Can you believe we're less than a month away from Elden Ring? FromSoftware's latest effort releases February 25th, and it's safe to say it's one of the most anticipated games of the year. Well, it may also be a little more accessible this time out.
In a new interview on the PlayStation blog, Hidetaka Miyazaki talks all things Elden Ring ahead of launch. When asked about the 'difficulty discourse' often surrounding games, he has some interesting things to say about the team's approach with Elden Ring.
"In Elden Ring, we have not intentionally tried to lower the game’s difficulty, but I think more players will finish it this time. As I mentioned, the player’s level of freedom to progress through the world or return to a challenge later are all elements that I feel will help people get through the game at a more leisurely pace.
Also, there isn’t a focus on pure action. The player has more agency to dictate their approach against, for example, the field bosses in the overworld and how they utilize stealth in various situations. We’ve even reduced the number of hoops that you have to jump through to enjoy it in multiplayer. So we hope the players embrace that idea of receiving help from others. And we feel like the overall clear rate will go up this time because of these things."
To be honest, this just sounds like you have more options at your disposal, which is always welcome news to us. A more open world brings more freedom, and it's pretty exciting to see a 'Souls' game go that route. Miyazaki also touched on this:
"There were two major challenges we faced developing Elden Ring. The first was expanding upon the level of freedom. More so than our previous games, Elden Ring has a vast world with an open overworld, so we were faced with the ordeal of how we maintain our gameplay style while offering a renewed sense of openness. So with elements like balancing the player’s exploration alongside boss fights, the order of progression that players go through the game, and the progression of the events themselves throughout the map–trying to expand on player freedom while balancing all of this was a significant challenge. But we learned many great lessons attempting to achieve this.
Another challenge making an open world game is the tempo and pacing of the player’s progression, essentially trying to balance how the player paces themselves as they explore this vast open-ended map and how that factors into the scope of freedom and progression they provide. So we also learned some valuable lessons while making adjustments in that regard."
Do you think open world will make things easier in Elden Ring? Let us know below.
[source blog.playstation.com]
Comments 23
i've been saying for the longest; whichever company makes a game of this type where, despite maybe not being exactly EASY, can be finished by most players in 10-20 hours, will have an ENORMOUS hit on their hands.
Is that him saying it's easier than the standard FromSoft stuff?
Can't wait, but I want to get this on Xbox (as I'll be using the PS5 for Horizon and I like to have something on each), but early signs seem like the PS5 will have the edge on load times. Really hope the final release will be bit more even than the beta tests suggest
@Kopite Sekiro was supposed to be “easier” too...
I think “easy” from a From Software perspective is just a less opaque and esoteric experience. They will always be demanding games, but the barrier of actually approaching that mentality has gotten lower from Bloodborne on.
I’ve been burnt too many times playing FS games. I don’t have the time/patience to “git gud”. I never got that far in Bloodborne, then did even worse in Sekiro. You’d think I’d learnt my lesson by this point, but no...in a recent PS sale I bought Demon’s Souls. Yet again, after a few hours I hit a brick wall and gave up. So sorry, will have to pass on Elden Ring. Saying that, it’s not like I won’t have anything to play - both Dying Light 2 and Horizon Forbidden West are out within weeks of each other - both huge open world games to sink my teeth into.
Please don't be easy.
Please don't be easy.
Please don't be easy.
[I realise there are people with other valid views, but for me part of the joy of Souls is the challenge and sense of accomplishment. That doesn't mean you can't have accessibility and difficulty settings either, they're not mutually exclusive.]
@themightyant I still think the biggest "problem" with FS games is that if you add difficulty settings so that they're not immensely frustrating and time wasting, what people would find is there's not much of a game actually there. The frustration and repetition IS the game that a niche clicks with, and being able to play through it "at your skill/patience level" actually removes what the game actually offers, because it offers little beyond the patience-test.
Elden looks like the first that actually offers something beyond that. Maybe Sekiro did, too, but that one was SO impossible and frustrating I never even got far enough to see what it offers.
@Nightcrawler71 Your history is IDENTICAL to mine. I've literally bought every single FS game across 3 systems. I've barely played into the first world of any of them before rage quitting. And then I bought Demon's Souls in the Black Friday sale....... I played the first area, did better than I've ever done in DS game....and that was that, I doubt I'll ever touch it again. It was stressful in an unpleasant way and not really fun.
Elden Ring looks so cool and makes me want to like it, but I know it'll be the same mess all over agian. I've yet to like a single FS game, yet I keep WANTING to want to like them.
But I know when it hits $40 or less I'm going to buy it anyway........ And I know I won't enjoy a minute of it, will find it unpleasantly stressful and irritating, and walk away again.
@Spiders I bought Sekiro at launch due to them claiming it would be easier. It was the most brutally impossible game of the entire series. I don't think I cleared the first boss, and felt lost the entire time approaching it. I won't be fooled again.
