Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree

[00:00:00] Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to another episode of the Pre-Order Bonus podcast. I'm one of your hosts, Cameron Warren and I've joined, as always, by the Pixel Professor, Jacob Price. It's July 11th, 2024. Jake and I skipped last week to celebrate the birth

[00:00:28] of United States of America. We love you, America. Don't die yet. Please. We are now, ladies and gentlemen, officially in backlog season. Dude, I've actually... This is the time of year, Jake. This is when you go back and you play the stuff that you

[00:00:52] left to die on the vine that's sitting in your Steam library or your Xbox library that you played that one hour of and then you never went back to here. This is right now, every year,

[00:01:04] this is when it happens. This is when I get the energy, primarily because there's no new games coming out for like a month. Yeah, actually wrapped up some games, believe it or not. Kind of a rare occurrence.

[00:01:21] Jake, I know you finished Shadow of the Error Tree, which is what we're going to talk about in today's episode. What's up on the backlog? Because I know you got to be deep in the backlog now because it's just the height of that season.

[00:01:31] Yes, it is. Let's see. I just beat Haunty. That was a game that came out in May. I'm pretty conflicted on that one actually. It's going to be an Indian Pressions episode.

[00:01:47] Boy, howdy. I've got a lot to say. There was a lot that irked me, but then it was punctuated by moments of brilliance. I'm going to be talking about that. Say that one one more time.

[00:01:59] This is Haunty. It's like this top-down hand-drawn, like you play as a little ghost navigating this world. Jake, have you played The Case of the Golden Idol? Dude, I've seen trailers for that game. It just came to Game Pass and it's got the craziest pixel art.

[00:02:21] It's like a mix between Microsoft Paint but it looks disgusting. It looks terrible. But it's so intentionally so, right? Yes. It's not like a bad disgusting. I've thought about playing that one quite a lot, but I never pulled the trigger on it.

[00:02:45] I'm honestly scared of games like that that require me to think a lot. Yeah. It's because the game is very openly like you must have a paper in pencil and use your powers of deduction. I am an absolute idiot. I cannot figure things out. So I'm kind

[00:03:04] of afraid of it, to be honest. But it gets like as crazy rate reviews and it just hit PC Game Pass. Yeah. So no, I haven't played that one. Maybe I will. We'll see. Let's see. I started Immortals

[00:03:19] of Avium, which is a game that we are going to talk on the show. So I'll save most my thoughts for that later. But this game has really fun combat. But I don't know what's happening in the story. And I have no desire to care. It's like...

[00:03:40] That sounds about every review that I've heard about that game right on par. Yeah. And then I finally went back into, I started Mad Max. Yeah. Dude, this game, I know it's like kind of, hindsight is 20-20. It's being kind to

[00:04:00] this game and people recently with Mad Max for your set that just came out. They're like, oh, the video game was actually good. I bought it for like five bucks. I don't know how long ago. Started playing it and, yeah dude, it's good. Like it feels really good

[00:04:13] to play. It's got weird controls, but it's good. Yeah. When you mentioned that we, I think we have, we have that on the docket with right coming up. Yeah. So, Mad Max. Secret plans with that one, but there are some things in the works.

[00:04:28] Yep. So, I also pulled that one back. I actually had, I have a save on that one that was like 20 hours in. Nice. And I opened the save up and I was like, I have no idea what to do with that. I was

[00:04:42] so lost. I didn't, I was like, I don't know how to control anything. I'm just dying over it. So, I just restarted and put like 10 hours into it. And yeah, I mean, it's like that 2012-ish open world game. But it's, you know, it's like well done.

[00:05:01] I could say it's just like a checklist game, but it's got cool vehicle combat and you punch people in the face. Yeah. Those controls are so funky. I feel like that would be a really hard game to come back to because the controls are non-standard, you know?

[00:05:18] Yeah, they're super weird. Oh, and then I have one more game I wanted to talk about. I started Golden Sun, the GBA RPG from 2001. People rave about this one in Corona Trigger. I booted up Golden Sun

[00:05:37] and this is going to sound like a really massive dunk, but not, I mean, not on Golden Sun. Sorry, everybody's bracing themselves now. But like what, what is he going to say?

[00:05:50] Why, I cannot think of modern RPGs that can go toe to toe with how well Golden Sun gets you invested in its characters and its story. Wow. Okay. I was shocked that like in three or so hours of play, I was just sitting there thinking

[00:06:10] to myself, how does this game nail such simple and clear exposition to get you involved? And I, so I started playing Golden Sun about when I started Immortals of Avium. And I just, in two very different styles of RPG, right? But I just thought to myself, Immortals

[00:06:28] of Avium is stumbling over itself to get the story started, whereas Golden Sun starts off with a bang and it starts off simply. And I just am infinitely more emotionally invested

[00:06:40] in Golden Sun within just a single hour of play than it was Immortals of Avium. And I'm like, man, what happened? And this is you're playing on Switch online. Yeah. So this is Nintendo Switch Online, which I'm super grateful for because it just has save states,

[00:06:56] right? So you can save literally any second, any frame of the game, you can save it. So yeah, Golden Sun has been I'm really that's that's the one game right now that I'm really excited to go back to and play probably the most.

[00:07:11] That's awesome. Yeah, I have been pretty deep in the backlog. So a few games Mad Bax, obviously I just mentioned, pulled that out. That's been fun to just go back to solid, solid game.

[00:07:24] A little bit dated, a little bit of like the sort of tired open world for I kept thinking to myself, I should just play Ghost of Sushi. I didn't like when I'm playing it. You can't like you can't help like the thing about this is my this

[00:07:35] is my fear with outlaws. Oh, is I'm going to play outlaws and I'm just going to say to myself, I just want Ghost of Sushi with two that's like my greatest fear. If it can't if outlaws can't like give Ghost of Sushi my run for its money.

[00:07:48] I think that's the problem for me. And hopefully the setting and other things solve that right and right. It seems really promising. I kind of feel like with open world games, especially in the past five or so years, we have such

[00:08:07] beautiful examples of open world games done really well that the standard is higher. You know, Elden Ring, Ghost of Sushi Ma, right? Obviously Breath of the Wild slash Tears of the Kingdom.

[00:08:21] And then, you know, I think even outside of those three, I think it's more mixed on Red Dead Redemption 2, but I would also include it sort of in this category of open world games that are sort of pushing or like raising the bar basically.

[00:08:34] And yeah, I agree going back. This is part of the reason why I'm so afraid to actually go play Horizon, Forbidden West or Horizon Zero Dawn is the first one, right? Which that game is what, 2017?

[00:08:48] So it's not even that old, but I'm a little afraid that I'm just not going to enjoy that open world as much as I have Ghost of Sushi Ma and Elden Ring. You won't. That one has a really cool story though.

[00:09:02] So I even back when I played that one, which was pre-Ghost of Sushi Ma, I just powered through to the main, like the main story and that was worth it.

[00:09:12] But yeah, anyways, Mad Max and then the other game that I've sung actually quite a bit of time into and it got its hooks in. And I was surprised because none of these farming cozy games have hooked me.

[00:09:26] My time at Sandrock hit game pass dude, dude, it's got its hooks in man. I'm invested like I'm all in like I'm playing like every night. Dude, this is this is insane folks. So obviously Cameron and I text each other quite a lot.

[00:09:41] I get a text one night Cameron's like, have you tried my time at Sandrock yet? I was like, no, he's like, dude, it's good. And then I'm like, Cameron is telling me that a farming sim is good. So I'm like, that means you know there's some serious.

[00:09:57] I'm like who took Cameron's phone to send me this message, you know. And then the next night Cameron sends me a message. He's like, have you tried my time at Sandrock yet? And I was like, wait a second.

[00:10:09] This game might be like if Cameron's hooked it might be one of the best farming sims of all time. I mean, here's the problem. There's Stardew Valley and then there's basically every other farming game. And I think that's going to be a constant problem.

[00:10:24] But it's like my wife always tells me like it's not as it's never it's not as good as Stardew Valley. Right. I'm like, well, you just you can't it's like Stardew Valley is like it's kind of like Fortnight. It's basically like its own thing.

[00:10:35] You know what I mean? Like it's its own genre at this point. My time at Sandrock, it's like it's not farming, but it's like builder simulator. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So like you're the you go and you become the town builder for this town.

[00:10:53] And so you have to fulfill contracts to build things like for the townspeople. Okay. So it's like materials or buildings or like equipment or machinery or fix, you know, like Bob the Builder style. I go fix it stuff. Yeah.

[00:11:11] I could see how that could be compelling because yeah, you know, just because and I actually we're going to talk about Patreon in a second, but under indie impressions, the mini series I run there, I actually I have an upcoming episode on

[00:11:26] shaking off farming sim fatigue because I feel like farming sim fatigue is kind of the new roguelike fatigue. Right. Where there's just been a huge flood of these types of games and I personally have been feeling a lot of farming sim fatigue

[00:11:40] and there are some games that are kind of messing with that farming sim and it's more broad like management sim. And so it kind of sounds like that's what you're saying that my time at Sandrock isn't let's wake up and run the farm and then

[00:11:52] meet everybody in the village. Is that right? Yeah, I think I think so it's a direct sequel to my time at Portia or Portia. I don't know how you say it Portia Portia Portia.

[00:12:03] I don't know. Apparently the developers basically stopped development on that one so that they can move on to my time at Sandrock because it was like we need like a clean sweep or whatever.

