The workforce at FromSoftware is admittedly good at making essentially the most fucked-up creatures possible. Among the stuff that workforce has match into its video games are utter nightmares ripped out of the deep darkish recesses of the human thoughts. Elements of its catalog, like Bloodborne, have explicitly leaned into that haunting aesthetic greater than others, and it looks like Elden Ring’s upcoming enlargement, Shadow of the Erdtree, goes to function an abomination in an identical vein.
The Elden Ring Twitter account posted a teaser picture of a brand new enemy being launched within the DLC, which seems to traipse round some darkish, foreboding wooded space with a strolling stick and elongated, deathly skinny limbs. The principle attraction, nevertheless, is its bulbous sac for a head and the amber glow inside it.
Upon nearer inspection, its head is much less a sac and extra a type of cage rendered from its pores and skin or some an infection. The bottom instantly round it seems blood purple, although it’s unclear if that’s simply a part of the setting it’s in or an aura that emanates from the factor. Regardless of the way you slice it, it doesn’t look significantly inviting, and I’m most likely not going to try to give it a hug.
As a few people within the replies to that tweet identified, this grotesquerie, which is known as the “deserted and tragic,” resembles an enemy sort from the perfect recreation ever, Bloodborne, referred to as a Winter Lantern. These creatures additionally walked round in related robes however, reasonably than sacs for heads, that they had fiendishly gnarled and overgrown brains, full with horrifying eyes and tendrils. Merely being of their presence would increase your Frenzy meter, and as soon as it maxed out, you have been quickly immobilized and dealt heavy harm.
There is likely to be extra to the thematic resemblances than simply that. Winter Lanterns have been solely present in two areas in Bloodborne: the Nightmare Frontier and the linked Nightmare of Mensis. These areas stood other than a lot of the areas within the recreation as a result of they have been in their very own realm. Shadow of the Erdrtree, which will likely be Elden Ring’s solely enlargement, doesn’t really happen within the (principally) contiguous land mass featured within the recreation, however as a substitute is ready in a kind of mirror world referred to as the Land of Shadows, which seems to be darker and extra distorted. Contemplating the DLC’s connection to Miquella and the way they’re the gateway to this new area, it isn’t a stretch to say this new enemy would possibly function below an identical guise to the Winter Lanterns in Bloodborne and be a product of Miquella’s twisted thoughts.
Nevertheless, there’s an opportunity that this enemy may as a substitute be a servant of Messmer the Impaler, who seems to be the primary antagonist of Shadow of the Erdtree. Within the debut trailer of the enlargement, Messmer states, “These stripped of the Grace of Gold shall all meet loss of life.” The enemy teased within the tweet particularly has a gold-tinged amber in its warped head, which can give away its allegiance. The flavour textual content of the tweet additionally reads, “The deserted and tragic who forage beneath the umbra pray for the embrace of a brand new grasp.” Contemplating each that the enlargement could happen in a realm of Miquella’s creation, making him the area’s grasp, and Messmer’s antagonistic position (in addition to his posturing on a throne for the enlargement’s cowl artwork), it’s very seemingly the 2 are in battle.
What’s presently unclear is that if Messmer has already taken over as grasp and the “deserted and tragic” need another person to rule (possibly even Miquella), or if Miquella and the Land of Shadows are presently below assault from Messmer, who’s trying to develop into its new grasp.
Regardless, it wouldn’t be the primary time FromSoft has been influenced by one among its personal video games within the improvement of one other. Shadows of the Erdtree appears to be borrowing a leveling function that’s ripped straight from Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, and lots of the mechanics throughout the studio’s portfolio bleed into each other on a regular basis. If it makes the sport extra mechanically and visually attention-grabbing, FromSoft can hold borrowing from Bloodborne for all I care.
