What Are you Playing Now & General Game Discussions

[CKwi88]

(04-24-2025, 10:07 AM)Millhouse Wrote: My first playthrough was pretty rough, all over the place, used a lot of npc help in fights, and missed parts of the game because I just didn't know about it.

But what made ER stand out to me was the replay value which I rank as top tier. After my first playthrough, I went all-in reading walkthroughs, meta builds, etc for New Game +, and had a blast with that as I 100% .

Then I did another playthru again, and again, and again. LOL Yeah I got hooked on it, then the DLC came out, and then same thing all over again.

I'm definitely doing an "assisted" run. I don't have the time to do all the exploring on my own. I'll boot up the Elden Ring wiki on Fextra and whenever I get to a named place I'll go to its page to check if there are any items I should be keeping my eye out for. Haven't really used it for progression or anything yet, but it has certainly helped me not miss anything. And like you said, there is a lot to miss. 

The "all over the place" sounds like par for the course for anyone's first playthrough of a Souls game. And as I'm running into kind of a rut through this Elden Ring playthrough, I kind of realize that the experimentation is both a high and low point. High because it encourages experimenting with everything the game has to offer, but low because being all over the place does indirectly increase the difficulty as your toon becomes a "jack of all trades, master of none". In this playthrough I went in with a pretty clear build in mind. Sword and board, vigor, endurance, enough faith for buffs and then pump strength. And it has been enjoyable. But now I have a loadout that really won't improve much, and I'd say I've done about 50% of the content. Could I respec and try something new? Yes, but my equipment will be significantly worse. 

I think that might actually be my biggest gripe with Elden ring: availability (or lack there of) of upgrade materials. Outside of special weapons, your primary weapon will consistently be a few steps ahead of secondary weapons, and it ends up being a crutch of sorts. The items for unlocking the smithing stones for purchase usually come too late. You find the first one and you probably already have a +8 or +9 weapon, if not more. But yay, you can upgrade and experiment with other weapons up to +6 now. 

It's a very good game, no doubt. I still think it's a little too big and stretches the formula thin. The other Souls games are a little tighter in their pacing, even if they are more linear.