Most games are rollercoaster rides that guide you from one point to the next while trying to keep your attention through exposition that rarely amounts to anything more than popcorn. While there is nothing wrong with that and said games can provide entertainment, the overall experience tends to be forgettable.

Elden Ring takes the established Souls formula and puts it in a Zelda like open world. After 500+ hours I still find new stuff, uncover dialogue with NPCs, etc. While all the elements to keep you entertained for hours upon hours are there, there is also a lot more. It's like a digital painting, a work of art. From the colour palette to the music. Even though the world is a bleak, surreal and dreamy nothing feels out of place. Every item, NPC, piece of dialogue feels like it belongs there for a reason. This unfortunately isn't always true for the side content, which is one of drawbacks of an open world.

The obvious shortcomings of an open world game are easily overlooked by the overall experience that is present here. It makes the Souls formula accessible to a larger mainstream audience without handicapping the experience or the artistic narrative. Elden Ring will undoubtedly go down as a masterpiece along fondly remembered titles like Grim Fandango or Deus Ex.