Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree

By Joe July 21, 2024

⭐ 9.5/10

This is the expansion for Elden Ring, which on its own is one of the greatest video games to ever come out. For the most part, this is just more Elden Ring, which is fine. The dungeons feel similar, the fighting similar, the weapons, etc. There are a few new things, but for the most part, not much differentiates this from the core experience.

Still, I will say this is some of the best Elden Ring. The vistas are as beautiful or haunting or mysterious or terrifying as anything in the main game. There are unique dungeons, unique enemies, a few cool puzzles, some interesting bosses. But really, more than anything, this was just an excuse to return to the game which was very welcome for me.

The main discourse about this expansion has been it's difficulty. This is an incredibly difficult expansion, because after you spend 100 hours on your character, you can get carved up the moment you step into the new area and meet common enemies. Most bosses can kill you in 2-3 hits, and enemies are more relentless than ever. Still, I didn't mind too much. Once you get how to level up here, it's mostly normal progression, and what I actually really loved was the expansion's ability to force me to mix things up.

So one criticism I had of the main game, and a criticism many people have, is that this game offers hundreds of weapons, variants, armor, spells, incantations, etc., and yet you are limited by how you can level them up, and usually end up switching weapons two or three times across a 100 hour play through. They're is little motivation to upgrade because you can get the best weapons early on. It's mostly the same here too, but I felt a little more encouragement in mixing up the builds. In this DLC, I used some 5 or 6 weapons to beat different bosses or areas, and that felt pretty cool. I used a totally different build to beat the final boss than I used for most of the game.

Maybe that feels cheap or unearned, but in the end I spent over 150 hours on this character, so it was cool to use all the tools at my disposal to meet each challenge. Because I did that, no boss was unbeatable for me, and I only ever spent maybe an hour or two trying to beat different guys. That was it's own reward, though I definitely can't say I feel I mastered any boss.

So ya, what an incredible piece of work this game is. I spent all those hours on this character across a few years, and I can firmly say I was rarely bored or wanting to play something else. It's incredibly frustrating, and the only times I wanted to quit was when I wanted peace in my heart again. But it's a super rewarding experience if you can stomach the frustrations. I still think the story is nonsense and I wonder if these games would be better served if they told a comprehensible narrative. Whatever, they want to do their own thing, so God bless.

Similar to the main game, I just can't give it a perfect score when it seems like it tries so hard to make you mad. Despite that, it comes pretty damn close. It's one of the best games of all time, and I've often came back to it over the years. I feel very confident that I will be coming back to this game in the future.