Elden Ring

WEBVTT
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Welcome to Games 105, where we talk about video
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games as people who like talking about video
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games. I'm Rowan Constantine. Yep, Berlgan Jensen.
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Tori Perotti. And Abbi Wallace. Abbi's the smart
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one. Yeah, I'm the smart one. So it's really
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just Abbi and the Three Stooges right now? Yeah.
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Beautiful. That's what we're working with. Abbi,
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what are we talking about today? Oh, so glad
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you asked. We get to talk about a beautiful game,
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a game that I have played twice. I think Brogan's
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finished this game, right? Yeah, I have. At least
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once? At least once. Finished all of the game
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at least once, then the base game a lot of times.
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Okay. We are talking about Elden Ring this episode.
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Rowan, you haven't played. I have never played,
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but I have a lot of friends who are really into
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it, and I'm on social media. Such a pity you
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haven't played. You're missing out. Tori, have
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you played? I have not, but only because I'm
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broke. Dang. Ain't that just the way? All right,
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we are talking about Elden Ring. Elden Ring,
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if you guys don't know, and if you do know, it
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is a game that came out in 2022, so it's a relatively
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new game on the scene. But... It has won many,
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many, many, many, many awards. It has run at
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least, what, three, four? Something like that.
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Something like that awards at Game of the Year.
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So it is a well -received, well -loved RPG. It
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was developed from software. It was directed
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by Hidetaki Miyazaki. He was known for the Dark
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Souls trilogy that came out in 2011 and the rest
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of the teens. And then the world building was
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done by George R .R. Martin, who wrote Game of
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Thrones. So this is a well -developed, well -loved
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game. It is open world, which means you kind
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of just walk around and explore. You're not set
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on this linear path. And it's filled with NPCs,
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enemies, and most notably, it's boss fights.
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It is one of the hardest games. on the market
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because the boss fights are so difficult. Agreed?
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Agreed. Agreed. The whole goal of the game, the
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reason that you play the game, one, to explore,
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but you are given a task when you open the game,
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and you're given a little bit of world building,
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but the Elden Ring has been destroyed, and you
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are trying to restore it and become Elden Lord
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in whatever route you choose to take. So it's
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a pretty simple RPG format. You have a task.
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You go about completing it. Simple. Yeah, simple.
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Simple. So you go in. You explore. You find some
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bosses. You find items. And you try to become
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Elden Lord. That's right. With that, you are
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a lowly tarnished. That's what you're called.
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Dark Souls, you're called a hollow. Elden Ring,
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lowly tarnished. And you, when you start the
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game, cutscene happens, a bunch of people, a
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bunch of named characters are listed. Those are
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the main characters. You are not. And with this
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game, lots of stories, lots of hidden details
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are listed in the item descriptions of every
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sword, every weapon, every piece of armor. Every
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single item has a lore description. And with
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this, the dialogue. Doesn't have to do the hard
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carrying in the story. Kind of leaves it vague,
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leaves it open for your imagination to fill in
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the blanks. So there's a lot of headcanon with
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this game. And with this, it creates your own
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personal connection to the game. You are this
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tarnished who must become the Elden Lord. However
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way you do that is up to you. That's the whole
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point of this open world experience. Can I actually
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ask you a question about that, Brogan, real quick?
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Because this is something I, this is like the
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one piece of thing that has never been established,
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right? Yeah. You talk about how there are all
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these main characters, right? And then you're
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the Tarnished, which is not that. Yeah. What
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is a Tarnished specifically? So a Tarnished,
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he becomes, so they, let's see, how would I phrase
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this? So Merika, the god of this world who controls
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the Elden Ring, she has a spouse called Horolu.
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or the lion as another word. And she banishes
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him and all the soldiers to the lands in between,
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the lands betwixt. And then Merica shatters the
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Elden Ring, and all the tarnished come back to
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claim the ring, to become Elden Lord. Okay. Claim
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all the fragments of the shattered ring. So you're
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a soldier from this land betwixt. Yeah. And that
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was cast out. Now you're coming back. Yeah. It's
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time for me to claim my inheritance. It's a really
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fascinating theme to me, I think. That specifically,
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partially because I've been thinking a lot about
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this idea of being from elsewhere and then coming
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in. That's really common in fantasy. But this
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idea... shows up in a lot of, obviously, in the
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Dark Souls games, right? But it's really common
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in Souls -like as well. A really popular one
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right now that comes to mind is Hollow Knight,
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right? Where you are the Hollow Knight, which
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I'm sure now I realize is a reference to Dark
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Souls. Go figure. It all connects. It all comes
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together in the end. In Dark Souls, just to add
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on to this, if you die continuously... you become
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hollow, you lose your purpose. So that's what
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hollowing is. Yeah, so, and I think that's an
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interesting question, right? In terms of being
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tarnished, like, does that have any kind of mechanical
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repercussions? Or like, what, there's the story
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explanation, right? Of like, this is where the
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tarnished came from. What does it mean to be
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tarnished? So what it means to be tarnished is,
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All those who die yet live. You always come back.
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So you follow this thing called points of grace.
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It's like your bonfire in Dark Souls. And it
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directs you in where you need to go. And that
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points you towards the earth tree where the Elden
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Ring is. It's the whole purpose of the Tarnished.
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It's to live, die, repeat. Gideon the All -Knowing
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is one of the main characters that you talk to.
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And he says, it's never possible for a Tarnished
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to become Elden Lord. Mother Merica wants us
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to struggle and fight continuously. It's the
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whole reason why she shattered the Elden Ring.
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It's to... That's a fantastic justification for
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PvP, by the way. Yeah. This is what happens to
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women on menopause, I swear. Verica was just
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going through menopause, okay? She's just one
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of the girls, okay? We can't fault her too much.
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She's just one of the girls. Oh, no. She's also
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a radagon, so... Ooh, that's true. The intersex
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menopause lady. So the whole point is to explore,
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kill bosses, like Abbi was saying, and to create
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builds and challenge yourself to become Elden
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Lord in whatever way possible. Let's see. A bunch
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of other stuff that happens is a bunch of player
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theories, so a headcanon I was bringing up earlier,
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and where you have, let's see, this destroyed
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land that was separated in this giant storm called,
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oh, let's see, what was it? It's where Dragonlord
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Placidusax is. I can't remember the name of it.
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Oh, yeah, Farmazula. That's the name. Oh, yeah,
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of course. Yeah. Rolls off the tongue, doesn't
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it? Well, if you've played the game more than
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once, then yes. Hey, yo, chill out. For he is
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the Kwisatz Haderach. This is Broken's podcast
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now? Hey, it's just my part of speaking right
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now. So this was the destroyed land that you
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go to after you burn the Erd tree. And you discover
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more stories, more details about... Who this
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dragon lord was? Why did the earth tree in the
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Elden Ring pick him at his time? So just a bunch
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of fun theories, a bunch of them. That environment
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in the storm where you just fight dragons, it's
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pretty cool. It's a lot of silent storytelling
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you have to piece together yourself. What does
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that do for the player? Like, as you're going
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through, I know for me, whenever I'm playing
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a game that has that kind of environmental storytelling
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aspect. i want to read more but then i always
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get bored and i will like i will be the person
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who like two hours into a game will say wait
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what what what are we doing who are these people
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i skipped all of the important dialogue so like
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like how does it um i guess like what what does
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that accomplish i guess is my question right
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how how does having this like very minimal storytelling
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experience affect your perception of the world
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as the player okay so okay so this depends on
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what area you are in in the game um so at the
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beginning you um you either beat your first boss
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or you die to him and the story starts then you
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go through this hero's grave and then you open
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the gate then you see limb grave um it's the
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first beginning area And I would say it's one
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of the prettiest parts of the game. You can spend
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the most time there and never get out of it.
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That's what I did. I actually never left Limgrave
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in any of my playthroughs. Oh. I know. I know.
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I hear it all the time. I've only seen playthroughs,
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and I know you're missing out. I know. It's a
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problem. I've also seen some playthroughs, and
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I know I'm missing out. And yet, I'm still stuck
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on the first real boss. Was it Margit? Yeah,
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Margaret the Fel Omen. Yeah, I'm stuck there
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after an hour of play. You haven't even got to
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Godric yet? No, I haven't. Okay, I'm going to
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get there one day. It's the best rune. It might
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be after I graduate, but I'll get there, okay?
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The life of being a college student. Anyway,
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so what does this accomplish? There we go. So
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the whole point is when you first start out the
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game, you see this beautiful scene, then you
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see this dude standing in front of you. He says,
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oh, you, fellow tarnished, I see. I see that
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you are maidenless. So maidens are the faith
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keepers in this game. They are the ones that
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bless you and grant you strength. What were you
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going to say? Shout out if you're maidenless.
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Nope, that'd be me. Not me, I got my maiden.
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I'm also maidenless, but for different reasons.
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Which spired into so many memes with... No maidens
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or, quote, no bitches. Easy conclusion. Easy
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conclusion. Yeah. But the whole thing, if you
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look at the Dark Souls trilogy, including Demon's
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Souls and Bloodborne, you are in this linear
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story. You go forward in one direction. And then
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you can go in loops around some other places
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that you've already been to. but with this open
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-world concept, it puts the story onto the player.
