I hated Elden Ring — now I can’t put it down

gamepur.com:

Picture this. You’re minding your own business while playing Horizon Forbidden West on story difficulty. You are almost entirely unaware that a game from the Dark Souls developers called Elden Ring is about to launch. Gaming to you is about cinematic storytelling and not the stress of difficulty, so From Software’s popular giant didn’t peak your interest. Suddenly, out of nowhere, perfect 10/10 Elden Ring scores come flying at you like social media dodgeball, including from your own coworker. Terrific, now you have to see what this is all about.

The first disappointment comes from spending an obscene amount of time in character creation only to have their face shrouded under a helmet. What is the point of designing a character when there is no option to hide it? A glint at the edge of a cliff with the message “Try Jump” by another player trolls you into death number one. Five minutes later and you suffer death number two by a giant crab-person monster. Apparently this was supposed to happen. You don’t face that enemy again and awaken in a new area of the cave, opening doors to a world ripe for exploring… while completely unaware that you missed an actual helpful jump message to a tutorial area.

The next twenty minutes are a blur. You venture outward and get absolutely deleted by a giant golden horse man, hear a horn go off and get swarmed by soldiers, then finally reach death twenty-something caused by a ballista to the face. Instantly you alt-tab and request a refund from Steam. Where is the fun in wandering aimlessly and getting murdered?

This was my introduction to Elden Ring…I didn’t get it…

The opening act of your first From Software title is a lesson in patience, and