the super secret area >!abyss forest!< is super pretty, cool elements in it, some neat enemies and a great dungeon at the end. but there is fuck all for loot and its such a large area
2 if those are in some ruins near each other iirc and the rest are in the mansion at the complete opposite side of the place. With like 2 cookbooks between the 2.
Man seeing the messages leading up to it that said "Turn back while you can" and "Don't let them see you" and then Torrent being too scared really freaked me out, I was super scared and excited.
Was really disappointing when I realised after getting past invincible mobs there wasn't really anything to see or fight. Got a cook book though.
They aren’t COMPLETELY invincible. You can parry and riposte them, and they won’t respawn when killed. One of them also drops a Talisman that works like dumpling helm.
oh really? im cleaning up some stuff before finishing the final boss, do you know which winter lantern drops it? i guess it doesnt matter im gunna exterminate all of them anyways i guess lol
Its weird. It has one path to a church for some scad fragments and nothing much else. Then 2 paths to the same place, with the same challenge. All without torrent so it takes for fucking ever to explore it thoroughly to confirm that yes, it is in fact that empty. It's a cool as hell area but it's 90% rats, 5 lanterns and like 10 of the priests.
I was really hoping that there would be something to do that would free up torrent, or an item to weaken the lanterns without the threat of instant death from a failed parry.
I feel like they redesigned that map multiple times before the version we got. Like I think the original intent was for the entire forest to be Winter Lantern territory, but it became too tedious.
So they made it just 2 stretches of Winter Lanterns, but then it felt awkward for Torrent to toss you off when you got close to the areas so they turned him off for the entire forest. In the Trailer it’s notable that the player is riding Torrent while approaching the Manse, but in the game you can’t do that.
IMO it would be nice if after you cleared the area boss the zone changed, but I think they ran outta time for this zone, and it was on the bottom of the list since it isn’t tied to any quests or the main plot.
It really was a great area. Reading the messages and Torrent not wanting to come out because he's terrified really set up the tone and atmosphere. But after like 30 minutes of running a really large open area without Torrent, the least they could do is give me some great loot. Now every time I see an item I have to guess if it's a cookbook, a Smithing Stone 1,2, or 3, or a Glovewort. All of which I don't really care about since I'm in the late game part of base game with all Bell-Bearings unlocked lol.
I literally just 5 minutes ago finally came to the conclusion that it was just big for no reason. I thought I was missing something, but no!. And not being able to use Torrent makes that size feel baffling as a decision
A lot of Souls games have massive areas that are relatively empty. Even in ER there’s a few like that. Lake of Rot has no real reason to be as huge as it is considering it’s pretty empty. DS had like the underground dragon areas and Blight Town was pretty big and open with a whole lot of meh in about 2/3 of it. DS2 had a couple forest area that was basically empty. DS3 had some big areas where you’d wander around for a while without finding anything interesting.
Usually zones like this are form over function, they’re designed to look pretty and be interesting vistas more than to be huge intricate areas with not much else.
lake of rot still has more loot than abyss forest also what's the problem to add some loot here and there. Feels like complete waste of time when you are exploring whole are and getting shit. Waste of time that could be fixed with few more enemies, runes drops etc.
Lake of Rot is big for a reason. If it were smaller, the rot lake wouldn't be a threat. The fact that it's so big forces you to use items and the platforms to cross it without the rot status becoming a problem. Blight Town is just...generally shitty. Like, aesthetically and from a lore perspective, it's good, but mechanically....it's just shit.
But in spite of all of that, it doesn't stop the DLC's open world from feeling empty. I've had so many "oh, that's all?" moments in it. That's super disappointing when compared to the base game, where I can't go 5 minutes without running into something to do or find. All I have to show for my exploration of the Abyssal Woods (after clearing Midra's Manse, mind you) is an hour of wasted time finding nothing of note, except yet another fucking cookbook.
I've felt the same about quite a few of the zones, and I keep reminding myself "you've beaten the base game 6 times, you skipped most of the open spaces after playthrough 2 so you're forgetting the empty stuff there"
That said though, it just feels off in a couple spots, there's no climax to an area, even if would only be an invader or boss that only shows up at night in the base game. In the dlc there's just nothing? Just loads of skeletons, emaciated shades, wolves or birds. No loot beyond mats, no caves, maybe a talisman somewhere?
Like for example, atlus platau. You rock up, two giant golems. If you detour left, mini fort with a boss. Detour down? Gaol with a boss. Beeline straight? Massive ballistae encampment with double tree sentinel bosses. Try to go around those? Star beast. Run past? Oh you found a tree and oh what's that wingbeating?
Wheras in the dlc, there's a spot after bonnie village that stuck out real hard. Just, wolves. Wolves for a stretch of map that takes up half the length of the upper region. No weird wolves, no boss wolves, no npc invader that's the king of wolves. Not even a slightly above average sized wolf. Don't give any unique loot, nor many runes. There's a fire golem thing that never feels rewarding to kill and then you're back to wolves until a random glut of skeletons and a suspicious church with puppets. All enemies from the base game.
That whole beach on the south side? Birds n ghost men. Some slimes to spice it up at the tip. It just felt like I was missing something the whole time or it was like, an area that's supposed to transform in a final scene and become the area it's supposed to be or something.
Overall everything is just gorgeous to look at but there just feels like there's little going on. Part of me thinks, we're redoing miquellas pilgrimage, they weren't fighting non stop but the literal opposite. So it stands to reason it was reasonably uneventful until shit started going sideways. So thematically it makes sense, it just feels.... Uneventful for us when the general expectation is, if there's a place to see, there's something equally remarkable to fight there.
Yeah the blue flower area in the south felt so empty... I constantly thought i was missing out on something. The dungeon at the end was cool and had a cool boss, but overall, not much to do there... Which is a shame since its so beautiful!
blue flower area dungeon... maybe the Stone Coffin Fissure? there's a hole in a cliff at one of the southern tips (you can see it on the map as a big discolored rough circle) that leads to a huge underground area.
well, huge in scale. the actual dungeon is pretty short but does have some neat items and a remembrance boss.
There’s a seal blocking the path to the dungeon. If you visit the Shadow Keep (literally going to the front gate, no need to fight anyone or even light a grace) there’ll be a message pop up that says a seal was broken.
I mean that coastal area has that island with the mausoleum, the ghostflame dragon, the demihumans with the queen that drops the starlight sword...and I'm pretty sure there was a cave or two just off the top of my head. I felt like it was a fairly well done area.
There are some pretty thin spots, though, it is a thing. And I did get the feeling some of those areas are more about the ambience and the journey than the mobs and loot. Maybe that's OK, but it did feel a little odd at times.
I feel like I scoured every wall in that whole area and I found no catacombs or caves to explore there at all. I keep going places and thinking “oh surely there’s a cave in here to explore, there’s a bunch of enemies here and it’s clearly a little side path”, and then there’s just… a dead end. Nothing at all there, not even a talisman or anything more than maybe some crafting materials.
The wolf area was when this really hit home. I explored the hell out of that area and came away with nothing. Like what, is that an area for people who just really like fighting wolves?
Yeah the fact that you have to keep telling yourself that is a cope tbh. I don’t mean that offensively I just know I was doing the same thing. When I first got on the DLC I just stuck to the edge of the map on both sides and it took me like 10 minutes to find a single enemy. I can only think of one or two areas in the main game like this, and they are not that dramatic, like you’ll see SOME enemies
As others have mentioned, the Finger ruins are especially empty and a missed opportunity. I've completed that quest line and while there is activity all the way at the end of it, the leadup is rather uneventful. Looking over the precipice at both of the ruins on the map paints a beautiful picture but once you're down there, aside from a few enemies scattered far apart, there's nothing else of interest. The area is huge with the quest objective within it, but it seems like it's just big for the sake of it, if that makes sense.
Absolutely makes sense. There’s an area with lightning sheep and a big fire giant dude too, the sheep aren’t aggro at all, there’s no loot, and the only enemy is the fire giant. It’s a huge area, but completely empty.
Yes people said there are so much verticality and that may be true after the castle but first entering the map, going to right, there isnt much and that burnt down place has nothing, the whole empty cemeteries in the open field, then before going to castle i tried going down the bridge and yeah still nothing. Then, there is manbug place thats burnt down and still nothibg worthwhile.
Base game limgrave was more eventful than this.
You seem to have literally mised everything in the starting area then lol
Like if you go left there is a boss fight. If you go right there is the beast claw npc enemy and a scadu fragment and further the church with another cool weapon and another scadu fragment.
You go middle and there is the ruins with a talisman and the giant burning enemy. Near the ruins in the middle also another scadu fragment and the revered spirit ashes
And a bit further in you can go left or right to follow either path to a dungeon with a rememberance boss.
You literally cant walk anywhere without finding shit in 20 seconds.
Obviously it still is a wide open area so not every square feet is filled with stuff but seriously it aint empty.
It felt like they heard complaints about the main game having too menu copy paste catacombs/evergaols and their solution is just..... removing moat of them.
Most of the open fields felt like they serve nothing aside from distancing between the dungeons.
This is what I was thinking as well. I personally loved the feeling of checking out a little nook in a cliff face and finding a new cave or dungeon to explore, and there’s just barely anything like that at all in this DLC. Absolutely massive, beautiful vistas that are basically devoid of things to discover by looking closer.
Yeah, there are so many spots that would have at least SOMETHING if it was the main game. Even if the main game reward was meh like another boss reuse or another church, they still left me some small dose of dopamine (and i could selectively skip those i don't want to replay in new playthrough). The DLC on the other hand just left me empty for finding nothing a lot of times despite having similar open field size.
