History YMMV / EldenRing

* EstrogenBrigade: While the previous Soulsborne wasn't unpopular with women, Elden Ring was the game to establish itself a consistent fanbase of female fans, mostly thanks to charming, sympathetic, and attractive male characters such as Blaidd or Varré; special mentions goes to Morgott, who shot up as the most popular Tarnished/OC x NPC ship in fanfiction and fanart, mostly with female Tarnished.

* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: The encounter with the Fell Twins boss on the bridge to the Divine Tower of East Altus. Is it supposed to be a hallucination? Are you literally whisked away to some kind of demiplane to fight two Omen who are guarding the Great Rune of the [[BoomerangBigot famously Omen-hating Omen King Morgott]]? The fact that one of them has uncut horns and the other doesn't makes it seem like the fight is supposed to be somehow symbolic of the dichotomy between Morgott and his twin brother Mohg and their differing acceptances of their Omen heritage, but it's never explained in-universe why the Fell Twins exist or what they represent.

* ItsEasySoItSucks: Spirit Ashes get this reception from a lot of players, who will go out of their way to avoid using them. While the ''Souls'' games lack a difficulty selection option, whether or not you choose to use and upgrade Spirit Ashes de facto acts as such in ''Elden Ring.'' Even ignoring GameBreaker spirits like Black Knife Tiche or a well-built Mimic Tear that can practically solo most bosses when fully upgraded, Spirit Ashes tend to trivialize or massively simplify otherwise challenging encounters. It's the way they do this, though, that is so contentious: most of them do pitiful damage but have a ton of hit points themselves. So they essentially act as meat shields to draw enemy aggro and give you free hits, sometimes moving into outright AIBreaker territory with bosses that stagger easily and/or can't juggle multiple player-level attackers properly. As a result, defeating a boss with Spirit Ashes doesn't even really require you to learn its move set, it's more equivalent to bypassing the fight altogether. Duo bosses are held as exceptions for obvious reasons.

** For veteran ''Souls'' gamers, the game may be much easier than they are used to, but thanks in large part to its online hype and long anticipation, the game has attracted a lot more newcomers than previous titles, many of whom have never so much as touched a ''Souls'' game before, which has led to many complaints. Gamers used to hack and slashing their way through games quickly find out that's not a winning strategy here, as even basic enemies require timing and patience to defeat. The lack of a clear goal, outside of following the grace sites vaguely pointing in a direction, has caused a few headaches as players wander into areas and bosses far too high leveled for them to defeat. The fact that there is no indication that some [=NPCs=] will require you to talk to them multiple times in order to obtain items from them or to complete sidequests. Speaking of which, the fact there is no actual way to track quests or even a quest log to tell you when you have started a quest has been a common sticking point for a few newcomers, as many end up missing out on items or helpful [=NPCs=] simply because they didn't know if they had started a quest, where to go for said quests, or even if they had completed a quest.

* ImprovedSecondAttempt: Not the game itself, but the manga adaptation, ''Road to the Erdtree''. There have been many attempts at adapting any of the Soulsborne games into comic books, but they have all largely ranged from SoOkayItsAverage to fairly bad. ''Road to the Erdtree'', on the other hand, has been very positively received as an excellent and enjoyable adaptations, which is somewhat surprising given that it's a comedic parody. Perhaps because of said comedic nature, the manga is able to have fun with characters and not take itself too seriously, which ironically allows it to show a true love and appreciation for the source material.

* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: The encounter with the Fell Twins boss on the bridge to the Divine Tower of West Altus. Is it supposed to be a hallucination? Are you literally whisked away to some kind of demiplane to fight two Omen who are guarding the Great Rune of the [[BoomerangBigot famously Omen-hating Omen King Morgott]]? The fact that one of them has uncut horns and the other doesn't makes it seem like the fight is supposed to be somehow symbolic of the dichotomy between Morgott and his twin brother Mohg and their differing acceptances of their Omen heritage, but it's never explained in-universe why the Fell Twins exist or what they represent.

** Godfrey/Hoarah Loux is yet another example, being one of the primary contenders for WorldsBestWarrior in the setting, but unlike the others he was born as a man, not a god, and attained his position through his own strength and accomplishments. The fact that he was gifted a lion familiar as a means to ''hold him back'' from the full level of power and savagery he's truly capable of speaks to his prowess. The second phase of his boss fight, where he kills said familiar, rips his shirt off, and discards his ax to fight you unarmed, has been acclaimed as one of the most balls out brutal and relentless fights in the game. Comparisons of him to [[VideoGame/MetalGearRising Senator Armstrong]], [[VideoGame/AsurasWrath Asura]], and/or [[VideoGame/{{Tekken}} Heihachi]] started up pretty much immediately.