[00:12:13] But what's cool about it is it's got like the town, it's got it looks really good. It's got like a great art style like art direction, cute sort of a cutie very like a unique look but like it looks really good. It's got a Western theme to it.

[00:12:29] Okay. Lots of fun characters that you can like, you know build relationships with like Stardew style you give them gifts and you chat with them. And then there's sort of an overarching mystery. So here's the twist. The twist is that you're in a post apocalyptic world.

[00:12:45] Oh, and the world you live on is on top of an old world that has futuristic technology. And so when you go to the mines like when you go to the mines like in Stardew, right? You're actually digging into the old world buildings like underground.

[00:13:04] So you'll discover relics like a camera for example. Yeah. Because you don't have they don't have like more modern technology. It's like a mix of technology like in the old world.

[00:13:16] And so there's like this overarching mystery about the old world and then there's like other kind of mysteries going on about the town. And then there's like a church that is like this weird church called the Church of Light. And there's some weird mystery associated with that.

[00:13:31] So it's got like some cool stuff in it, right? Like some twists and turns and some anyway. Some twists and turns. Nice. My time is Sandrock. Hope Jake pick it up. Actually your wife might like that.

[00:13:44] I'm trying to get my wife to play because I think this could be the one that she really would like to get back into. I haven't downloaded. I actually downloaded it. I want to say two days ago.

[00:13:52] So it's on my docket but my mind is kind of well I'm dealing with two things right now. I'm dealing with post from Software Game Blues. Oh yeah.

[00:14:02] And which is which hits hard and then Golden Sun is like I said it's a game that's kind of on my mind. It's hitting the spot for me right now. Yeah, that's a real thing. Post game, high depression. Yeah.

[00:14:18] The last thing I'll just mention that I'm back to again. And this is one of those games that I go back to essentially annually and play a whole bunch of. So I'm back in XCOM 2 again. Nice.

[00:14:31] And that's just one of those games I go back to basically every year. I have like multiple hours in on four different platforms. I just said I'm feeling the momentum this time that I might see it all the way through. Ooh fingers crossed man. I'm feeling the momentum.

[00:14:48] The momentum could fall off at any day. But I'm currently feeling the momentum that game is freaking hard. It's just a really hard game of all those tactics games. None is more punishing than XCOM 2.

[00:15:02] And it's probably one of the reasons like people hold it in such high regard. It's very deep but it's also extremely punishing and you can easily kind of screw yourself over.

[00:15:12] So that's one of the reasons I pick it up and then I fall off again because it's like so good. But then you go play a mission and you lose like three of your best squad members. Nice. And you're just depressed.

[00:15:22] So this time I'm like, you know what? I'm just going to save XCOM. I don't even care. I'm going to literally save XCOM. I don't care. I will literally reload the exact same term like five times to get the perfect turn. And that's how I'm playing it. Yeah.

[00:15:37] I pulled it up on how long to beat. It says main story is 33 and a half hours on average. Dude, that seems really short to be honest because it's I think it goes. I'm sure you can like speed run it but it's like it's a pretty beefy. Yeah.

[00:15:55] I feel like whenever you look at the main story average on how long to beat you need to add some time like at least like 15% of whatever that is on top of it. Yeah. Because that includes people who might be logging times in and they're super familiar

[00:16:11] with the game. What other thing I'll mention? So that's my backlog. The other thing that I did recently and I just because this is my only outlet to talk about it so I just have to throw this out there. I just finished rewatching Battlestar Galactica. Oh, dude.

[00:16:32] Dude, let me tell you man. I think that's my I think that's my favorite show of all time. You know what's funny is one of my lit professors when I was an undergrad was like, Jacob, you know what show you need to watch?

[00:16:48] And I'm like, folks, I'm a Spanish major. So I'm like, oh, this is probably some, I don't know, show from Latin America. Some Otter Cinemaglia. Yeah. And they're like, you need to watch Battlestar Galactica.

[00:17:01] And to this day, I still haven't watched it partly because I'm a little scared of what they meant by that. Is there a specific lesson in my life that they wanted me to learn? Dude, dude, there are so many lessons. It's essentially just like any good drama.

[00:17:20] It's a soap opera in space with robot aliens that look like humans and also robot alien robots that look like robots. They're not aliens. They're robots. They're kind of aliens. Where do you watch it? It's on prime. Everything, the whole thing all seasons.

[00:17:40] And there's a lot of it, right? Like a lot of it. There's five seasons. Oh, for some reason I thought this was like 12 seasons. No, it's not like a mega show. I mean, there are a lot of episodes, but like, dude, I finished it again for probably

[00:17:56] the fifth or sixth time, but I hadn't. I think it's been a while since I, because I watched it a bunch in like the early 2010s. Just refinish it and it's like, dude, I freaking love that show. I love that show so much.

[00:18:11] It was one of those where like I finished it and was like, should I just watch it again? Because nothing comes close to it. It's like, I just love it anyway. I just said this is the only outlet. No one else cares. You know what I mean?

[00:18:23] No one else cares. I can't tell anyone else that because they'll be like, what are you talking about? You know, reach out to us if you like Battlestar Galactica. If you haven't watched Battlestar Galactica, please prime video. Watch that thing. Give it. Like just trust the process.

[00:18:41] You're going to go into it and you're going to be like, man, this is like kind of cringy CGI. It's like, I don't know. If you stick with it, you will be your infantry. Yeah. Yeah. Anyways, that's my TV talk for the week.

[00:18:56] Nice. It's time to talk a little shop. So Cameron and I have been working on some changes to the podcast and to our Patreon specifically, but what we're going to do with the podcast is it's one...

[00:19:15] It's several changes, but there's really one big change that we're going to do. Long time listeners, you know that we love to talk about games in categories. And the categories have been narrative mechanics, gameplay loop, and impact on the industry.

[00:19:33] And we've kind of decided to do... to change this very slightly. So we're going to keep the narrative category and that's where we're going to start our analysis of each of these games.

[00:19:45] In the narrative, I'm going to probably make a little bit more of an effort to sort of include things from, you know, just actually my background as a literature professor about some of the things that we are discussing.

[00:19:57] So that's really just a slight change that will happen there. However, the mechanics and the gameplay loop categories, they're going to be rolled into one where we just talk about game design more broadly. Here we kind of feel like those two categories, they are different things,

[00:20:15] but those are the two categories that kind of bleed into each other the most when we're performing analysis on these games anyway. And so we're going to talk about them more broadly, but we also think that framing it as game design will just kind of help us think

[00:20:28] more about the intentionality behind the design of games, right? Rather than just kind of relaying what the mechanics are and what the gameplay loop is for any given game.

[00:20:39] And then we're going to stick with our impact on the industry category, but here this is where we're going to make a better effort to sort of include a lot more numbers. This is Cameron's background as a data analyst and this is...

[00:20:53] And so we're going to be thinking a little bit more, crunching a little more some of the numbers about some of these games that we're talking about and then analyze sort of impact on the industry in that regard.

[00:21:04] So those are kind of the changes that are going to happen sort of in a regular episodes. We're also going to really streamline kind of what it is that we... Or not streamline, but I guess make more regular sort of the pattern of what we're going to do.

[00:21:22] So every... And what I mean by this is that we'll still have weekly episodes, but for our Patreon to sort of match some of the changes that we're doing. So please listen if you're interested in supporting us on Patreon.

[00:21:35] There will be a monthly extended edition episode that is sort of guaranteed to happen. They've been a little sporadic in the past and there will also be a monthly sort of like guaranteed special topics episode.

[00:21:46] And so for example, in July for this episode for Shadow of the Erdtree DLC, there will be extended edition where we add another category. And here we're going to be talking about sort of the nature of Shadow of the Erdtree as a DLC and DLCs broadly.

[00:22:00] And then on July 25th, we have planned to talk about Immortals of Avium, but the extra bonus there for Patreon subscribers will be a special topics portion. And we're going to talk about Immortals of Avium in the context of, okay, but was it really that bad?

[00:22:20] Because this was a game that got slammed really hard when it came out. And I remember when the first trailer was even shown, sort of the responses there. And so when we do these special topics episodes,

[00:22:31] we're going to kind of approach them with a specific question in mind and then use that game as a case study. So that's kind of how things will change on the episode front. Yeah, absolutely. So just two comments on that I think on the game design category,

[00:22:48] I mean, we end up bleeding those two categories anyways. And so they sort of merge and combine almost every episode that we do that. And so we kind of, this is like an effort to simplify and streamline and make our intro shorter too.

[00:23:05] So we don't have to repeat that as many times, but and then on the Patreon front, there's quite a few changes. And it's something we debated quite a bit because as so often happens with a subscription service, which is what Patreon is,

[00:23:20] you get lost in the weeds of having like too many different tiers. And to be honest with you, like we were introducing four different tiers, might even be five. And that may shock people at the upfront, but go take a look, like going Patreon, the idea behind this.

[00:23:37] And if we get feedback from you guys, from people out there being like, this is way too confusing. Totally. Like this is definitely not locked in stone, but this is what we're trying for now.

[00:23:46] The idea behind it is just give people options of how you want to consume the content from the show that we do. And so we're giving you options. Like if you just want early access to the episodes and that's all you want

[00:23:59] and you pay like a little minimum and you support the show that way. Fantastic. You can do that. If all you care about is what Jake's doing with Indie, Indie games, 100% you covered. If you want like these special topics that we're doing, these extra episodes,

[00:24:14] that's on their extended edition. So you're going to be able to like pick and choose and like piece me all together everything that you want from us and like what level of support that you want to provide.

