Elden Ring (PS5)

Every once in a long while, a game arrives that genuinely shifts the landscape of its medium, one that forces the rest of the industry to sit up, take notes, and quietly reconsider what they thought they knew. Elden Ring, released in February 2022 by FromSoftware and published by Bandai Namco, is emphatically one of those games. The collaboration between director Hidetaka Miyazaki, the creator of the Dark Souls series, and George R. R. Martin, the author of A Song of Ice and Fire, sounds on paper like the sort of pitch a marketing department dreams up at 2am. And yet the resulting game is so assured, so vast and so wickedly crafted that it earned a near-perfect critical reception and became one of the best-selling games of its generation. Tarnished, the Lands Between awaits.

The premise drops you into a sprawling, broken fantasy realm called the Lands Between, tasked with tracking down the shards of the shattered Elden Ring and claiming the title of Elden Lord. If that sounds vague, that is entirely by design. FromSoftware’s lore has always been dispensed in dribs and drabs through item descriptions, cryptic NPC conversations and environmental storytelling, and Elden Ring continues this proud tradition of making you feel profoundly confused in the most compelling way imaginable. What it offers in return is a world of staggering scope and artistry, from the golden fields of Limgrave in the early game to the nightmarish rot-blasted wastes of Caelid, all of it presided over by the colossal, luminous Erdtree. It is, without question, one of the most beautifully realised open worlds in the history of the medium.

What sets Elden Ring apart from its Soulsborne predecessors is the transition to a fully open world, and FromSoftware handles this with a confidence that puts many long-established open-world franchises to shame. There are no quest markers cluttering your map, no hand-holding waypoints steering you towards the next objective. Instead, the game trusts you to explore, to get lost, to stumble upon a legacy dungeon you weren’t expecting or a boss encounter that sends you sprinting back the other direction at considerable speed. The combat, meanwhile, is the lock-on-focused, stamina-managed brawling that FromSoftware popularised, refined and expanded with an enormous range of build options spanning sorceries, incantations, bladed weapons, bows, great shields and everything in between. Death will come often, and it will occasionally feel unfair. It rarely actually is.

The game is not without its rough edges. The back third leans heavily on reusing boss encounters, and some players will find the late-game difficulty curve a touch punishing, particularly if they have been neglecting to level up their Vigor stat. NPC questlines, a franchise highlight, can be fiendishly difficult to progress naturally given the sheer scale of the world. On the PS5 specifically, the game launched with some frame rate inconsistencies in performance mode, though subsequent patches improved stability considerably. None of this meaningfully diminishes the achievement on display. Push Square called it the definitive FromSoftware game, setting a new benchmark for open-world design, and it is very difficult to argue otherwise. The orchestral soundtrack alone is worth the price of admission.

Elden Ring is a game that rewards patience, curiosity and a willingness to be humbled repeatedly before triumphing spectacularly. It is enormous, secrets-dense, and endlessly surprising even dozens of hours into a playthrough. For those who have never ventured into a FromSoftware title before, it is arguably the best entry point the studio has ever produced, offering more freedom and flexibility than its predecessors. For veterans, it is a masterclass in everything they already love, expanded to a scale that still feels remarkable. A substantial range of hints, tips, secrets and essential strategies to help you survive and thrive in the Lands Between can be found below.

Elden Ring: Hints, Tips & Secrets

Essential Beginner Tips

Meet Melina before you do anything else. Resist the urge to charge off into the open world immediately. Follow the guiding light between Sites of Grace until you have rested at three of them, at which point Melina will appear. She grants you the ability to level up using runes and hands you the Spectral Steed Whistle to summon your mount, Torrent. Without her, any runes you collect cannot be spent, meaning every death is pure loss.
Collect the Spirit Calling Bell from Renna. After meeting Melina and obtaining Torrent, fast travel back to the Church of Elleh at night. A witch named Renna will be perched on the ruins nearby. Speak to her honestly and she will gift you the Spirit Calling Bell and the Lone Wolf Ashes, allowing you to summon spirit allies to assist in boss fights. This is one of the most useful items in the game and is entirely missable if you don’t return at night.
Invest heavily in Vigor. New players frequently pour their rune upgrades into damage-dealing stats and find themselves dying in a single hit come the mid-game. Aim to bring Vigor to at least 40 before investing heavily elsewhere. The survivability increase is substantial and will save you considerable frustration.
Spend your runes before risky encounters. Runes dropped upon death can only be recovered if you reach the spot where you died without dying again. If you are carrying a large amount and are about to tackle a boss or a dangerous new area, fast travel to a Site of Grace and spend them on levels or items first.
Smash glowing skulls with Torrent. Scattered throughout the Lands Between are skulls with lit-up eyes. Ride over them with your horse to shatter them, and they will always drop a small sum of runes. It is a quick, combat-free way to top up your rune count as you explore.
Upgrade your Flask of Crimson Tears. Your healing flask can be improved in two ways: increasing how many charges it holds (via Golden Seeds found near glowing Erdtree saplings) and increasing how much each charge restores (via Sacred Tears found in churches across the world). Both upgrades are invaluable and should be prioritised throughout the game.
You can skip Margit the Fell Omen. The first major boss guarding Stormveil Castle does not have to be fought head-on. A cliffside path to the right of the castle gate allows you to bypass Margit entirely and reach Stormveil’s interior. If you do want to fight him, buy Margit’s Shackle from the merchant Patches for 5,000 runes. Using it during the fight temporarily pins him to the ground, giving you free hits.
Map Fragments are not automatic. The overworld map begins greyed out. To reveal each region, you need to find its Map Fragment, indicated by small orange icons on the hidden map. In the world itself, look for upright stone pillars with glowing inscriptions. Collecting them fills in that area of your map.

