Elden Ring dataminers find cut quest for Vyke, the guy on the cover art

gamesradar.com:

A quest for Elden Ring's Vyke, the character who appears in the cover art, was apparently cut from the game.

You'll probably recognize Vyke as the kneeling knight on Elden Ring's front cover. He appears only briefly in the final game as an NPC invader mini-boss. You can get his unique armor set and spear by defeating him, but it seems a bit odd that a character with such a small role would appear so prominently on the cover art.

Now, Elden Ring data miners have uncovered a cut questline featuring Vyke. Sekiro Dubi breaks it down in a new video (via Eurogamer (opens in new tab).)

Gostoc has a number of unused voice lines making reference to a knight in "armor melting inwards" - Vyke. Unfortunately, no remnants of text or dialog for Vyke's quest have been discovered, but his intended spawn location suggests that he would've been a summon to help you fight a boss in Stormveil Castle.

The quest seemingly would've had a few dialogue choices and offered a handful of rewards: some neutralizing boluses and a couple of unnamed items that were also cut from the game. The video above also contains a short look at Vyke's face.

As with previous From Software games, data miners have been digging deep through Elden Ring's files to uncover loads of quests and dialog that didn't make it into the final game. There's some wild stuff like a Mimic Tear gaining self-awareness, more story around Godfrey, as well as a "dreambrew" you could use to get NPCs drunk and make them spill their secrets.

A recent Elden Ring update finally gave players a way to see how many Runes their Runes are worth.