Elden Ring: Shadow Of The Erdtree Is Secretly A Survival Horror Game

The Soulsborne games are already steeped in dark fantasy and body horror, with several FromSoftware bosses created from the amalgamation of withered, twisted, and still-sentient husks that have been sewn together against their will. But The shadow of the Erdtree leans more towards horror, the survival horror genre in particular, with an entire area that demolishes everything you've learned over the last decade.

Mild spoilers for Shadow of the Erdtree follow.

I venture into the corners of the Land of Shadows to find a ruined forest stripped of sunlight, the sky a murky gray, and the waters rippling with blood-red veins. It's eerily open, inviting me to explore every avenue, but when I try to summon my steed TorrentHe refuses, too scared.

Without my horse to keep me company, I press on and immediately find messages scrawled in the dirt. These were not left by the players; They are much more disturbing than that. “Don't let him see you,” reads one of them. “Once they see you, there is no escape,” warns another, as the place of grace draws ever closer. For once, though, it doesn't feel like a respite, but rather a gateway to something more treacherous. “You can't even touch it,” says the last one.

I ignore these strange omens and move on, more vulnerable in the open air without Torrent. Rats with yellow-tinged flames enveloping their eyes watch me from the shadows, but I've seen them before. That's not what the warnings are about. Something else lurks in these woods.

Soon, I see a strange figure in the distance, wandering aimlessly while hunched over. Her head is a bulbous, oozing mass with no discernible features. All around her there is tall grass and even more warnings carved into the ground. "Hide. Don't make a sound," says the first. "Combat is not an option."

I drag the grass, so uncomfortably close I can almost touch it. The discomfort persists in the silence. As with any enemy in Fire ring, I take my camera and fix it, but it doesn't have a health bar. Reluctantly, I sneak past, moving very slowly. A firefly of flashes could be heard flapping its wings. I think I'm free, I go back to explore the forest, but there I see two more lurking in the distance, wandering without rhyme or reason.

Back to the blades, but now there are tall upright yellow bushes sandwiched between the strands, and I accidentally bump into one. It rings, lets out a bell chime, and before I know it, I'm clutching my head in pain as this ghost appears behind me. I can't move, I can't defend myself and he's eating my brain from the inside out. You died.

This entire segment felt much closer to Foreigner: Isolation either Amnesia than a soullike, stripping away everything he had learned about the genre. This wasn't an enemy he had to dominate or fight, he wasn't learning his moves like an intricate dance routine, he was hiding me, sneaking me around. I have fought gods and slain ancient dragon lords, but this was something I couldn't even touch.

There is always an element of fear in a soul, coming face to face with an enemy you know you are going to fight, but nothing has made me feel as uncomfortable as these inexplicable and madness inflicting creatures along the path of a ominously forest known only as the Abyss. The only thing you can do is hide. I've tried running, believe me, and they are disturbingly fast.

It brings something completely new to the table and goes back to a genre FromSoftware hasn't ventured into since the early 2000s. Their 2002 PS2 title Kuon is among the greats of survival horror, even if it's lesser known, and seeing that DNA return to Elden Ring with Shadow of the Erdtree was as exciting as it was terrifying. Trying something so experimental with this DLC, breaking expectations of what these games are supposed to be about, was definitely a highlight.

From the moment Torrent refused to be summoned, terrified by what lurked in the darkness, I knew I was walking into one of the best areas we've ever seen in a Soulsborne game.