[00:24:23] So yeah, so it's I'm going to make a mean joke here. It's not as confusing as the new game pass tiers. Oh yeah, we didn't talk about that new game. Yeah. And honestly, I don't know if we need to say much more than it's

[00:24:36] confusing and weird and obviously Xbox wants game pass to be more profitable. That's the main reason behind all these changes. That's why they're skewed that the way that they are to try to push you towards the $20 month ultimate tier. But anyway, with our Patreon,

[00:24:51] our goal is to kind of make it well. What are you interested in from us? Right? If you're interested in hearing more about different Indie games and special topics related to Indie games, well there's a way that you can support that directly.

[00:25:03] Or if you just want all the extra stuff that we're doing, you know, there's a tier for that as well. And like Cameron said, if you just kind of want to throw tip our way, you want to listen to episodes early

[00:25:14] and you want to give feedback on the podcast more readily, easily. There's sort of, there's kind of a tier for that as well. So we're hoping that it's more convenient than anything. 100%. Like I said, you can go to patreon.com slash period of cast

[00:25:33] to find all that extra information. And if you have signed up the other special news, if you are already an existing subscriber and you're listening right now to this episode, you're going to be grandfathered into the highest tier, which is the new collectors edition of the show

[00:25:53] that we put together. That's going to literally have everything in it. So if you have been a supporter up until now, that is the special bonus that you're getting. Thank you so much for supporting us early and being like an early member of the patreon.

[00:26:06] You've literally, we could not thank you enough. So for that, you're getting grandfathered into the, to the collectors edition ultimate plan, which means you will get access to as soon as this regular episode is done. Just keep on listening because we will go right into our extended edition.

[00:26:24] If you have not signed up, we'll end our regular episode. But if you want that, go to patreon.com. You can sign up, get access to the extended edition. We're going to dive into DLCs as a extended topic. All right, enough of that. Let's talk some Elden Ring.

[00:26:42] Now we're going to talk about Elden Ring in our new three categories or not in our traditional four categories. Those are retired, right? We'll be talking about the narrative of Elden Ring, Shadow of the Erd Tree. Here we're talking about story.

[00:26:59] We're talking about, I mean, and this is a from software game. So how is that story being told? Is it still worth it to kind of have these cryptic storytelling methods and making the player do a lot of work to really get story out of it?

[00:27:14] Next, we'll be talking about the game design. There's a lot to say here and obviously from software is always the center of detention when it comes to specific game design decisions such as difficulty, not having an easy mode, et cetera.

[00:27:28] And so we'll be tackling some of those topics there. And then finally we'll conclude with impact on the industry. Elden Ring made a massive splash because it was reaching cod numbers upon release. And then two years later we have this enormous DLC coming out

[00:27:45] and so it'll be interesting to sort of talk about Elden Ring, the base game in retrospect and what from software was able to accomplish with the DLC and how that's going to impact monetization which has kind of been the topic

[00:27:57] of this year for this podcast and for Cameron and I with DLC and with games going forward. So we will begin with the narrative. Cameron, what the heck is going on in Shadow of the Erd Tree? I haven't even watched any videos.

[00:28:14] I've been trying to stick to my own interpretation. So there's this god named Micola and Micola's going on a journey and leaving these crosses across the land and she's got these peeps out there in that old shadow tree area.

[00:28:39] The shadow under the tree which is some hidden world that you reach by touching the bloody hand of Micola. So is Micola dead in that little egg in there? In Morgoth's... In. You don't need to talk. Cameron's laughing because he could see my face and

[00:29:02] I'm about to say a lot. I'll tell you from the perspective of someone who didn't like... So, okay, so here's what I did. I did listen to a podcast that attempts to explain the lore of Elden Ring. Still could not conceptualize the story for you

[00:29:19] in any way shape or form. Like really, still really couldn't do that. Somebody compared it to the Bible which after hearing the interpretations of the story from a few different perspectives, 100% agree with that. I will say that I think the story in Shadow of the

[00:29:37] Error Tree is a little bit more straightforward. Jake, you're going to have to conceptualize what you interpret as the full spectrum of the narrative, like the plot, like the overarching plot. I'm still a little bit lost on what that is, to be honest.

[00:29:51] I know that Micola's involved and she's leaving these crosses across the world and the different bosses that you run into are associated with the journey that Micola went on. And then there's these different NPCs out in the world that are following her and different things happen to them.

[00:30:07] These wars, and almost everything, Elden Ring revolves around the idea that hundreds or thousands of years ago in this world that you inhabit in the game, there was these crazy wars between these gods and kings that happened and that left the world this sort of ethereal overworld

[00:30:29] slash spirit world, if you will, that exists in the Elden Ring universe. Where all these kings and gods and family members inhabit that world and continue to have, or just exist for the player to interact with in a way that makes sense in the context of the game.

[00:30:53] Jake, but explain what's your synopsis of the plot of Shadow of the Erichry? Because I'm still a little bit lost on that, to be honest, as deep as I am in the game. Yeah, it's a bit strange because it's really hard

[00:31:06] to piece exactly where Shadow of the Erichry is supposed to fall in terms of the story of the base Elden Ring game. Now, you can access the DLC via an optional boss before completing the game. And so my sort of interpretation is that

[00:31:25] Shadow of the Erichry, the story is kind of supposed to take place in parallel with some of the significant late game events of Elden Ring. So in Elden Ring, you are a tarnished and basically what you do as a tarnished

[00:31:42] is that you can try to ascend to become Elden Lord, which is essentially God of the Lands Between. And it's a difficult path to get there and it's a highly competitive path. And honestly, it reminds me, it seems to be this interesting fusion

[00:31:59] of Greek mythology where you have siblings who are constantly at war with each other. So that's kind of like one of the foundations is like it's an extremely messy, ugly family tree and a lot of these people don't get along

[00:32:15] and a lot of these people want to become Elden Lord and they all have their own agendas. And they're all essentially, not all of them, but a lot of them are against Marika, who is currently like the God, Radegon and slash Marika. And on top of that,

[00:32:32] this is where kind of the biblical reading of the game comes into play. I saw this especially a lot in Shadow of the Erichry. And it really dawned on me that the way that just like the regular plebs, the tarnished and the followers

[00:32:44] kind of interact with all of these gods feels very much based on the Catholic notion of intermediaries via saints. Right? We're like, for example, it's really common in countries and regions with really strong Catholic presence that there's like a patron saint of the area.

[00:33:05] When you were praying to God, you prayed to God via that saint and you ask for that saint to sort of bless you in a specific way. Or you might pray to another saint who tends to be in charge of X types of blessings, right?

[00:33:19] And this is kind of your interaction with it. And so it's interesting because in Elden Ring you meet all these NPCs who essentially have their own patron saint. And sometimes that means that they have their own opinions about who should be Elden Lord

[00:33:35] and who should be kind of running things and who should ascend to Godhood. So that's how I understand like the basic web, narrative web of Elden Ring and Shadow of the Erichry is a very specific branch where you have Mykola who wants to ascend to Godhood

[00:33:53] and is portrayed in early in Shadow of the Erichry. The followers of Mykola refer to that there's something with gender identity happening with Mykola. I think tech, I don't know. I'm just going to use they them because I don't know. It gets confusing.

[00:34:11] But essentially they refer to Mykola as kindly Mykola. And the followers of Mykola believe that Mykola will become a benevolent, generous God. And so they use words like kind and gentle to describe Mykola. And it's insinuated that Mykola, when they passed to the Shadow Realm

[00:34:32] that they did so through Moog who is another one of these sort of saints slash demigods. And Moog is portrayed as just kind of an evil dude that was like, you know what? Mykola sucks. I'm going to hold Mykola captive and Mykola's body captive.

[00:34:48] Hence why you have to kill Moog in order to access the DLC. And so just because I've been rambling and talking a lot here, the Shadow of the Ertree story is essentially that. It's somebody else's path to Godhood and they're doing it in an unconventional way

[00:35:05] via the Shadow Realm. And you kind of begin having killed Moog as somebody who could potentially be a really strong follower of Mykola. Is that helpful at all? Yeah, no it is. If you haven't played these games, so everything's Jake saying

[00:35:30] really makes sense, but if you haven't played these games, that's going to be like you just forget it. And even if you have, so there's actually, it's actually kind of funny has a podcast with some more Hussain from GameSpot who is a crazy Frumsoft fan

[00:35:48] and has a really strong understanding of the lore. And he in that episode walks through sort of like the deep lore of Elden Ring. If you're interested, I think that's a really good synopsis. There's going to be like a million YouTube videos

[00:36:00] that go crazy deep on this stuff, like six hour breakdown type of stuff. But if you want like the one hour, like one hour 20 minute synopsis of it, that's actually a really good episode that I listened to. So yeah, I... So I mean it still doesn't really,

[00:36:20] so I'm going to do this question then for me Jake because I still don't understand this and I think a lot of people playing the game don't understand either. So when I go to the Shadow Realm, I'm going to like all these crosses

[00:36:37] and I'm coming across that mark like the path of Micola, right? Yeah. And I'm meeting these like bosses on... What's my like ultimate goal in the DLC? What am I trying to do? Am I trying to kill Micola? Well, in true Frumsoft style it feels open.

