Julius

I finished this in a day but forgot to follow up, so... ...Ufotable really are just out here setting the standard for animation in the industry, huh? Rewatching the Mugen Train Arc, as much as I still love it, the final fight - glorious as it is - is very stop-start, just due to the nature of the characters involved. It's not a particularly long fight, despite how intense and lustrous it is. But the Entertainment District Arc is all killer, no filler, and there's a fight on multiple fronts which goes on for about half of the Arc. That the animation quality, then, somehow stepped up from what they achieved in a somewhat short but very intense burst at the end of the Mugen Train Arc, is simply astounding -- the animation in a weekly show was just as good as, and perhaps arguably (I'd definitely argue this) even better than, that of the movie. Demon Slayer just nails the basics of a shonen. You care about these characters, the shorter arcs, the overarching arcs, and are easily invested. It's not doing anything groundbreaking for the genre in terms of writing (it's not Hunter x Hunter subverting a lot of the tropes in the shonen book), but it's writing is simple yet very effective, and that's perhaps the most important thing. It's because it isn't trying anything dangerously bold in the genre that the animation takes centre stage -- the conversations I see aren't about what happened in the final fight, but how that final fight looked and felt. The clanging sound of swords, the almost lucid slashes across a dark background, the way characters leap to and at each other, how it's all choreographed and framed, and then it's all elevated even further by the soundtrack. Look, I think it's a small step down from Mugen Train's OST, but that's not saying much when Mugen Train has one of my favourite recent anime OST's, and some incredible tracks. I've been weirdly inconsistent on here about scoring anime I watch, as I view it a little bit more casually than I do games or films, but I track and score every anime I watch on MAL, and finishing the Entertainment District Arc, I was stumped for the first time in a long time on how to score it. Again, the story itself isn't anything wild or a Magnum Opus of writing, but I seriously don't think I've been as hyped by, or as in awe of, an animated fight as I was watching the latter parts of the Entertainment District Arc. So I gave it a 10. Seriously, jump on the Demon Slayer anime bandwagon if you haven't already, because your eyes and ears are in for a treat.

Meanwhile, a meaningful update on where I'm at:

I haven't played around with Scapes too much yet to be honest, but I'll throw some replays up later

Trophy hunters love this one simple trick!

You see, the problem with a great idea like that is that doesn't allow the refs and VAR assistants to be as incompetent

Delayed four and a half months until October 11th. One part of me is saying RIP to the thought of having XVI out by the end of the year now, probably slipping into Q1 2023... ...but then the other part of me is holding onto a thread of hope in that we've been told to expect news in the next month's - and that we wouldn't be getting the next update to begin with until we were reasonably close to launch. Head honchos over at S-E have some pretty massive decisions to make here. A mid-October release date for this just doesn't seem the right decision if XVI is aiming for that same window. I haven't been wowed by anything from Forspoken that we've seen since the first trailer, so part of me selfishly would rather that game be pushed further back for XVI to step into the limelight.

In what can only be described as a mind-meltingly confusing move for a company like Rockstar, but is actually a sensible move, it looks like GTA V on next-gen is only going to be priced at £15 until mid-June, and £35 thereafter. Which timeline are we actually in at this point?

My problem with how VAR is utilised in offside replays is that arms are even considered to the extent that they are to begin with, especially with how handball has been cracked down on (maybe a bit too harshly) in most cases. It's football -- unless there's an extreme example where some part of the arm is offside and is used to gain an advantage (for example, if a player controlled the ball with their shoulder) I don't understand why we wouldn't just be looking at the attacking player's legs and feet in comparison to the defending player's legs and feet. Part of the idea of offside is to essentially have a fair footrace to the ball if a defender is tracking back, but only considering their position in a vacuum and not even their direction or current momentum (which is silly anyways because nine times out of ten the defending player is going to be slower than the attacking player through the middle of the pitch), so it's supposed to be an equalising thing for, again, essentially a footrace...where one player might be facing or currently moving in the wrong direction to begin with.