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It gives you the power saying, okay, what do
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I need to learn from this story? Or you can just
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say, like you, Rowan, I've been playing for two
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hours, or I've been playing for ten hours, and
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I have no idea what the story is. So it's just
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up to the player if they want to know the story
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or not. It won't be spoon -fed. It won't be forced
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into you. Right. But also in Elden Ring, there
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is just enough lore for you to kind of get an
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idea of the world, but it's also pretty vacant
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in its lore. You have to draw a lot of your own
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conclusions. So in its creation and in its genesis,
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you have to be willing to give it meaning as
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you play. So that's what this, like Elden Ring
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specifically does that. Some other games just,
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they spoon feed you, as Rogan said, but for this
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one, it's like you put in what you take out or
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you take out what you put in. Yeah. Right. Yeah.
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I'm just, I'm really curious about like how,
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I guess, how would your experience have been
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different if you had been spoon fed the story,
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right? If, if this story was given to you, right.
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As something that you possessed and you, you
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know, you could just absorb it. Right. How would
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that have changed the way that you engage with
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the game? as opposed to it being something that
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you kind of have to build and find for yourself?
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Okay, I would say I would lose a lot of discovery
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on my own, saying, oh, I know how this connects
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to this part of the story. So it removes all
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the player theories and removes all the headcanon
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that people create. Would you understand the
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world a little bit better? Yes. But you lose
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the aspect of, I'm just a tarnished in this place.
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I come to this place being any background I want.
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I'm creating my own character. I'm putting myself
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into this character, saying I can railroad myself
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into this story, into this set of armor, this
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sword, this shield, this set of magic. Or you
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can get everything in the game and say, yeah,
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I'm the one true Elden Lord that has everything.
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Honestly, I think it would have been one of those
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things where you... there would be kind of like
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a division of players. You either have your players
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who are trying to build the wiki and fill out
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every single information bubble that they possibly
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can, or there will be your players who just are
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completing the game to complete the game. So
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I think if you had more expressive, like deliberate
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lore in Elden Ring, you would have two camps.
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And with... Miyazaki deliberately doing less
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lore with having just enough lore for you kind
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of to get immersed and get involved but just
00:14:38.789 --> 00:14:41.429
enough that you have to band together with your
00:14:41.429 --> 00:14:43.490
other tarnished and your other players to kind
00:14:43.490 --> 00:14:45.970
of understand or even come to a conclusion to
00:14:45.970 --> 00:14:49.309
make meaning out of it so it would I think personally
00:14:49.309 --> 00:14:52.539
in my I think if there was more lore, it would
00:14:52.539 --> 00:14:55.460
divide the game fan base. And because there's
00:14:55.460 --> 00:14:57.779
less lore, it kind of brings them together. Just
00:14:57.779 --> 00:15:01.500
from an outside perspective, it kind of seems
00:15:01.500 --> 00:15:05.159
like it wouldn't make sense to be given all the
00:15:05.159 --> 00:15:07.580
lore because you're entering this land that you
00:15:07.580 --> 00:15:10.779
have no knowledge or recollection of. So of course
00:15:10.779 --> 00:15:12.200
you're going to try to figure out what's going
00:15:12.200 --> 00:15:16.700
on and what you're doing. From a gameplay and
00:15:16.700 --> 00:15:18.820
from a story perspective itself, that would make
00:15:18.820 --> 00:15:21.440
more sense that you don't know as much as perhaps
00:15:21.440 --> 00:15:25.179
someone like me would like. Yeah. And that ties
00:15:25.179 --> 00:15:27.879
in with all the NPC characters. They drop bits
00:15:27.879 --> 00:15:30.779
of lore here and there for you, and it puts you
00:15:30.779 --> 00:15:34.620
on their side quests and storylines. And some
00:15:34.620 --> 00:15:37.679
can be completed while you lock off others and
00:15:37.679 --> 00:15:41.000
vice versa. Or you can just kill everyone and
00:15:41.000 --> 00:15:45.059
then you get no story. So it's just a lot of
00:15:45.059 --> 00:15:48.799
details in the world itself and in the characters
00:15:48.799 --> 00:15:50.860
that you just need to find and take the time
00:15:50.860 --> 00:15:56.480
to put in, even though the mantra of souls born
00:15:56.480 --> 00:16:00.019
quest lines or storylines, you rest at this side
00:16:00.019 --> 00:16:02.159
of grace or the bonfire. You talk to this person,
00:16:02.259 --> 00:16:06.019
run around and then sit at another grace. And
00:16:06.019 --> 00:16:07.759
then you go back to the person and they're just
00:16:07.759 --> 00:16:09.679
gone. You're like, where the frick did they go?
00:16:12.159 --> 00:16:14.639
Or they just appear burning in a pile of ash.
00:16:14.679 --> 00:16:16.960
You're like, well, I don't know what happened,
00:16:17.039 --> 00:16:20.340
but okay. That wasn't my goal. Right. I didn't
00:16:20.340 --> 00:16:25.919
mean to do that. Have good life insurance. But
00:16:25.919 --> 00:16:28.299
that kind of leads into how you learn the lore.
00:16:28.659 --> 00:16:30.759
NPCs are a really great way for you to learn
00:16:30.759 --> 00:16:35.179
lore, but also just the experience of the game
00:16:35.179 --> 00:16:38.019
and what you're seeing and what you're interacting
00:16:38.019 --> 00:16:40.539
with also kind of gives you... any kind of world
00:16:40.539 --> 00:16:43.120
-building lore. It tells you more about the lands
00:16:43.120 --> 00:16:46.740
between and what happened to get to this kind
00:16:46.740 --> 00:16:51.960
of place. So more visual and audio storytelling
00:16:51.960 --> 00:16:56.379
and folklore than just written word, which I
00:16:56.379 --> 00:17:00.379
think is a really, really good choice. Yeah,
00:17:00.480 --> 00:17:04.160
I remember I was just looking at some cut scenes
00:17:04.160 --> 00:17:05.660
and some clips and things, and I thought it was
00:17:05.660 --> 00:17:08.769
really fascinating to see. I was talking to a
00:17:08.769 --> 00:17:12.190
friend about this, and he mentions as well that
00:17:12.190 --> 00:17:15.690
on the whole, Elden Ring is a lot greener and
00:17:15.690 --> 00:17:20.089
more lush than a lot of other Souls games. But
00:17:20.089 --> 00:17:27.869
it still has this aspect of the ruins and the
00:17:27.869 --> 00:17:30.930
death of something previous is very prominent
00:17:30.930 --> 00:17:33.549
throughout the game. Just that aspect of visual
00:17:33.549 --> 00:17:39.109
storytelling where you are put in a world. where
00:17:39.109 --> 00:17:41.509
something has happened. And I do think that there's
00:17:41.509 --> 00:17:43.549
a bit of an impetus to figure out what that something
00:17:43.549 --> 00:17:47.109
is, right? I think the story pushes you, like
00:17:47.109 --> 00:17:49.250
the game encourages you to ask those questions
00:17:49.250 --> 00:17:52.230
and find things out as you're searching by just
00:17:52.230 --> 00:17:55.289
creating these sort of mysteries around you of
00:17:55.289 --> 00:17:58.150
like something big has happened. It's up to you
00:17:58.150 --> 00:18:00.029
to kind of piece together what that thing is
00:18:00.029 --> 00:18:04.230
without anyone really wanting to tell you. And
00:18:04.230 --> 00:18:08.089
adding on to that. With the visual storytelling
00:18:08.089 --> 00:18:11.029
of it, you're not even on the front cover of
00:18:11.029 --> 00:18:15.130
the game itself. It's not even you reaching for
00:18:15.130 --> 00:18:17.369
the sword if you know the cover of the game.
00:18:17.750 --> 00:18:20.710
It's another character. His name is Vyke, but
00:18:20.710 --> 00:18:24.730
let's not get into that at the moment. We'd be
00:18:24.730 --> 00:18:27.230
here another three hours. There's so much lore
00:18:27.230 --> 00:18:30.809
you can just cover in a lot of hours in the game.
00:18:33.000 --> 00:18:34.920
I think one of the fascinating things to me as
00:18:34.920 --> 00:18:39.500
well in terms of visuals is, and maybe this is
00:18:39.500 --> 00:18:41.480
also a way in which it really does a good job
00:18:41.480 --> 00:18:44.380
of kind of de -centering you as, I guess, the
00:18:44.380 --> 00:18:48.500
not protagonist. Though, I mean, we're all the...
00:18:48.680 --> 00:18:50.299
we're all the protagonists of our own story,
00:18:50.420 --> 00:18:55.160
right? No, no, no, not to Elden Ring. Technically,
00:18:55.240 --> 00:18:57.740
you are a main character, but you're not the
00:18:57.740 --> 00:19:00.339
main character. You show up on a world, and they
00:19:00.339 --> 00:19:03.119
say you have to go get the frickin' magic ring
00:19:03.119 --> 00:19:05.960
thing that's the big part of the world. You're
00:19:05.960 --> 00:19:08.420
just Frodo Baggins by that point, bro. You need
00:19:08.420 --> 00:19:10.160
to get your great runes and create the Elden
00:19:10.160 --> 00:19:12.140
Ring. And is Frodo Baggins not the protagonist?
00:19:13.119 --> 00:19:16.960
It depends on who you ask. Tolkien would say
00:19:16.960 --> 00:19:19.740
yes. Better fans would say no. But this is not
00:19:19.740 --> 00:19:21.599
Lord of the Rings. And look, there's a difference
00:19:21.599 --> 00:19:25.099
between protagonist and main character. All right?