[00:36:55] However, I would say that the ending is pretty straightforward. There's no like multiple endings that I'm aware of anyway when it comes to Shadow of the Urge. Should we give a spoiler? I'm interested so if you want to keep going

[00:37:08] we can give a spoiler to people who want to skip ahead. Yeah, let's do a quick spoiler. I mean, let's do a spoiler, okay? Spoiler wall. Skip ahead a few minutes. Skip ahead like one minute. So essentially this is why I think this is sort of a game

[00:37:22] or a story that happens in parallel when you come to the final confrontation you prevent Micola from ascending to Godhood. By killing her general, right? Yes. Her consort, yeah, consort Radon. That's an ugly thing that we can save for later.

[00:37:44] That's more lore talk but just like in terms of narrative you prevent Micola from ascending to Godhood and you as a player... And there's no like decision it's not branched to the main story. Not that I'm aware of. I have not seen anything

[00:37:58] and I do not believe that there is sort of an alternate. Oh, interesting. So it's not like the main where you can kind of choose okay, I want to institute a new celestial space age or I want to be Elton Lord

[00:38:12] or I want to be Golden, all that stuff. Yeah because in the main game I mean the outcome is varied there are many different endings but the outcome... There's always one commonality in all these endings and that's that you defeat Radegon and Elton Beast

[00:38:29] and you become Elton Lord and those endings really vary depending on what type of age you are going to usher in as the Elton Lord and there are essentially three endings to Elton Ring. The first one is that you become Elton Lord

[00:38:47] and it's not like the Elton Lord I would have to put it away because we can't find the end and it's the elton that's what makes us Elton. So, at the end of the story you do a one character ending and you want to be Elton Lord

[00:39:00] but if you put an ethical ending and then you're going to go around and be Elton Lord and you have to take that because it's like a Elton Lord you don't mix the ending with the Elton King and then Yeah, it's like bad and crappy literally right

[00:39:20] Yeah, no the bad ending which I think has the coolest cutscene ever is the Lord of frenzied flame ending Because in Elden Ring you burn that you burn the Erd tree and then to really kill it

[00:39:34] You go into you go to farm Azula and you defeat Malaketh who infuses the rune of death Well, do I have that right? Yeah The rune of death essentially gets fused into the fires of the Erd tree so you kill it for good

[00:39:47] It's like you took round up to the plant and then And then you poured gas on it and then you lit it on fire, you know you but in shadow of the Erd tree. There's no There's not yeah, it doesn't it's just one path

[00:40:02] Just stopping Micola from a sending and as in it does it give and folks I played like a ton of the deal I'm almost I'm like I have enough time in it where I still don't understand. I'm asking I'm asking this question Does it give?

[00:40:18] I'm really close to the end. I haven't finished it, but I know everything that happens I just don't understand it Jake does Does it give like an overarching reason as to why you want to stop? Micola as the tarnish. Yes, it does So that reason is given there

[00:40:36] I won't go into full detail However, I do want to say that one of the coolest fights story-wise is actually the second to last fight because

[00:40:51] Instead of having multiple endings. I feel like what shadow the Erd tree does is like it puts a lot of weight on your NPC quest lines if you completed NPC quest lines or not and those decisions Will

[00:41:06] Impact severely impact the second to last boss fight, which I feel like is a bit spoilery But maybe not too much. So it's vague enough. I think that just get you excited about it so yeah that

[00:41:18] You've really in and this is one of those things about from software games is they have these wonderful totally maniacal NPCs and I feel like in shadow the Erd tree Maybe more in the foreground than other games

[00:41:36] How you interact with NPCs and whether or not you complete their quest lines pays off big time Yeah, yeah, yeah Yeah, I think we even had a conversation about this and I want it in the third main boss

[00:41:53] Did you have an NPC in that room Jake? You told me you didn't No. Yeah, let's see The fire the I don't think I did. I don't think I had an NPC No Yeah, so I so I had one yeah

[00:42:11] And I beat the fight and like the third try with the NPC Yeah, yeah, so It's so funny about this. I think this is a good So yeah, the narrative Jake just kind of gave it great breakdown by the way. Thank you

[00:42:27] That was Jake has a wonderful understanding a grasp of these from software Lord you can see though like I Don't think any other game series Does what from soft does when it comes to narrative?

[00:42:43] They just don't do that and we discussed this a lot when we had our Like our our main Elden Rain was a which by the way if you haven't listened to that episode is one of our most popular episodes I think it's now number two yeah

[00:42:56] maybe behind Stardew Valley, but um And it's a two-parter Yeah, we talked about this idea of like how from soft In beds the narrative of the game in so many it's not like an upfront narrative It's not like a cutscene driven dialogue driven

[00:43:19] Character driven narrative. It's very much like Hidden in the nooks and crannies in such a way that like as you peel it back and piece together the mystery But for some reason it actually works and is compelling

[00:43:33] We're in pretty much every other game you would be pissed and you'd say just tell me the freaking story and Be upfront about it, but for some reason in from soft games like

[00:43:42] In Dark Souls games and the way that they've executed this in Elden Ring and and in other games They've done I think Sekiro is different so Sekiro is very much more straightforward. Yeah I think in that regard. It's a much more straightforward like narrative like traditional narrative

[00:43:58] But it this is very non-traditional but it works and it's like really compelling and interesting and like unraveling all the tapestries in the depth like the depth here is Incredible like there's just an insane ridiculous amount of depth

[00:44:14] to the narrative. I mean if you go on YouTube, it's just evidenced by Hundreds of hours of videos of people breaking down like the deepest troughs of the lore It's just so compelling anyway, they just yeah, they just do incredible job

[00:44:32] Yeah, I would say that if you're lost in the story Here's my from software one-on-one or one-on-one kind of breakdown of what to look for in a story it's from software nearly every single story has to do with Obsession leading to corruption like that is

[00:44:50] 80% of what's happening in these stories Is some somebody becoming corrupted by their own obsession and then somebody essentially Betraying their own convictions at some point in order to obtain whatever their desire is So that's what that's typically what's happening

[00:45:08] And I mean NPCs bosses that is like the majority of them. That is the main theme to look for now Reading item descriptions. I know can get a little taxing and feel a little too cryptic

[00:45:20] I would recommend that you read the item descriptions to the unique weapons and armor sets So you defeat a boss you, you know cash in their soul or whatever it is for their weapon item

[00:45:34] And you read that item description you read armor descriptions for all the super important You know the unique ones. I've already said it. I don't need to restate it and

[00:45:44] Then you're gonna get so much more out of the stories. You're gonna figure out why you killed this guy You're gonna figure out why they were hostile to you, you know And it's kind of a shame because that might happen after a boss fight

[00:45:57] But it does give you a greater appreciation for what it is that you're actually doing in the world And then obviously talking finding and talking to as many NPCs as possible I feel like that's a bit of a mixed bag because

[00:46:08] Sometimes NPCs in from software games are just freaking cryptic Bloodborne was one that was I think is one of the more impenetrable ones to be honest Especially in the second half of the game where it's like What what does that mean?

[00:46:24] What yeah, that's why are you saying that and then I agree with Cameron in that securos way more straightforward shadow the urd tree I would say is actually relatively straightforward if you speak to the NPCs

[00:46:38] They'll kind of give you a sense of what they're feeling about Micola maybe the history behind Micola to a certain degree And so it is nice in that regard Elden Ring is also much more straightforward the base game just because it's like hey

[00:46:51] Become Elden Lord take down everybody in your path, right? That's like the the basic to the narrative and what I think works for some from software games is that if you just want to beat The boss and get the loot it allows you to have that experience

[00:47:05] If you it's so it kind of accommodates every level of interest in the narrative or in the lore and world building If you want to go ham you can do that if you just kind of want to figure out okay

[00:47:16] What's happening with this one NPC? Why are they so weird? You can do that and then you can kind of move on So I actually believe that the narrative structure of Elden Ring and Shadow the Urd Tree is designed around player agency actually just like

[00:47:32] Not your decisions some of your choices will have consequences not all of them But also if you just kind of want to focus on the combat and stuff You're allowed to do that and the game allows it Yeah, 100%

[00:47:49] Speaking of moving to the combat. Let's talk about the design Our new category our new merged slightly tweaked category Shadow of the Urd Tree This is an expansion. This is a DLC to Elden Ring. So the base game is still the same

[00:48:08] For 90% of it. There's some changes though to There's not really mechanical changes. So we probably won't spend a ton of time talking mechanical. I think there's maybe a couple Things in terms of like new weapon types and some other things but like generally

[00:48:27] It's it's pretty much the same from a mechanical standpoint, but the design is definitely Significantly different so much so that it caused an uproar caused a ruckus Jake And that is due to the way that from soft implemented

[00:48:42] The difficulty curve and shadow of the Urd Tree which is based on acquiring shadow tree Yeah What are they shards shadow? Seeds Shadow tree seeds and when you get one of these seeds it increases your power basically it buffs your

[00:49:07] Damage resistance, I believe and your damage output by a certain percentage I believe from like where your level is so there's a combination of factors going in right so from soft recommended Going into the DLC at level 120 to 150 and

[00:49:26] Then on top of that they have the shadow tree seeds as well. So people were going in at like 1 5th at 200 Going and fighting the first main boss and being like holy crap. This is insanely difficult Um And this was a really interesting slightly controversial