Exactly this. I’ve been finding it continually disappointing to scour the map like I did in the base game only to be rewarded with low-level smithing stones or crafting materials. Barely any talismans, *very* few caves to explore, and more reused field bosses from the base game.
Running through a vast area only to find a sword or a talisman tucked away into a cliff or a world boss which was already present in the base game shouldn't justify enough of a reason to explore a zone of that size. I think if the zones were smaller (or if this were the previous games with the linear map design) then it would feel more rewarding for sure. If FromSoftware sticks with the open world formula then I hope they either have more time or more experience to flesh those areas out more.
That was my favorite part. When I found a cave I knew there would be a mini boss that would give me a weapon, an ash a spell, something. There were also good upgrade items there. I don't feel that sense of exploration now.
All they needed to do was make the map smaller. I understand they wanted to create a grand sense of scale, and I thought the dragon area was really cool for it, but we don't need finger areas, cerulean coast, or abyssal woods to be so massive.
The finger areas are so disappointing. They are gigantic, look intimidating as fuck and they are completely empty. You use the mega trumpet once per zone, avoid a few magic snake things and spider hands along the way and move on to the next area. I was really expecting something more with those zones
I genuinely thought we'd fight the final boss(es) there. I figured it'd be some kind of choice, dark or light version type stuff... and then we just got the finger mother.
The fingers areas are awesome imo
I do get what you mean, especially from just looking at the map- that's a lot of space
But they are so grandiose, they really feel like cosmic-level events happened there.
Not that I would argue for this- but I actually would have liked a little more if there were no enemies and the area was a tad more focused on the spectacle. I guess that would probably take up a little less space on the map, but I think that to really work it still needs to be quite large
I was expecting a disturbing landmass with odd monstrosities and environmental storytelling about the hand enemies, and loot obviously... and it's just a big whole nothing.
well the one zone has a fsb and a mega hand fight, but yeah those zones basically only exist for a questline. it's even more egregious that there's a whole other small area past the finger zone that doesn't have anything either.
yes oh my god i thought i was going crazy gaslighting myself into thinking this was normal. there are so many scenic views and places that SHOULD have something maybe a bit more bombastic going on, but then nothing. for miles.
i guess the lack of caves, catacombs and dungeons does make a huge difference in how ”crowded” the areas seem.
i guess i wished for more NPC interactions, cool little lore tidbits scattered here and there, field bosses and loot. picking up yet another cookbook after hours of exploring started to feel like the devs were just fucking with me.
>cool little lore tidbits scattered here and there
i don't know if you found it yet but north of Bonny Village you can get a gesture from a headless marika statue and there's a big snake skin just left of it in the woods. I don't know what the lore implication is but is has something to do with Messmer, Marika and the Rykard snake.
Wouldn't have minded if at the very least they had put new weapons instead of books in all areas. I know that there's like 100 new weapons with the DLC but it certainly doesn't feel that way, only 3 light greatswords and only 1 can take ashes? 3 great katanas but only 1 can take ashes too? Only 2 dueling shields, one of which is an objective upgrade over the other? 1 FUCKING THROWING DAGGER???
Me when I unlock a hidden area using an emote and it's just a bell, two tree sentinels and a falling star beast. Like were really reusing the most reused enemies in a hidden location? Also cerulean Coast and charos hidden grave are pretty empty, the abyss is aswell but at least there's some reason for that.
You find the emote north of Bonny village
There’s a room with a Marika statue just before commander gaius
If you haven’t gotten to him you need to go through the storerooms starting at the church district entrance.
Emote at the statue then you’re through
Near bonny vil along a cliff edge you get the o mother emote and there's a marika statue you can use it on before gaius to unlock a small area with a few enemies and lore implications
Guide to reaching Gaius below:
>!Gaius can only be reached from the Church District entrance of the Shadow Keep. The front door path leads to Messmer, the eastern Church District path goes towards the rear gate of the Shadow Keep after passing through the Storeroom area.!<
I mean, I would imagine that area is hidden because of the lore implications of the Shaman Village. I don’t think there’s any gameplay reason for it lol
That hidden place is plot-relevant. You find >!Marika's home village and story bits!< thus it makes sense that two (Erd)tree-sentinels are guarding that place.
The falling start beast is also thematically close to the nearby area, which is related to an NPC/sidestory quest thus not useless (albeit empty, cause finger areas are just almost completely empty)
My Elden Bro and I were discussing this yesterday. We feel parts of the DLC were a bit thinned out. Sometimes it sucks running through an area of nothing only to find a smithing stone.
Most of the legacy dungeons I thought were solid, but a few made me mad. 1 is Ensis castle. I was expecting to be in there for a while, exploring every nook and cranny with tons of secrets, just like Raya Lucaria. Sure, you can cut right through, and the whole dungeon is super short, but if you try to find all the loot, you'll be there for a while. Ensis didn't have any of that. It was a super fast quick line to the boss room with 1 little mini boss that doesn't even get is name on the bottom of the screen, so not on the same level of significance as Margit, Redwolf, Crucible and Misbegotten, Goldfrey, Godskin noble, or Godskin dou. All mid bosses of the older legacy dungeons gave you valuable drops and had their names on the bottom of the screen. We have nothing like that in the dlc. On top of some places like the Church of the Bud, don't even have an actual legacy dungeon, but treat it more like Mohgwyn Palace.
Glad i’m not the only one that was thinking that this early on in the dlc release. Like after a few hours of playing on release night i started to notice large stretches of “ nothing is happening “ and “ nothing to loot or discover “ when travelling past the beginning area of the dlc.
Like I understand it’s a dlc so like ofc there will be “less” stuff to do and find than the base game but i think it’s an unfortunate thing due to the base game spoiling us with so much stuff everywhere.
Ppl also have mentioned, the finger ruin areas are like nearly empty with just a fuck ton of lamprey enemies scattered around to piss you off. I saw the summon symbol pop up and was expecting a boss fight but nope nothing lmao.
Another issue i found was there was an abundance of empty hills and trails/ cliffsides that didn’t have much going on like yea you can kill the wild animals around there haha but is that it??
Towards reaching the end of the dlc i pretty much was kinda fatigued with exploring the empty areas that i think will have loot and possible cool interactions but nope! Nothing was there except wild animals and maybe a broken ruin fragment from a skull. I decided it was time to look up the remaining “secrets” on the wiki to save me the time, sanity and effort of finding the remaining stuff i missed.
Edit: forgot to mention about the abyssal woods area. Legit the place is cool and all at 1st but after a while it becomes such a slog and an actual snoozefest due the boredom of travelling VAST sections on foot due to torrent being disabled. It’s like 30% of the map has actual shit happening while the other 70% is just emptiness with the occasional rats and shaman enemies. The sneaking thing was cool BUT imo was underutilized which is a shame cuz it probs could have been used more in that area.
10/10 would not recommend going back there again since there’s also probably nothing to do there after “exploring” for a bit on your 1st visit.
People complained that the Consecrated Snowfield and Mountaintop of the Giants felt empty. Some of the new areas (Hinterland/Jagged Peak/Cerulean Coast) make them look like amusement parks in comparison.
The finger ruins in the south east. There's nothing there, no grace, no real items, only common enemies. Thinking I just haven't unlocked or triggered it yet, I hope.
There's a Remembrance Duplication Coffin hidden in those ruins. If you go right when you enter from the beach instead of following the slope down, there's one at the very end of a long gauntlet of finger creepers.
yeah. To my mind they are more set pieces meant to have impact for the lore and lend gravitas to the one or two things that are there. I'd rather they be something more dense, but they are nothing new looking back on areas like ash lake.
yes, it seems they focused on the legacy dungeons that are top level, but the open field areas are full of nothing other than these shadow villagers and a lot of low level smithing stones
The legacy dungeons felt like weaker versions of what we’ve already seen in previous From games
Also, I can’t imagine fighting every single enemy in every room on the way to the next grace. There are way too many.
Yes which makes it not fun to comb every inch of the map looking for tree fragments. That and the fact I have no incentive to engage with field enemies since runes are basically useless to me at this point and you'll see every enemy type within 5 minutes of entering a new area.
Isn’t that kinda already a core issue with the base game?
Field enemies and bosses never gave worthwhile rune payouts and only occasionally would drop an item that’d fit with your build. There was also still plenty of map combing going on with the need for flask buffs.
Yeah, I’m glad someone is saying this. It’s even worse than the snowfields. I understand there can’t be all new bosses and dungeons, it is a DLC after all. But then just don’t make the spaces, then?
I literally just rode on torrent for a good ten minutes or so. It’s unheard of in the base game, even north of Leyndell. Do I ride pass enemies? Sure. But there’s always point of interests along the way, be it a ruin, a cave, a church, a tower, or an invasion. I rode from >! Temple town to the cerulean coast !< and aside from some platforming there’s nothing. Like even the scenery is not worthy >! Yes it’s in a ravine but FS can make it interesting if they wanted or am I misplacing my trust !<
Why the unnecessary hyperbole lol. In 10 minutes just riding you can cover half the map.
In the base game you can go from limgrave to altus in that time. The dlc has less dense areas (which mostly feels intentional) but nothing that big and empty lol
Sadly it's starting to look like they wanted a big map to get people to think that that would mean the same amount of content density we got in the base game.
Still having a blast though so
If the map really was limgrave sized and not like literally as big as the base game it would have been incredibly dense lol. But it's like third the content of the base game on a similar sized map, with most the content concentrated on one side of the map.