** Players that main Rivers of Blood are often nicknamed [[VideoGame/MetalGearRising Jetstream Sam]] due to the weapon resembling his signature weapon, the HF Muramasa and his theme lyrics also contain the words "blood", quite fitting considering the weapon name and what it does.

* InformedAttribute: [[ForeverWar The Shattering]] was stated to be a cataclysmic war of epic proportions, with every demigod warring against the others in the hopes of gaining enough strength or power to claim the Elden Throne and become the new Elden Lord using their Great Rune, along with those they claimed along the way. However, if you actually go through the various demigods you fight and figure out their motivations, you can eventually realize that this claim... Isn't very accurate. For starters, only 2 demigods even ''want'' the damn Throne, (Godrick and Mohg) one of which is driven by simple ego and lust for power with a pitiful amount of troops, and the other of which seeks to remake the world in his image, but was perfectly content to do so completely hidden away from the outside world, with practically nobody even realizing where he was or what he was doing. Radahn, being the GloryHound that he is, also could've vied for it, but it's never confirmed one way or the other, and he was quickly rendered completely mad during his duel with Malenia. Speaking of Malenia, she also made absolutely no attempt for the Throne, instead putting all her time and effort into supporting her brother's side-project that explicitly sought to escape the terrible status quo that the world was in. Morgott was content to play defense for the entire war, only going on the offense against his most hated brother Rykard before he sacrificed himself to a giant God-eating serpent, and had almost all of his troops abandon him out of disgust. Miquella and Ranni never involved themselves in the war directly, and Godwyn was dead before it even started. All told, out of the numerous participants in the war, only a handful actively fought their siblings, even fewer fought them for the express purpose of gaining power, and by-and-large, most demigods would've happily spent the entire war doing their own thing, completely unrelated to becoming the new Elden Lord.

* InformedAttribute: The Shattering was stated to be a cataclysmic war of epic proportions, with every demigod warring against the others in the hopes of gaining enough strength or power to claim the Elden Throne and become the new Elden Lord using their Great Rune, along with those they claimed along the way. However, if you actually go through the various demigods you fight and figure out their motivations, you can eventually realize that this claim... Isn't very accurate. For starters, only 2 demigods even ''want'' the damn Throne, (Godrick and Mohg) one of which is driven by simple ego and lust for power with a pitiful amount of troops, and the other of which seeks to remake the world in his image, but was perfectly content to do so completely hidden away from the outside world, with practically nobody even realizing where he was or what he was doing. Radahn, being the GloryHound that he is, also could've vied for it, but it's never confirmed one way or the other, and he was quickly rendered completely mad during his duel with Malenia. Speaking of Malenia, she also made absolutely no attempt for the Throne, instead putting all her time and effort into supporting her brother's side-project that explicitly sought to escape the terrible status quo that the world was in. Morgott was content to play defense for the entire war, only going on the offense against his most hated brother Rykard before he sacrificed himself to a giant God-eating serpent, and had almost all of his troops abandon him out of disgust. Miquella and Ranni never involved themselves in the war directly, and Godwyn was dead before it even started. All told, out of the numerous participants in the war, only a handful actively fought their siblings, and the others would've happily gone the entire time doing their own thing.

** Why did Radahn and Malenia fight to begin with? It's not at all intuitive for them to do so given that their realms are on the opposite sides of the map, that Malenia had much easier targets to pick off (right between the Haligtree and Caelid are Liurnia, which is in a civil war, and Limgrave, which Godrick can barely hold against the local beastmen and brigands with his depleted skeletal garrison), and that Radahn had just been repulsed from the capital by Morgott. Was it a case of two half-siblings fighting for power, or a Rune Shard, as suggested by Morgott in the cutscene of his boss fight? Did Malenia think Radahn had kidnapped Miquella, thus sparking a fight? Or perhaps Radahn posed enough of a threat that Malenia felt she had to stop him? Did she invade Radahn's territory solely to get to Mohg's palace, a location directly underneath the Heart of Aeonia where Radahn and Malenia dueled,[[note]]As in Miquella's cocoon is [[https://i.redd.it/aztdq2hy5yw81.jpg almost to the pixel]] at the same location as the arena; both images have the same coordinates, one is the underworld and the other is the overworld.[[/note]] and a misunderstanding created the conflict? There are vague hints into why they fought to begin with, but it leaves it open for debating regardless. Another aspect to this duel is that both Radahn and Malenia are gracious to each other, with her allowing him to use his gravity magics and he allows her to retrieve her prosthesis. Is this simply CombatByChampion and these are the rules of engagement? Do they respect each other enough to allow this to happen despite the clear disadvantage? Or is it simply pride and a desire to showcase their own skills?