[00:49:50] Mechanic because I think what people expected was Okay, I'll take my super buff character who's at the highest level of the game And I'll just go into the DLC and it'll just be like fighting all the bosses that I'm used to fighting

[00:50:05] And from soft did this really interesting thing where they designed this game So that literally only the hardest of the hardcore players of elden ring could actually experience the DLC because if you don't Put enough hours to get a character

[00:50:23] To level 120 to 150 with maxed out fully upgraded weapons And have enough skill to go into the DLC and like make it far enough to actually get

[00:50:34] Shadow tree seeds or take the time and effort to like look up where they are so you can just go rush and like upgrade I mean that takes a huge amount of investment So it is it's just a it is a wild

[00:50:48] Game design choice to think and then on top of that you can't even go into the DLC until you beat an optional boss Which at the time the DLC released only how many percentage of players honestly less than 30 on steam

[00:51:06] Less than 30 of players in the entire steam player base had actually fought this thing So jake, this is insane right like this is wild it is Until you realize it's not I mean and it's funny because

[00:51:25] You know the initial backlash was just like oh dude this DLC is way too hard. It's way too hard I'm getting crushed and you know, I felt that as as well too, but then I thought to myself Folks at from software You I mean they like their reputation

[00:51:41] They like what they've done for gaming They like that they've created a souls like as a term based on the games that they have created And they have set their own standard and so They're gonna keep that right And they know or they knew full well

[00:51:57] That people have been playing elden ring for two whole years Finding every possible way to break the game with their builds and you've got players who are well over level 200 Um, and they've got all these stats. They've got all the gear and they've got everything min maxed

[00:52:14] And how do you Prevent how do you maintain your reputation as a notoriously difficult game? When you know you've got people who have just completely broken the game to pieces already Well, you go back to the tried and true game called Sekiro, right?

[00:52:29] They essentially took the prayer beads system of Sekiro And then they put it into the dlc in order to cap people's ability to just tank Or to just demolish enemies and bosses now

[00:52:45] I don't think what they did especially now that I think about it in retrospect having beaten the dlc I don't think what they did was unfair because one they wanted to maintain that experience but also two

[00:52:57] The the regular enemies just in the world the bosses were crazy tough But you could bring all of your gear and you were doing just fine against regular enemies And regular enemies are dropping runes and upgrade materials left and right like the the dlc is so freaking generous

[00:53:15] in Getting the player to level up and to round out their character and to level up all of their weapons anyway Then i'm like, you know what they actually threw in a bunch of stuff to mitigate this even if you're not finding shadow tree seeds

[00:53:27] You're finding ways to get your character to adapt quickly to the difference to the new difficulty, you know yeah 100 percent it's man it's like Dude it's such a it's such a brilliant implementation because what I love about it Is that it forced players It forced players To embrace

[00:53:55] All the mechanics of the game. Yep, like all of the systems No longer could it could like from soft no longer could it could there be this crowd of players that's like Gatekeeping like certain mechanics to make it like more difficult on themselves

[00:54:11] You know, well, which is there's a huge crowd of like from soft hardcore Is there like oh summoning trivializes the game right? Well, those people aren't saying that anymore Yeah, and they're especially not saying that after this final boss

[00:54:27] 100% they maybe it maybe they could have said it like up to that final boss But then 99 of people who I've heard have fought the final boss or no Like yeah, you are pulling every single thing that you can possibly for every potion every weapon every method of fighting

[00:54:45] I'll be honest with you Jake shield came back out for me mimics here fully upgraded. I was back to shield come I was like, I'm gonna do a dex character And we're just skipping shields is like no I went back to shields fully upgraded my shield

[00:54:59] And like that was the only way that I could actually make progress and once I and again And that was just embracing like different combat and the other thing that this that they do in the dlc actually that I thought Is very interesting is like

[00:55:13] They make they kind of force you to use like different Combat styles and like even different weapons like when you're fighting different bosses because some bosses Depending on how you're fighting and what style you're implementing or what combination of weapons you're using

[00:55:30] Can it can make the experience way more difficult or way easier? um which is Also super interesting because I didn't feel and in the main and the base game

[00:55:43] It felt like you could kind of pick a style that you wanted and you could just roll with it against everybody And the dlc I felt like really stretched that I had to go in I'd switch weapons

[00:55:52] I needed to like figure out weaknesses. I really need to go deep into that And that's that's brilliant actually and honestly, I think it makes sense for a dlc of this this caliber right where This is like this was an extra end game essentially right?

[00:56:09] I'm added to the base game of elden ring and when you're an end game when you're min maxing when you're working on builds I mean, isn't that the triumph of the developer to have the players actually engage with all of the mechanics and the design choices

[00:56:23] That you put into a game instead of just steam rolling or doing one thing because you know, I was doing the same thing I was thinking okay, what do I know about this boss? Should I try a pierce damage type? Is that going to work better for me?

[00:56:36] Oh based on what i'm seeing in this boss here I think they're going to be work too or they're going to be weak to Lightning or they're going to be weak to holy damage

[00:56:44] And what elden ring did or what shadow the urgery did to help round that out Is that they added this huge slew of weapons to fill in all of the gaps that there were yeah massive Yeah, yeah, so pretty much like in the base game

[00:56:58] If you were like struggling to find like a set of I don't know decks arcane Weapons to suit your build well, guess what there are a billion of those in the dlc

[00:57:11] Um, so I ran a strength strength and faith build which there's plenty of options in the base game But in the dlc. I was like, oh my gosh

[00:57:19] I can look through my arsenal and now I have strength faith weapons that do lightning damage holy damage or fire damage You know, I have there's so many options based on the weapons that i'm finding in the game I have strength faith weapons that can close gaps

[00:57:33] You know wants to do piercing damage and so I felt like your roster of weapons was rounded out to help compensate for the fact that these bosses are

[00:57:42] Crazy difficult and that you needed to do your homework to figure out. Okay. What armor set do I need to bring in? What weapons do I need to bring in?

[00:57:51] I ended up doing one massive respect overhaul at one point of the game just being like, you know what? I have way too many stat points here and not nearly enough

[00:58:00] I think I had too many stat points in decks and not enough in faith and I was like, I I'm using faith scaling weapons I need to go fix this and it you know completely

[00:58:10] Changed because I optimized my character and so with game design that really pushes the player To take a good look at what's in their inventory What their stats are like and how they're approaching bosses

[00:58:21] I think that's a big success and I think that is something that is absolutely worthy Of in almost necessary it's something that you're selling as end game content Yeah, I think my one push push back or like point of criticism

[00:58:37] Of the dlc would be one and this is the same criticism I had for base elden ring Is that it's really hard to figure out how to Fully implement and fully take advantage of the mechanics and the systems of the game Without going on the internet

[00:58:57] Yeah, it's not impossible but the line between not impossible and This is doable as extremely wide Just I just and Miyazaki even had an interview where he's like look using a guide is a 100 viable way to play our games

[00:59:19] Which I don't know. I'm not I don't know what that I mean, I'm saying it's a criticism I don't love that I would like you know if I were designing a game which I couldn't I don't even have that ability or that skill So it's like

[00:59:30] armchair dev here for a second Uh But it's like I'd want the player to be able to figure that out like within the game Right without having to go to a guy or have that like built into the game

[00:59:41] Somehow I'm just like a little bit more so that I can understand what's happening Kind of the same issue with I mean, this is one of my criticisms if I had any even for boulders gate is when you have

[00:59:52] When you have systems that are so deep and so complex Helping the player to understand how all those systems are working together. I think it's just an incredibly hard challenge

[01:00:01] It's just crazy hard. Yeah. In fact, there was an article that just went out recently on pcgamer talking about how the tool tips that calculate the percentage hit chance Against enemies based on certain situations and boulders gate three have been bugged like since the game. Oh interesting

[01:00:19] So they've been bugged because somebody started doing like a whole bunch of math based off The percentage like hit chance which is based off a bajillion different variables in the game Which is based off the d&d 5e rule set that's implemented like into the back end code

[01:00:36] And it's a whole thing and so I just It it can get like a little just for me personally and this is maybe not even a criticism Just like for depending on the type of game where you are right like

[01:00:51] It was just like a teeny bit too much just like a teeny teeny tiny bit too much maybe Uh For me I would like to have it just more like prescient to understand like okay. How do I actually tackle? This and there's like a concept of

[01:01:08] trial and error But it's just a it's just a matter of how much time and investment Do you want to put into like the trial and error and the other this is the other just point of criticism throughout is while the game is

[01:01:23] plentiful with upgrade materials trial and error becomes a lot more difficult when you have to upgrade The certain weapons to plus 25 Which takes an f ton of runes Yeah, um and that can just become just a chore and I just I hate chores in video games

[01:01:41] And I think this may be the one chore an elden ring That there's maybe the one chore in elda. I think even there's not really even much grinding to me in this game There is one chore though and that is The upgrade materials

[01:01:57] That's the one thing that I just really don't like about this game It was a problem in the base game and it's a problem that's made worse in the dlc is when you have those non

[01:02:07] Special non unique weapons just like your basic run of the mill weapons, which they're not bad I mean I had a few of those that were my go-to for specific fights and when I wanted to inflict specific types of damage

[01:02:20] And then yeah, it is dumb because each level of upgrade costs 12 smithing stones of you know, whether it's smithing stone level one two three four five whatever it is and then leveling it up to 24

[01:02:34] And you want to get it to 25, but it costs like a really expensive and rare and limited upgrade item to do so and Yeah, I totally agree because you would get to like a boss and i'm like, oh, you know what?