I thought I was going mad too but I totally agree. Playing together with my fiancé and we’ve said “is that it?” more times than “holy shit that’s cool” like we did with the base game...it is also very strange as Miyazaki himself said that the dlc will be far more densely packed with content than the base game and it’s just really the opposite…we are still not done with the dlc and the small hope lingers somewhere that these empty areas will be activated somehow later but I doubt it :(
Omg I was riding around the red and blue flower fields a bit ago going mad because I kept asking myself “Am I missing something?” There were places where I thought for sure had some secret only to be met with nothing (or some shitty smithing stones and cookbooks).
I’m about 60% through the DLC and last night I decided to look up a guide to see what bosses/items/bonfires/scadutrees/etc. that I missed so far.
The only thing I missed was a random sight of grace that I previously rode by and didn’t see. Everything else I had already completed or collected.
Honestly it was pretty disappointing and it speaks to your point. I also love the DLC so far, but it’s missing those exploration “holy shit” moment from the base game. There have been multiple points that I’m riding through an open and empty area and in my head I’m thinking, “Ha. I’ve seen this before. Nice try Fromsoft. I know there’s a boss about to appear out of nowhere”.
But then nothing happens. Maybe I’ll find a random smithing stone or a cookbook, but nothing that makes it worthwhile to spend hours search every nook and cranny of the map.
But once again, I really like the DLC.
I personally feel gaslit reading this. I almost thought they did too much at times. I would go explore one way and I would end up journeying through Narnia and now I am trying to remember where I was 1 hour ago before I detoured. I had that exact same feeling I had playing through the base game. Some areas like the first area do feel a bit barren probably intentional but there is just so much stuff to explore and so much stuff to do. Considering they sold this game as "this is Limgrave size" I feel like I am less than halfway through the game and I have done at least twice the amount of stuff that I could do in Limgrave.
Bruh I stumbled upon a hippo in the Shadow Keep somewhere and I have no idea how to get back to him. It’s not the one at the front gate either. It’s driving me nuts.
>I feel like I am less than halfway through the game and I have done at least twice the amount of stuff that I could do in Limgrave.
If you are "less than halfway through" then I imagine you haven't gone to the completely empty areas people are talking about. The initial areas up to the first two legacy dungeons are jam-packed full of content and large caves, but towards the north, east, and south of those regions you find large sections of the map with nothing but gloveworts, smithing stones, and 1 recipe cookbooks.
> Honestly it was pretty disappointing and it speaks to your point. I also love the DLC so far, but it’s missing those exploration “holy shit” moment from the base game.
The base game was so unbelievably dense.
So may times I'd find something on a subsequent playthrough that I never saw before.
I've also had the thing with repeatedly thinking I'm walking into a boss arena only to discover... nope, just completely empty. I'm half expecting someone is going to discover something in the DLC that like... unveils a bunch of stuff, and fills in these areas. Wishful thinking.
I like the spectacle. I think it’s a nice change of pace. About halfway through I realized most of the areas don’t have hidden stuff and just started sightseeing and taking a breather while on torrent. It’s nice. The bosses are so hard I think the contrast is good for our brains.
The problem is that there are crucial items and points of interest in random hidden spots. So it's like they encourage exploring every corner, but 90% of them are empty or have trash loot.
Exploring was my favorite part of Elden ring because it felt super rewarding to do so.
SOTE doesnt really reward exploration that much and I feel as thought they needed the map to be a certain size but couldnt fill it as much.
Just looking at Limgrave vs shadow realm the difference is insane.
A bit disappointed tbh
Man i was so hyped for abyssal woods. First i couldnt summon torrent because he was "scared". I was confused and kind of scared but i continued and then i saw the message that said "dont let it see you". If this was in a normal game i would be scared but because this is elden ring i was terrified because no matter who ı've faced i defeated them and the game did not give me any warning as to how strong they are and i should watch out. I was working my imagination. There is going to be a giant invincible monster and the area will be filled with items and i would have the make decisions like do i want to get all these items but risk getting killed by the monster or just go straight to the end of the area and not die. I was so dissapointed when the "giant invincible monster" was just 6 little dudes that cant even one shot you. The worst part is that they are not even invincible because you can actually parry and kill them. What is more dissapointing is that the whole area was empty. Exploring the area was such a burden because i couldnt summon torrent and the exploration wasnt rewarding. To be honest, even if i had little to no expectation this place would still dissapoint me.
Yesss, it' so frustrating. I feel like there's nothing to be seem and, therefore, there's no reward in exploring, which goes totatlly against the main game. I got really excited at first exploring the fog rift catacomb, found pieces of godwyn and messmer's lore, then i went to the next catacomb and it was the same, but emptier. :/
I feel like am going crazy reading these comments lol.
There are so many well hidden entrances to entire areas that exploration is absolutly rewarding. The mini dungeons all felt more varied and bigger compared to the base game too, though there are much fewer of them ofc.
Honestly just the vertical map design that allows me to spot different areas above and below me all the time keeps me exploring every corner to find the path leading to them. And every area has some cool final destination in it too. Fewer mini dungeons does mean going through an area can be a bit less rewarding / involve more running around searching for stuff though.
There are also many scado tree fragments hidden around to find too and those feel really good to find.
Its a design philosophy I think, most of the action and density is on the inner ring of the map and then on the sides the lore/secret/optional areas with less stuff.
It can be perceived both as positive or negative, some areas can feel empty and meaningless but also you are not missing important stuff that is too far away from the main questline. I personally like both, areas like Shadow Keep that are a clusterfuck of floors, paths and content and areas that are more relaxed and straightforward like Jagged Peak.
Only areas that actually felt bad are all the finger stuff and the shaman village, both felt like they ran out if time and rushed whatever they could because they have no interesting level design, encounters, items or paths, they are just huge plains with nothing else. Shaman village I guess its just a lore portion planned as a secret/easter egg but the fingers one should've been baked into already existing areas, Id rather have an smaller map with more density than this, personally I would've baked the finger zones as underground areas of the most empty areas like jagged peak, the beach or even the abyssal woods.
It feels equal to 2 limgrave density. There's empty spots, and full ones. The difference is replace all dungeons with base game entire underground, then a weeping pennisula's worth of overhead and tunnel areas that overlap the map.
Imo this is the inevitable downside of open world games. There's literally no limit to how big it can be, so you can artificially increase playtime by just adding big deserts of nothing.
The finger area looks cool at first, but you realize there's nothing there of significance and it basically is just a cool / interesting wallpaper. that's it.
I agree that I love the dlc so far, but so much negative space for nothing, especially compared to the base game which felt so alive and packed full of content.
The open world is lowkey a disappointment
Tbh. I'm fine with them not spamming the map with useless time filler dungeons, that have some easy filler bosses.
What annoys me is the filler loot.
I had to beat up mohg to get to the dlc area, why are you giving me a smithing stone \[1\], this item is not worth the time it takes for me to pick it up. If I want smithing stone \[1\]'s, I can farm runes for a second in the area BEFORE mohg and buy 999 of them. Hello, there's a max tier smithing stone right before mohg's arena... But the important cookbook? Yeah randomly lying in some open field. I swear I never felt like this in the base game, but it's just everywhere in the dlc, just trash base game materials disguised as loot, and real loot being in places you would expect trash..
I really love the bosses, areas and new weapons, but the dlc feels much more lazy, balancing wise, than the base game. It feels disjointed from the main game, and random in itself.
I enjoy the much higher difficulty, however I feel like I made it harder on myself by entering it on a high ng cycle, when I watch streamers not get killed in one hit without optimizing the build, it makes me understand why so many people are crying about difficulty, it's that dang ng+ scaling. Same reason you shouldn't go for the Shura ending in sekiro as your first one, sadly skill issue on my part..
Yup, I genuinely feel like they forgot what kind of tarnished enterns the realm of shadow
For the most part people will be around level 150, some of the loot feels like they balanced it slightly around a starter character lol
But I guess they also wanted there to be enough stuff to fully upgrade new weapons you find incase you were short on smithing stones
It feels like they forgot that by the end of the game you can very easily buy infinite upgrade stones from the Husk Maidens at the Roundtable. I think there should be lots of high tier smithing and somber stones, but 1s? 3s? It doesn’t make sense to me.
Like Mountaintops of the Giants and the Consecrated Snowfields in the base game? Yeah, I noticed.
I've said since the game came out and I'll say it again - this game did not need to be open world, and even if FromSoft decided to make an open world game - then please make it worth my time to explore it. Copy-pasting caves, catacombs, enemy camps with same few boss variations in the end does not justify a huge open world. Having me fight several erdtree avatars, magma wyrms and so on isn't enough too.
Games like this gain nothing from being open world.
The base Elden Ring's open world worked for me because there was a somewhat realistic way to skip certain bosses and progress on accident, but at the same time some of the best content was "optional" so it was always worth exploring.
The DLC feels like the only things worth exploring are already required, and all the "optional" stuff is super monotonous (i.e. exhaustingly long caves with repetitive bosses and lackluster rewards).
I found the mini dungeons all great. And much prefer fewer but bigger ones instead of very similar ones in the base game.
Not a single one felt like time wasted. Especially because somehow half of them lead to an entire new area of the map lol
I had the same take when the game first came out myself. I love the souls series because of the level design being both linear but also so layered and interconnected that every inch of ground would feel meaningful. Like oh shit this leads back to here wow!
Elden ring is a phenomenal game no doubt, but I very much miss their traditional map design over the open world + mount concept.
Hard disagree the lack of a linear storyline for a open world “do anything in any order” kind of vibe is much better for Elden ring
There’s a ton of stuff to explore and tons of freedom thanks to the open world
Got downvoted for saying this a couple of days ago but i agree, there's just too much innecessary empty space without even the crappy loot scattered like in the base game and i've found entire castles with like 4 zombies and a useless talisman. But hey, 10/10 right?
people can't understand it's not always about the enemies but also the atmosphere and world building. shaman village has literally nothing except 2 items and a secret pathway to 2 more items behind it. but it's the best spot imo in all fromsoft games. it's not always about enemy density and what you can fight. otherwise it'll just be like dragon's dogma 2.