00:19:25.140 --> 00:19:26.779
So you're the main character, but you're not
00:19:26.779 --> 00:19:29.880
necessarily the protagonist. Right. I don't know.
00:19:29.900 --> 00:19:31.859
You're the one that gets put on a quest, is all
00:19:31.859 --> 00:19:33.559
I'm saying. Well, all of you are put on the same
00:19:33.559 --> 00:19:36.059
quest to get the Elden. Everyone who died in
00:19:36.059 --> 00:19:38.940
that war and has been reborn as the Tarnished.
00:19:39.319 --> 00:19:41.240
And do they all get the Elden Ring at the end?
00:19:41.380 --> 00:19:43.140
This is actually a really fascinating... I didn't.
00:19:43.720 --> 00:19:46.759
This is a really... Did you actually play the
00:19:46.759 --> 00:19:49.880
game? Hey, I did. Did you get past Lemgrave?
00:19:50.319 --> 00:19:52.400
Sorry, Rowan, go ahead. No, no, no. This is a
00:19:52.400 --> 00:19:56.720
really fascinating aspect of just general MMO
00:19:56.720 --> 00:19:58.759
games and whatever, right? Because there's this
00:19:58.759 --> 00:20:01.039
idea that you are here with a bunch of other
00:20:01.039 --> 00:20:05.349
people. Just by nature of it being... I guess
00:20:05.349 --> 00:20:07.529
not technically an MMO. I'm not sure if you would
00:20:07.529 --> 00:20:10.650
consider Elden Ring an MMO or not. It is now.
00:20:10.869 --> 00:20:15.049
But there is the implication built within the
00:20:15.049 --> 00:20:18.009
lore that there are other tarnished running around.
00:20:18.230 --> 00:20:22.549
Either way. At some point, I have found with
00:20:22.549 --> 00:20:27.009
most of these games, you do run into this position
00:20:27.009 --> 00:20:28.829
where you do kind of have to abstract yourself
00:20:28.829 --> 00:20:31.789
out, where it tries to de -center you. It tries
00:20:31.789 --> 00:20:34.660
to say, hey, you are one of hundreds. of these
00:20:34.660 --> 00:20:38.240
of this type of character um but there does come
00:20:38.240 --> 00:20:39.880
a point where it's like okay like you have now
00:20:39.880 --> 00:20:42.720
beat the god of the world and now you have to
00:20:42.720 --> 00:20:45.180
you know and now it is your choice to like do
00:20:45.180 --> 00:20:47.420
the thing with the tree or the ring or whatever
00:20:47.420 --> 00:20:51.519
yeah and like You're the main character now.
00:20:51.619 --> 00:20:54.960
You are doing main character stuff at that point.
00:20:55.200 --> 00:20:59.019
That is what main characters do. Correct. And
00:20:59.019 --> 00:21:01.900
arguably, right? And this is where you get into
00:21:01.900 --> 00:21:05.299
what is a protagonist, right? But depending on
00:21:05.299 --> 00:21:08.599
how you choose to tell the story, that does feel
00:21:08.599 --> 00:21:11.740
like protagonist -y stuff to me. I don't know.
00:21:12.039 --> 00:21:14.839
And so it's an interesting conceit that I feel
00:21:14.839 --> 00:21:18.480
like a lot of MMOs play with. The thing that
00:21:18.480 --> 00:21:20.480
I was going to say that I was kind of fascinated
00:21:20.480 --> 00:21:25.700
about was the way that we, in all the boss fights
00:21:25.700 --> 00:21:29.940
that I've seen, they have a very distinct environment,
00:21:30.240 --> 00:21:33.079
right? Like they have a separate arena, which
00:21:33.079 --> 00:21:35.299
is an interesting move to me for an open world
00:21:35.299 --> 00:21:38.680
game, right? I'm so used to seeing open world
00:21:38.680 --> 00:21:40.539
games where you go and like the boss is just
00:21:40.539 --> 00:21:43.000
kind of there. And it might block you off. It
00:21:43.000 --> 00:21:45.160
might like prevent you from leaving the space.
00:21:47.750 --> 00:21:51.349
in Elden Ring and in other Souls games as well,
00:21:51.450 --> 00:21:54.750
you walk through a portal and there's a glimmering
00:21:54.750 --> 00:21:59.650
wall. Yes, but also in Elden Ring, you also have
00:21:59.650 --> 00:22:02.470
just open world bosses. For sure. There's the
00:22:02.470 --> 00:22:04.289
big horse guy at the beginning. Yeah, you have
00:22:04.289 --> 00:22:06.809
the tree sentinel. You have Flying Agil. You
00:22:06.809 --> 00:22:09.349
have, let's see, the dragon on the bridge in
00:22:09.349 --> 00:22:12.869
Caelid. You have a bunch of the knight cavalry.
00:22:14.130 --> 00:22:16.910
You're just rolling through and like, producing
00:22:16.910 --> 00:22:20.930
games. You have Borealis the Frost Dragon. Let's
00:22:20.930 --> 00:22:22.650
see what else. You have all the dragon worms.
00:22:23.269 --> 00:22:27.029
You have the drakes. But yes, some, after you
00:22:27.029 --> 00:22:29.589
go into the open arena, it becomes walled off.
00:22:29.690 --> 00:22:31.849
So I will admit that. Well, yeah, and I guess
00:22:31.849 --> 00:22:33.410
that's the interesting thing to me, right? Is
00:22:33.410 --> 00:22:37.970
that, you know, what is... how does that like
00:22:37.970 --> 00:22:39.730
like on the one hand i understand there's a level
00:22:39.730 --> 00:22:41.690
of like okay like this is an like a quote -unquote
00:22:41.690 --> 00:22:44.210
important boss right you're you're going up against
00:22:44.210 --> 00:22:46.450
someone that's like plot relevant this is a story
00:22:46.450 --> 00:22:49.009
event um and then you get a cut scene and all
00:22:49.009 --> 00:22:53.190
that um it's just such an interesting move to
00:22:53.190 --> 00:22:55.089
me in terms of open world storytelling to do
00:22:55.089 --> 00:22:57.609
it that way yeah um as opposed to just blocking
00:22:57.609 --> 00:23:00.609
off the area to me it it really enhances this
00:23:00.609 --> 00:23:07.150
feeling of almost like You know, this idea that
00:23:07.150 --> 00:23:08.990
you as the tarnished are from this other world,
00:23:09.089 --> 00:23:11.309
right? You're from this other space, this other
00:23:11.309 --> 00:23:13.970
dimension, whatever. And you're coming into the
00:23:13.970 --> 00:23:17.130
world. And then you're, like, almost leaving
00:23:17.130 --> 00:23:21.589
it to go do these really important things. So
00:23:21.589 --> 00:23:23.829
there's this weird kind of liminal space where,
00:23:23.849 --> 00:23:26.230
like, all of the important things happen in not
00:23:26.230 --> 00:23:30.910
the world. Yeah. For me, it kind of, with these
00:23:30.910 --> 00:23:32.809
boss fights that go to these different arenas
00:23:32.809 --> 00:23:35.680
and whatnot, like... Like the Lunar Queen. What's
00:23:35.680 --> 00:23:40.079
her name? Rinala the Lunar Queen. Rinala, yeah.
00:23:40.099 --> 00:23:43.000
Rinala or her sister. What one? Rinala. Okay.
00:23:44.839 --> 00:23:47.220
It's just taken to a completely different arena
00:23:47.220 --> 00:23:48.519
environment. And for me, that's kind of like
00:23:48.519 --> 00:23:50.680
showing, it's almost like showing the power of
00:23:50.680 --> 00:23:52.599
that particular boss. That they can take you
00:23:52.599 --> 00:23:55.319
out of the world. And so defeating them is kind
00:23:55.319 --> 00:23:58.279
of like a bigger advance. Like, I just defeated
00:23:58.279 --> 00:24:02.539
a demigod who could shape this world and chose
00:24:02.539 --> 00:24:06.730
not to. No, that is really cool. And that also
00:24:06.730 --> 00:24:07.950
speaks to something else that I was thinking
00:24:07.950 --> 00:24:11.009
about with this, which is when you're... And
00:24:11.009 --> 00:24:12.710
again, you can correct me if I'm wrong. This
00:24:12.710 --> 00:24:15.509
is just based off of what little exposure I've
00:24:15.509 --> 00:24:18.789
had. Yeah, for both of us. In these major boss
00:24:18.789 --> 00:24:21.670
fights, it almost seems like... I don't know.
00:24:21.730 --> 00:24:24.009
In a lot of platformers or various things, when
00:24:24.009 --> 00:24:28.589
you're fighting a boss in a big boss room, games
00:24:28.589 --> 00:24:31.829
that are very reliant on formula and timing and...
00:24:32.960 --> 00:24:35.140
just like understanding a move set and then being
00:24:35.140 --> 00:24:37.299
able to time your moves along with the move set,
00:24:37.400 --> 00:24:41.559
right? Yeah. Something that I noticed a distinct
00:24:41.559 --> 00:24:46.140
lack of is like environmental moves, right? It
00:24:46.140 --> 00:24:48.619
seems like most of the time, and I could be wrong
00:24:48.619 --> 00:24:50.559
about this, and it seems like I am. You're looking
00:24:50.559 --> 00:24:54.380
at me like I am. Well, partially. Okay. I'm going
00:24:54.380 --> 00:24:57.700
to correct after you're done. Yeah, okay. But
00:24:57.700 --> 00:25:01.200
it just, it feels like most of the time, like...
