Elden Ring has nothing to learn from Breath of the Wild
Welcome to the Elden Wait. In this episode I zoom in on the Elden Ring promotional concept art and screenshots released to see what I can find. Where You Can...
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fromsoft is miles ahead of breath of the wild in general, not any specific games
fromsoftware's library is full of tight-fitting overworlds that limit progression through skill and knowledge. Elden Ring is the first time they'll be trying an open world game and I still fully expect "This door cannot be opened from this side" all over the placeI'd argue it's somewhat the opposite. FromSoftware has been leagues ahead of the rest of the Legend of Zelda series, with Breath of the Wild being the only game that dares step forward and try to close the gap.
fromsoftware's library is full of tight-fitting overworlds that limit progression through skill and knowledge. Elden Ring is the first time they'll be trying an open world game and I still fully expect "This door cannot be opened from this side" all over the place
for a series inspired somewhat by zelda, I can agree that it's eclipsed its inspiration in some areas like worldbuilding and combat, but botw isn't functioning on the same axis as soulsborne. It's not closing any of the gaps that do exist between zelda and dark souls fmpov, it's closing gaps toward other, worse franchises :V
A souls game with open world doesn't work. Not like BOTW.
I think a semi open world can work with semi connected levels
Having said that. Eldrin ring isn't 100% souls. It's probably a mix. I mean you ride a horse. So therofre they will give you more land to roam. Before you just walked around everywhere
And I don't understand the souls and zelda comparison. Zelda is a far more traditional adventure game with puzzle elements. The only puzzles souls has is figuring it how to beat a hard boss.
I mean, we haven't seen an open world Souls game yet.
Dark Souls is the obvious comparison to Zelda, because its structure isn't too dissimilar from the average Zelda game's. It features a segmented open world, dungeons, and big bosses at the end you can fight. It doesn't rely much on puzzles, but those are hardly the only thing to make a Zelda game.
Those are a massive aspect of it. Zelda has villages and towns, sidequests, mini stories and items. Souls is full on action RPG. There are far more games more comparable to souls than Zelda. But souls is its own unique thing. its a game driven by its difficulty and overcoming challenges.
Zelda has bosses yes so does a ton of games. And dungeons in souls aren't anywhere like in Zelda. Zelda's dungeons are hugely puzzle driven. Souls are 95% combat. In fact most of the game is.
And no we haven't seen an open world souls and nor should we.
Like I said...Eldin Ring might be semi open world. The entire point of an open world game is exploration and discovery. If you're going to just make a souls game but just have an open world design. It would be bad. Just look at games like Dynasty Warriors 9 hat tried to do Dynasty warriors with open world. It was absolutely abysmal.
It feels premature to claim that designing a Soulsborne game with an open world in mind will somehow make the game worse. Additionally, the Soulsborne games have all those things you mentioned: villages, sidequests, mini-stories, and items. Heck, I'd go so far as to call those in Dark Souls more compelling.
While Dark Souls 1 definitely put more of an emphasis on combat than Zelda's finding a boomerang and subsequently shoving it into a boomerang shaped hole, its progression and focus on dungeons are absolutely reminiscent.
I do think that Breath of the Wild (and hopefully its sequel) learned from the loneliness of Dark Souls. Breath of the Wild is a quiet adventure through an (relatively) unforgiving world. It features little in the way of music and relies more on background storytelling and ambience to convey a narrative.
Souls at its core is combat driven. Its not comparable to Zelda in any way. The side quests aren't side quests they're optional things in relation to stat padding, the villages are just there as a background tool and the items aren't story focused items like in Zelda. ITs not like you're finding a hammer and need it to open a door.
All I'm saying is I'd compare Zelda to a dozen other games before Dark Souls.
Zelda is a gaming staple. Many MANY games inspire from it.
You're right, dark souls doesn't tie progression to special items like zelda does
But dark souls is in part inspired by Zelda according to Miyazaki
Only in the western fantasy exploration tropes rather than any game design decisions to be honest, and far less so than it takes inspiration from berserk
The overlap exists in world design, which is really more metroidvania esque than being related to each other
So ye