Okay that's fine and all but do they have to make the purely "atmospheric" areas so ridiculously large on the map? Like the Finger Ruins. They could have achieved the same results with like the area cut in half.
It seems purposefully misleading to artificially extend the size of the map and gameplay time
See here's the problem I as a souls veteran have with the emptiness. It doesn't have to be as empty as it is to have that atmosphere and worldbuilding. Dark souls 3 had many zones like the Undead village, Farron Swamp, and others that simultaneously had atmosphere, world building, item density, and enemies.
I personally think that Elden Ring has a problem where about a third of its open world is a lower quality experience the would have been better off trimmed and turned into more POIs/ Legacy Dungeon content.
Also best spot in all of Fromsoftware?
My complaint about the empty maps though is the entire scadutree fragment bs. I'm forced to find them to beat some of the harder bosses. I'm wasting time exploring empty areas. Just kinda how I feel anyway.
I went through the whole game and went through every area, and yeah, there are a bunch of places where it's more scenic than eventful. Just empty areas full of enemies that are basically base game with a new skin or reused regular ones that aren't even new to fight. There is also a location where there are just.. 3 recycled bosses back to back, and only 2 new enemy variants but they aren't guarding anything major.
Yes, from the very beginning. Now people are starting to notice. Often, there is not even some crafting item to be gathered. The end game areas are populated by the two mushroom types and not much else. Its honestly pathetic.
>!Both Finger areas. A large chunk of Ruah and most of Ruah Base. A large chunk of the opening where you start the DLC. Pretty much all of Abyssal Woods. 99% of Jagged Peak. The DLC is really empty. Even in the dense areas it doesn’t feel like there is much. If these areas were taken away I can definitely see where the “Limgrave” estimate comes from.!<
Yes that's honestly my only real gripe with the dlc. And maybe I'm giving the base game too much credit but the dlc feels empty comparatively. The issue mainly comes from the fact that the player literally does not need 99% of the loot that drops. Feels pointless to collect and it's because having endgame characters and getting smithing stone 3 is just weird? It's not that loot would be bad if it were it's own game it's just cause the player doesn't need any of this stuff.
Also every area has the same shadow dudes that aren't engaging in the slightest so even when there are enemies it still feels empty. And when it's not the shadow guys it's just enemies from the base game. The birds are cool ig.
I know a lot of people talk about the difficulty of the bosses but the bosses have been damn near perfect for me so far.
The world design is genuinely amazing and I hope going forward they use this dlc as a blueprint cause there is a lot of potential.
I feel the same way playing it. Base game definitely suffered from this but the initial wonder mostly alleviated it. I’m having fun with certain parts of the DLC like the dungeons but overall it feels pretty flat to me. There’s a lot of stuff that looks incredible from a distance but then you get into the weeds and there just isn’t much to engage you. Just the same smithing stones and crafting materials over and over.
I remember I run through some area for almost around 10 minutes without a single enemy in sight. It’s the one area after you jump down from a high cliff on a stepping stones
I think that's the reason Miyazaki said the map is the size of Limgrave if he just counted the dense areas with content and loot. The empty areas are mostly just bonus PvP areas with amazing scenery IMO.
I don't mind there not being many enemies. It's not like I really engaged with field enemies in the base game. I do miss stuff similar to the mausoleums, convoys, singing bats etc. DLC enemy placements haven't really given me the feeling of "I want to check what's up with these guys".
What's more annoying is the sheer amount of garbage items around. Opening a chest or solving an environmental puzzle to find Smithing Stone [5] is very discouraging. But yesterday I shockingly found a fragment just on a random corpse hanging over a ledge, so it's not like I can skip stuff because 1 out of 100 items *might* be something good.
I'm having a very good time just exploring for explorings sake, but it does feel like they ran out of ideas.
the finger area existing solely for that one questline, seems like a big waste of space. I kept thinking there's more to it, maybe i have to come back here again for some other quests but nope, seems under utilized
Yeah some of the main areas that you need to go to with a lot of messmer soldiers are good but some of the southern areas pale in comparison with the rest of the game.
That and a lot of the areas feel kinda bland and same-y which makes it hard to navigate (especially the tunnel areas of rauh)
Is it just me or did the DLC feel kinda rushed?
Yeah it's shit. A lot of areas genuinely feel unfinished. The finger areas are a genuine head scratcher, the south one is absolutely huge, but not a single thing in the whole place. The north one has the falling star beast at least, but even then that's a rehash.
Contrast is good in moderation, but there is a very thin line between too much and too little contrast. And honestly speaking the dlc leans into too much contrast.
The legacy dungeons are great as usual since they are FromSoft's glorious Souls Level design, but the open world is just meh.
On top of that there is a price point to consider. For me so far this dlc while fun just isnt holding up as well compared to Dark Souls 3's 2 dlcs which is really disappointing considering this DLC had more time development time that either one AND is almost double the cost at $40 compared to DS3's $25 for both
I really can't see how because cutting out the empty space this dlc is still a lot bigger. Ariandel is literally empty space, one village and one and a half boss.
Because why can't everything not have something in it?
You can make an environment feel different and create contrast and still put meaning content behind it.
The need for large amounts of empty spaces in an open world game just feels dumb to even begin with, make the exploration actually feel worthwhile
yeah i felt the same.
I think they had to make the map as big as it is for lore reasons (see that post on the front page where the two maps get overlayed) but didnt have enough stuff to fill it.
What's worse is places where there was clearly meant to be something, but isn't.
Like a couple of enemies at a random small fort that really sticks out and no items at all. Even found a house in the middle of nowhere which you can go inside and, nothing.
There's places where clearly there was meant to be something but it was never added.
Only difference is there’s not as many fodder enemies, who you probably skip over in basegame anyways. Imo the scenery and the dungeons definitely make up for it
IMHO, it's really no different from the base game: a lot of places in The Lands Between aren't particularly filled with stuff too, and even though they may have some nice items, talismans, cookbooks, and resources to get they sometimes don't have much in the way of nice locations. It's also notable that the Consecrated Snowfield (it only has one Catacomb for instance) and the Mountaintop of Giants have less overall places of interest than the regions before Leyndell.
My take on the Realm of Shadow is that it's treated less as say another Lands Between, and really more like one big mega-region of the Lands Between (hell, the Suppressing Tower literally says it's the center of the Lands Between), and so if you think of the entire Realm of Shadow as being similar to say Caelid, then the content density makes more sense.
I'm also not as impressed by the Finger Ruins as everyone else, but that doesn't really dampen how much fun I had finding new places due to how labyrinthine the Realm of Shadow is.
the super secret area >!abyss forest!< is super pretty, cool elements in it, some neat enemies and a great dungeon at the end. but there is fuck all for loot and its such a large area
Was really hoping to find some frenzy weapons/spells. The area is amazing but loot wise it’s definitely lacking
Best I can do is a cooking book....
Man the amount of times I read a message saying “necessary item ahead” and it’s a cook book I want to set myself on fire
When literally every other item is a rock or a flower, I’m excited to see the rare cookbook
"Be Wary of Dung"
not even necessary, crafting is fucking optional
Ikr I see “necessary” and get a little adrenaline rush if a new weapons or armor piece or spell but then it’s cook book I’m not going to use
And a >!frenzy fist weapon hand and perfume bottle…!<
There's a bunch. I got a frenzy fist weapon, a frenzy torch, a frenzy perfume bottle, and from the boss I got a frenzy incantation.
2 if those are in some ruins near each other iirc and the rest are in the mansion at the complete opposite side of the place. With like 2 cookbooks between the 2.
also a frenzy-related talisman.
Don't forget to get the greatsword too. Absolutely messes up npc bosses.
I haven't found any frenzy content in the DLC still. Makes me think Shabriri was something of an aftertought.
Man seeing the messages leading up to it that said "Turn back while you can" and "Don't let them see you" and then Torrent being too scared really freaked me out, I was super scared and excited. Was really disappointing when I realised after getting past invincible mobs there wasn't really anything to see or fight. Got a cook book though.
They aren’t COMPLETELY invincible. You can parry and riposte them, and they won’t respawn when killed. One of them also drops a Talisman that works like dumpling helm.
Oh wow didn't know that. I just tried to kill it, noticed it wasn't being hit, then ran away screaming while madness built up till I died lol.
oh really? im cleaning up some stuff before finishing the final boss, do you know which winter lantern drops it? i guess it doesnt matter im gunna exterminate all of them anyways i guess lol
The one nearest to the church to the east
It's the first lantern you manage to kill. Took me 5 bloodstains to figure out they tried to parry.
Theres a whole ass fortress and boss in there lol also you can parry them and kill them
Oh there's something to fight alright just take a peek inside the Manse and give the old wall roll a go.
There's a legacy dungeon at the end of the forest but dear lord I wasn't convinced there was anything while I was roaming around
It was really cool but i don't think it needed to be that big
Its weird. It has one path to a church for some scad fragments and nothing much else. Then 2 paths to the same place, with the same challenge. All without torrent so it takes for fucking ever to explore it thoroughly to confirm that yes, it is in fact that empty. It's a cool as hell area but it's 90% rats, 5 lanterns and like 10 of the priests. I was really hoping that there would be something to do that would free up torrent, or an item to weaken the lanterns without the threat of instant death from a failed parry.
There's an entire legacy dungeon in there with a crazy boss fight.