I saw a clip of this going around yesterday without any context and it shot up on my to-do list for the game My plan going into the game was always to do a hybrid Knight/Sorcerer build focusing on STR/VIG/END as usual for much of the game before pumping Runes into INT/MIND later on to give me more versatility and to see the cool spells. But my experience with the last boss, as much as I loved it, showed me that my current build just probably isn't going to cut it moving forwards, considering some of the later areas I've already come across later in the game, and this was hammered home by 5 seconds I had spoiled of some random boss fight (thanks, YouTube thumbnail clips - thankfully didn't see a name or even really the boss, just someone with a typical sword and board melee build like mine getting smeared across the floor), which made it abundantly clear that rather than re-spec... I'm going to choose to grind in order to level up INT/MIND so that they're pretty much on par with my other stats and incorporate them into my build. Well, INT a bit (a lot) further, as I have a spell I've picked up that I really want to use! I'd actually already started doing the quest which would get me to where I needed, as it turns out, so will be finishing that after work today and putting some other essential parts of the grind in place. After the grind I have one more thing to do to get the armour set I've been fawning over the entire game, I have the big ass swords I wanted, and so there'll be no looking back. Tonight, I become a farmer. A farmer of Runes. And ascend to damn near godhood.

Getting Gold in IA-5 kept me from playing Elden Ring yesterday. Some of these License Tests are no joke! To give you an idea, the course is probably no longer than 2 miles, and when I completed it I had some 483 miles added to my daily counter, so...yeah, it's rough. Definitely the one I've spent the most time on so far, but Gold on some of the other License Tests is nothing to snort at either. Got to the point where I know that part of the track to an insane degree and was adjusting on the fly to wheel spin and dodgy cornering on each run, constantly getting Silvers, and ended up with an insanely clean looking run. About 25% of the way into my attempts I think I had it down but my thumb locked onto the left stick and I accidentally flicked the car off the track as I took it off for a straight. Grrrrrrrr. My mate bested my time after probably half of my attempts but watched my run for reference and I gave him tips on it as he went. A little grating to my pride that he beat my time considering how much time I put in to mastering the test, but I'm glad he went for it and can now appreciate my pain, and I'm never going back. My Gold run according to him looked much, much smoother than his, though, so I'll take that hopefully the PS App hurries up and updates with screenshots and videos soon so I can start sticking some footage I've captured on here (had an insane rally run where I became Lightning McQueen), as uploading to and copying thing from Twitter is a bit of a pain!

Yeah, honestly I don't blame you, especially with all of the other great games out at the moment, as well as waiting to see how this whole microtransaction situation plays out long term for the game, because right now I think it's tough to gauge exactly how impactful that is on the mid- and late-game. For me, I knew the quantity would be there to help me replace FIFA (though I had questions over whether or not it would click), and so £70 was fine for me because I was signing up for the long haul anyways, but if you get the opportunity to grab this game on sale towards the end of the year when I imagine we'll see it going for £30 to £40, I think it'll be a bargain for how much you'll get out of it