@NEStalgia I agree with that to a point but think there is still room for a little wiggle room. e.g. have a very clear "THIS is the difficulty we recommend" notice and then for other difficulties change the setting a LITTLE.
i.e. Not the +50% more damage, 200% health we see in other games, it shouldn't be a cakewalk. But perhaps you do 10% more damage and take 10% less. Or just enlarge the parrying window a touch. More subtle to suit a larger range of players with different skill levels. Though this is hard as the balance of Souls is one of their core tenets.
Again this doesn't mean you can't also have accessibility options too. Not to make the game easier per se but to comparatively make the game the same difficulty for those who need it.
P.S. Yes Sekiro is the hardest! But it's still MUCH easier than Cuphead!
Pumped.
Only From game I’ve played that I didn’t run through multiple times (or even finish, much to my chagrin) is Sekiro. I’d still like to go back and finish one day…iirc I left off at a long set of stairs or a hill, and some insanely dexterous pikeman mid-boss made me question all my experience with From and Souls games up to that point.
Insane that I can still remember exactly where I am and why I put down the controller. Such a good game…I simply don’t (didn’t…?) have the skill or patience or both to progress further.
@armondo36 I mean I get your point, but the Surge 2 did this already, a fantastic under appreciated souls like, I actually like it more than any Souls game. It wasn’t a huge hit, Elden Ring will be though no doubt.
My favourite From game is Bloodbourne, that’s a true classic. I might not pick up Elden ring straight away, I’ll see.
@themightyant Yeah, I technically wish they implemented difficulty settings. I'd like to actually want to play the games I've paid for to the end, lol. But I do fear that, with classic souls games, right now I don't play through them because they're frustrating and stressful. But if I could set the difficulty, even to a reasonable amount, I fear my opinion would be that the games are thoroughly uninteresting. They really don't offer anything at all other than trying to surmount frustrating battles. I imagine that's a big part of why they don't offer it, it kind of shows the man behind the curtain, and he's not as impressive as you thought.
Elden and Sekiro, though, I think may have a compelling enough environment to make it worth exploring with difficulty settings though. There seemed to be a lot more interesting bits of Sekiro, but I can bother to see even less of it than other Souls games!
One thing I realized playing further into Demon's Souls than I normally even do is, the combat.....really isn't all that engaging. This is no Bayonetta or Nier. Being "hard not to get killed" is used to replace engaging, dynamic combat. I know DS is built to match the PS3 original, but Dark Souls 1 has even worse combat. But it kind of highlighted most of the "difficulty" in souls games is kinda cheap deaths and then just having to replay everything over and over. When you get a spawn before a boss, it's not as irritating to do (though slightly boring.) With luck, Elden addresses that.
Now, Nioh has far more engaging combat....but I can't figure out how to do it at all! It's so super hard. Hard as DS is, it's simple compared to Nioh. I can't kill anything in that series! But I recognize the very nice combat system even if I can't do it.
Cuphead, LOL! Sekiro lied tom me...they said it was easier...it was a nightmare. But Cuphead shocked me. NEVER did I expect what I was getting into when I bought that. I suck at that, too, though not QUITE as bad as Nioh and Sekiro. Maybe it's par with my MH level of suck (which is indeed a lot of suck.)
@Microbius LOL, I'm glad I'm not the only one that feels that way about Fromsoft games, it seems like in the Sony and Nintendo worlds of the internet, everyone things it's the best franchises of all time....one starts questioning their gamer card....
Dark Souls as a franchise isn't anything special when it comes to the low completion ratio of the games. People these days are real babies about finishing their games.
So he's not saying it's any easier, just that you aren't forced down a linear path where if you hit a road block, that can been game over and never played again by many gamers.
Personally, I'm going to wait for a price drop.
I don't have the patience for these types of games. I play to relax and escape into worlds, not rip my hair out in frustration. LOL
@isturbo1984 fair.
But when it comes to everything else it’s pretty special.
Sorry, had to let my fanboy out for a moment 😃
@armondo36 There are several games like that already. All of them just kind of floundered. Remnant immediately coming to mind as one of these.
These games thrive because of their challenge.
Mother father! Just read that miyazaki "rediscovered his love of creating poison swamps in elden ring" fudge my life. Still excited to play and die.
@Dusk_Actual I played the second one before I was ready and it resulted in me taking a 8y hiatus from the game, lol. But I eventually went back and beat it recently. It was one of my favorite experiences of the year in 2021. I have to be careful not to just throw in the next From Software game in willy nilly.
@NEStalgia “They really don't offer anything at all other than trying to surmount frustrating battles”
I could disagree more strongly. Everything from the world design, to level design, to drip fed lore, story and world building are excellent. Admittedly I understand why some don’t like the last 3 as it requires work on our part, it isn’t spelled out on a plate, but that’s part of the wonder. It takes a sense of imagination and every answer leads to more questions. I get that’s not for everyone. Add to that the wonderful music, character design and more and the games ooze unique atmosphere in a way others wish they could.
