Man part of me thinks i need to replay elden ring, because i beat it for the first time in a little under 40 hours. I probably missed so many side objectives.
You probably missed a vast majority of the bosses in the game. Technically you only need to beat less than 10 bosses to finish the game, but the game has like 160 bosses with like 40 more in the dlc.
Although a large chunk of them are repeats with a few different moves/elements etc, they still have their own unique caves/dungeons and enemies, new weapons and so on.
165 + 42 bosses. Fuck tons of secret areas, caves and dungeons. Some bosses you access from questlines. My first run took 130 hours so that guy and his speedrun must have missed a lot :D
It's 207. But most of them are repurposed normal enemies. I know it's 207 because Summer Games Done Quick just did a 4 man every boss run where they each took a portion of the bosses. It was a cool format.
I think the absolute bare minimum is 12, right? Radahn is not gated if you go to Altus before fighting him, so that's one. Either Margit and Godrick or Red Wolf and Rennala, then DTS, Goldfrey, Morgott, Fire Giant, Godskin Duo, Maliketh, Gideon, Godfrey, and Radagon and Elden Beast (we count this as a single boss I assume since no rest between). Actually, Mohg is also not gated by any other boss, you can just die in invasions to unlock him, so 11 is the magic number if you're really into CBT.
Elden Ring is Fromsoft's most approachable and mainstream offering. It's still quite difficult and tons of optional content is difficult to find. But just beating the game? There might be a handful of tricky parts but I can't think of any off the top of my head.
I think they were probably talking about how they managed to beat it in 40 hours considering the scale of the game. I think I sunk around 250 into my first play through, but I explored areas exhaustively.
For example, 250 hours for 1 playthrough....is too much.
Then there is the "skill" of each person. Everyone will get stuck on some bosses, but not every boss, or not too many tries.
My first playthrough, with going literally everywhere was around 90. But i also pretty much only play soulslikes and i didn't get "stuck" in anything for more than a dozen tries. Maybe Malenia took close to 20.
Looking at howlongtobeat, a good average, for doing everything is around 130h. But based on my personal experience, anything that howlongtobeat says, i usually do it like much faster. My friend who is new to games, and his only experience was Sekiro and Dark Souls 3, it took him 120h.
Then there are the people who for some reason only went in a straight line, following the golden line. 40 hour is more than enough to finish the game like that. Minimal exploring, only to find out how to go to the next part.
If you start the game right now, and since you know how to go to the next area, if you just kill the main bosses in a straight line, you will be done with the game in like.....10 hours max.
Step 1, big ass castle right in front of you. Step 2, explore everything south and east of that. Step 3, explore north of that. Step 4, go up in one of at least two obvious ways, and explore that area. Step 5, go through the massive gates and explore that area. Step 6, walk to the enormous cauldron. Step 7, go back to 4, which is pretty obvious. Game over.
There's a popular mod called Convergence that just released 3.0 and has an astonishing number of new bosses, weapons, spells, and areas, plus some reimagined old areas and QOL improvements. I'd still recommend vanilla first for people who have never played the game, but for people who have already played through once, it adds a lot of depth in a way that blends seamlessly with the original. Very impressive mod, do recommend.
Of course, if you just skipped a bunch of stuff the first time, then just exploring the nooks and crannies of the vanilla game might provide some equally novel experiences
I wish I could just play Shadow of the Erdtree. give me a menu option that gives me a choice between 8 level-appropriate pre-made builds and put me directly in the Land of Shadow please. I miss it so much but going through all of Elden Ring a fourth time is just slightly too much commitment.
I got the plat in around 70. First playthrough and just kept going. Ill be real, i like DS3 way more. ER and NR suffer from huge empty spaces. That doesnt happen in their other games.
It's impossible to get platinum in ER with just one playthrough. You have to get multiple different endings, some of which require lengthy side quests to unlock. Also, the map is only empty to people who rush through without exploring, and platinum is only possible with heavy exploration.
While that makes sense, you still can't get it in that few hours unless you're heavily researching what to do and where to go in the shortest amount of time possible. Doing that and then complaining about the world being empty is bold
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u/MyCabbagesOhNo 4h ago
Man part of me thinks i need to replay elden ring, because i beat it for the first time in a little under 40 hours. I probably missed so many side objectives.