00:25:01.559 --> 00:25:05.440
in a way the boss, like not that the environment
00:25:05.440 --> 00:25:07.759
is the boss, but the boss is the environment,
00:25:07.859 --> 00:25:09.920
right? Like, like you're fighting this huge,
00:25:09.960 --> 00:25:14.779
massive force and. like you are essentially getting
00:25:14.779 --> 00:25:17.240
hit with a hammer that is basically a mountain,
00:25:17.359 --> 00:25:19.859
right? And so in a sense, they are the environment,
00:25:20.019 --> 00:25:21.500
but that's the thing, right? Is that you're not
00:25:21.500 --> 00:25:24.940
like, oh, I have to avoid these plumes of flame
00:25:24.940 --> 00:25:26.160
that are coming out of the ground. It's like,
00:25:26.160 --> 00:25:27.660
no, I'm avoiding the plumes of flame that are
00:25:27.660 --> 00:25:30.380
coming out of this dude's feet or whatever. Right.
00:25:31.259 --> 00:25:37.940
So you're correct most of the time in this game.
00:25:38.539 --> 00:25:43.210
Some bosses are otherwise. And, well, so I'm
00:25:43.210 --> 00:25:45.630
curious, you know, as you expand on this, I want
00:25:45.630 --> 00:25:50.109
to know why. Okay. Why, like, to you, what makes,
00:25:50.289 --> 00:25:53.490
you know, why would this boss have an environmental
00:25:53.490 --> 00:25:56.670
move and this one not? I'm really curious about
00:25:56.670 --> 00:25:59.730
that. Let's see. Okay, the best example I can,
00:25:59.809 --> 00:26:02.430
there are a few best examples I can think of.
00:26:02.490 --> 00:26:07.410
You have Lord Reichard. He is a god -devouring
00:26:07.410 --> 00:26:12.119
serpent. Oh, normal. I mean, in terms of serpents,
00:26:12.119 --> 00:26:14.819
yeah. That's true. And in terms of RPGs, extremely
00:26:14.819 --> 00:26:17.700
normal. That's fair. Serpents do be devouring
00:26:17.700 --> 00:26:20.759
gods. So it becomes a huge thing, and there's
00:26:20.759 --> 00:26:23.579
a lot of environmental damage you can take in
00:26:23.579 --> 00:26:27.420
the game in that boss fight. Then you have, let's
00:26:27.420 --> 00:26:33.119
see, you have both fights with Radon. So when
00:26:33.119 --> 00:26:35.299
they first fight Radon, it's called the Festival
00:26:35.299 --> 00:26:38.539
of Champions, and then you go to fight Radon
00:26:38.539 --> 00:26:41.140
with a bunch of other people. Halfway through
00:26:41.140 --> 00:26:46.059
that boss fight, music gets intense. He then
00:26:46.059 --> 00:26:49.779
flies up into the air. And then you can't see
00:26:49.779 --> 00:26:52.539
him. And then he comes down as a freaking meteor
00:26:52.539 --> 00:26:57.599
coming at you. I think I have seen this. So that's
00:26:57.599 --> 00:27:00.039
the first fight with Radon that you go through.
00:27:00.039 --> 00:27:03.160
That's the first one. Yeah. In the DLC, you fight
00:27:03.160 --> 00:27:06.319
him again. Okay. So you kill him in the base
00:27:06.319 --> 00:27:09.720
game. You collect his great rune. Then it's...
00:27:10.230 --> 00:27:14.549
environmental stuff um then let's see other environmental
00:27:14.549 --> 00:27:17.910
things but what you were saying with like they
00:27:17.910 --> 00:27:20.210
the boss is becoming the environment there's
00:27:20.210 --> 00:27:23.329
a lot of that in the game as well um but let's
00:27:23.329 --> 00:27:26.250
see yeah i guess my question is like what's different
00:27:26.250 --> 00:27:28.769
you know like i i know that there is environmental
00:27:28.769 --> 00:27:32.009
effects right but why i would say it becomes
00:27:32.009 --> 00:27:35.720
more of a challenge You have to manage your health.
00:27:35.779 --> 00:27:37.500
You have to manage all your resources. You have
00:27:37.500 --> 00:27:39.599
to say, okay, I need to avoid this area. I can
00:27:39.599 --> 00:27:42.559
only fight this boss in this limited space. It
00:27:42.559 --> 00:27:47.220
makes it more of a challenge in my mind. Then
00:27:47.220 --> 00:27:50.220
you also have, if you do the side quests of characters,
00:27:50.460 --> 00:27:53.579
they can appear with you to fight the boss if
00:27:53.579 --> 00:27:58.690
you summon them. So that ties into like... more
00:27:58.690 --> 00:28:01.789
of the NPCs becoming protagonists with you if
00:28:01.789 --> 00:28:05.730
you do their side quests. So it's all depending
00:28:05.730 --> 00:28:08.950
on the level design or the boss fight design,
00:28:09.269 --> 00:28:13.930
and I want to do that when I graduate a little
00:28:13.930 --> 00:28:16.269
bit and write the stories for games such as this.
00:28:16.710 --> 00:28:20.230
If he will graduate. He will graduate. He will
00:28:20.230 --> 00:28:23.529
graduate. He will graduate. Yeah, April. Hey,
00:28:23.589 --> 00:28:30.500
let's go. Yeah. But I'm not totally sure why
00:28:30.500 --> 00:28:33.859
they do that, why people create environmental
00:28:33.859 --> 00:28:36.359
stuff and put it in or leave it out. I'm not
00:28:36.359 --> 00:28:39.440
entirely sure. A question to follow that up.
00:28:39.500 --> 00:28:41.859
Do you think it has to do with the storytelling
00:28:41.859 --> 00:28:46.880
of that boss? Yes. Yes? Yes. Okay. For the first
00:28:46.880 --> 00:28:51.200
fight with Radon, his whole kingdom is nuked
00:28:51.200 --> 00:28:55.410
by another boss called Melania. She is the goddess
00:28:55.410 --> 00:28:59.809
of what's called the Scarlet Rot. So it affects
00:28:59.809 --> 00:29:03.710
the brain, affects the body of the person. So
00:29:03.710 --> 00:29:09.150
Radon, being a gigachat, allowed Melania to fight
00:29:09.150 --> 00:29:13.730
him and allow her to essentially get back up
00:29:13.730 --> 00:29:15.470
from being on the ground and putting her arm
00:29:15.470 --> 00:29:20.589
back in place to continue to fight Radon. Then...
00:29:21.450 --> 00:29:25.869
She nukes his back with a scarlet flower. So
00:29:25.869 --> 00:29:29.529
basically it's an atomic bomb of disease affecting
00:29:29.529 --> 00:29:34.609
his people. So you face the whole scarlet rot
00:29:34.609 --> 00:29:37.970
through his kingdom. So it's environmental storytelling,
00:29:38.250 --> 00:29:42.470
but affects how you view the boss, saying, okay,
00:29:42.509 --> 00:29:45.250
he was strong enough to hold back all the stars
00:29:45.250 --> 00:29:49.349
in this game and then hold the moon in place.
00:29:49.930 --> 00:29:54.029
while fighting me as a person, while he doesn't
00:29:54.029 --> 00:29:56.809
have a brain at this point. He's just absorbed
00:29:56.809 --> 00:30:03.230
by the scarlet rot. So there's this idea of because
00:30:03.230 --> 00:30:07.170
you are fighting him, you are also fighting all
00:30:07.170 --> 00:30:09.430
of the stuff that he's holding back. So he is,
00:30:09.549 --> 00:30:11.849
in a very real sense, controlling the environment,
00:30:12.109 --> 00:30:14.230
and that's what you're dealing with. Yeah, you
00:30:14.230 --> 00:30:17.589
find that out through cut scenes. That you could
00:30:17.589 --> 00:30:23.700
skip if you wanted to. Of course. But yeah. I
00:30:23.700 --> 00:30:26.180
just wanted to loop back to something we were
00:30:26.180 --> 00:30:29.160
talking about earlier real fast. That we're not
00:30:29.160 --> 00:30:30.980
the main character of Elden Ring. The TARDIS
00:30:30.980 --> 00:30:34.440
aren't. And I liked how you said that we could
00:30:34.440 --> 00:30:35.940
become the main character. That makes sense.
00:30:36.440 --> 00:30:38.839
And from what I can tell, even though it's a
00:30:38.839 --> 00:30:42.400
very mythical world, it's a shattered world that
00:30:42.400 --> 00:30:45.200
obviously has really no ties to our world today,
00:30:45.339 --> 00:30:49.430
but... I like how there's, like, different themes
00:30:49.430 --> 00:30:51.630
throughout. You can apply today just through
00:30:51.630 --> 00:30:53.430
the different lore and whatnot. Like, we may
00:30:53.430 --> 00:30:54.930
be nothing now, but we can become something.