[01:02:46] Actually, I think this type of weapon would really crush this boss And then you're like, oh crap. It's going to cost me 150 000 runes Which you can get in the game, right? And if you don't have all the bell bearings to just outright buy all of those smithing stones

[01:03:01] Um, then it becomes even more of a chore because you need to figure out where they are And then you have to go to back to the round table hold Even if you're buying them all and then you upgrade them all and then they implemented a delay

[01:03:12] I don't know if you notice this but there's like a half second delay on button presses Just so people don't accidentally spend Like smithing stones on something they don't want to Oh, yeah. So it takes it takes just a frustrating

[01:03:26] It sounds like no time at all, but it takes a frustrating extra half second Every time you want to spend materials It's just not fun. It's just not fun So I'll give you the best example

[01:03:37] If you if there is a way for player to skip a mechanic that they find not fun They will find That way to do it and they will do it every time and i'll tell you how I am doing smithing stone upgrades

[01:03:49] I looked up a guy to find the stupid bell bearings which sucked and took like five hours. I'm not gonna lie It took like a lot of hunting. Yeah, it's a lot of hunting

[01:03:58] You have to go like there's bosses you got to fight like you got to get past certain areas in the base game This is my second character. So I went did all that then it's like oh well to to like

[01:04:08] You got to buy these runes if you don't have them And so I just I wanted to upgrade a bunch of different weapons so that I could try all the new cool crap in the dlc Well, none of the crap is viable

[01:04:20] Because it's not fully upgraded to plus 25 And so what I so what I end up doing is there is a bird in the morgoth area I would drop into that with the new moon bow That has lock on

[01:04:36] I'd put on the gold scarab and I would go shoot that thing 50 times and just reset and just do it again And reset and do it again and sit at the side of grace. That is not fun

[01:04:46] No, but that's literally the most efficient way to get runes and to like upgrade these weapons And so that's that is my main criticism of It's a shame because yeah like lots of cool and no matter how generously we're with runes and with Upgrading materials in the dlc

[01:05:04] You still had to do some sort of a grind In order to get weapons up to snuff or you're just hoping and praying That it takes the other resource the somber smithing stone, which you only need one of each to level up

[01:05:17] Here's an interesting thing. I wonder if it's a back end system imitation because One thing that just came into my head is why would they not just drop weapons? at higher

[01:05:28] Upgrade levels based on like where you are in the game because then that would limit the amount of upgrade, right? Yeah, yeah So if I'm in uh It's like just drop it at plus 25

[01:05:42] Just drop it at plus 25. I don't does that like break the game or even plus 20 I don't I don't know I don't know because you know what by the way, um if you kill patches in the base game when you first meet him

[01:05:52] Which always kill patches never let that sob live never dude He drops a spear that's plus seven So I don't know What is that the only one in the game there? I cannot think of another example of a weapon that does not drop

[01:06:11] So there's precedent for it. So it's not like a back end limitation. There's precedent. His spear is plus seven Hey from soft if you're listening to this podcast Think about it man drop it at plus 20 just saying plus 20. That's good enough. It is right plus 20 plus 15

[01:06:28] Even heck yeah, I'll take that Yeah, but no that I think that's a valid criticism and I think the problem is worse in the dlc Um In which is which is a massive shame. I'm not a big fan of that either

[01:06:42] Um, but let's see other other things in terms of games design and the difficulty It's funny because oh, this is the other thing I wanted to say about um using a guide I actually think that criticism is valid

[01:06:56] And I don't think what I'm about to say even contradicts what Miyazaki says we're using a guide is fine But I mean in from software games. There's such an immense satisfaction of beating a boss because you worked hard to do it

[01:07:08] You had to trial an area error your way through it to a certain degree and Typically when you actually do beat a boss You beat it without taking a whole lot of hits because you have learned that boss front and back

[01:07:21] You know what I mean and there's an immense satisfaction in that Yeah, 100 and when you go back if you do a second playthrough You're like oh man the muscle memory comes to use that much faster because you've spent the time to learn this boss

[01:07:32] And it is deeply ingrained in your brain. I would say maybe not equally satisfying but also satisfying Is coming up with the right build like that anti boss build, right? um

[01:07:46] And right being able to have enough know-how sort of develop organically while playing the game to come up with a build to take down a boss Um, there's one boss and I won't mention it because it is it is later and it's a required boss where I

[01:08:02] The first two times I entered the boss arena. I assessed the situation I looked at the boss and I thought you know what I actually think I have equipment right now That will enable me to take on this boss

[01:08:15] And so the next time I died I switched out all of my equipment. I changed my talismans I put on different armor. I was using a different weapon. I even changed the ash of war on the weapon

[01:08:26] And then I went back into the arena and I performed infinitely better And it is immensely satisfying to think ah, you know what? I know this game well enough That I was able to figure out a build that fits my play style

[01:08:39] That I came up with myself on this boss that feels really good. And so to have things be opaque enough that You're using a guide. I think it does detract from that satisfaction I think I 100% agree with you, but to my earlier point

[01:08:57] Then you need to facilitate that experience more Which for a player unless you've just invested an insane amount of time into it Uh It's just it's just not fun to try and get all the materials, you know to so that you can do that

[01:09:14] I would I'd much rather have like hey I much I've got a bajillion weapons in my inventory, but they're all useless in the dlc And there's some that I could use like according to my skills my uh

[01:09:26] The way I've I've set up my skills like there's stuff that I could try But I can't trial an error unless I upgrade it to plus 25 which just feels like okay. I gotta go sink time But yeah, what you're saying I think is 100% true Uh, which

[01:09:42] Which is why suck your eyes kind of because you just have one weapon and you just got to get good Dibba the press which is interesting because it constrains the design right it constrains the design when you only have to design for one One weapon set. Yeah, basically

[01:09:58] Right and so then you anyway, no, no, I agree. It's second year. It was one weapon set plus a prosthetic That is kind of how you approach things right um

[01:10:07] Final things that I want to say about the game design. I loved I want to say like 80 of these bosses and I would say I love even 90 of these bosses But the 10 I didn't love I hated Like there were

[01:10:27] I loved now was that was that because of difficulty or was that because They were just I mean screwy. They were screw you bosses They were screw you bosses and this of course is a very subjective reading of of some of these bosses

[01:10:41] If you want to know which ones they were please Contact me on discord on twitter whatever means you have to reach out to us Because I would love to just group hate on some of these bosses. Um But it was essentially how they were designed were essentially

[01:10:55] Really difficult for my brain to wrap around for other people I know they thought these bosses were fun and they were like Maybe they were really easy for some people but for me Oh, dude, they just did not work with my brain

[01:11:07] But then again, you know, they're bosses that I love that other people hated and which is pretty normal I would say for from software that Not every single boss is going to knock it out of the park

[01:11:16] There are some that you're going to just throw your hands up in the air and shout bs um So, yeah, I don't know I wanted to say that but I also wanted to say on on the use of summons and just kind of boss design in general

[01:11:30] that um I Beat most of these bosses solo. Sorry. I have to say that because I'm a from soft diehard, right? But um What I noticed is that in the dlc and this is true of the base game

[01:11:43] But especially in the dlc they are so many bosses are really well designed for group fights where they're There's no single boss that I feel like you could summit summon your mimic tear or

[01:11:58] An ash or even another cooperator and just feel like oh, you know what? They're just going to take care of it Um because the boss attacks really included the entire group So a lot of a we do a good job at attacking everybody

[01:12:11] Yep, they attack everybody and I think they did a really good job at attacking all different type of player builds Whether you're melee whether you're ranged magic incantation whatever it is There was no boss that you could breeze through on any one build

[01:12:26] I would say which I think is an accomplishment because it takes some serious Thought in order to make a boss that can kind of accommodate every single play style and also be tough for every play style Jake let's move on to quickly talk about impact on the industry

[01:12:45] um So elden ring last it sold about 25 million units Uh, so it's massively massively successful at this point. It is it is a mainstream video game Crazy to think but yeah El from software. This is a dark souls game dark souls is mainstream now

[01:13:05] This is not like a niche genre anymore. This used to be five years ago This was like a tiny like a niche game that people loved and talked about This is now like one of the most popular games ever made Yeah

[01:13:18] So it's now like uh, it's just in a different stratosphere You know, it's in a different place with like kai senat being sort of the pinnacle, right? 100 000 people watching his stream This guy who like barely plays video games except for cod

[01:13:31] And then he streams elden ring and it's just like this massive thing and then from south sena moa milani a statue um But yeah, no, so jake what's uh We've got this 40 dollar 50 dollar 40 bucks 40 dollar dlc

[01:13:53] I feel like we haven't had a 40 dollar dlc in a long time. I I agree. Um, if if maybe Not definitely not ever but like a 40 dollar dlc that is a essentially a for a 40 to 60 to 70 hour

[01:14:12] Experience depending on what you do with it, right? Yeah added to the base game Dude This is So and we had this conversation and I posted in our discord chat. I said hey guys look it's a hundred dollar video game And that's what this is

[01:14:31] And I think this is Obviously, this is a general life. This is a very uh sort of Making a presumptive answer, but I think This is the future of of

[01:14:50] A viable business model for the companies that make video games as much as we would like them to just Make the game and make it for six sell it for 60 bucks and everyone be happy with it