It's addictively good, and I mean, the fact that I've apparently already put 15 hours into it while mainly playing a game as brilliant as Elden Ring - and I'm someone that typically hates playing more than one game at a time - speaks volumes about the game's quality. Not once but twice I've already noticed my friends playing the game at 23:00, I figure if we're all playing we might as well jump in a chat - even if we're at different stages and doing our own things - and all of a sudden it's 04:00 or 05:00! It's just that much fun. Friday night one of us was in Yorkshire but he jumped into the chat to talk, and so I shared my screen over the chat in the PS App, which was a surprisingly seamless experience. I mentioned a lot of my points of praise before, but what I think you'd enjoy about it is that it definitely feels like a game where it highlights all of the things you need to do to progress as you play - if you just want the main course, by all means, it wants you to just start digging into the meat of the meal, and you don't really need to dive into the side dishes of the game if that's not your thing. Coupled with the fast loading times and snappy menus, if you only focus on races and the minimum required upgrades, I reckon you're getting through some 10 - 15 races per hour quite handily, and if you're in a rush and ready to go from one to the next, probably even a bit closer to 20. From what I've seen of the trophies it also seems to be one that wants you to put time into the game and mastering it in some aspects (such as the License Tests, which are very addictive, especially with friends' times to beat), but isn't asking nearly as much as I would have expected from a game like this. There are things I have gripes with, though, for sure. After one long session I've already kicked the in-game soundtrack to the curb and have started a custom playlist for the game, mainly with music from older games and some Japanese pop/rock/jazz/hype tracks to keep that GT vibe going, and if not that I'll just stick on a podcast instead. Again, online multiplayer not being available from the get-go in a game which requires online seems pretty deplorable to me, and even if you crit path it to unlock it (it's 9 or 10 café missions in), you're probably looking at an hour to an hour and a half to unlock it if you win every race on your first attempt and don't get distracted by some of the side stuff. And yeah, there's a big question at the back of my mind about the microtransactions. It seemed inevitable after how I saw them implemented from a distance in Sport, but keeping mum until the release of the game about it (it was one of the first things I asked about to my friend who got the game a day early when we jumped in a chat together) in the style of Battlefront II was a stupid move, and having the option to top up your wallet with some microtransactions show up every time you get some more credits added to your funds after a race, or when confirming a purchase, is despicable. I picked up the Digital Deluxe Edition and have only been using the extra cash I got on upgrading my vehicle and yesterday I finally dipped lower than 1 million CR in the bank, mainly because you'll do a bunch of races with one car and then you'll need to use an American 4WD car that you haven't upgraded, and need to start upgrading that to get it in shape for a race to be competitive. This all being said, it's still far from the most disgusting and predatory microtransactions I've come across in a game, because GTA Online takes the cake there. In short: highly recommend, don't think I've ever been so addicted to a racing game before, and if not for Elden Ring, I have no doubt my time in the game would be double what it currently is. I wanted to nip playing FIFA in the bud this year and it seems doable now that GT7 is here. Also @Cookyman I'm playing with the front of car perspective. I did start in the cockpit, and the game looks fantastic there, but once I got to the point of the License Tests and needing to shave off a second or two here or there to beat my friend's times, I found that I needed a full view so that I could cut over corners exactly how I needed to, etc.

I also beat the big boss that is the hot topic, and hoo boy, is that one hell of a fight. I already loved the character from what I'd read and heard about them elsewhere in the game, so finally getting to square up to them, and having the fight surpass my expectations, was pretty spectacular. And I'm looking forward to seeing the ramifications of the fight too. However, while the fight is conceptually awesome...I do think it has some practical issues, and I feel like there are definitely one or two things which could have been done to make the fight a bit. It also brought to the forefront a minor nitpick for me in the game that I'd come across a few times before but could put up with, but this being a boss fight, it blew it up exponentially, and now it's going to be on my mind a lot moving forwards into other important fights. For reference, I've been running a STR-based melee build, which I've only really recently started phasing into a Magic Knight hybrid, and I'm probably one of the lesser experienced Souls players here, so looking at the tally for my number of deaths, I think I'm probably going to be one of those more intimate with the fight in terms of sheer exposure to it. I spent a good while with it, but thankfully, just powered through - got to that point where I always knew what was coming. It never felt unfair as I feel a couple of bosses in Dark Souls and Demons Souls did at times (looking at you, my clip-happy experiences with O&S and Adjudicator), but well, I'll just get onto it: praise, criticism, my idea on how it could potentially be improved, warts and all. Stopping there for now, got a few places I want to check out before I've got a couple of ideas for where I want to head next. I'm pretty confident I know where exactly the next big bosses are going to be based on my running ahead (I've pretty much only got the top right quarter of the map left to discover, and I have a good idea of what to expect there based on NPC talk, quests, and item descriptions), but I'm in no real rush to get to them, because I'm just enjoying the game that much. I do look forward to hopefully getting to the grinding spot @Hero-of-Time and @drahkon have been mentioning though, one final big grind before probably just going where I think I need to go would be very nice Lastly, it needs to be said: what a great year this already is for games. In all of the Elden Ring hype - which it's worthy of every drop of - I've somehow not realised that with this, Legends: Arceus, and a good chunk of late night/early morning Gran Turismo 7 sessions that I already have 3 games that I'm confident I'll be talking about at the end of the year when it comes to my personal favourites and backing in GOTY discussions. That's insanely wild, and I haven't even picked up Sifu or Horizon Forbidden West yet. Dare I say that 2022's already on course to be one of the strongest years for gaming, never mind the fact that so many other games with huge potential are pencilled in or are likely to be aiming to come out by the end of this year?