“the combat.....really isn't all that engaging. This is no Bayonetta or Nier” that’s subjective. Room for multiple views. Personally I prefer the strategic, methodical combat of Souls to the hectic breakneck pace of Bayonetta (witch time dodge to win) or Devil May Cry, flashy but button mashy (Not played Nier yet… it’s on the list…). I suspect if those were slowed down to souls speed they wouldn’t be as breathless and engaging as people think either. That’s absolutely not a criticism of those games, I can see they are near the peak of their genres, it’s just a personal preference, they scratch different itches and please different players.
The difference is that while Bayonetta, DMC or Nier give dynamism through a large move set and on-the-fly breakneck decision making, Souls do the opposite. They make the strategy all important, the WHEN and HOW you attack, move or dodge. I accept it’s not for everyone but for those who it clicks with it’s like a game of chess, apparently simple on the surface but layered with options, subtlety and depth.
Death is never cheap, that’s the beauty of it. If “you died” 99% of the time it was because YOU made a mistake. You rushed in without checking your surroundings or you attacked when you should have retreated. You learn and do better next time, you change strategy, you learn patterns. It’s this growth as a player that’s at the core of Souls. Again that’s an acquired taste.
@Spiders Sekiro was definitely easier than Bloodborne, I'm hoping it's more along the lines of those 2 I've never clicked with the Souls style.
@isturbo1984
Dark Souls 2 is my favorite!! It was the first game I ever platinumed back in the ps3 days…this was before Scholar came out…and the only dlc available at the time was Sunken Crown.
Ahhh memories
@themightyant It has pretty art, maybe interesting level design, I can't comment on level design too much not having played through any of the games myself, but that's probably fair. Which is most of why I do wish I could see the rest. But it's basically an animated 3d DeviantArt page. "Story"/lore we won't agree on tough. Cryptic, vague, incomplete storyboard concepts scattered in inventory item descriptions and alluded through set design without context isn't storytelling. I'm conjunction with other methods of storytelling it can be a powerful tool, but alone, it just that, incomplete concepts. People treat souls like religious texts where vague and incomplete documents that have been poorly translated for 5000 years from dead languages and extinct cultures are taken as having elaborate, detailed truths, and everyone sees a different well defined truth in the pages, because the pages don't actually have enough remaining information to have any idea what it originally actually said. Souls actually intentionally goes out of its way to recreate that exact experience using religious imagery and context! It's a mess. By acolytes...err...I mean fans get really into it....
Combat, yeah, I mean you have to play it like it's a stealth game, only you get ohkod on any error and if you do you have to replay the last hour. I'd probably enjoy the combat if I didn't have to keep repeating the last hour. That's where I hope elden changes things. That's cheap. The difficulty isn't the battle is that battle of trial and error learning capped by redoing massive amounts of work each error. Sure you can get 100 hours out of the game, because you spend 20 hours replaying the same area 20 times to die on one challenge
@NEStalgia The level design is one of the most praised things about Dark Souls and Bloodborne. The feeling of being lost and almost overwhelmed with options before finding shortcuts and having a moment of revelation and understanding about how it all fits together. No map, icons or hand holding needed. Be brave, one step at a time. Gods be praised!
We're never going to agree on the storytelling. That's fine, there's room for opposing views. Though I can understand yours. I also loved your 'religious texts' analogy. It's partly true, amplified by the 'acolytes' description (lol. well played).
BUT story doesn't always have to be spelled out neatly to be good. Movies like Inception, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Shutter Island or even Basic Instinct are all better for the open ended nature and the fact there is no factual conclusion. Moreover movies like Memento & Looper tell their story's in non-chronological order and with gaps and ambiguity. We have to decide for ourselves what happened, and it leads to discussion. Souls are the same. It's a difficult balance, done badly it's completely unfulfilling, and I can see how many people fall on that side of the argument. But for many of us, each item you pick up has some associated lore than is a piece of the larger puzzle, story and plot. I enjoy that challenge immensely. Though I don't pretend to understand much at all, it pulls me in with rich intrigue.
Runs are usually much shorter than an hour and get quicker with each learning. I wouldn't say (Sekiro excluded) you play them like a stealth game. You're not sneaking up on people per se. It's just methodical, tactical and slow compared to your average game. What you can't ever do (unless you REALLY know what you're doing) is just run through them blasting everything willy-nilly. It's 1vs1 whenever you can and chess-like.
What I like most of all is how much of a different challenge they present compared to almost every other game. Especially the most popular AAA games like the stagnant FPS genre or the open filled with hand holding and world maps filled with markers. Souls are the polar opposite of many of these design ethos. That's not a slight on those games, there's absolutely room for all.
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