00:30:55.069 --> 00:31:01.250
Just all of that. Yeah. Yeah. That's a big takeaway
00:31:01.250 --> 00:31:03.130
from a lot of the players that have, like, played
00:31:03.130 --> 00:31:05.509
this game. And why I was, like, super interested
00:31:05.509 --> 00:31:08.390
in talking about this is that the lessons that
00:31:08.390 --> 00:31:10.750
you learn, that you choose to learn as you play
00:31:10.750 --> 00:31:14.089
this game, are very applicable to your own life
00:31:14.089 --> 00:31:16.279
and into your real life. There's... hundreds
00:31:16.279 --> 00:31:18.920
of stories online hundreds of fans who've said
00:31:18.920 --> 00:31:21.880
so many things about how Elden Ring and how Dark
00:31:21.880 --> 00:31:24.519
Souls have like made their life better and like
00:31:24.519 --> 00:31:27.839
helped like build coping mechanisms and coping
00:31:27.839 --> 00:31:29.799
skills in their own life and one of those is
00:31:29.799 --> 00:31:33.039
like maybe you weren't the main character at
00:31:33.039 --> 00:31:34.660
the beginning of the story but you can be the
00:31:34.660 --> 00:31:37.319
main character now and that in choosing to go
00:31:37.319 --> 00:31:39.700
back through that veil and into that boss fight
00:31:39.700 --> 00:31:43.559
you you enter into your arena over and over and
00:31:43.559 --> 00:31:45.799
even if you get knocked down that's not the end
00:31:45.799 --> 00:31:49.259
of it because like you can be brought back and
00:31:49.259 --> 00:31:52.039
try again and again so like these very real life
00:31:52.039 --> 00:31:54.900
lessons that are being learned in a video game
00:31:54.900 --> 00:31:58.980
yeah Going off that, you learn patience. You
00:31:58.980 --> 00:32:03.240
need to learn patterns and moves that the bosses
00:32:03.240 --> 00:32:08.119
do. And you need to just be patient with yourself
00:32:08.119 --> 00:32:10.680
so you don't just throw your controller, punch
00:32:10.680 --> 00:32:19.539
your monitor. I remember playing... Well, not
00:32:19.539 --> 00:32:22.509
I remember, but I just started playing... replaying
00:32:22.509 --> 00:32:24.730
hollow knight again um because silk song just
00:32:24.730 --> 00:32:26.349
came out and i was like yeah i'll play through
00:32:26.349 --> 00:32:27.730
the first game maybe i'll actually beat it this
00:32:27.730 --> 00:32:34.710
time um but i i got up to the what's her name
00:32:34.710 --> 00:32:37.349
shoot i i hornet i got up to the hornet fight
00:32:37.349 --> 00:32:40.069
and the first time i played it i remember the
00:32:40.069 --> 00:32:43.109
hornet fight being just the absolute worst i
00:32:43.109 --> 00:32:45.869
i hated it so much and i'm not good at video
00:32:45.869 --> 00:32:51.190
games right like to me my my default is I'm just
00:32:51.190 --> 00:32:52.450
going to go up and I'm going to try to hit the
00:32:52.450 --> 00:32:53.890
thing as much as possible and then I'm going
00:32:53.890 --> 00:32:57.049
to die and that's just how it's going to go until
00:32:57.049 --> 00:33:00.690
I figure out how not to die. And so it was really
00:33:00.690 --> 00:33:02.609
interesting coming back to a game that I was
00:33:02.609 --> 00:33:06.109
used to and that I was experienced with and facing
00:33:06.109 --> 00:33:09.230
that fight again and thinking like, oh no, I
00:33:09.230 --> 00:33:12.670
know what to do here. After I had gotten used
00:33:12.670 --> 00:33:15.069
to it, getting almost up to the boss and figuring
00:33:15.069 --> 00:33:16.829
out how the game works and learning that I had
00:33:16.829 --> 00:33:20.710
to change my mindset. you know, insert motivational
00:33:20.710 --> 00:33:26.609
poster here, like that opportunity to confront
00:33:26.609 --> 00:33:29.150
something that I had seen before. Right. And
00:33:29.150 --> 00:33:32.730
that I remembered being so hard, like so painfully,
00:33:32.809 --> 00:33:36.369
just frustratingly hard. And then I beat I beat
00:33:36.369 --> 00:33:37.769
Hornet like two tries. And I was like, oh, that
00:33:37.769 --> 00:33:39.890
wasn't too bad. It was so predictable. I figured
00:33:39.890 --> 00:33:42.230
it out. Like it was this is this is simple. Why
00:33:42.230 --> 00:33:44.269
did I have such a hard time before? But I had
00:33:44.269 --> 00:33:45.450
a hard time because I didn't know what I was
00:33:45.450 --> 00:33:48.980
doing. And I, yeah, like that definitely does
00:33:48.980 --> 00:33:50.900
have some, some real world application, right?
00:33:50.960 --> 00:33:55.140
As you, as, as you encounter and deal with things
00:33:55.140 --> 00:34:00.859
that are so difficult, you learn to overcome
00:34:00.859 --> 00:34:03.819
them and then they seem easy and simple. But
00:34:03.819 --> 00:34:06.359
that's because you have grown, not because the
00:34:06.359 --> 00:34:10.840
thing is any less than it was the first time.
00:34:11.119 --> 00:34:15.460
Amen. Very well said. Very well said. Do we even
00:34:15.460 --> 00:34:17.519
need the rest of the podcast? Yeah, that was
00:34:17.519 --> 00:34:20.860
a great... No, we do. Can't end there. There's
00:34:20.860 --> 00:34:22.760
still so much more to talk about. That's true.
00:34:22.820 --> 00:34:24.659
This game is massive. What's the deal with the
00:34:24.659 --> 00:34:28.139
music? Oh my gosh. Tori, tell us about how we
00:34:28.139 --> 00:34:29.719
get immersed in that because you did a little
00:34:29.719 --> 00:34:33.320
bit of digging into the audio of it. I did. And
00:34:33.320 --> 00:34:36.019
so just for context, I am a composer myself.
00:34:36.159 --> 00:34:38.260
I play four instruments. This is something I
00:34:38.260 --> 00:34:43.710
am very good with. But the first thing that's
00:34:43.710 --> 00:34:46.170
really interesting is that the music was actually,
00:34:46.210 --> 00:34:49.610
it's actually live. It was filmed by people.
00:34:49.750 --> 00:34:53.269
It wasn't like computer generated. It was filmed
00:34:53.269 --> 00:34:55.769
by the Budapest Film Orchestra, which I had never
00:34:55.769 --> 00:35:00.909
heard of until I looked it up. Props to Budapest.
00:35:01.489 --> 00:35:06.110
And Kirimura, I think, I don't speak Japanese.
00:35:07.630 --> 00:35:11.369
Sounded great to me. oh thank you but she also
00:35:11.369 --> 00:35:17.349
looks up different like medieval fanfare and
00:35:17.349 --> 00:35:19.210
songs and whatnot just to try to put it all together
00:35:19.210 --> 00:35:21.469
while the orchestra employed employed different
00:35:21.469 --> 00:35:24.550
techniques to um make it seem more environmental
00:35:24.550 --> 00:35:28.289
so which is just very cool they wanted to feel
00:35:28.289 --> 00:35:30.690
ancient but they wanted it to feel powerful and
00:35:30.690 --> 00:35:32.989
i think they do a very good job at that because
00:35:34.190 --> 00:35:37.010
I'm just rambling now, whatever. But something
00:35:37.010 --> 00:35:39.710
interesting about video game music is that it's
00:35:39.710 --> 00:35:42.050
intentionally designed to keep your focus, which
00:35:42.050 --> 00:35:44.190
is why if you have a hard time studying or whatnot,
00:35:44.369 --> 00:35:47.349
people suggest that you listen to soundtracks
00:35:47.349 --> 00:35:49.570
from your favorite games. And so I end up pirating
00:35:49.570 --> 00:35:51.510
stuff from The Legend of Zelda to listen to,
00:35:51.570 --> 00:35:59.329
as you do, because Nintendo. But these boss fights
00:35:59.329 --> 00:36:02.269
and whatnot, it's not the same without the music
00:36:02.269 --> 00:36:05.739
in particular. The ambiance when you're wandering
00:36:05.739 --> 00:36:09.719
around, Lim Gray, for example, or the Academy,
00:36:10.000 --> 00:36:12.139
it's all very different, and it all sets the
00:36:12.139 --> 00:36:14.199
mood and the tone based on how the musicians
00:36:14.199 --> 00:36:16.840
were told to play and based on other factors
00:36:16.840 --> 00:36:19.320
as well. They did their research when they wrote
00:36:19.320 --> 00:36:22.880
all the music for the background. It's very impressive
00:36:22.880 --> 00:36:25.980
the more I listen to it. True. Some of my favorite
00:36:25.980 --> 00:36:29.260
songs from Elden Ring come from the boss fights.
00:36:29.500 --> 00:36:34.360
The world playing music is perfect. But the boss
00:36:34.360 --> 00:36:36.139
fights, when they go into the second phase, it
00:36:36.139 --> 00:36:41.800
goes hard. It's peak. Just say it how it is.
00:36:41.820 --> 00:36:44.159
It goes hard. It goes hard. And it's meant to.
00:36:44.360 --> 00:36:49.079
Right. And some of my favorite is with the voice
00:36:49.079 --> 00:36:53.219
line of this specific character in the DLC that
00:36:53.219 --> 00:36:55.940
everyone most likely loves. His name is Egon,
00:36:56.159 --> 00:37:02.039
the Drake Warrior. But in this boss fight, you...