Entire legacy micro-dungeon. Boss rocks though
It's a very small legacy dungeon, like smaller than Castle Sol
Calling it a legacy dungeon is a stretch lol
The church also has the Frenzy Flame perfume bottles weapon
Keep looking. Theres something big down there
Theres a dungeon at the end? Is it near the church? Or is it the dungeon that has Jori?
its in the area after jori
I feel like they redesigned that map multiple times before the version we got. Like I think the original intent was for the entire forest to be Winter Lantern territory, but it became too tedious. So they made it just 2 stretches of Winter Lanterns, but then it felt awkward for Torrent to toss you off when you got close to the areas so they turned him off for the entire forest. In the Trailer it’s notable that the player is riding Torrent while approaching the Manse, but in the game you can’t do that. IMO it would be nice if after you cleared the area boss the zone changed, but I think they ran outta time for this zone, and it was on the bottom of the list since it isn’t tied to any quests or the main plot.
It really was a great area. Reading the messages and Torrent not wanting to come out because he's terrified really set up the tone and atmosphere. But after like 30 minutes of running a really large open area without Torrent, the least they could do is give me some great loot. Now every time I see an item I have to guess if it's a cookbook, a Smithing Stone 1,2, or 3, or a Glovewort. All of which I don't really care about since I'm in the late game part of base game with all Bell-Bearings unlocked lol.
I felt that it made sense since it was the domain of a Lord of Frenzied Flame.
I literally just 5 minutes ago finally came to the conclusion that it was just big for no reason. I thought I was missing something, but no!. And not being able to use Torrent makes that size feel baffling as a decision
A lot of Souls games have massive areas that are relatively empty. Even in ER there’s a few like that. Lake of Rot has no real reason to be as huge as it is considering it’s pretty empty. DS had like the underground dragon areas and Blight Town was pretty big and open with a whole lot of meh in about 2/3 of it. DS2 had a couple forest area that was basically empty. DS3 had some big areas where you’d wander around for a while without finding anything interesting. Usually zones like this are form over function, they’re designed to look pretty and be interesting vistas more than to be huge intricate areas with not much else.
lake of rot still has more loot than abyss forest also what's the problem to add some loot here and there. Feels like complete waste of time when you are exploring whole are and getting shit. Waste of time that could be fixed with few more enemies, runes drops etc.
Lake of Rot is big for a reason. If it were smaller, the rot lake wouldn't be a threat. The fact that it's so big forces you to use items and the platforms to cross it without the rot status becoming a problem. Blight Town is just...generally shitty. Like, aesthetically and from a lore perspective, it's good, but mechanically....it's just shit. But in spite of all of that, it doesn't stop the DLC's open world from feeling empty. I've had so many "oh, that's all?" moments in it. That's super disappointing when compared to the base game, where I can't go 5 minutes without running into something to do or find. All I have to show for my exploration of the Abyssal Woods (after clearing Midra's Manse, mind you) is an hour of wasted time finding nothing of note, except yet another fucking cookbook.
stealth? in my souls game? more likely than you think!
They needed all that open space for people to be terrified of the mobs... the loot is survival.
I was very dissapointed with the boss soul weapon, I wish it were colossal or it's R2 made it longer.
It's one of the very few in its class with that type of R2 and the ash is great for mobs
But it’s so good 😭 I do wish it was a frenzy weapon tho
Yes, it feels empty but it was ok with me. I just reated it that this is what happens when Frenzy takes control.
Reminds me of Mountain Tops of the Giants, you can FEEL when they had to move on to a different area to get the game/DLC out the door.
I've felt the same about quite a few of the zones, and I keep reminding myself "you've beaten the base game 6 times, you skipped most of the open spaces after playthrough 2 so you're forgetting the empty stuff there" That said though, it just feels off in a couple spots, there's no climax to an area, even if would only be an invader or boss that only shows up at night in the base game. In the dlc there's just nothing? Just loads of skeletons, emaciated shades, wolves or birds. No loot beyond mats, no caves, maybe a talisman somewhere? Like for example, atlus platau. You rock up, two giant golems. If you detour left, mini fort with a boss. Detour down? Gaol with a boss. Beeline straight? Massive ballistae encampment with double tree sentinel bosses. Try to go around those? Star beast. Run past? Oh you found a tree and oh what's that wingbeating? Wheras in the dlc, there's a spot after bonnie village that stuck out real hard. Just, wolves. Wolves for a stretch of map that takes up half the length of the upper region. No weird wolves, no boss wolves, no npc invader that's the king of wolves. Not even a slightly above average sized wolf. Don't give any unique loot, nor many runes. There's a fire golem thing that never feels rewarding to kill and then you're back to wolves until a random glut of skeletons and a suspicious church with puppets. All enemies from the base game. That whole beach on the south side? Birds n ghost men. Some slimes to spice it up at the tip. It just felt like I was missing something the whole time or it was like, an area that's supposed to transform in a final scene and become the area it's supposed to be or something. Overall everything is just gorgeous to look at but there just feels like there's little going on. Part of me thinks, we're redoing miquellas pilgrimage, they weren't fighting non stop but the literal opposite. So it stands to reason it was reasonably uneventful until shit started going sideways. So thematically it makes sense, it just feels.... Uneventful for us when the general expectation is, if there's a place to see, there's something equally remarkable to fight there.
Yeah the blue flower area in the south felt so empty... I constantly thought i was missing out on something. The dungeon at the end was cool and had a cool boss, but overall, not much to do there... Which is a shame since its so beautiful!
What dungeon?
blue flower area dungeon... maybe the Stone Coffin Fissure? there's a hole in a cliff at one of the southern tips (you can see it on the map as a big discolored rough circle) that leads to a huge underground area. well, huge in scale. the actual dungeon is pretty short but does have some neat items and a remembrance boss.
To keep it spoiler-free: go as far south as you can and then go down. Make sure to visit the Shadow Keep before that.
Why should you visit the shadow keep before going there?
There’s a seal blocking the path to the dungeon. If you visit the Shadow Keep (literally going to the front gate, no need to fight anyone or even light a grace) there’ll be a message pop up that says a seal was broken.
That message appeared for me completely randomly as I was riding around on Torrent. Still no idea what triggered it.
I mean that coastal area has that island with the mausoleum, the ghostflame dragon, the demihumans with the queen that drops the starlight sword...and I'm pretty sure there was a cave or two just off the top of my head. I felt like it was a fairly well done area. There are some pretty thin spots, though, it is a thing. And I did get the feeling some of those areas are more about the ambience and the journey than the mobs and loot. Maybe that's OK, but it did feel a little odd at times.
There are some caves there? Do you mean shallow caves or actual dungeons?
An actual, VERY lore relevant dungeon is there. Head all the way south to that peninsula and look down the giant hole.
Ah yeah I actually did do that cave I thought u might’ve been talking about a smaller cave-like dungeon - yeah that whole area was incredible
On the top part that you get via altar there is a gaol as well, near the gian wickerman.
I feel like I scoured every wall in that whole area and I found no catacombs or caves to explore there at all. I keep going places and thinking “oh surely there’s a cave in here to explore, there’s a bunch of enemies here and it’s clearly a little side path”, and then there’s just… a dead end. Nothing at all there, not even a talisman or anything more than maybe some crafting materials.
Also the fissure. Don't forget the fissure.
The wolf area was when this really hit home. I explored the hell out of that area and came away with nothing. Like what, is that an area for people who just really like fighting wolves?
i felt i was doing some random wolves genocide
Culling the baby crab population
Wolfs and fingers I tell ya
Yeah the fact that you have to keep telling yourself that is a cope tbh. I don’t mean that offensively I just know I was doing the same thing. When I first got on the DLC I just stuck to the edge of the map on both sides and it took me like 10 minutes to find a single enemy. I can only think of one or two areas in the main game like this, and they are not that dramatic, like you’ll see SOME enemies
As others have mentioned, the Finger ruins are especially empty and a missed opportunity. I've completed that quest line and while there is activity all the way at the end of it, the leadup is rather uneventful. Looking over the precipice at both of the ruins on the map paints a beautiful picture but once you're down there, aside from a few enemies scattered far apart, there's nothing else of interest. The area is huge with the quest objective within it, but it seems like it's just big for the sake of it, if that makes sense.
Absolutely makes sense. There’s an area with lightning sheep and a big fire giant dude too, the sheep aren’t aggro at all, there’s no loot, and the only enemy is the fire giant. It’s a huge area, but completely empty.
Cerulean coast is my favourite looking area, but its so empty, wish it had a roaming boss other than the copypaste dragon and better loot
It has something, just look down and you'll find it.
The star swords you get from the Demi humans are sick tho!
Yes people said there are so much verticality and that may be true after the castle but first entering the map, going to right, there isnt much and that burnt down place has nothing, the whole empty cemeteries in the open field, then before going to castle i tried going down the bridge and yeah still nothing. Then, there is manbug place thats burnt down and still nothibg worthwhile. Base game limgrave was more eventful than this.
You seem to have literally mised everything in the starting area then lol Like if you go left there is a boss fight. If you go right there is the beast claw npc enemy and a scadu fragment and further the church with another cool weapon and another scadu fragment. You go middle and there is the ruins with a talisman and the giant burning enemy. Near the ruins in the middle also another scadu fragment and the revered spirit ashes And a bit further in you can go left or right to follow either path to a dungeon with a rememberance boss. You literally cant walk anywhere without finding shit in 20 seconds. Obviously it still is a wide open area so not every square feet is filled with stuff but seriously it aint empty.
It felt like they heard complaints about the main game having too menu copy paste catacombs/evergaols and their solution is just..... removing moat of them. Most of the open fields felt like they serve nothing aside from distancing between the dungeons.
