FromSoftware’s Elden Ring has released to critical acclaim and has enjoyed a positive reception from both long-term fans of the Soulsborne series and newcomers alike. While retaining the series’ core, crippling difficulty, Elden Ring also makes a number of improvements and refinements — including going open-world in its design — making it the most accessible entry in the series thus far.
While its sprawling world just begs to be explored and its incredibly designed bosses eagerly await their partner (you) for a deadly dance of dodge rolls and well-timed attacks, not everything is absolutely perfect. Here, we’re going to run through three ways in which Elden Ring could have been even better.
We’re noting now that these really are largely just us nitpicking (bar the final entry). But in the strive for absolute perfection in the industry, resolving these minor issues can go a long way to pushing the medium forward, as developers take notes and learn from one another. Pobody’s nerfect, after all.
Resolving the Performance Issues
Ways Elden Ring Could Have Been Better
This is something we noted in our review, where we played through the entire game on PC. Elden Ring’s performance is pretty rough right now, with the PC version, in particular, suffering from hefty framerate drops, stuttering, bugs, and crashes. It’s a familiar story for FromSoftware, as the developer has always struggled with the platform on its previous titles, too.
Unfortunately, performance is a problem on consoles, too. As outlined by DigitalFoundry’s tech analysis video, both PS5 and Xbox Series X fail to reach a consistent 60fps even in the game’s ‘Prioritize Framerate’ mode that uses a Dynamic Resolution Scaling for when things get particularly hectic on-screen.
Given how much smoother and more fluid the combat and general exploration feels when you do hit 60fps (you’ve got to play the PS4 Pro version on PS5 to achieve this, in turn losing some visual fidelity), this really is problematic, and can often drag you out of the immersion that The Lands Between does so well to build with its stunning locales, interesting NPCs and the freedom to craft your own story.
FromSoftware has announced it’s working on resolving these performance problems, but whether or not we’ll ever see the game achieving a steady 60fps on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X remains to be seen.
Crossplay for Its Multiplayer
Ways Elden Ring Could Have Been Better
While Elden Ring is still predominantly meant to be a single-player experience, there are some multiplayer features dropped in for good measure. Players can leave messages around the world to help (or try and hinder) fellow Tarnished on their quest to become an Elden Lord. There’s also the option to invade another player’s game to fight them or fight alongside them in what is essentially a co-op mode, perfect for those punishing boss battles.
It’s yet another example of the subtle ways in which FromSoftware has made Elden Ring more approachable for newcomers, without detracting from the core experience long-term fans want.
But we’re in 2022 now. Crossplay is more or less a common staple in multiplayer games, and yet, Elden Ring forgoes this, instead opting to keep players in their respective platform ‘families.’
That means Xbox One and Series X|S players can all play together, and so too can those on PS4 and PS5, but you can’t play with someone on PS5 if you’re on an Xbox or PC.
Again, it’s a little nitpicky, and given multiplayer’s not the core focus here, it’s understandable the extra time and effort involved in enabling crossplay has been spent elsewhere. Perhaps I’m just sad I can’t have resident Soulsborne expert Zhiqing lend me a helping hand when I need it on Xbox from her PC. I imagine I’m not the only one, however.
Lack of Accessibility Options for Disabled Players
Ways Elden Ring Could Have Been Better
I’m going to preface this section by saying I’m not at all qualified to discuss the complexity of the issues that face disabled gamers when it comes to accessibility options in games. As such, I’ll be referring to those that are, with some quotes to ensure I get this point across correctly.
Elden Ring isn’t a very accessible game from this perspective. Instead, it is indeed the “most approachable game in the series so far” to quote Can I Play That. While the title has, arguably, made a number of changes to make it a better jumping-in point into the Soulsborne genre than most others, it still lacks a swathe of options that can retain that level of challenge while also ensuring disabled gamers can, well, enjoy it.
In this fantastic Eurogamer piece with accessibility consultant SightlessKombat, the Soulsborne series — and consequently Elden Ring’s — lack of guidance in where you’re supposed to go next is highlighted.
To resolve this issue, Dead Space 2 and The Last of Us Part II had an option to have the camera automatically turn towards your next objective, depending on context. While SightlessKombat acknowledges this is difficult to achieve “…with the Souls games being so open and explorable, it might seem like a daunting task, but even having the ability to set custom beacons could also be an answer to this.” This is something that, to its credit, Elden Ring has implemented, with custom markers being placable on the map, which shows up on the compass at the top of the screen.
It also mentions the need for improved audio accessibility options, chiefly the need for audio description.
“Additionally, the audio description could help not only with allowing the understanding of area layouts, but also give a sense of the atmosphere and visual aesthetic, which is what a lot of people seem to take away from these titles and focus on.”
Audio cues could also be implemented to help signpost when an enemy is going for a single attack or a combo. “For instance, when an enemy goes for a combo vs a single attack or an area of effect, each should sound different enough that you can learn them as you play and should be consistent.”
These options don’t detract from the difficulty of the game that fans are so defensive of, as all enemies and bosses have visual tells anyway that players much learn in order to defeat them. But for a blind player, they’re put at a disadvantage because there’s no audio alternative.
By having these options in the menus for players to choose to turn on if they’d allow them to properly enjoy the game, it’s not detracting from the experience if you’re fortunate enough to not need to enable them in the first place. Just… don’t turn them on?
Similarly, when it comes to dodging and knowing where enemies are, SightlessKombat notes that he had to rely on a CoPilot to tell him what directions were clear and which weren’t.
“The only solution I found was to have a CoPilot tell me ‘clear left’, ‘clear back’, ‘clear right’, etc and move accordingly. Having directional cues (haptic or otherwise) that you can dodge would be extremely helpful and if players don’t want those they could be toggled on/off, much like any of the elements in this list.“
Again, it’s not a case of accessibility requiring a “slap-on easy mode,” to quote Ben Bayliss in his article on Can I Play That? (which I also highly recommend you read), but finding ways in which a game can be inclusive of all players, regardless of their disability.
Ultimately, as fantastic as Elden Ring is, it could do better in being more accessible to the large disabled players around the world.
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