00:37:02.429 --> 00:37:06.090
fight this Drake called Bale. And when you go
00:37:06.090 --> 00:37:08.809
into the second phase, music goes absolutely
00:37:08.809 --> 00:37:15.090
hard. It's just so nice. But the voice lines
00:37:15.090 --> 00:37:19.369
without the voice lines, it's not as great, but
00:37:19.369 --> 00:37:22.789
just shows you the power of voice actors as well.
00:37:23.510 --> 00:37:25.150
There's something very interesting about just
00:37:25.150 --> 00:37:28.050
the role of sound with our senses. Yeah. We kind
00:37:28.050 --> 00:37:29.289
of will forget about it because I don't know
00:37:29.289 --> 00:37:31.809
about y 'all, but when I was a kid, And it was
00:37:31.809 --> 00:37:34.550
time for me to go to bed. Volume went down, covers
00:37:34.550 --> 00:37:37.809
overhead, playing the DS anyway. But the experience
00:37:37.809 --> 00:37:42.170
was just very different. You just need the sound
00:37:42.170 --> 00:37:45.630
to really feel immersed. It's funny you mentioning
00:37:45.630 --> 00:37:48.929
voice lines and having this experience of sound.
00:37:50.190 --> 00:37:52.730
I really like the film Triple R that came out
00:37:52.730 --> 00:37:58.010
a few years ago. It's fantastic. Also a great
00:37:58.010 --> 00:38:01.610
introduction to like... You can just say Indian
00:38:01.610 --> 00:38:03.849
film. It is an Indian film. That is fair. It
00:38:03.849 --> 00:38:06.650
is not a Bollywood. Yeah, I know. It's Tamil.
00:38:06.789 --> 00:38:09.909
It's Tollywood, right? But yeah, so Indian film.
00:38:11.650 --> 00:38:13.369
One of the interesting things, I have the soundtrack
00:38:13.369 --> 00:38:16.730
on my Spotify, and one of the songs in this movie
00:38:16.730 --> 00:38:19.550
is one of the main characters is being tortured.
00:38:21.250 --> 00:38:23.650
to to get a confession right they're trying to
00:38:23.650 --> 00:38:26.389
get him to confess that he committed this terrible
00:38:26.389 --> 00:38:28.989
crime um and he won't admit it because not that
00:38:28.989 --> 00:38:30.530
he didn't do it but he won't admit that it's
00:38:30.530 --> 00:38:32.570
a crime right he won't beg for forgiveness for
00:38:32.570 --> 00:38:34.010
this thing that he's done he's too noble for
00:38:34.010 --> 00:38:36.369
that and he sings this really beautiful song
00:38:36.369 --> 00:38:39.269
about like how is he going to give in when he
00:38:39.269 --> 00:38:41.289
is this child of the forest right and all this
00:38:41.289 --> 00:38:42.969
stuff as he's being like pretty relentlessly
00:38:42.969 --> 00:38:46.489
tortured That's a wild sentence out of context.
00:38:47.670 --> 00:38:51.670
One of my favorite songs is torture. It is absolutely
00:38:51.670 --> 00:38:55.309
beautiful. But one of the things is that on the
00:38:55.309 --> 00:38:57.730
Spotify, like the first time that I listened
00:38:57.730 --> 00:39:01.590
to it as a recording, they include one of the
00:39:01.590 --> 00:39:04.409
lines from like the, I guess he's a governor
00:39:04.409 --> 00:39:10.190
in the song as he's like commanding like more
00:39:10.190 --> 00:39:13.659
torture. And when that hit, I was like, oh, my
00:39:13.659 --> 00:39:20.340
gosh. They really, like, that line hurt. And
00:39:20.340 --> 00:39:21.840
it's weird because the line, out of context,
00:39:22.039 --> 00:39:24.000
right, it's just a line. It's just a guy saying
00:39:24.000 --> 00:39:27.280
something. And the song is good without the line.
00:39:27.340 --> 00:39:29.860
But the two together, right, they have this distinct
00:39:29.860 --> 00:39:35.880
effect. And, yeah, I don't know. Like, it's.
00:39:36.750 --> 00:39:40.030
It is so fascinating to me how much like sound
00:39:40.030 --> 00:39:42.469
has an effect, right? And the different kinds
00:39:42.469 --> 00:39:44.469
of effects that sound can generate and create.
00:39:44.630 --> 00:39:47.590
The fact that it has the capacity to change your
00:39:47.590 --> 00:39:50.869
mood in that way, to increase your focus, right?
00:39:50.989 --> 00:39:56.650
To do all that is just so like, I don't know.
00:39:56.750 --> 00:39:59.250
Sound mixing is an art that is often underprepared.
00:39:59.570 --> 00:40:03.170
I would agree. And it's also like you were saying.
00:40:04.670 --> 00:40:07.409
You need the voice and the music to hit at the
00:40:07.409 --> 00:40:11.329
same time to impact your inner self, to impact
00:40:11.329 --> 00:40:18.389
your ego, let's say. To shake you to your core
00:40:18.389 --> 00:40:22.150
saying, oh, this is what this is trying to say
00:40:22.150 --> 00:40:25.949
to me. And I think they did a really good job
00:40:25.949 --> 00:40:28.849
with the voice acting. In Elden Ring, it is...
00:40:29.880 --> 00:40:32.940
Borderline like powerful, but also very moving
00:40:32.940 --> 00:40:35.099
and with different characters that you're meeting
00:40:35.099 --> 00:40:38.059
It's like they got a very wide range of voice
00:40:38.059 --> 00:40:40.300
actors and obviously I played it in English so
00:40:40.300 --> 00:40:42.480
I know like the English voice acting but like
00:40:42.480 --> 00:40:45.380
the the different levels the different tones
00:40:45.380 --> 00:40:48.820
the way that they like deliver their lines makes
00:40:49.420 --> 00:40:52.320
everything feel bigger than it is. You can come
00:40:52.320 --> 00:40:54.880
up to a boss fight and stars and meteors can
00:40:54.880 --> 00:40:57.219
literally be falling out of the sky. But if it's
00:40:57.219 --> 00:40:59.599
just this wimpy little daisily voice, it's not
00:40:59.599 --> 00:41:03.420
going to be as powerful as a deep, booming celestial
00:41:03.420 --> 00:41:07.940
voice. So voice acting has such a power to it.
00:41:08.219 --> 00:41:10.679
And the sound design of this game is just...
00:41:10.679 --> 00:41:13.800
They just did a beautiful job with this. And
00:41:13.800 --> 00:41:17.150
going off of that, with the voice actors... they
00:41:17.150 --> 00:41:19.909
need to have good lines to actually just speak
00:41:19.909 --> 00:41:22.869
from. Like some of my favorite characters in
00:41:22.869 --> 00:41:27.429
the game is like Alexander the Iron Fist. Then
00:41:27.429 --> 00:41:30.969
you have Castellan Jaren, the one who welcomes
00:41:30.969 --> 00:41:34.110
you to the Radon Festival. Then you have Egon,
00:41:34.250 --> 00:41:37.889
the Drake Warrior. And like this quote from him
00:41:37.889 --> 00:41:41.730
just like gets me moving every single time. It's
00:41:41.730 --> 00:41:44.690
like... He says, like, curse you, Bale. Like,
00:41:44.730 --> 00:41:46.690
I'm not going to do it justice. So it's like,
00:41:46.789 --> 00:41:53.369
curse you, Bale! Yeah, but it's truly moving
00:41:53.369 --> 00:41:56.630
when you hear it from the voice actors and with
00:41:56.630 --> 00:41:59.130
the writers themselves writing those lines for
00:41:59.130 --> 00:42:06.510
the voice actors to use. Yeah. I, this morning,
00:42:06.550 --> 00:42:11.760
I watched the... Golden guy. He talks about being
00:42:11.760 --> 00:42:14.039
golden a lot. And then halfway through the fight,
00:42:14.099 --> 00:42:16.900
he steals a dragon head. He rips off a dragon
00:42:16.900 --> 00:42:21.840
head and puts it on his body. Whatever that guy's
00:42:21.840 --> 00:42:23.280
name is, I thought you were going to supply it
00:42:23.280 --> 00:42:26.960
for a second. I have no idea. I'll look it up.
00:42:27.239 --> 00:42:29.619
I heard grafted. I'm pretty sure it's Godric
00:42:29.619 --> 00:42:32.659
the Grafted. Oh, yeah, yeah. Godric the Grafted.
00:42:32.659 --> 00:42:34.159
I was going to say Gideon. I was like, Gideon
00:42:34.159 --> 00:42:36.820
sounds real close, but not quite. No, not Gideon
00:42:36.820 --> 00:42:39.219
the All -Knowing. It's Godric the Grafted. Yeah.
