Hands-on: Elden Ring took me to the shadow realm in its expansion, and it ruled

I had a gut feeling that my time with the Elden Ring expansion Shadow of the Erdtree would kick off where it did. How else could it start but with Miquella? The hand of the Empyrean was one of the big lingering threads left after players rolled credits on FromSoftware’s open-world journey, and Shadow of the Erdtree is all about him, and the many mysteries surrounding him.

We recently got the chance to go hands-on with Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree, experiencing the expansion from the beginning. Even talking about how to get there will entail some degree of spoilers for Elden Ring‘s base game, but I’ll do my best to avoid too many unnecessary details about the actual expansion content itself. Discovery’s a big part of Elden Ring, and there is much to discover in the Realm of Shadow.

Waiting for me, inside Mohg’s palace, in front of the embryo found there after defeating the Lord of Blood, was a knight named Leda. She acknowledged my Tarnished as someone also searching for Miquella, and for answers, and bade me to touch the hand left hanging from its grotesque shell.

This is how you kick off the DLC and proceed into the Realm of Shadow, and its placement gives you an idea of just how powerful FromSoft expects players to be when they enter it. Shadow of the Erdtree is not really something that you can just kick off from the start of a fresh file. You’ll need to, at the very least, beat the Lord of Blood to start this new leg of your journey.

Inside the Realm of Shadow, I was greeted with a vast plain, home to stretches of ethereal tombs and wandering enemies. Some, like the dancing fighter with circular blades, reminded me how long it’d been since I had rolled credits on Elden Ring. Others seemed intentionally imposing, like a colossal wicker-giant stomping around. It definitely gave off “optional world boss” vibes.

It took a few futile deaths to come to grips with my loadout. We had three options, though we could also just jump back to a certain location from the base game and re-spec at any point. The Warrior and Knight options both offered their own approaches to the blade, but I was more interested in and spent most of my time with the hand-to-hand magic build.

Using special equipment that enabled fists as my weapons of choice — and with a B-tier Faith scaling, at that — the loadout mixed quick combos and hits with long-range magic. It felt like I was playing a Monk build, able to hurl lightning at foes from mid-range or deal tons of staggering damage up-close. Add on a Skill that basically let me unleash a flurry of kicks, and I had found my build for the run.

Mixing magic and might made hand-to-hand combat spectacular. This new playstyle felt like an expansion of the magic playstyle that actually encouraged close-quarters combat, allowing me to deal staggering damage to foes close-up or strike from afar with ranged magic. Other weapons I found offered similarly smart twists on basics, whether it was a sword with a neat twist or some really intriguing weapon skills.

Other parts of my time in the Realm of Shadow felt familiar, though. Two different routes made up the main “paths” we could go down, without advancing too far into the DLC for this slice. Each one culminates in a dungeon, fog gate, and boss; the Belurat Castle Settlement and the Dancing Lion you might have seen in the trailer already. Then there’s Castle Ensis, a very mysterious place with an even stranger boss waiting inside.

It would be pretty easy to say that this DLC felt a lot like more Elden Ring, because it really, honestly does in the best ways. I spent a ton of my time just running around, looking for paths forward or side alleys. Dungeons offered unique little challenges, like a host of melee enemies barring my path towards a couple of magic casters bombarding me from afar. Little jerks waited around corners to cheap-shot me as I ran by. And there were definitely some horrific terrors that caused me to jump once or twice.

In fact, that is one aspect where it feels like FromSoftware is escalating even more: the nasty terrors of the world around you. Creepy blue worms seem friendly, until you agitate them. Gnarly beasts and insect-like beings plague your path between graces. There is a natural, untamed wilds-aspect to the enemies here that weaves it all together well.

Bosses were their own demons to deal with, and naturally, the ones I fought in Erdtree are no pushovers. The two “main” bosses, found at the end of dungeons behind fog gates, gave me the most trouble. The Dancing Lion could move about and quickly deal with a pack of allies, while the other boss took the efforts of both my summoned companions and my Spirit Ashes to defeat. Additional bosses lay in wait on the fringes of the map, in special evergaols or dungeons, waiting for me to find and bash my head against.

Along the way, I ran into followers of Miquella, who seem to be the running cast of this expansion. They all have different reasons for swearing themselves to Miquella, and offer you help, so long as you continue to press on in the kindly Empyrean’s footfalls. You’ll need the help, too, as some of these bosses posed a pretty hefty challenge.

It feels strange to say I spent roughly three hours in this land and only have more questions, but it’s true. I want to dig into the mysteries of why certain forces and foes were appearing in the Realm of Shadow, and even what this realm is. I’m curious to understand the strange layout of this place, how structures can bend and twist upward into the sky. And I’m especially eager to understand how this unsung war, stricken from the records and seemingly unmentioned in the base game, now plays back into the lore of Elden Ring.

Miquella was always the loose thread waiting to be pulled, and Shadow of the Erdtree seems determined to yank as hard as it can. The question of what’s waiting to be found, however, will be extremely intriguing to discover as the whole yarn unravels.

While Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree certainly feels like more Elden Ring, it manages to do so without falling into tiresome repeats or old habits. Yes, there are some returning foes I ran into, though they feel placed with purpose, rather than just trying to take up dungeon space or round out enemy numbers. Certain parts, like dashing through an area on Torrent, searching for the next Grace before you get pummeled by the foes chasing you, absolutely dredge up some fond 2022 memories.

But in the years between, FromSoftware has clearly sought to build something that feels like its own new chapter. It’s disparate, taking place in a different realm, and even introduces a new form of power-scaling. The host of new characters, Miquella’s followers, bring a lot to the experience too. Seeing a bunch of bright new faces, likely unprepared for the horrors that await them as NPCs in a FromSoft game, piques my curiosity even more.

It took very little time for me to settle back in with Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree, and it wasn’t long after when I remembered just why the base game grabbed me. The RPG didn’t only rely on the merit of being a good Souls-adjacent title. Elden Ring’s world, its deep lore and mythos, and the physical manifestation of those ideas present in this giant open world waiting to be explored make for an appealing fantasy adventure. A few hours in the Realm of Shadow, and I can safely say I’m eager for more.

Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree goes live on June 21, 2024.

_{[Travel and lodging for this event was provided by Bandai Namco.]}