you'll need to dedicate a cool 15 - 20 minutes to hitting the R1 button and about five minutes dodging baby dragons who will come to protect her. Every time we start a new character, this is the first thing we do.
Crafted Scion
We weren't going to include this one, but too many people don't seem to be aware of this system. You can craft in Elden Ring. You've probably picked up 500 "Rowa Fruits" — if you hit pause, you can go into the "Item Crafting" and turn them into a load of different items. If Item Crafting is greyed out for you, you're either in combat and you should deal with that, or you need to buy the Crafting Kit, which is sold by Kale, the Santa-looking merchant you meet in the Church of Elleh near the start.
Crafting is a huge deal in Elden Ring. If you run out of arrows, you can simply craft more. If you're short a few souls for that next level, you can turn random junk you found on the ground into sellable items.
But what makes Crafting worth adding to this list is the fact that some of the most powerful buffs in the game come from items you can make yourself. Exalted Flesh increases your physical damage by 20%, which means you need just four attacks where others need five. Almost every boss in the game will die quickly to a weapon smeared with Rot Grease, and Preserving Boluses will save you from the same fate.
Crafting is easily one of the least explored aspects of Elden Ring, but by mastering it you'll quickly become unstoppable. Plus you get to pretend you're Geralt of Rivia, sliming up your sword before you go to do battle against monsters.
Look Around You
We know what you're thinking — "Oh, great tip, I'll make sure my TV isn't off when I play Elden Ring". You're so sassy, so quick to judge. Here's the thing about From Software's games — they're a masterclass in subverting expectations, and in Elden Ring that means thinking about the default position of the average player's camera and how they can use that information against you.
If you've been to the Caria Manor in Liurnia you're probably already aware of this, and you probably have the thousand yard stare that accompanies a trip through that area. But if you haven't been there yet, here's an example of how Elden Ring encourages you to pay attention to the little details.
In the above screen, you can see, pretty clearly, the pale cream-coloured rocks which indicate the presence of a nasty enemy lying in ambush. If you're like we were, you'll grin and think "not this time, Elden Ring" as you walk around the trap and through the arch. And that's when you'll spring something much, much worse.
Elden Ring does this constantly, but it's not limited to scaring the wits out of you. Most gamers know that if the obvious path goes right, a quick trip down the path to your left will net you some sort of treasure. But Elden Ring has honed this idea to a fine art — all the best things in the game exist just outside of your normal peripheral vision.
One of the toughest bosses in the game exists at the end of a long path that goes to the right, and if you just go left you'll find an item that makes him much, much easier to defeat. We've placed our summon sign down outside this fight more than three dozen times and never seen a player use the item to parry him.
As you make your way through Elden Ring, keep this in mind. It changes how you see the entire world, and it will lead to finding so many more cool items without the help of a guide.
Help Others, Help Yourself
Our final piece of advice is pretty simple — drop your summon sign down outside bosses whenever you get the opportunity.
Cooperation in Elden Ring is one of the coolest aspects of the game. The world of Elden Ring is terrifying, but sharing that burden with someone else makes it a little bit easier — just having someone with you makes you feel safer.
But there's more to jolly cooperation than just the warm and fuzzy feeling you get from helping someone out! First thing’s first — you can learn how a boss fight works without risking any of your own runes. If you drop your summon sign outside the boss fog, dying in the fight will just send you back to your summon sign, runes intact. Sometimes the toughest thing about Elden Ring is knowing you need to retrieve the runes you dropped when you died last time.
It gets better though — if you defeat the boss with your new teammate, you will get runes as well. There are some pretty great rune farm videos out there on YouTube, which let you easily bank up loads of the resource you'll need for everything from levelling up to buying Smithing Stones, but by far the most rewarding way to increase those runic funds is by getting summoned.
And once you've gone through and beaten a boss a dozen times with some randoms, you'll be more than prepared to take them on for reals — with or without summons.
/End
It's a revolutionary concept, finishing something, but Elden Ring can be completed...
Once you've got a good handle on the game — and the above tips will no doubt help — you'll be more than prepared to do the one thing George RR Martin isn't capable of. You can power through to the end. It's a revolutionary concept, finishing something, but Elden Ring can be completed. And once you finish, you can start your NG+ run, where things are actually more horrifying. Actually, maybe there's a reason Georgie boy doesn't want to finish those books…
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