00:42:39.800 --> 00:42:43.980
Too many Gs in this game. Goated letter. Gibson
00:42:43.980 --> 00:42:53.619
the guitar. And I'm not sure how consistent this
00:42:53.619 --> 00:42:55.340
is with other ones, but just in that fight alone,
00:42:55.619 --> 00:42:57.639
one of the things that was really cool to me
00:42:57.639 --> 00:43:00.440
that I noticed was he has this cut scene where
00:43:00.440 --> 00:43:03.019
the camera is right up against his face. And
00:43:03.019 --> 00:43:06.929
he's doing this really... deep kind of musing
00:43:06.929 --> 00:43:10.210
right like here's you coming he turns and he
00:43:10.210 --> 00:43:12.210
says ah tarnished you know blah blah blah and
00:43:12.210 --> 00:43:15.349
then it cuts to the fight and you're like a hundred
00:43:15.349 --> 00:43:18.329
feet away like he's so far away when this happens
00:43:18.329 --> 00:43:20.690
right and so on the one hand it does kind of
00:43:20.690 --> 00:43:23.690
reiterate that idea of like you know it creates
00:43:23.690 --> 00:43:25.769
this distance between you and the narrative right
00:43:25.769 --> 00:43:28.090
because the narrative is right here you know
00:43:28.090 --> 00:43:30.570
really close to you and then the you are far
00:43:30.570 --> 00:43:32.710
away you know really close to the character and
00:43:32.710 --> 00:43:37.230
then you are far away But also, like, I think
00:43:37.230 --> 00:43:39.329
it does do something for scale, right? It's that
00:43:39.329 --> 00:43:41.170
idea of, like, setting the camera at something's
00:43:41.170 --> 00:43:43.329
feet so it looks bigger, right? When, you know,
00:43:43.349 --> 00:43:46.570
this character is so big that he takes up the
00:43:46.570 --> 00:43:49.809
whole screen of the camera, right? When it's
00:43:49.809 --> 00:43:52.610
about him. But then, like, it goes to the fight
00:43:52.610 --> 00:43:55.170
and he's super far away, right? But that's just
00:43:55.170 --> 00:43:58.409
how imposing the character is, right? And that
00:43:58.409 --> 00:44:01.250
is supplanted by the voice acting and, you know,
00:44:01.269 --> 00:44:04.829
by all these things. that all just work together
00:44:04.829 --> 00:44:12.269
to i i guess it comes back to this idea of helping
00:44:12.269 --> 00:44:22.269
the helping the the player connect with and relate
00:44:22.269 --> 00:44:25.090
to what they're playing right make them feel
00:44:25.090 --> 00:44:28.530
like they're uh like the character is a person
00:44:28.530 --> 00:44:30.889
as opposed to like being you know kind of its
00:44:30.889 --> 00:44:33.139
own being which is often what you see, right?
00:44:33.219 --> 00:44:35.139
That's that idea of being able to project yourself
00:44:35.139 --> 00:44:39.960
onto the tarnished. That's why you don't name
00:44:39.960 --> 00:44:42.880
it, right? It's the tarnished. So they're going
00:44:42.880 --> 00:44:44.760
to be like, ah, yeah, I'm the tarnished. It's
00:44:44.760 --> 00:44:52.679
me. I would have to agree. I think that was one
00:44:52.679 --> 00:44:55.980
of the things that when I was first introduced
00:44:55.980 --> 00:44:57.860
into the game and some of the impacts of it is
00:44:57.860 --> 00:45:01.340
that you are... so set into the center of it
00:45:01.340 --> 00:45:03.719
and yet so displaced from the center of it and
00:45:03.719 --> 00:45:06.480
it is these boss fights that kind of you know
00:45:06.480 --> 00:45:09.739
displace you it's the erd tree you know looming
00:45:09.739 --> 00:45:11.420
in the distance and yet there's like what like
00:45:11.420 --> 00:45:15.219
seven that you can like see from any angle it's
00:45:15.219 --> 00:45:17.099
like you always know that this thing is looming
00:45:17.099 --> 00:45:20.099
over you and yet you are still stuck in this
00:45:20.099 --> 00:45:23.320
third like third person perspective you know
00:45:23.320 --> 00:45:26.260
like isometric right behind them you're there
00:45:26.260 --> 00:45:30.280
in the center but so And I think it's just one
00:45:30.280 --> 00:45:32.039
of those things that when you walk away from
00:45:32.039 --> 00:45:34.300
the game, even if you've played for three hours
00:45:34.300 --> 00:45:36.639
total or if you've become Elden Lord four or
00:45:36.639 --> 00:45:38.460
five times or if you've just been looking at
00:45:38.460 --> 00:45:40.239
the boss fights, it's still something that you
00:45:40.239 --> 00:45:44.400
take away from playing this game is how central
00:45:44.400 --> 00:45:49.380
you are and yet how big the world is. It's one
00:45:49.380 --> 00:45:52.559
of those things I love so much about this game
00:45:52.559 --> 00:45:56.159
is that you do kind of get a sense of scale into
00:45:56.159 --> 00:45:59.179
your own life, that this isn't, This game isn't
00:45:59.179 --> 00:46:00.440
the be -all, end -all, but there is something
00:46:00.440 --> 00:46:02.760
outside of the computer. There's something outside
00:46:02.760 --> 00:46:06.300
your door. There is an erd tree looming over
00:46:06.300 --> 00:46:09.260
you. There's grass you need to touch. There's
00:46:09.260 --> 00:46:11.519
grass you need to touch. There are clouds you
00:46:11.519 --> 00:46:13.639
need to see. There's music you have to create.
00:46:13.760 --> 00:46:17.320
You can't get sucked into it all the way because
00:46:17.320 --> 00:46:19.920
every part of the game will remind you that there's
00:46:19.920 --> 00:46:22.949
something else. that there is something more
00:46:22.949 --> 00:46:25.869
to see, people to interact with. If you walk
00:46:25.869 --> 00:46:27.530
around the world thinking everyone else is an
00:46:27.530 --> 00:46:30.750
NPC, you might learn some lore. You might gain
00:46:30.750 --> 00:46:33.829
some knowledge as you walk around. Or you might
00:46:33.829 --> 00:46:38.750
just abuse them because they're an NPC. Don't
00:46:38.750 --> 00:46:42.590
abuse your NPC friends, please. Don't crucify
00:46:42.590 --> 00:46:47.630
the Koroks. Don't abuse them. No. Hey, I know
00:46:47.630 --> 00:46:51.320
that one. But going off that, it's... The quote
00:46:51.320 --> 00:46:54.840
of Dark Souls' term, it's going hollow. You lose
00:46:54.840 --> 00:46:59.800
your purpose. If you just repeat yourself over
00:46:59.800 --> 00:47:01.599
and over again and don't progress, you're just
00:47:01.599 --> 00:47:05.139
going insane. Definition of insanity. But in
00:47:05.139 --> 00:47:09.380
Elden Ring, you follow the rays of gold, the
00:47:09.380 --> 00:47:13.320
grace of gold, towards the Ur -Tree. You don't
00:47:13.320 --> 00:47:15.320
have to do that. You can choose your own story.
00:47:15.380 --> 00:47:17.340
Choose what bosses to fight, where you want to
00:47:17.340 --> 00:47:20.000
go. Or you can just follow the path that you're
00:47:20.000 --> 00:47:24.119
set on automatically. So you just need to take
00:47:24.119 --> 00:47:27.199
life by the reins and control your own life.
00:47:29.099 --> 00:47:32.679
Amen, brother, amen. I think the last thing I
00:47:32.679 --> 00:47:34.219
have to say, I took a class about video games
00:47:34.219 --> 00:47:37.980
a couple months, years, years ago. And we talked,
00:47:38.059 --> 00:47:39.960
and one of the lectures is about like metagames,
00:47:40.019 --> 00:47:43.699
which is the game outside of the game, or paratexts,
00:47:43.699 --> 00:47:45.400
which is the literature outside of the literature.
00:47:45.480 --> 00:47:48.219
And one of the quotes that we had, from Johan
00:47:48.219 --> 00:47:52.019
Huizinga is, as meaning seeps into these play
00:47:52.019 --> 00:47:55.159
spaces, their statuses as play spaces erode.
00:47:55.380 --> 00:47:58.440
So I think the more we spend time into these
00:47:58.440 --> 00:48:00.400
games or the more we play these games or the
00:48:00.400 --> 00:48:03.619
more we experience them, the less game -like
00:48:03.619 --> 00:48:12.699
they are and the more real they become. If we
00:48:12.699 --> 00:48:14.780
want to jump off of that some more, I... Yeah,
00:48:14.780 --> 00:48:18.519
go for it. I think it's really interesting, especially
00:48:18.519 --> 00:48:24.659
in MMOs, where a friend of mine and I, he lives
00:48:24.659 --> 00:48:27.820
in Oregon now, and so one of the main ways that
00:48:27.820 --> 00:48:31.960
we can connect is through video games. We play
00:48:31.960 --> 00:48:35.219
a lot of Warframe because it's co -op and doesn't
00:48:35.219 --> 00:48:37.840
risk anything, so I don't have to worry about
00:48:37.840 --> 00:48:40.539
being like, oh man, I messed up the team or whatever.
00:48:41.960 --> 00:48:47.000
We just go and do the thing, and it's fun. But
00:48:47.000 --> 00:48:52.400
it is interesting to see, I guess, in both directions,
00:48:52.579 --> 00:48:54.940
right? Like, on the one hand, the more time you
00:48:54.940 --> 00:48:56.619
spend in the game, right, the more real it becomes.