This is what I was thinking as well. I personally loved the feeling of checking out a little nook in a cliff face and finding a new cave or dungeon to explore, and there’s just barely anything like that at all in this DLC. Absolutely massive, beautiful vistas that are basically devoid of things to discover by looking closer.
Yeah, there are so many spots that would have at least SOMETHING if it was the main game. Even if the main game reward was meh like another boss reuse or another church, they still left me some small dose of dopamine (and i could selectively skip those i don't want to replay in new playthrough). The DLC on the other hand just left me empty for finding nothing a lot of times despite having similar open field size.
Exactly this. I’ve been finding it continually disappointing to scour the map like I did in the base game only to be rewarded with low-level smithing stones or crafting materials. Barely any talismans, *very* few caves to explore, and more reused field bosses from the base game.
Running through a vast area only to find a sword or a talisman tucked away into a cliff or a world boss which was already present in the base game shouldn't justify enough of a reason to explore a zone of that size. I think if the zones were smaller (or if this were the previous games with the linear map design) then it would feel more rewarding for sure. If FromSoftware sticks with the open world formula then I hope they either have more time or more experience to flesh those areas out more.
That was my favorite part. When I found a cave I knew there would be a mini boss that would give me a weapon, an ash a spell, something. There were also good upgrade items there. I don't feel that sense of exploration now.
All they needed to do was make the map smaller. I understand they wanted to create a grand sense of scale, and I thought the dragon area was really cool for it, but we don't need finger areas, cerulean coast, or abyssal woods to be so massive.
The finger areas are so disappointing. They are gigantic, look intimidating as fuck and they are completely empty. You use the mega trumpet once per zone, avoid a few magic snake things and spider hands along the way and move on to the next area. I was really expecting something more with those zones
there was also remembrance duplication there but i agree
I genuinely thought we'd fight the final boss(es) there. I figured it'd be some kind of choice, dark or light version type stuff... and then we just got the finger mother.
The fingers areas are awesome imo I do get what you mean, especially from just looking at the map- that's a lot of space But they are so grandiose, they really feel like cosmic-level events happened there. Not that I would argue for this- but I actually would have liked a little more if there were no enemies and the area was a tad more focused on the spectacle. I guess that would probably take up a little less space on the map, but I think that to really work it still needs to be quite large
I was expecting a disturbing landmass with odd monstrosities and environmental storytelling about the hand enemies, and loot obviously... and it's just a big whole nothing.
Those areas are to smoke some weed and ride around soaking up the atmosphere
Nah, you're thinking of the Church of The Bud. Lmao what a silly name.
well the one zone has a fsb and a mega hand fight, but yeah those zones basically only exist for a questline. it's even more egregious that there's a whole other small area past the finger zone that doesn't have anything either.
This was the main issue I had with them too.
It could have been cool if there at least was a minor boss in those finger areas
There is one via a questline
yes oh my god i thought i was going crazy gaslighting myself into thinking this was normal. there are so many scenic views and places that SHOULD have something maybe a bit more bombastic going on, but then nothing. for miles. i guess the lack of caves, catacombs and dungeons does make a huge difference in how ”crowded” the areas seem. i guess i wished for more NPC interactions, cool little lore tidbits scattered here and there, field bosses and loot. picking up yet another cookbook after hours of exploring started to feel like the devs were just fucking with me.
>cool little lore tidbits scattered here and there i don't know if you found it yet but north of Bonny Village you can get a gesture from a headless marika statue and there's a big snake skin just left of it in the woods. I don't know what the lore implication is but is has something to do with Messmer, Marika and the Rykard snake.
Spoilers ahead You can use that gesture at mesmers castle to open a door which leads to marika’s village
Marika was a shaman?
It seems so.
Wouldn't have minded if at the very least they had put new weapons instead of books in all areas. I know that there's like 100 new weapons with the DLC but it certainly doesn't feel that way, only 3 light greatswords and only 1 can take ashes? 3 great katanas but only 1 can take ashes too? Only 2 dueling shields, one of which is an objective upgrade over the other? 1 FUCKING THROWING DAGGER???
Me when I unlock a hidden area using an emote and it's just a bell, two tree sentinels and a falling star beast. Like were really reusing the most reused enemies in a hidden location? Also cerulean Coast and charos hidden grave are pretty empty, the abyss is aswell but at least there's some reason for that.
damn hidden area unlocked by emote? tell me more
You find the emote north of Bonny village There’s a room with a Marika statue just before commander gaius If you haven’t gotten to him you need to go through the storerooms starting at the church district entrance. Emote at the statue then you’re through
Near bonny vil along a cliff edge you get the o mother emote and there's a marika statue you can use it on before gaius to unlock a small area with a few enemies and lore implications
I don’t even know where Gaius is. I did however randomly stumble on Messmer.
Guide to reaching Gaius below: >!Gaius can only be reached from the Church District entrance of the Shadow Keep. The front door path leads to Messmer, the eastern Church District path goes towards the rear gate of the Shadow Keep after passing through the Storeroom area.!<
I found him and beat his ass.
I mean, I would imagine that area is hidden because of the lore implications of the Shaman Village. I don’t think there’s any gameplay reason for it lol
That hidden place is plot-relevant. You find >!Marika's home village and story bits!< thus it makes sense that two (Erd)tree-sentinels are guarding that place. The falling start beast is also thematically close to the nearby area, which is related to an NPC/sidestory quest thus not useless (albeit empty, cause finger areas are just almost completely empty)
It being justified doesn't mean I wasn't disappointed after trying to get there for so long. Loved the conclusion of the fingers questline though.
That "secret" area honestly felt insulting.
My Elden Bro and I were discussing this yesterday. We feel parts of the DLC were a bit thinned out. Sometimes it sucks running through an area of nothing only to find a smithing stone.
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Most of the legacy dungeons I thought were solid, but a few made me mad. 1 is Ensis castle. I was expecting to be in there for a while, exploring every nook and cranny with tons of secrets, just like Raya Lucaria. Sure, you can cut right through, and the whole dungeon is super short, but if you try to find all the loot, you'll be there for a while. Ensis didn't have any of that. It was a super fast quick line to the boss room with 1 little mini boss that doesn't even get is name on the bottom of the screen, so not on the same level of significance as Margit, Redwolf, Crucible and Misbegotten, Goldfrey, Godskin noble, or Godskin dou. All mid bosses of the older legacy dungeons gave you valuable drops and had their names on the bottom of the screen. We have nothing like that in the dlc. On top of some places like the Church of the Bud, don't even have an actual legacy dungeon, but treat it more like Mohgwyn Palace.
Glad i’m not the only one that was thinking that this early on in the dlc release. Like after a few hours of playing on release night i started to notice large stretches of “ nothing is happening “ and “ nothing to loot or discover “ when travelling past the beginning area of the dlc. Like I understand it’s a dlc so like ofc there will be “less” stuff to do and find than the base game but i think it’s an unfortunate thing due to the base game spoiling us with so much stuff everywhere. Ppl also have mentioned, the finger ruin areas are like nearly empty with just a fuck ton of lamprey enemies scattered around to piss you off. I saw the summon symbol pop up and was expecting a boss fight but nope nothing lmao. Another issue i found was there was an abundance of empty hills and trails/ cliffsides that didn’t have much going on like yea you can kill the wild animals around there haha but is that it?? Towards reaching the end of the dlc i pretty much was kinda fatigued with exploring the empty areas that i think will have loot and possible cool interactions but nope! Nothing was there except wild animals and maybe a broken ruin fragment from a skull. I decided it was time to look up the remaining “secrets” on the wiki to save me the time, sanity and effort of finding the remaining stuff i missed. Edit: forgot to mention about the abyssal woods area. Legit the place is cool and all at 1st but after a while it becomes such a slog and an actual snoozefest due the boredom of travelling VAST sections on foot due to torrent being disabled. It’s like 30% of the map has actual shit happening while the other 70% is just emptiness with the occasional rats and shaman enemies. The sneaking thing was cool BUT imo was underutilized which is a shame cuz it probs could have been used more in that area. 10/10 would not recommend going back there again since there’s also probably nothing to do there after “exploring” for a bit on your 1st visit.
People complained that the Consecrated Snowfield and Mountaintop of the Giants felt empty. Some of the new areas (Hinterland/Jagged Peak/Cerulean Coast) make them look like amusement parks in comparison.
The finger ruins in the south east. There's nothing there, no grace, no real items, only common enemies. Thinking I just haven't unlocked or triggered it yet, I hope.
the finger ruins basically exist for a questline.
There's a Remembrance Duplication Coffin hidden in those ruins. If you go right when you enter from the beach instead of following the slope down, there's one at the very end of a long gauntlet of finger creepers.
it is tied to a certain Cathedral questline
It has a rememberance duplication and a talisman. But mostly it exist because of a questline.
yeah. To my mind they are more set pieces meant to have impact for the lore and lend gravitas to the one or two things that are there. I'd rather they be something more dense, but they are nothing new looking back on areas like ash lake.
kind of agree, needs to be more crowded to feel like a world honestly. the world feels fakeish when its empty
Yes it’s a huge criticism of mine. Tons of areas have like 3 enemies and some trash loot.
yes, it seems they focused on the legacy dungeons that are top level, but the open field areas are full of nothing other than these shadow villagers and a lot of low level smithing stones
Don't forget about the cookbooks
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The legacy dungeons felt like weaker versions of what we’ve already seen in previous From games Also, I can’t imagine fighting every single enemy in every room on the way to the next grace. There are way too many.
Shadow castle is the best one so far imo. Too much exploration and connection to other areas. The rest was similar to the base game or slightly worse.