Oh damn, that's a great shout Glen! I loved that advert but it never clicked before, but that definitely makes the most sense for inspiration. Always knew Game Freak and co. were a cultured lot well, I guess James Turner specifically in this case, have no idea at all how a bunch of Japanese guys and gals might've come across that ad!

Yeah, I did the same, love it didn't have much luck with the boss fight though, so I still need to go back, but didn't suit my melee build at all and they destroy Ash Summons. Those were the ones I was referencing yesterday: Definitely one of the weaker boss fights I think I've encountered so far in the game, it's not terrible by any means, it just kind of gives me O&S vibes in how it functions...but kind of worse? At least for my melee build the fight comes entirely down to i-frames when rolling through one of their attacks, and a lot of the new mechanics just don't really seem that useable here. The arena is massive but it's not really used as you're often cramped between them anyways. Again, I'll be back, but they didn't leave a fantastic first impression

I'm glad I'm not the only one that thought this also @darksnowman Sobble's final evolution, Inteleon, seems like a pretty clear reference to James Bond/MI6, and I'd guess the entire line is based on newts. Which we have some indigenous species of. Don't ask me about Grookey and it's line though: at best I'd guess that they're a reference to drummers, but not a particular one? It's also called the Chimp Pokémon when I think it's clearly a monkey, and I mean, I guess we have those in zoos? There's some neat stuff in there but Pokémon, for me, hasn't had great nuance and design for its regions since Unova in Gen V. Everything since then has very practically been "this country...but in the world of Pokémon!" I mean Unova is an entire region based on a city, and while every region is visually similar in shape to its inspiration, it never felt like it went beyond inspiration - there was loads of space for them to flex their creative muscle and design an awesome place. It's insane how much thought went into extrapolating so much in that region, from the focus on truth and ideals, to the design of many of the Pokémon, to the actual locations in the region compared with New York. Ditto for the preceding four main series regions before that. So yeah, Scarlet and Violet I'm sure will have many references to the real world, but in terms of the region, I agree that it will probably be pretty shallow in how it does this if the last few regions are anything to go by

Cult of the Lamb is coming to Switch...uh...soon, but hey that's exciting and the trailer is fun:

It's over in Caelid, next to my previous grinding spot, which I think is pretty well known (where you get ~1000 Runes per kill on these fidgety short guys). You don't actually need to attack anything, just need to be careful, and get ~2000 Runes per run, can do two runs in a minute, and so you're probably looking at somewhere between 200,000 and 240,000 Runes per hour. Hope that helps Don't think I'll be playing this much today, if at all, as I woke up with a migraine which has only been getting worse, so think I might take a break from screens after typing this