00:48:56.739 --> 00:48:58.719
And that can be dangerous as well, right? You
00:48:58.719 --> 00:49:01.400
know, when you're more worried about beating
00:49:01.400 --> 00:49:03.760
and becoming the Elden Lord or doing whatever
00:49:03.760 --> 00:49:06.079
than you are, there comes a point where you need
00:49:06.079 --> 00:49:12.340
to touch some grass. But I do think... that there
00:49:12.340 --> 00:49:14.099
is kind of what we've been talking about this
00:49:14.099 --> 00:49:16.059
idea of like what do you take out with you you
00:49:16.059 --> 00:49:18.519
know when you go to touch that grass you know
00:49:18.519 --> 00:49:23.920
how how has touching the grass changed um how
00:49:23.920 --> 00:49:26.780
how does that how does that experience in the
00:49:26.780 --> 00:49:30.519
in the play space how does that change your experience
00:49:30.519 --> 00:49:36.360
outside of it and yeah i don't know it just i
00:49:36.360 --> 00:49:40.039
feel like there is an extent to which, nope,
00:49:40.119 --> 00:49:42.760
that's not the phrase that I'm looking for. I
00:49:42.760 --> 00:49:45.619
had a thought, and it was gone. I have lost it,
00:49:45.699 --> 00:49:48.739
but it's a cool quote. It's like, how much of
00:49:48.739 --> 00:49:51.059
the game are you willing to bring to your real
00:49:51.059 --> 00:49:54.460
life and not be ashamed of it? True. And going
00:49:54.460 --> 00:49:56.699
off of what all of you have said, I'm going to
00:49:56.699 --> 00:49:59.960
bring in a quote from Destiny, a different game.
00:50:00.360 --> 00:50:03.679
So this is a helmet. They have lore on everything
00:50:03.679 --> 00:50:08.809
as well. I'll just read the whole thing because
00:50:08.809 --> 00:50:10.869
this is what we're all trying to talk about.
00:50:11.710 --> 00:50:16.190
So to quote it, it says, Reality is the finest
00:50:16.190 --> 00:50:20.010
flesh, O bearer mine, and are you not hungry?
00:50:20.630 --> 00:50:24.670
O bearer mine, what kind of talking skull would
00:50:24.670 --> 00:50:28.050
address its host that way? A stiff, stuck -up
00:50:28.050 --> 00:50:32.409
old fossil? Not me. Ahamkara, the illusion that
00:50:32.409 --> 00:50:35.550
one's ego depends on an object or an idea or
00:50:35.550 --> 00:50:40.150
a body. Some people say you should have no Ahamkara.
00:50:41.250 --> 00:50:44.130
For context, Ahamkara are dragons who control
00:50:44.130 --> 00:50:49.329
a lot of different things in the game. Go back
00:50:49.329 --> 00:50:51.670
into this quote. Some people say you need to
00:50:51.670 --> 00:50:55.750
have the right Ahamkara. All I know is that you,
00:50:55.889 --> 00:50:59.909
talking to the player, are not an illusion. Understand?
00:51:00.730 --> 00:51:04.409
This world around you, the people you meet, they're
00:51:04.409 --> 00:51:08.079
a little thin, right? cardboard and drywall,
00:51:08.239 --> 00:51:14.000
cheap theater. Come on, try it out. Say, quote,
00:51:14.219 --> 00:51:18.320
I am more real than this, quote. Feels good,
00:51:18.420 --> 00:51:21.960
doesn't it? Quote, I am the only real person
00:51:21.960 --> 00:51:28.300
here, quote. Isn't it like their insults and
00:51:28.300 --> 00:51:32.639
their bullets just went a little soft? I came
00:51:32.639 --> 00:51:36.789
to find you, only you. Because you're special.
00:51:37.530 --> 00:51:42.110
You're from somewhere real. And together, we
00:51:42.110 --> 00:51:45.789
can burn our way back there. Can't we, oh player
00:51:45.789 --> 00:51:55.489
mine? Wow. Wow. When things get meta. I've been
00:51:55.489 --> 00:51:59.949
doing a lot of work with thoughts like this specifically.
00:52:00.329 --> 00:52:03.230
One of the things that I've been thinking about
00:52:03.230 --> 00:52:16.849
is the... I really liked the movie labyrinth.
00:52:17.309 --> 00:52:19.269
And I think one of the interesting things is
00:52:19.269 --> 00:52:21.150
we talk about how we engage with play spaces
00:52:21.150 --> 00:52:25.130
is Sarah's in, in the main character, Sarah's
00:52:25.130 --> 00:52:28.849
relationship with her fiction. Right. So she
00:52:28.849 --> 00:52:31.949
starts the movie out with this very kind of,
00:52:31.949 --> 00:52:34.849
she projects her understanding onto the world
00:52:34.849 --> 00:52:36.730
around her. She's like, Oh, like this is fantasy
00:52:36.730 --> 00:52:39.170
or, you know, I am the main character in a fantasy
00:52:39.170 --> 00:52:41.230
story. And that's, that's how the world works.
00:52:41.820 --> 00:52:45.219
And so her her mom asks her to do something and
00:52:45.219 --> 00:52:47.920
she's like, oh, like, you know, you're so mean
00:52:47.920 --> 00:52:50.340
to me. You know, she doesn't say you treat me
00:52:50.340 --> 00:52:51.960
like a wicked step like like you're the wicked
00:52:51.960 --> 00:52:53.500
stepmother. But that's like the interpretation.
00:52:53.800 --> 00:52:57.400
Right. She sees this her her stepmother as like
00:52:57.400 --> 00:52:59.760
the villain in the story. Right. Because she
00:52:59.760 --> 00:53:02.639
sees everything is like a fantasy. And then over
00:53:02.639 --> 00:53:04.900
the course of her experience at the end, she
00:53:04.900 --> 00:53:07.039
comes out and she has learned how to differentiate.
00:53:07.679 --> 00:53:10.599
Right. She has learned that, one, she is in complete
00:53:10.599 --> 00:53:15.719
control of how she manages her narrative so she
00:53:15.719 --> 00:53:18.380
can choose who's the villain and who's not. Right.
00:53:18.460 --> 00:53:21.480
That's all up to her. And two, she is in complete
00:53:21.480 --> 00:53:23.840
control of what she brings out of the narrative.
00:53:23.960 --> 00:53:27.639
Right. So at the end of the film, she all of
00:53:27.639 --> 00:53:29.579
her favorite characters and all of the things
00:53:29.579 --> 00:53:32.239
that she loved about this story, instead of her
00:53:32.239 --> 00:53:35.639
being lost in the story. She brings them out
00:53:35.639 --> 00:53:38.900
with her. And so the last scene is her like having
00:53:38.900 --> 00:53:41.539
this beautiful party in her bedroom with all
00:53:41.539 --> 00:53:43.900
of these fantastical, fun characters that she
00:53:43.900 --> 00:53:47.260
has brought into the real world as opposed to
00:53:47.260 --> 00:53:50.320
being lost and consumed by the story itself.
00:53:50.639 --> 00:53:54.500
And I think that's often how we need to think
00:53:54.500 --> 00:53:56.199
about engaging with video games, right? Like
00:53:56.199 --> 00:53:59.619
we take the things that we want from them, right?
00:53:59.679 --> 00:54:03.139
We can learn as much as we want from them, right?
00:54:03.630 --> 00:54:06.369
play in them, engage with them, see what that
00:54:06.369 --> 00:54:12.309
does for you, but also recognize that it is a
00:54:12.309 --> 00:54:15.409
stage, right? That it is not real, that it's
00:54:15.409 --> 00:54:18.130
something else. And so you are in complete control
00:54:18.130 --> 00:54:24.489
of what you do with that. Amen. Yeah, I would
00:54:24.489 --> 00:54:30.210
agree. You just need to realize yourself as the
00:54:30.210 --> 00:54:32.900
player. I need to take a step back if you're
00:54:32.900 --> 00:54:35.619
getting into it too deep or if you're just always
00:54:35.619 --> 00:54:39.440
consuming the specific genre. You need to take
00:54:39.440 --> 00:54:42.780
a step back. Touch the grass. You need to be
00:54:42.780 --> 00:54:45.380
with your friends. Yeah, talk about video games
00:54:45.380 --> 00:54:47.460
with your friends. But don't make it your god.
00:54:47.760 --> 00:54:52.219
Right. Don't make it your idol. On that note,
00:54:52.300 --> 00:54:55.579
I think that concludes our episode on Elden Ring.
00:54:55.960 --> 00:54:58.480
A very successful episode, I might say. Indeed.
00:54:58.679 --> 00:55:02.090
Touch some grass. Talk to friends. Don't worship
00:55:02.090 --> 00:55:04.530
video games. Do it. Do play them. Yeah. Have
00:55:04.530 --> 00:55:07.610
fun, everybody. All right. Well, thanks for listening
00:55:07.610 --> 00:55:09.889
in to Games 101. We'll probably have a better
00:55:09.889 --> 00:55:15.130
title. Games 105. Games 105. Hey. Come back next
00:55:15.130 --> 00:55:17.989
time for our next lecture. Thanks for coming
00:55:17.989 --> 00:55:21.050
in to Games 105. I was Rowan Constantine. I was
00:55:21.050 --> 00:55:24.210
Bergen Jensen. I was Tori Perotti. And this was
00:55:24.210 --> 00:55:27.110
Abbi Wallace. Have a good time. This podcast
00:55:27.110 --> 00:55:28.989
was brought to you by Food for Thought Audio.