** Boc the Seamster is a demi-human who's been chased out of his home cave for [[KlingonScientistsGetNoRespect being a seamster instead of a fighter]], and gets beaten up again for trying to come back to reclaim his sewing kit. The only one who's shown him love so far is his late mother, who longs to be reborn into a better-looking body, so he doesn't get ostracized.

** Similarly, there were a number of memes comparing the game to ''VideoGame/{{Stray}}'' shortly after that game came out. The fact that the two were the best reviewed games of 2022 despite their vast differences in tone and gameplay contributed to this, with many fans viewing the cute indie adventure game about cats as being an amusing antithesis to the triple A NintendoHard DarkFantasy game.

** Was Radagon's relationship with Rennala motivated by genuine love, or merely a shrewd political play on Marika's part? The fact that Radagon abandons his wife to return to Marika's side when it became more convenient for her to have him as her own consort seems to imply the latter, but it's possible that Radagon did so reluctantly or had no choice in the matter. The fact that Radagon is an UnknownCharacter makes it very hard to know what his own feelings were in the matter.
*** Likewise, what is the Red Wolf's purpose in the Academy? Was it left by Radagon as a token of affection to Rennala, or, as suggested by WebVideo/TBSkyen, a warning to the Academy not to defy the Golden Order again.

** [[spoiler:Mohg, Lord of Blood, has the hots for Miquella, wishing to make him his consort and elevate him to full godhood. Miquella is his [[VillanousIncest half-brother]] who is [[NotGrowingUpSucks eternally cursed to be a child]].]]

* SpiritualSuccessor: A very minor case, but the way the endings of the game are structured are eerily similiar to endings and routes of ''VideoGame/ShinMegamiTenseiNocturne'' - both involve the Player Character fighting a god-like being for the right to create a new age, both can involve absorbing the philosophies of other characters of what the next world should be like and then use them to change the ending (The Mending Runes for the Tarnished, and the Reasons for the Demi-fiend) and both have endings where you aid a mysterious but constantly present and powerful ally associated with chaos to completely subvert the order of the world and give the proverbial middle-finger to God (who in both games just so happens to be called "The Great(er) Will") with the Age of the Stars Ending or the Lord of Frenzied Flame Ending for ''Elden Ring'' and the True Demon Ending for ''Nocturne''.

* ToughActToFollow: ''Elden Ring'' has received overwhelming, almost unanimous praise, is hailed as the start of a new generation of video games and is considered by many to be Creator/FromSoftware's magnum opus. Naturally, some are worried that they'll never be able to create anything to surpass it. Notably, ''VideoGame/ArmoredCoreVIFiresOfRubicon'' was the first game they released after ''Elden Ring'' and critical consensus was while it was a fun throwback to the studio's roots and great to see them branching out, it was nowhere near as good as ''Elden Ring''.

* EvilIsSexy:
** Sellen is a highly unethical sorcereress but her AffablyEvil personality and surprisingly attractive model for a character whose face isn't even supposed to be seen in normal gameplay has earned her this reaction.
** Varré is one of the most popular character among male-attracted fans, thanks to a combination of voice acting, creepy yet endearing dialogue and design (along with a conventionally attractive face underneath the mask), and Yandere-like personality. Mohg is also liked in these circles for similar reasons.
** Malenia's SuperpoweredEvilSide, the Goddess of Rot, continues Fromsoft's long tradition of threading the needle between horrific FanDisservice and genuine sex appeal (see also, Chaos Witch Quelaag from Dark Souls). Her FullFrontalAssault exposes the extent to which the Scarlet Rot has ravaged her body, but also demonstrates her impressive AmazonianBeauty figure beneath all that, and her unleashed magic and change of demeanour make her even more commanding and intimidating than she was in her first phase.

** Why is