Hidetaka Miyazaki Says Making Elden Ring Easier Would 'Break the Game' as Shadow of the Erdtree Launches

ign.com:

Elden Ring expansion Shadow the Erdtree will seemingly feature developer FromSoftware's toughest ever bosses, as toning down the difficulty would "break the game itself" according to game director Hidetaka Miyazaki.

FromSoftware games are known for being challenging but the conversation around video game difficulty reached new heights thanks to Elden Ring selling 25 million copies. Amid some calls for the developer to make things easier or add different difficulty modes, however, Miyazaki has clarified why FromSoftware instead looks to continuously push players.

"If we really wanted the whole world to play the game, we could just crank the difficulty down more and more, but that wasn’t the right approach," Miyazaki told The Guardian.

"Had we taken that approach, I don’t think the game would have done what it did, because the sense of achievement that players gain from overcoming these hurdles is such a fundamental part of the experience. Turning down difficulty would strip the game of that joy, which, in my eyes, would break the game itself."

Shadow of the Erdree, which arrives today, June 21, 2024, features bosses with which FromSoftware "really pushed the envelope" on what the player can withstand, Miyazaki said ahead of its release. In fact, getting into the expansion even poses a challenge as players must defeat an optional boss.

Those eager to explore every inch of the expansion can check out IGN's extensive guide, which covers Shadow of the Erdtree's new weapons, its various quest lines, and how to defeat those pesky new bosses.

In our 10/10 review, IGN said: "Like the base game did before it, Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree raises the bar for single player expansions," we said. "It takes everything that made the base game such a landmark RPG, condenses it into a relatively compact 20-25 hour campaign, and provides fantastic new challenges for heavily invested fans to chew on."

Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He'll talk about The Witcher all day.