[01:15:00] It's a reality that's just not going to happen because capitalism and that's just the world we live in So there too for you must make 100 dollar video games and sell 100 dollar video games And you have to get the consumer to buy 100 dollar video games

[01:15:12] And that's what we have here with elden ring plus shadow of the archer is a 100 dollar Video game obviously it's split into two pieces, but This is a game that's going to that is very financially successful

[01:15:24] Obviously because of the amount that it sold, right and not every game is going to be like that And so you can't have like if it's not successful enough that you can finish that dlc and then get it out Then obviously that's your first problem

[01:15:37] You have to make like a product that people want to buy But if you can do that then it's like hey, here's how you make A whole bunch of profit as you take the game you just built and then you add a whole bunch of content to it

[01:15:49] You wrap it up and then you sell it for like a chunk price. Yeah anyway, I mean Yes, I agree, but Only somebody like from software has the luxury to take two years To put out that dlc

[01:16:05] Yeah, that's a great. That's a great point. I mean two years is a long time for a for a For an expansion because even like diablo 4 Even diablo 4 which is gonna have an expansion in november That's only that's a year right and even between them they've had

[01:16:26] expansions, haven't they maybe not like they're a live serve diablo is interesting because they're a live service They're a paid six 70 dollar game That's a live service with seasons and battle passes and Full price dlcs. Yeah

[01:16:42] That's that's insane and yes, I mean it being a live service game does influence their monetization and their content output but I just think that like Only from software with elden ring which smashed expectations

[01:16:57] Only does that really provide them the time which is a luxury in game development to do two years for a 40 hour experience that they can tack on to elden ring and then they have the goodwill and the reputation to charge 40 bucks for it and

[01:17:13] Many many people are saying this is like a brand new game. This is a sequel right and Charging 40 bucks for it like there are games There are many games that are smaller than shadow the urt tree that are charging more for it And those game developers

[01:17:29] Are just simply not in the position that from software is in to do that and so I like I want to get back I do agree that like Honestly game companies need their big triple a games to be 100 dollars

[01:17:42] They want to get 100 dollars out of every player and the way that they've been doing it has been mixed And there's a lot of trials And a lot of errors and people are figuring out whether that needs to be micro transactions, etc but

[01:17:56] I have to ask you isn't this just going back to a model from like 10 15 years ago of just having like the base game and then offering expansions and then Just concluding the game Funny how that works, huh? I feel like there's

[01:18:12] A bunch of industries especially in entertainment that are going through this right now It's like we had a model that worked with movies. Yeah You put the movie out It's in theaters you charge like a relatively modest ticket price to go see it in the theater

[01:18:28] Where a family of four can go to the movies and they can watch it and it's in theaters long enough And it doesn't come to dvd or to vhs for like six months. Yeah At least Or eight months or nine months

[01:18:43] And then so people feel compelled to go to the theater. Well now everything's to streaming or it's in Or you can just rent it like three weeks later after it comes to the theater and everyone's going like well, how come movies don't make any money? Well, that's why

[01:18:57] um, so gaming it's like the same thing where We we've had this conversation before so we don't need to belabor the point but fortnight Ruin the gaming industry because every company wants fortnight money But but fortnight has is its own

[01:19:12] And I think companies are figuring that out or have already figured out That fortnight is its own thing. Yeah, it's its own entity. It is his own platform It is not a game that you mimic

[01:19:24] It's not a game that you try and make a game like you just and it's proven to be very unsick it's proven to be a not A successful business model To try and maintain for the vast majority of companies that have tried to do it

[01:19:39] They are not able to do it successfully. It's too hard. It costs too much money. It takes too much time And the payoff is not big enough And so you if you get it right, it's the biggest payoff in the world

[01:19:52] It's the biggest payoff in the industry and it makes the most money by far Right And so but companies pretty much every company on the books in the industry has failed to to do this in a significant way

[01:20:08] So as now they're going back to the drawing board and looking for different models and to your point jake It's like they're probably just getting up going back to the model that worked before. Yeah, which is put the game out at full price

[01:20:19] And have some sort of dlc that gets an additional revenue on top that uses all the assets and engine that you just spent Five years working on. Yeah, I mean The other example that comes to mind is alan wake 2 where um

[01:20:33] And we talked about this right alan wake 2 came out last year And there have been reports in the recent months are like, oh remedy still hasn't recouped all their costs on alan wake 2 Or they haven't made this profit as big as they want

[01:20:45] So people were freaking out about it But then the alan wake 2 first batch of dlc came out and in order to buy it you had to upgrade to the deluxe edition Which is 20 bucks. And I just I thought to myself. I was like

[01:20:58] This is such an old school model. And so what did I do? I bought the deluxe upgrade and now I have access to the dlc that just came out and the dlc that's going to come out in the future and

[01:21:08] That's it, you know, they got 80 bucks out of me there and I just yeah, it's just so funny that like Yeah, that live service model. Hopefully we're going to see a shift in the industry where We just see less people chasing that fortnight model

[01:21:22] I really hope that's what happens and I hope that elden ring and its dlc kind of Stand as a as a testament to like no, there's There's another way and it works. This is it

[01:21:34] Yeah, and it's I mean, it's not going to be the only way and game pass is evidence of this microsoft's committed a game pass So on some level game pass is working

[01:21:43] Now we just mentioned that they just raised prices and created like four different new tiers that are all super confusing and weird But the reason they did that is because of call of duty

[01:21:55] Because call of duty every single year is the biggest game in the industry by a massive huge margin Just like a massive massive margin like it makes like a billion a year, right? Um And so microsoft in order to continue to make game pass viable is like, okay

[01:22:10] We're gonna put call of duty on game pass day one, but guess what we're raising the price So if you're not a fan of call of duty and you keep game pass ultimate like you're subsidizing all the call of duty players a little bit

[01:22:24] So just but i'm you know, i'm gonna play it like it's on game pass. I'm gonna download it like i've I've dabble in the call of duty. I like the single player camp, but it's like playing an action movie. It's pretty fun, right?

[01:22:36] It used to be really into war zone and season 1 feel like a lot of people are like I haven't played it in years now, but um Yeah, I mean that's a different model that hopefully work and xbox is like may actually finally be

[01:22:51] The dominoes may actually finally be falling enough where they have a stream of games dropping quarterly Finally after all these years of everyone talking about it like till their heads fell off. Yeah

[01:23:03] It actually may finally actually be happening. I know we've said that so many times like yep This is gonna happen. This is the year it's gonna happen. It actually may finally be happening So, you know, there'll be this different models, but I think hopefully

[01:23:20] From you know from soft and elder ring obviously this is anomal. This is a little bit of an anomaly because most Almost every game is not going to be as huge and as popular as this game was right

[01:23:32] And so it may just it may even just be a bad example for people to look at That being said, I think the impact is You know the impact is you know pretty much the same as what The impact of elden ring was and just looking at what

[01:23:49] They did with an open world design looking what they do with the design of narrative looking at how they Positioned their game and marketed it and sold it. Yeah, they were they're so successful that they are gonna have

[01:24:03] People taking elements of what they do and I think that's a good thing because I think they did it the right way And they did it super effectively. Yeah reuse those assets folks

[01:24:13] And and I I mean from soft, I think the their masters of kind of hiding how they reuse assets, right? um So that that's very cool too, but yeah reuse them and they've got the the The animations from succuro. Yeah

[01:24:33] Stuffed into this dlc. There's stuff from dark souls one in here. Um, yeah The urtri avatar boss, which is in the base game not in the dlc Is patterned after asylum demon. I mean It's it's just a reuse of asylum demon. So Yeah, they're great at that

[01:24:52] But um, yeah, I don't know if I have anything else to say on impact on the industry other than that This this is a unicorn But I do think it does offer a model that might work Um

[01:25:03] And I really really hope that it does shake up the triple a industry Um in a positive way that helps them rethink sustainable monetization for their games And with that ladies and gentlemen, this has been our episode on elden ring shadow of the urtri talking about the dlc

[01:25:23] to the massive 2022 Game of the year hits from software. What's next for from soft? Miyazaki said he is working on He still has one more he has his ideal fantasy rpg

[01:25:43] So elden ring was not his ideal fantasy rpg. So he said whatever the next thing is I think that was his most recent interview Was he's he wants to make his ideal fantasy rpg? Which I think means that they made enough money on elden ring

[01:25:58] That he can go do something something pretty good my predictions will be the um, we get armored core seven Is gonna come out. Yep before before whatever this ideal fantasy rpg is

[01:26:11] We get another from soft game along the lines of bloodborne or sekiro. It's sort of a one-off Um It kind of introduces a new take on their not nearly as big

[01:26:23] Yeah, no, no, I think i'm thinking bloodborne sekiro size and style in the sense that like it has its own unique take on combat And then in 2030 we'll get the first trailer for whatever this ideal fantasy rpg is. Yeah five or six years from now. Yeah

[01:26:39] That's gonna be That's how long it takes to make a triple-a game now. It's gonna be like six years minimum Yeah from they brought whatever it is. They've started pre-production since elden ring was done I'm sure and I know that team was much larger now obviously, but right

[01:26:54] Well, ladies and gentlemen Again, this has been our episode on shadow of the ear tree Uh, if you like the show, please leave a review on your podcast platform of choice helps people find the show

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[01:27:21] Also, we've talked all about our upgrades and changes to patreon Please go to patreon.com slash pre-order cast check out all those changes If you want to support us directly find a tier that works for you and I promise you it's going to be worth it

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[01:29:10] I cannot think of another one That is this big and as I mentioned in in the base episode This is a brand new game. I mean in a lot of ways it feels like a sequel

[01:29:21] Um, and it could have been I this this could have been a sequel in in scope Um in size and all that has to offer and all the secrets and things that you can explore and the sheer number of bosses, etc um

[01:29:38] It really could have been and so it's strange And I man I want to ask though Why is this called the dlc and not an expansion? Is expansion just kind of an antiquated term at this point? Is anything that's additional To a game just dlc at this point?