Got the Digital Deluxe version of the game and so hopped on with a couple of mates at midnight. One of them messed up the pre-load so jumped off after he realised he could only play the Music Rally ad nauseam, and my other mate hopped off around 01:30. So anyways, here I am starting to type this at 05:30 (I'm off work at the moment so no need to fear for my lack of sleep ), which should say a lot. This game is good. Like, addictively good. I was hoping it would be my FIFA replacement going in, and now there's no doubt in my mind that it's going to fill the role of a less intense game dutifully. So far I've completed a handful of races and got Gold in all of the A and B license tests, and spent extra time in those license tests trying to best my mate who got the game a day early (I now hold the better times for most of the tests - for now!) - some of those are insanely tough, and the feeling of being 0.002 seconds off a Gold is excruciating, but it's too much fun to put down. The game feels incredibly responsive and smooth, and the menus and short load times feel super snappy. Oh, and in a proper throwback to the days in my childhood with GT3: my left thumb looks a little worse for wear and the print-side of my right middle finger is tender from battling with the trigger. Firstly: the haptics. The game feels kind of nuts. The way it reacts to a change in surface and conveys it to you through feel - be it the chug-chug of a Tokyo speedway or hitting the grass - is kind of insane. Jury is still out for me on the adaptive triggers, can't figure out whether I'm a fan or not with how they're used here, but I do feel like I'm compensating for their adaptive nature by just tightening my hold on them, which probably isn't great in the long term. Visually, the game looks stunning. Next time I hop on I'll be sure to take some screenshots, but for now I've been playing in the mode prioritising frame rate, and I've not noticed a single dropped frame so far (I'm usually pretty sensitive to this stuff as a dodgy frame rate can make me feel dizzy). Not too surprising really based on what Digital Foundry were reporting, seems like Polyphony did a great job polishing the game up. This all being said, there are some odd decisions to be found in the game. For instance, the game requires online at all times otherwise you are SEVERELY limited in what you can do (I think it's basically an exhibition race with a choice of 12 or so cars?), and if that wasn't frustrating enough, the online multiplayer mode - in a game which needs to always be online - isn't accessible from the get-go? There are also some odd choices in terms of the car lineup, maybe it's just because I haven't played a racing sim in so long (Forza Motorsport 4) but...man, is it thin on the ground in some areas. No doubt more is coming down the road, but a quick look through Brand Central showed some pretty major supercar and hypercar brands being MIA, such as Koenigsegg and SSC, and some really big name cars are missing too. No Bugatti Chiron? Again, it's probably coming down the line, but I didn't expect to come back to racing sims to find less cars in the games now than when I last played them might be a case those brands have deals I'm not aware of, but it does seem like there's stuff missing. Lastly, a minor annoyance I've spotted but will surely grow accustomed to, so I'll mention it now: the default option that your cursor is hovering over after completing a License Test is 'Exit' rather than 'Retry', which is a pain to remember when you're ten attempts into trying to get Gold or beat a friend's best time and just want to smash 'X' and jump back straight back in. However if you fail the test (for example, you hit a wall or drive the entire car off the track) your cursor hovers over 'Retry'...so they clearly know what's up. Strikes me as an odd decision. But yeah, had a lot of fun, and really looking forward to taking my time (..?) and chipping away at this game.

Did you go any further than the Manor? I'm assuming that you completed it I've also been avoiding Caelid like the plague, but after I take on the Manor tomorrow, I think it'll be time. I did pop in yesterday with some 30+ levels more than when I was first there and took out a couple of areas but the enemies in the open world kind of scream at you nonstop that you shouldn't be there, extremely aggressively. Not that that's at all a bad thing Did some grinding tonight for a couple of hours, didn't want to put the game down but didn't have the energy for catacombs/caves (just burnt out on that aspect a bit right now I think, hopefully be back up for it tomorrow), shot up ~20 levels and think I might now be a higher level than I've personally ever been in a From game before? I'm now at Lv 83, so yeah. Imma destroy those little freakos in the Manor tomorrow.

Yeah, you're probably right, I just want to one-shot those things got jumped by some in a woods somewhere when I grabbed an item...just, From...no. Sounds like I'll need to double back there after I've finished grinding

I entered. Saw an enemy. Turned around. Walked out. Nope. I'll wait until I'm obscenely OP before going in there I don't get the talk of players of From Software games being masochists but there's no denying that Miyazaki and some of his team are a bit of sadist I'm actually at a point where I think I might need to do some grinding, so maybe I'll just stick on a podcast after some food and look up if there's a better grinding spot than the one I've currently got. I've gone as far as I think I can for now with lighting up Sites of Lost Grace (which is, uh, pretty far) but I definitely felt under-levelled on the way over. Got a little burned out on catacombs and caves earlier too all of a sudden, which probably doesn't help the level situation the three main locations that I think could be the way forward just have me dealing out too little damage and receiving a bit too much for my liking, so grinding it is!