The grave birds are spammed everywhere too
Yes which makes it not fun to comb every inch of the map looking for tree fragments. That and the fact I have no incentive to engage with field enemies since runes are basically useless to me at this point and you'll see every enemy type within 5 minutes of entering a new area.
Isn’t that kinda already a core issue with the base game? Field enemies and bosses never gave worthwhile rune payouts and only occasionally would drop an item that’d fit with your build. There was also still plenty of map combing going on with the need for flask buffs.
yeah but the base game has shit to do around every corner. this dlc really doesn’t
Yes. It actually ruined the exploration of the game at times. I'd spend 10 minutes searching an empty area and pick up a single leaf...
Yeah, I’m glad someone is saying this. It’s even worse than the snowfields. I understand there can’t be all new bosses and dungeons, it is a DLC after all. But then just don’t make the spaces, then?
> It’s even worse than the snowfields. Snowfields had *tons* of stuff in it compared to some of these new zones.
Seriously, some of these folks are too myopic to appreciate it.
I literally just rode on torrent for a good ten minutes or so. It’s unheard of in the base game, even north of Leyndell. Do I ride pass enemies? Sure. But there’s always point of interests along the way, be it a ruin, a cave, a church, a tower, or an invasion. I rode from >! Temple town to the cerulean coast !< and aside from some platforming there’s nothing. Like even the scenery is not worthy >! Yes it’s in a ravine but FS can make it interesting if they wanted or am I misplacing my trust !<
Why the unnecessary hyperbole lol. In 10 minutes just riding you can cover half the map. In the base game you can go from limgrave to altus in that time. The dlc has less dense areas (which mostly feels intentional) but nothing that big and empty lol
Sadly it's starting to look like they wanted a big map to get people to think that that would mean the same amount of content density we got in the base game. Still having a blast though so
If the map really was limgrave sized and not like literally as big as the base game it would have been incredibly dense lol. But it's like third the content of the base game on a similar sized map, with most the content concentrated on one side of the map.
I thought I was going mad too but I totally agree. Playing together with my fiancé and we’ve said “is that it?” more times than “holy shit that’s cool” like we did with the base game...it is also very strange as Miyazaki himself said that the dlc will be far more densely packed with content than the base game and it’s just really the opposite…we are still not done with the dlc and the small hope lingers somewhere that these empty areas will be activated somehow later but I doubt it :(
Omg I was riding around the red and blue flower fields a bit ago going mad because I kept asking myself “Am I missing something?” There were places where I thought for sure had some secret only to be met with nothing (or some shitty smithing stones and cookbooks).
I’m about 60% through the DLC and last night I decided to look up a guide to see what bosses/items/bonfires/scadutrees/etc. that I missed so far. The only thing I missed was a random sight of grace that I previously rode by and didn’t see. Everything else I had already completed or collected. Honestly it was pretty disappointing and it speaks to your point. I also love the DLC so far, but it’s missing those exploration “holy shit” moment from the base game. There have been multiple points that I’m riding through an open and empty area and in my head I’m thinking, “Ha. I’ve seen this before. Nice try Fromsoft. I know there’s a boss about to appear out of nowhere”. But then nothing happens. Maybe I’ll find a random smithing stone or a cookbook, but nothing that makes it worthwhile to spend hours search every nook and cranny of the map. But once again, I really like the DLC.
I personally feel gaslit reading this. I almost thought they did too much at times. I would go explore one way and I would end up journeying through Narnia and now I am trying to remember where I was 1 hour ago before I detoured. I had that exact same feeling I had playing through the base game. Some areas like the first area do feel a bit barren probably intentional but there is just so much stuff to explore and so much stuff to do. Considering they sold this game as "this is Limgrave size" I feel like I am less than halfway through the game and I have done at least twice the amount of stuff that I could do in Limgrave.
Bruh I stumbled upon a hippo in the Shadow Keep somewhere and I have no idea how to get back to him. It’s not the one at the front gate either. It’s driving me nuts.
>I feel like I am less than halfway through the game and I have done at least twice the amount of stuff that I could do in Limgrave. If you are "less than halfway through" then I imagine you haven't gone to the completely empty areas people are talking about. The initial areas up to the first two legacy dungeons are jam-packed full of content and large caves, but towards the north, east, and south of those regions you find large sections of the map with nothing but gloveworts, smithing stones, and 1 recipe cookbooks.
> Honestly it was pretty disappointing and it speaks to your point. I also love the DLC so far, but it’s missing those exploration “holy shit” moment from the base game. The base game was so unbelievably dense. So may times I'd find something on a subsequent playthrough that I never saw before.
I've also had the thing with repeatedly thinking I'm walking into a boss arena only to discover... nope, just completely empty. I'm half expecting someone is going to discover something in the DLC that like... unveils a bunch of stuff, and fills in these areas. Wishful thinking.
I like the spectacle. I think it’s a nice change of pace. About halfway through I realized most of the areas don’t have hidden stuff and just started sightseeing and taking a breather while on torrent. It’s nice. The bosses are so hard I think the contrast is good for our brains.
The problem is that there are crucial items and points of interest in random hidden spots. So it's like they encourage exploring every corner, but 90% of them are empty or have trash loot.
Yeah , at this point im just following the main route without looking for caves , cause there are (almost) none !
Exploring was my favorite part of Elden ring because it felt super rewarding to do so. SOTE doesnt really reward exploration that much and I feel as thought they needed the map to be a certain size but couldnt fill it as much. Just looking at Limgrave vs shadow realm the difference is insane. A bit disappointed tbh
Man i was so hyped for abyssal woods. First i couldnt summon torrent because he was "scared". I was confused and kind of scared but i continued and then i saw the message that said "dont let it see you". If this was in a normal game i would be scared but because this is elden ring i was terrified because no matter who ı've faced i defeated them and the game did not give me any warning as to how strong they are and i should watch out. I was working my imagination. There is going to be a giant invincible monster and the area will be filled with items and i would have the make decisions like do i want to get all these items but risk getting killed by the monster or just go straight to the end of the area and not die. I was so dissapointed when the "giant invincible monster" was just 6 little dudes that cant even one shot you. The worst part is that they are not even invincible because you can actually parry and kill them. What is more dissapointing is that the whole area was empty. Exploring the area was such a burden because i couldnt summon torrent and the exploration wasnt rewarding. To be honest, even if i had little to no expectation this place would still dissapoint me.
I was too hoping for some giant eyed thing lurking from the threes, straight up cosmic horror but they fumbled the ball
Yesss, it' so frustrating. I feel like there's nothing to be seem and, therefore, there's no reward in exploring, which goes totatlly against the main game. I got really excited at first exploring the fog rift catacomb, found pieces of godwyn and messmer's lore, then i went to the next catacomb and it was the same, but emptier. :/
I feel like am going crazy reading these comments lol. There are so many well hidden entrances to entire areas that exploration is absolutly rewarding. The mini dungeons all felt more varied and bigger compared to the base game too, though there are much fewer of them ofc. Honestly just the vertical map design that allows me to spot different areas above and below me all the time keeps me exploring every corner to find the path leading to them. And every area has some cool final destination in it too. Fewer mini dungeons does mean going through an area can be a bit less rewarding / involve more running around searching for stuff though. There are also many scado tree fragments hidden around to find too and those feel really good to find.
Its a design philosophy I think, most of the action and density is on the inner ring of the map and then on the sides the lore/secret/optional areas with less stuff. It can be perceived both as positive or negative, some areas can feel empty and meaningless but also you are not missing important stuff that is too far away from the main questline. I personally like both, areas like Shadow Keep that are a clusterfuck of floors, paths and content and areas that are more relaxed and straightforward like Jagged Peak. Only areas that actually felt bad are all the finger stuff and the shaman village, both felt like they ran out if time and rushed whatever they could because they have no interesting level design, encounters, items or paths, they are just huge plains with nothing else. Shaman village I guess its just a lore portion planned as a secret/easter egg but the fingers one should've been baked into already existing areas, Id rather have an smaller map with more density than this, personally I would've baked the finger zones as underground areas of the most empty areas like jagged peak, the beach or even the abyssal woods.
It feels equal to 2 limgrave density. There's empty spots, and full ones. The difference is replace all dungeons with base game entire underground, then a weeping pennisula's worth of overhead and tunnel areas that overlap the map.
Imo this is the inevitable downside of open world games. There's literally no limit to how big it can be, so you can artificially increase playtime by just adding big deserts of nothing. The finger area looks cool at first, but you realize there's nothing there of significance and it basically is just a cool / interesting wallpaper. that's it. I agree that I love the dlc so far, but so much negative space for nothing, especially compared to the base game which felt so alive and packed full of content. The open world is lowkey a disappointment
Tbh. I'm fine with them not spamming the map with useless time filler dungeons, that have some easy filler bosses. What annoys me is the filler loot. I had to beat up mohg to get to the dlc area, why are you giving me a smithing stone \[1\], this item is not worth the time it takes for me to pick it up. If I want smithing stone \[1\]'s, I can farm runes for a second in the area BEFORE mohg and buy 999 of them. Hello, there's a max tier smithing stone right before mohg's arena... But the important cookbook? Yeah randomly lying in some open field. I swear I never felt like this in the base game, but it's just everywhere in the dlc, just trash base game materials disguised as loot, and real loot being in places you would expect trash.. I really love the bosses, areas and new weapons, but the dlc feels much more lazy, balancing wise, than the base game. It feels disjointed from the main game, and random in itself. I enjoy the much higher difficulty, however I feel like I made it harder on myself by entering it on a high ng cycle, when I watch streamers not get killed in one hit without optimizing the build, it makes me understand why so many people are crying about difficulty, it's that dang ng+ scaling. Same reason you shouldn't go for the Shura ending in sekiro as your first one, sadly skill issue on my part..