Secrets & Hidden Areas

The teleporter chest in Dragon-Burnt Ruins is a trap. In early-game Limgrave, the Dragon-Burnt Ruins contain a chest in an underground cellar. Opening it teleports you directly to the Sellia Crystal Tunnel in Caelid, a mid-to-late-game area where enemies can kill you in a single strike. If you find yourself there unexpectedly, do not fight anything. Sprint to the nearest Site of Grace to unlock fast travel and escape.
Nokron, Eternal City is a hidden underground region. This entire area does not exist on your map until you defeat Starscourge Radahn at Redmane Castle in Caelid. Upon his defeat, a meteor crashes near Fort Haight in Mistwood, creating a crater with a path down into the city. Nokron contains some of the game’s finest rewards, including the Mimic Tear Spirit Ash.
The Mimic Tear boss has a notorious exploit. Before entering the fog gate to fight the Mimic Tear boss in Nokron, unequip all of your weapons, armour and spells. The boss copies your loadout at the moment of summoning, meaning it will spawn completely unarmed. Quickly re-equip your gear once inside and defeat your bewildered, defenceless double with ease.
The Mimic Tear Spirit Ash is the most powerful summon in the game. Found in a chest behind a fog gate in Nokron’s Night’s Sacred Ground area (requiring one Stonesword Key to enter), this Spirit Ash summons a copy of your own character, complete with your weapons, armour and abilities. Upgrade it using Ghost Gloveworts at Roderika in Roundtable Hold. A fully upgraded Mimic Tear can solo many of the game’s bosses.
Illusory walls can be struck to reveal hidden passages. Throughout the game’s dungeons and legacy areas, certain walls appear solid but dissolve when attacked. Some of the game’s best-hidden secrets, including entire additional rooms and shortcuts, are concealed behind these invisible barriers. If an area feels like it should continue but doesn’t, try hitting the walls.
The Flask of Wondrous Physick can be customised. Found at the Third Church of Marika in Limgrave, this special flask is separate from your standard healing flasks and can hold two Crystal Tear effects, mixed at any Site of Grace. Minor Erdtrees around the world drop these tears when their bosses are defeated. Combining effects such as the Cerulean Hidden Tear (removes FP costs for fifteen seconds) with a damage-boosting tear can enable devastating combinations before major boss encounters.
Rune Arcs amplify your equipped Great Rune. After defeating a major boss such as Godrick the Grafted, you can activate their Great Rune at the corresponding Divine Tower. Equipping the rune does nothing on its own, but consuming a Rune Arc activates it, providing significant stat boosts that last until your next death. Godrick’s Great Rune, one of the first available, adds five points to all stats and is particularly valuable early on.
Patches is hiding in Murkwater Cave. The fan-favourite FromSoftware NPC Patches can be found in Murkwater Cave, located along a narrow gorge in Agheel Lake in Limgrave. He invades you partway through the cave, but if you defeat him and then spare his life when prompted, he becomes a merchant selling useful items throughout your playthrough. Do not kill him.

Build & Progression Tips

You can respec your character after defeating Rennala. Once you beat Rennala, Queen of the Full Moon in the Academy of Raya Lucaria, you can speak to her to reassign all your stat points using a Larval Tear. These are limited per playthrough, so do not discard them. This means early build decisions are not permanent, so experiment freely.
The Samurai class starts with one of the best weapons in the game. The Uchigatana has innate bleed buildup and excellent damage scaling for Dexterity builds. If you are unsure which class to pick and want an edge in the early game, the Samurai is an outstanding choice.
Ashes of War let you customise weapon skills. These can be applied to most weapons at any Site of Grace using a Whetstone Knife (found at Gatefront Ruins). They change the weapon’s special attack, activated with L2, and can also alter the stat scaling of the weapon itself. Experimenting with different Ashes of War is one of the most rewarding parts of build-crafting in Elden Ring.

Video Walkthroughs

For players new to the Souls genre, this comprehensive beginner-focused tips and tricks video is an excellent starting point before diving into the Lands Between:

ULTIMATE Elden Ring Beginner Guide — Tips and Tricks

For a full step-by-step walkthrough of the entire game, the IGN Elden Ring Walkthrough playlist is one of the most thorough available:

Elden Ring Full Walkthrough Playlist — IGN

Good luck!

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Elden Ring for PS5