Remember how Breath of the Wild didn't just put Twilight Princess Link in an open world? Well...

Elden Ring's open world does not complement its still-unchaged-since-Demon's Souls mechanics -- if you thought it was too easy to run past janky AI fodder in Dark Souls 2, wait until you see the exact same shit in a gigantic flat wasteland that will only become more cumbersome to play through with every fresh save file.

It's peak when FromSoft are in their bag though, Leyndell is the type of shit where you can't help but be in disbelief that it was somehow created by humans. The power fantasy provided by my shameless quadruple Katana build did wear thin by the end, but the Souls take on action-RPG mechanics has always stood out to me for its actually fucking bearable blend of intuitive while still open-ended progression with a consistent sense of real discovery rather than the interchangeable loot/skill tree hell of so many other games. Big Dragon Quest energy on this one.