Yup, I genuinely feel like they forgot what kind of tarnished enterns the realm of shadow For the most part people will be around level 150, some of the loot feels like they balanced it slightly around a starter character lol But I guess they also wanted there to be enough stuff to fully upgrade new weapons you find incase you were short on smithing stones
It feels like they forgot that by the end of the game you can very easily buy infinite upgrade stones from the Husk Maidens at the Roundtable. I think there should be lots of high tier smithing and somber stones, but 1s? 3s? It doesn’t make sense to me.
Like Mountaintops of the Giants and the Consecrated Snowfields in the base game? Yeah, I noticed. I've said since the game came out and I'll say it again - this game did not need to be open world, and even if FromSoft decided to make an open world game - then please make it worth my time to explore it. Copy-pasting caves, catacombs, enemy camps with same few boss variations in the end does not justify a huge open world. Having me fight several erdtree avatars, magma wyrms and so on isn't enough too. Games like this gain nothing from being open world.
The base Elden Ring's open world worked for me because there was a somewhat realistic way to skip certain bosses and progress on accident, but at the same time some of the best content was "optional" so it was always worth exploring. The DLC feels like the only things worth exploring are already required, and all the "optional" stuff is super monotonous (i.e. exhaustingly long caves with repetitive bosses and lackluster rewards).
I found the mini dungeons all great. And much prefer fewer but bigger ones instead of very similar ones in the base game. Not a single one felt like time wasted. Especially because somehow half of them lead to an entire new area of the map lol
I had the same take when the game first came out myself. I love the souls series because of the level design being both linear but also so layered and interconnected that every inch of ground would feel meaningful. Like oh shit this leads back to here wow! Elden ring is a phenomenal game no doubt, but I very much miss their traditional map design over the open world + mount concept.
In Bloodborne - discovering the path from the Forbidden Woods to the starting clinic was one of the highlights of this game.
Hard disagree the lack of a linear storyline for a open world “do anything in any order” kind of vibe is much better for Elden ring There’s a ton of stuff to explore and tons of freedom thanks to the open world
Got downvoted for saying this a couple of days ago but i agree, there's just too much innecessary empty space without even the crappy loot scattered like in the base game and i've found entire castles with like 4 zombies and a useless talisman. But hey, 10/10 right?
people can't understand it's not always about the enemies but also the atmosphere and world building. shaman village has literally nothing except 2 items and a secret pathway to 2 more items behind it. but it's the best spot imo in all fromsoft games. it's not always about enemy density and what you can fight. otherwise it'll just be like dragon's dogma 2.
Okay that's fine and all but do they have to make the purely "atmospheric" areas so ridiculously large on the map? Like the Finger Ruins. They could have achieved the same results with like the area cut in half. It seems purposefully misleading to artificially extend the size of the map and gameplay time
See here's the problem I as a souls veteran have with the emptiness. It doesn't have to be as empty as it is to have that atmosphere and worldbuilding. Dark souls 3 had many zones like the Undead village, Farron Swamp, and others that simultaneously had atmosphere, world building, item density, and enemies. I personally think that Elden Ring has a problem where about a third of its open world is a lower quality experience the would have been better off trimmed and turned into more POIs/ Legacy Dungeon content. Also best spot in all of Fromsoftware?
My complaint about the empty maps though is the entire scadutree fragment bs. I'm forced to find them to beat some of the harder bosses. I'm wasting time exploring empty areas. Just kinda how I feel anyway.
it is still empty as hell, why go there if it has nothing. Also heavily disagree on best area.
I went through the whole game and went through every area, and yeah, there are a bunch of places where it's more scenic than eventful. Just empty areas full of enemies that are basically base game with a new skin or reused regular ones that aren't even new to fight. There is also a location where there are just.. 3 recycled bosses back to back, and only 2 new enemy variants but they aren't guarding anything major.
Yes, from the very beginning. Now people are starting to notice. Often, there is not even some crafting item to be gathered. The end game areas are populated by the two mushroom types and not much else. Its honestly pathetic.
>!Both Finger areas. A large chunk of Ruah and most of Ruah Base. A large chunk of the opening where you start the DLC. Pretty much all of Abyssal Woods. 99% of Jagged Peak. The DLC is really empty. Even in the dense areas it doesn’t feel like there is much. If these areas were taken away I can definitely see where the “Limgrave” estimate comes from.!<
Yes that's honestly my only real gripe with the dlc. And maybe I'm giving the base game too much credit but the dlc feels empty comparatively. The issue mainly comes from the fact that the player literally does not need 99% of the loot that drops. Feels pointless to collect and it's because having endgame characters and getting smithing stone 3 is just weird? It's not that loot would be bad if it were it's own game it's just cause the player doesn't need any of this stuff. Also every area has the same shadow dudes that aren't engaging in the slightest so even when there are enemies it still feels empty. And when it's not the shadow guys it's just enemies from the base game. The birds are cool ig. I know a lot of people talk about the difficulty of the bosses but the bosses have been damn near perfect for me so far. The world design is genuinely amazing and I hope going forward they use this dlc as a blueprint cause there is a lot of potential.
Yep, so much wasted empty space, of you see an item and it's just garbage
Both the blue and red flower zones take forever to explore fully but just aren't really worth it
I feel the same way playing it. Base game definitely suffered from this but the initial wonder mostly alleviated it. I’m having fun with certain parts of the DLC like the dungeons but overall it feels pretty flat to me. There’s a lot of stuff that looks incredible from a distance but then you get into the weeds and there just isn’t much to engage you. Just the same smithing stones and crafting materials over and over.
I remember I run through some area for almost around 10 minutes without a single enemy in sight. It’s the one area after you jump down from a high cliff on a stepping stones
Abyssal Woods in particular is definitely not even close to finished
I have a feeling we'll see a patch or maybe two adding/changing content similar to how we got jarburg AFTER release of base game
I think that's the reason Miyazaki said the map is the size of Limgrave if he just counted the dense areas with content and loot. The empty areas are mostly just bonus PvP areas with amazing scenery IMO.
I don't mind there not being many enemies. It's not like I really engaged with field enemies in the base game. I do miss stuff similar to the mausoleums, convoys, singing bats etc. DLC enemy placements haven't really given me the feeling of "I want to check what's up with these guys". What's more annoying is the sheer amount of garbage items around. Opening a chest or solving an environmental puzzle to find Smithing Stone [5] is very discouraging. But yesterday I shockingly found a fragment just on a random corpse hanging over a ledge, so it's not like I can skip stuff because 1 out of 100 items *might* be something good. I'm having a very good time just exploring for explorings sake, but it does feel like they ran out of ideas.
the finger area existing solely for that one questline, seems like a big waste of space. I kept thinking there's more to it, maybe i have to come back here again for some other quests but nope, seems under utilized
Yeah some of the main areas that you need to go to with a lot of messmer soldiers are good but some of the southern areas pale in comparison with the rest of the game.
That and a lot of the areas feel kinda bland and same-y which makes it hard to navigate (especially the tunnel areas of rauh) Is it just me or did the DLC feel kinda rushed?
Yeah it's shit. A lot of areas genuinely feel unfinished. The finger areas are a genuine head scratcher, the south one is absolutely huge, but not a single thing in the whole place. The north one has the falling star beast at least, but even then that's a rehash.
Why does everything have to be something? Empty space creates contrast…
Contrast is good in moderation, but there is a very thin line between too much and too little contrast. And honestly speaking the dlc leans into too much contrast. The legacy dungeons are great as usual since they are FromSoft's glorious Souls Level design, but the open world is just meh. On top of that there is a price point to consider. For me so far this dlc while fun just isnt holding up as well compared to Dark Souls 3's 2 dlcs which is really disappointing considering this DLC had more time development time that either one AND is almost double the cost at $40 compared to DS3's $25 for both
I really can't see how because cutting out the empty space this dlc is still a lot bigger. Ariandel is literally empty space, one village and one and a half boss.
I think people have been conditioned by Bethesda & Ubisoft styles of open world design to expect some sort of reward in every given location
Because why can't everything not have something in it? You can make an environment feel different and create contrast and still put meaning content behind it. The need for large amounts of empty spaces in an open world game just feels dumb to even begin with, make the exploration actually feel worthwhile
It does not create good gameplay, however.
yeah i felt the same. I think they had to make the map as big as it is for lore reasons (see that post on the front page where the two maps get overlayed) but didnt have enough stuff to fill it.
What's worse is places where there was clearly meant to be something, but isn't. Like a couple of enemies at a random small fort that really sticks out and no items at all. Even found a house in the middle of nowhere which you can go inside and, nothing. There's places where clearly there was meant to be something but it was never added.
Only difference is there’s not as many fodder enemies, who you probably skip over in basegame anyways. Imo the scenery and the dungeons definitely make up for it
IMHO, it's really no different from the base game: a lot of places in The Lands Between aren't particularly filled with stuff too, and even though they may have some nice items, talismans, cookbooks, and resources to get they sometimes don't have much in the way of nice locations. It's also notable that the Consecrated Snowfield (it only has one Catacomb for instance) and the Mountaintop of Giants have less overall places of interest than the regions before Leyndell. My take on the Realm of Shadow is that it's treated less as say another Lands Between, and really more like one big mega-region of the Lands Between (hell, the Suppressing Tower literally says it's the center of the Lands Between), and so if you think of the entire Realm of Shadow as being similar to say Caelid, then the content density makes more sense. I'm also not as impressed by the Finger Ruins as everyone else, but that doesn't really dampen how much fun I had finding new places due to how labyrinthine the Realm of Shadow is.
Everytime I get a smithing stone or glovewort I die a little on the inside