Game is selling well, let's pretend to be surprised The really surprising thing for me was seeing a friend from high school in my friends list playing the game, as he's the type to only really jump on FIFA/GTA/CoD/big single player or multiplayer experiences. Nothing wrong with that of course, but very surprising, just shows how great a job has been done with the marketing of this game. Firstly: good lord, I respect the grind I did a bit of grinding myself yesterday in a nice spot and got my secondary attributes for my hybrid build (DEX/INT) up to where I wanted them (18/15) and then got my primary attributes all up to snuff (STR/VIG/END to 25). I didn't do any grinding in Dark Souls but did a lot of it to farm Grass at the entry to 1-3 in Demon's Souls, so now I've just been going back whenever I beat a boss and find myself a bit short on Runes. I've only played through Demon's Souls and Dark Souls, so can't talk to the same extent about its difficulty compared to the other games as yourself and some of the others here, but I agree, it hasn't been that difficult *touches wood* so far. I think it just comes down to the sheer variety of tools at your disposal: every build seems viable, every weapon and moveset seems viable, there are Ash Summons, Flasks of Physick, Jump Attacks, and Shield Counters definitely makes most scenarios manageable, so long as you're smart about it. You can grab a pair of greatswords and demolish a lot of things in this game with jump attacks. There's only been one mini-boss (well, two, they were a pair) I've come across so far where my Ash Summons were practically useless, and for the bosses I was facing, the arena just wasn't great, because you ended up with your back to the wall in a massive room, which just doesn't suit my build. I'll be going back I'm sure, but it's the only one where I was like "eh, that's not a good boss fight", though to be fair I think the pairs of identical bosses with different weapons/conditions are just going to be like that when I'm wielding a melee build. The biggest thing for me that I was worried about to be honest when it came to the difficulty was the speed of the game, as I've mentioned before. Demon's Souls and Dark Souls are slow and in terms of their actual gameplay code, a decade old by the time I got around to them, but I've found I've adapted relatively quickly in some bizarre scenarios that I never came across in those two games when it comes to speed and variety, especially when it comes to some of the bosses. The first one gave me a bit of a hilariously rough time, though looking back I was under-levelled, on one occasion got too greedy, and on another he forced me off a cliff on what was easily my best attempt. Something else that definitely feeds into that I feel is the Stakes of Marika at most bosses and mini-bosses. I love the boss fights in what I've played of From games a whole lot (though there are some bad ones) and so it's nice to be able to just go back and get stuck in, but it also makes it a lot easier to learn the boss inside and out when you don't have to remember half a mile of other things you need to sprint through/dodge roll from/not set off. There are also waaaaaaaay more NPC summons than I've been used to, the only one I used prior to this was a missable one in Demon's Souls, which felt earned. All a move to make it more approachable I guess. The challenge is still there fundamentally I think if you decide to play solo/not use Ash Summons/NPC summons, but the sheer amount of tools at your disposal can definitely take away a good chunk of it. Yeah, I'm definitely the sightseeing type too, and I was actually thinking yesterday about something I feel this game could have stolen from Xenoblade: some sort of reward for accessing hidden areas or Sites of Lost Grace (probably Runes), or areas you "aren't supposed to be in". I know some will definitely argue that the reward in Elden Ring is coming across something you haven't before and it giving you that satisfaction of exploration, which I totally agree is there, but despite the world being open...it definitely feels level-gated to quite an extent. If you run ahead you will straight up get destroyed in some places, and so while I enjoy the exploration, in those times where I want to explore ahead rather than deal with a dungeon or what have you, there has definitely been one region for me where the only option really is sprinting through. It's nice to have that difficulty in the open world, rather than saved just for smaller encounters in smaller areas, but beyond giving myself Sites of Lost Grace to go back to when I want to tackle that part of the map, it was a whole lot of "oh hey that thing over there looks coo– FREAKING RUN RUN RUN". Honestly, after Elden Ring and once I've gone back to complete Artorias of the Abyss, I might just move onto Bloodborne or Sekiro myself. One reason is for the variety in place (I've only experienced dark fantasy From so far, which is cool, but coupled with the new mechanics in Elden Ring, DS II and III just don't look that appealing now), but secondly is because those just seem like very different experiences to what I've experienced from From so far. Sekiro, for instance, as far as I'm aware, can owe a whole lot of its challenge to players not having anywhere near as many options when it comes to how to take the game on. Maybe I've heard wrong, but builds just don't really seem like a thing, and so that challenge sounds super appealing (and also just having a main character and narrative to invest in, too). Will be super curious to see where I take my From journey after this...but back to Elden Ring