[01:30:07] I I don't know. Yeah Yeah, and you know It may be wow kind of has that privilege because it's such an old game You know what I mean that it does use sort of that older

[01:30:33] Uh terminology to talk about it. But the reason why I bring that up is just because I mean this dlc stands stands for downloadable content and dlc is used for things as minuscule as You know the the different charms that you can buy for like resident evil games

[01:30:48] Right, which is like a buck or two something like that and then here you have dlc. That's 40 dollars I I guess what i'm really getting at is I feel like expansion is a good term

[01:30:58] And i'm a little sad that it's not being used as much to describe something like this because uh to me shadow the urtory is like the I the

[01:31:07] Classic example. It's a textbook example of what an expansion is it expands upon the base game in every way possible, right? um But yeah, we talked a little about this as as a monetization model and I just I just kind of wonder like, um

[01:31:26] I don't know. Are we really gonna see dlcs like this? Like is the reason why expansion is a word that's not being used anymore is because the idea of an expansion is just like

[01:31:35] Consider not viable are people interested in something if they hear like oh this game's getting an expansion Is that something that like piques people's interest? Hmm. Mm-hmm, right. Yeah I Hmm Right Yeah, maybe this is maybe this is actually the riskiest part of doing expansions

[01:34:19] Right is that you can you can plan and get into production on a full expansion But if your base game does not sell well if it does not resonate Then It's it becomes easier and easier to justify canceling the expansion, right?

[01:34:35] Let's talk about another ubisoft game. Let's talk about skull and bones Um, remember that one did that come out this year or was that last year? Dude, I can't even remember was that february this year? Yeah, dude. Oh, yeah, where where was it? Yeah Yeah, right um

[01:35:06] Let's let's actually contrast that maybe with something like sea of thieves, right where Skull of skull and bones it it launched initially it was pretty mixed Skewing negative on its reception, right? Mainly because I don't think the game itself was even that bad

[01:35:26] But it did not reach expectations at all at all, right? And so anything that was kind of planned for skull and bones and I don't think servers have been shut down for it yet or anything necessarily but

[01:35:40] We haven't heard a peep about it and the game has kind of gone off the radar because There's no massive drive for that And then in contrast you have sea of thieves when that launched a bunch of people complained that it was slow And there was no content

[01:35:54] But see if thieves has been around forever at this point And I would argue that sea of thieves as a live service game actually gets expansions, right? And I don't know if they call them expansions

[01:36:05] But it definitely feels like that's the type of cadence that they get and it has been successful enough that Rare hasn't put out anything else, right?

[01:36:16] Since sea of thieves not that not that I know of anyway, and they've managed to launch sea of thieves on like ps5 even Um, something's working for them over there Yeah I want us to was a 40 dollar or 30 or 40 dollar, right? Right Mm-hmm, right

[01:39:14] Oh really? Huh Yeah Shattered space, right? I mean It is interesting to think like I almost feel like was something like starfield, right? This is a Bethesda. Bethesda has been around forever. They've been around the block and I feel like

[01:40:01] They have enough wherewithal to sort of understand that games can have long tails, right? And I I want to learn more about starfield doing super well because when it launched It was pretty mixed on reception and I think you know, I don't know

[01:40:20] We don't need to get into that, right? But I feel like we always knew that starfield will do well because it's build itself as a Bethesda space opera, right?

[01:40:28] And so it is interesting to hear that like well, I guess what it is doing a while like those knee jerk reactions maybe weren't On par with what's going on and Bethesda still with the game and they're gonna have this big DLC come out

[01:40:41] Um because I'm kind of fixated on sea of thieves something interesting to kind of throw out there Is that the initial release? Metacritic aggregate score for sea of thieves on pc and xbox one are 67 and 69 respectively So not that great However, the ps5 aggregate score is 81 right

[01:41:07] And so this is this is a game and the point that i'm getting at is like What kind of confidence does studios and publishers have in games to allow them to grow? And to like improve with their expansions

[01:41:21] And sea of thieves it came out in 2018. This is you know Um, this is going to be pre pandemic. This is pre sort of financial squeeze that we're feeling right now in the games industry

[01:41:34] There's more confidence. I feel like there's more money for microsoft to keep this thing afloat until it works um And I want to say that maybe this is happening was nmax and microsoft Bethesda with With starfield

[01:41:46] But I just almost feel like and i'm getting out this too because this is something that's coming up is just that like Where's the faith and confidence in publishers to allow studios and their games and in the case of this conversation via expansions to

[01:42:04] To have a long tail And i'm feeling cynical. Maybe it's just really not there in most cases That's insane to me. They got away with that

[01:43:22] Mm-hmm. Yeah Mm-hmm Yeah Mm. Yeah, right. Oh man, this is freaking difficult. Um I could probably tell you that my top three favorite dlcs from this year that I have on hand I know right i'm obviously shadow the urtary um alan wake 2 and then

[01:45:07] Eastward octopia dude, uh, you played some eastward, right? So I haven't completed it because I just got distracted. Um eastward is a game that Uh, I think most people would rank it seven out of ten. It's one of it's one of those seven out of ten games

[01:45:27] That I think it's going to find it's Oh, yeah, some of my favorite pixel ever Yeah, um and then so they sold this dlc for seven bucks And the dlc is essentially a farming sim attached to the game

[01:45:44] It takes place sort of like in this parallel universe with the main characters And i'm gonna save some of my analysis for for this indian pressions episode I have coming up on it But as a farming sim, it is amazing. Um Because it it features a lot of

[01:46:02] Great quality of life that eliminates a bunch of grind And just the one example I'll share right now is that um, you can go to the mines and you can do mining

[01:46:12] But it's a mini game instead of going through the mines with your pickaxe and hacking at a ton of rocks You play a mini game and the better you perform at the mini game the more resources you get from mining And it is such a great

[01:46:25] Um way of changing the pace of what you're doing in the game Now I've I've been super impressed with it But other top dlcs that come to mind for me No one's no one's going to be surprised by this but the cuphead dlc delicious last course

[01:46:40] Um, I really loved that one Um, I actually played a tiny bit of the prey dlc moon crash Um, which is pretty cool Um shoot. I want to say that there's some diablo 2 dlc. Is there maybe i'm making that up

[01:47:02] Yeah, it is right. Okay. For some reason I thought I was making that up That one I would also throw in there as some of my favorites We're not but I haven't played that game in a bajillion years either so

[01:47:18] Yeah, there we go. Lords of destruction. Yep. Yep. Yep. Yep. So um, yeah Oh, I still need to play that dude You know what I actually might be able to do that Because ooh nice Haha That's a deep cut, isn't it?

[01:48:14] Oh, yeah. Oh that one is amazing. I Yeah, because you get to play as the Mayans and the Aztecs Dude, oh, I can't believe I didn't think of that. I'm ashamed nice The conquerors. Yeah Yeah Yeah, shame Yeah Um, hold on

[01:49:26] I had to look up a list and this is one I'm also ashamed that I didn't think of immediately Uh red dead redemption man the undead nightmare Oh really? I played that at like friends houses when it came out Whoa Whoa The rumor comes up every year, right?

[01:50:09] Yeah and have a Add three passing references to Arthur Morgan and Colligan Yeah Missed opportunity. Um, yeah, I would I would love to like 100% that but I also want to have a life Um, how about this? Mm-hmm minimum

[01:51:23] I'll just say that if you are an old fart gamer and you want the old ways of gaming to come back GTA 6 is probably the only titan that could take on fortnight. Yeah, that's its own thing, right? Yeah In two seconds

[01:51:58] GTA 6 is in pre-orders. I think will probably hit like a hundred million. Yeah Um, my final my final question for this uh extended edition is what dlcs Have you not played that you would like to play? That one is on my top list of um expansions

[01:52:49] I even got like the special edition of the witcher 3 when it was super cheap with the dlc And then it got like the next gen upgrade Um, so that has been on my list and then

[01:53:01] This one will surprise nobody. I haven't played the blood born the old hunters dlc And that's one that has been on my list to to finally play um

[01:53:12] Then uh shoot there was one more dlc that I was like I haven't played this and I know that someday I will um Shoot man. What was it? They add cool things to to games. Yeah I don't know man. I this is part of the question

[01:53:39] I think that there's just not the confidence that we've kind of talked about that Um, a game will do well enough to merit an expansion and for The base game and the expansion to be profitable enough to meet whatever stupid imagine I quota is there You know, yeah

[01:54:32] Holy cow Is that the best contemporary example of something maybe on par with shadow the urtri I mean the miles moralis wasn't really billed as dlc I mean, you're not wrong. Oh the last game. I thought of it was the icky island dlc um

[01:55:28] That's the other one that sort of on my list to get around to Soon Yeah, it was gonna happen