Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree Comprehensive Review

The highly anticipated Elden Ring expansion has arrived, but does FromSoftware deliver the magic we expected

First Impressions and Overall Experience

Many players sensed before release that this highly anticipated expansion might not meet expectations. Despite deep trust in FromSoftware's pedigree, actual gameplay confirmed that intuition often proves uncomfortably accurate.

After intense battles in the realm of shadow, veteran players and newcomers alike lost interest in returning to this so-called "randomized land." Multiple attempts to rally teammates for renewed combat were met only with silence and the lonely sight of friends occupied with other activities.

Character Design Highlights

While the overall experience disappoints, the game genuinely showcases FromSoftware's accumulated expertise in character design over the years.

Iron Eye - Beginner-Friendly Choice

Iron Eye stands out as the most newcomer-friendly character, offering excellent usability. With built-in mobility and the piercing arrow skill that interrupts enemy actions, combined with infinite ammunition, it provides a stable damage output environment. This design somewhat fulfills many players' expectations for archer-class gameplay.

Rogue - Balanced Offense and Defense

The Rogue character combines DPS with utility, absorbing enemy attacks while dealing significant damage. Its ultimate ability creates totem gravestones that establish buffer zones during intense combat, potentially synergizing with Iron Eye and serving as effective pursuit tools.

Executioner - Style Icon

The Executioner represents the most charismatic character in Shadow of the Erdtree, featuring spectacular weapon clashes with sparking effects, graceful backflips, and unique transformation mechanics. While combat effectiveness remains questionable, the visual appeal is undeniably maxed out.

The Eighth Character

Due to confidentiality requirements, detailed showcase isn't possible, but this character's playability certainly matches others in the roster.

Multiplayer Cooperation Experience

The success of multi-character design lies in each character providing distinctly different gameplay experiences. Teaming up with friends proves genuinely enjoyable, sharing the satisfaction of completing challenges, acquiring gear, and defeating bosses together.

However, it's worth noting that much of this enjoyment stems from the pleasure of gaming with friends rather than the game's inherent charm.

Technical Performance Issues

Poor Optimization

The game's optimization performance falls short of expectations. Testing across three different PlayStation console models (original PS5, PS5 Slim, and latest PS5 Pro) revealed that FromSoftware treats all hardware "equally" - when stuttering occurs, no one escapes regardless of hardware generation.

Data read/write code clearly contains issues, with 99% of stuttering occurring during character air current climbing and frequent map loading moments. The good news is combat frame rates remain relatively stable, and after several hours of adaptation, players can generally accept the performance.

Based on past experience, if console optimization proves inadequate, expectations for PC platform performance shouldn't be high, particularly for Japanese-developed games.

Narrative and Storytelling Shortcomings

Questionable Text Quality

The development team added dedicated quests for each character, rewarding completion with exclusive relics - potentially a good means of increasing replayability. However, the entire story's textual expression proves overly simplistic and direct, lacking basic aesthetic appeal and completely losing the mysterious qualities of traditional Souls games' fragmented storytelling.

Numerical System Flaws

Insufficient Equipment-Skill Integration

Deep experience reveals developers clearly put insufficient effort into data population. The game lacks effective integration between equipment and skills, missing the roguelike pleasure of assembling components for specific builds, essentially offering no meaningful build diversity.

Unreasonable Randomization System

While other games employ pseudo-random systems, FromSoftware insists on true randomization. The result: archer players constantly receive melee weapons, while mage characters continuously gain physical attack power boosts. Equipment can be traded, but stat rewards prove consistently disappointing.

Particularly after defeating the day's final boss, anticipating rewards often leads to crushing disappointment.

Game Mode Design Problems

Roguelike-Battle Royale Combination Issues

The rapid circle-closing mechanism prevents players from adequately exploring, yet exploration represents one of Souls games' most captivating elements. Excessive time pressure creates extremely low error tolerance, where single team wipes or minor mistakes cause teams to miss farming spots, slowing attribute growth and ultimately leading to failure.

With fixed game time, achievable actions also trend toward fixed values. Missing outposts on day one means day two attempts at compensation only create new problems. The entire game pace feels frantic, offering no breathing room for relaxation.

Missing Communication Systems

Under high-intensity gameplay, teaming with random players offers poor value. While smooth communication could alleviate these problems, the game's marking system proves terrible and voice system practically nonexistent, forcing players to rely on telepathic communication.

Unbalanced Solo Mode

In solo mode, enemy health isn't proportionally adjusted but set to 1.5 or even 2 times normal values. Random events also pack the schedule, with omen encounters appearing immediately after giant battles before leveling opportunities.

When facing certain bosses, solo players must handle at least two players' worth of workload. The game provides no reasonable adjustments for single-player gameplay.

Severe Content Reuse

Asset reuse proves significant throughout the experience. A single map serves the entire journey, with identical island shapes, geographical features, cliff positions, and waterway locations remaining constant. Only building positions shift slightly with a few special terrain additions. The desert remains the same desert with different atmospheric filters as lazy solutions.

Conclusion

Shadow of the Erdtree gives the impression that developers understand neither roguelike mechanics nor battle royale fundamentals. The entire project emanates an improvised quality, where even the act of being perfunctory feels perfunctory.

Perhaps from the beginning, Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree's creation served merely to fulfill certain commercial obligations. For anticipating players, careful consideration of purchase decisions comes highly recommended.