Blood on moss, tattered horrors in the sky: Elden Ring is Eurogamer’s 2022 game. Perhaps it feels weird to say it because there really was no doubt about it. Over the past few weeks, game sites have announced that Elden Ring is their favorite game of the year. Elden Ring is inevitable in 2022.
True story: At first, we were a little confused about our choices. Not by games that are terrifying wonders. But by that feeling of giving way to the inevitable. Game of the Year picks should hit with a sense of surprise before settling in, and it feels like the only choice we could have ever made. There are many, but what about the first part? It never came as a surprise.
nevertheless. Still, isn’t that a surprise? And isn’t that something worth celebrating? Let’s take a step back so we don’t misframe Elden Ring’s success through the lens of editorial decisions. right. Isn’t it incredible that a game as mean, weird, and distinctive as Elden Ring was voted Game of the Year 2022 by so many people, not just us? And isn’t that great?
It’s a reminder of the course that From Software’s games have taken over the past decade or so. Most people who loved the early games of the modern From era (even Demon’s Souls and even the original Dark Souls) discovered this wonderful, strange and insane thing that felt like a huge secret. I have a story. Everyone has stories of how these games worked out (often painfully). And how these games thought: the choices they made and the choices they wanted players to make. Everyone has a story about trying to convince someone else: I’m playing this game right now and nothing else like it. it doesn’t explain anything. Multiplayer is horrible. I literally have no idea what will happen next.
These people who joined first – they fascinated others. Dark Souls was quietly big: It sold decently, but was a total barnstorming success in terms of how it got noticed by other designers, other developers, and publishers. was bigger. Bloodborne was bigger. Sekiro is huge, and now Elden Ring is a game that doesn’t get in the way of other games. Elden Ring was a big hit. big event. Dad, to use the beloved words of former Eurogamer editor Oli Welsh.
And it wasn’t just the From game itself. Over the past few years, so many different games from different developers have borrowed a bit of FromSoftware’s design. Bringing the world together the way FromSoftware taught them. Soulsborne games can be played straight like Steelrising, or viewed through a weird personal lens like Death’s Door. FromSoftware’s formula turned his Double-A scene upside down, but it also skewed the giant blockbuster. Zelda also paid attention.
This is strange in a way. Because it takes the weight of personality, the unique sense of authorship of the Dark Souls game and turns it into a tenet of the genre. I also have a problem with the From stuff. First is the lack of consideration for accessibility, including cognitive accessibility. But it’s also great. Because all future games had to choose between 8-9 years ago. It’s games as a service, his Ubi formula for open worlds, it’s all jazz. Most of the audience is strange, esoteric, and dangerous to discover its magic. They chose peculiar games, odd games, games worth talking about, writing about, reading about. A game worth ranting about if its accessibility thinking is so poor. A game that takes you to a place where you really don’t know what’s going to happen next.
And this is the final point. Elden Ring isn’t the biggest Soulsy game yet. I also have a feeling that it will be the last in no time. Fromm has already announced that the next game will be something very different, and there’s also a sense that it’s just as good as the follow-up. ,I understand that. We know how the trick works and it’s still an absolute pleasure to see it performed again, but the feeling of being completely flattened by something unprecedented Sparks are much harder to come by.
This is good too, really. Fromm gets to do something new, which could lead the whole industry in a new direction. And we can all enjoy the feeling that Fromm’s games have made us worthy. Again, you never know what will happen next. Happy 2023!