Reviews (and impressions from reviews in progress) are starting to come in, and they're looking good. Digital Foundry technical review is also up: In no real rush to pump hours into GT7 as I don't think I'm okay pumping Elden Ring time into other games (maybe I'll just start the career), but I'm in for the long haul with it, so very excited to see how it's turned out. Roll on Friday

Yeah, think tiredness might have played a part, but there was just a sense of wonder for me that I just can't nail down. It just made me feel more than a boss fight in a game, it's a tough one to explain! And yes, those guys are a pain in the ass! I actually bolted out of that area the first time because of them, but at that point I'd figured out what was going on with how to unlock the thing, just thought I was under-levelled I spent about 30 minutes jumping around the place with Torrent and had no luck, so I figure (I don't actually know anything, but stick it in a spoiler because just referencing it feels spoiler-ish): Not that I could find... @Hero-of-Time sorry to hear you're not as crazy hot as some of us on here from the get-go, but as you've played the other From games - and played a hell of a lot of games in general! - I always find your perspectives invaluable. Even if this becomes my favourite game of all time and you hate it (not saying you do or will, just hypothetically if you came away really down on it), I'm sure I'll be able to understand where you're coming from, so by all means go for it, I think it just makes for much better, more rounded, and more meaningful discussion around the game. I've definitely got some minor nitpicks with the game (ahem, why not tell me how many Gold Seeds or Tears I have when asking me if I want to upgrade and then saying I don't have enough!). I also appreciate the honesty because I've definitely heard and read some things around the internet the last few days (not here, but on some of the early impressions stuff and review talk last week) where I'm just sitting there like "you're blazing hot on this game...but you don't even seem to understand the game? What are you talking about?!", and it's infuriating because it sometimes feels like people get caught in the zeitgeist and basically are throwing up the same buzzwords and opinions without giving it much thought. It's nice to read some level-headed "this is where I'm at with the game, this is how I feel about it", and for it to be something other than the usual non-positive thing about the game's difficulty. For me, I loved Breath of the Wild, even if it had a lot of areas where I want it to improve when it comes to its sequel. Demon's Souls and Dark Souls I thoroughly enjoyed, but it was just too oppressive for too long at times for me, and made me feel overwhelmed and need to take regular breaks, whereas with Elden Ring, because it's much more open and I'm not being bottlenecked down a certain route, I can find my own room to breathe, which is giving rise to some super long play sessions. I also just love the mechanical additions, like with the Jump Attack and Shield Counter coupled with stagger, and as I said before, I'm very worried about how willing I'll be to go back to Dark Souls II and III after this. Funnily enough, though, when I talked to a friend on Friday during our weekly GTA session, I was only some 4 hours in or so, and remember saying "there hasn't been a great interconnected space yet which feels like a proper From dungeon - I haven't gone to the castle yet, so know something like that could be coming, but I kind of miss it and I'm concerned about how it'll be handled." I've played through that legacy dungeon (think that's the buzzword they were using in the marketing) since and I think it absolutely captures that feeling, so look forward to hearing your thoughts on that when you get to some of them EDIT: I'm also sorry that got so long-winded