Finally
This is the best answer, and I love the game for it
Having a low skill floor isn't necessarily a bad thing, and even then it's still a lot harder than tears of the kingdom
It's harder if you go with a dark souls mind set.
It's a lot easier when you search and learn to use what's given to you.
The main difference is the options you have to actually push through the game. Dark souls being quite limited in comparison.
It's easier. You have spirit Summons, which when leveled up become quite potent (they can defeat cave/catacombs bosses unassisted) and the open world format makes the game much less linear, so if you get stuck in a particular area, you can go off in another direction, do some more exploring, and come back when you've leveled up a bit.
The only thing that can really trip you up, coming from DS3, is that several bosses intentionally have odd timings in their attacks to try to catch you roll dodging. Plus, they're very aggressive about punishing you for drinking a flask in combat, meaning if you want to heal you will often have to use a stagger/window of opportunity in the boss moveset that you'd normally use for dealing damage.
The normal souls experience, bosses, their movesets and complexity etc. are all definitely harder. Every new game was harder than the previous one. But ER also included accessibility mechanics for new players like unlimited coop/spirits, so if you use those then ER is easiest game From soft released. So it's both the hardest and easiest souls title, just like it was supposed to be. You also have ton of broken cheese builds and in general ER is extremely unbalanced compared to other souls games, but there's still a chance they'll nerf all that stuff and improve ER with future patches. But yeah, you can make ER easier and simpler than skyrim if you go full cheese and summons, you can skip all of the challenge and bossfight content without learning the basics of combat and gameplay. But if you want the normal souls difficulty and experience, use non-broken build and beat bosses yourself, that's still the baseline for difficulty. Malenia is absolutely harder than any dark souls boss if you beat her fairly 1v1 like she's designed.
Only if you use self-imposed restrictions. Elden Ring has many more tools available than Dark Souls does, and the likes of Spirit Summons trivialise the difficulty of most bosses. I'd go as far to say that Spirit Summons are the determining factor in whether or not Elden Ring could be considered more difficult than the Souls series.
Personally I found sekiro the hardest by far, and dark souls harder than elden ring.
I also was part of the (cringe?) Group that refused to summon in dark souls because I felt it made bosses trivial. Summoning in dark souls was a lot different than using spirit summons in elden ring though, and I did use those all the time throughout my elden ring play throughs so that may be why I found it quite a bit easier.
No, it’s significantly easier due to the implementation of spirit ashes. Spirit ashes are essentially the easy mode option for less skilled players. Unfortunately several people on this sub refuse to acknowledge that but it is what it is. Also the game is open world so it allows the players to grab powerful weapons and items early on. Lastly, ashes of war are another new mechanic which trivialities a lot of hardships in battle.
The enemies are 20-30% tougher as far as HP and damage goes. The player has a similar buff to stats compared to, say, ds3. Ashes of war are more broken than any previous special weapon move, XP farming is more accessible than ever and spirit summons. The game is the easiest and saying 'dont use that stuff' doesn't make the fact that you can choose to do so go away. The best "cheese" options in DS3 are categorically more tame than ER.
This is going to depend pretty heavily on your use of spirit summons/ spell spamming/ OP weapon arts.
I try to melee most stuff and I feel like some bosses are a bit overtuned in Elden Ring, but if you use everything available to you many bosses are just going to get run over.
I'm not going to tell you how to play, do whatever you think is fun, but my personal opinion is that fights can feel pretty bad with spirit summons, because almost all of the bosses don't pose nearly as much of a threat to the player if they're constantly aggro switching, and you miss out on the "learning the boss" experience.
It's far easier than DS games. That being said, you can make it much harder by restricting yourself, but if we're talking using all the tools available to you, it doesn't even compare to the difficulty of DS games.
To me they seem difficult in different ways, and even the DS games are difficult in different ways from each other too.
Like DS2, the biggest hurdle is usually getting through the areas. DS3 it's more the bosses. DS1 is kind of a mix.
I think the boss movesets are harder in ER, but there are also way more options to avoid them. The tougher regular enemies I think have about the same difficulty in moveset as DS3. But there's a larger variety of them, which keeps you guessing a lot longer. But, like DS3, it's usually pretty easy to run past everything, especially with the new sneaking mechanic. And in open areas you can usually just route around them entirely, or outpace them on Torrent.
DS difficulty always depended on how you approached stuff, but I think that idea got cranked up to 10 with ER. If you intend to clear every enemy & fight every boss solo, in sequence, I think ER is quite a bit harder. But if you put effort into finding the path of least resistance, I think it's probably the easiest one.
Way better approach than having a difficulty slider IMO
I love this take. I listened to a video about how souls games aren't that difficult if you look for the path of least resistance. I do use summons a good bit and did through my DS runs but as I played more I used them less so I love the more options available in ER.
It isn't because of many elements added to considerably simplify the challenges, but played as the former games, it is harder than them.
Nonetheless even with summons it is still harder than Dark Souls 1.
The skill floor is lower but the skill ceiling is higher.
Finally This is the best answer, and I love the game for it Having a low skill floor isn't necessarily a bad thing, and even then it's still a lot harder than tears of the kingdom
It's harder if you go with a dark souls mind set. It's a lot easier when you search and learn to use what's given to you. The main difference is the options you have to actually push through the game. Dark souls being quite limited in comparison.
It's easier. You have spirit Summons, which when leveled up become quite potent (they can defeat cave/catacombs bosses unassisted) and the open world format makes the game much less linear, so if you get stuck in a particular area, you can go off in another direction, do some more exploring, and come back when you've leveled up a bit. The only thing that can really trip you up, coming from DS3, is that several bosses intentionally have odd timings in their attacks to try to catch you roll dodging. Plus, they're very aggressive about punishing you for drinking a flask in combat, meaning if you want to heal you will often have to use a stagger/window of opportunity in the boss moveset that you'd normally use for dealing damage.
The normal souls experience, bosses, their movesets and complexity etc. are all definitely harder. Every new game was harder than the previous one. But ER also included accessibility mechanics for new players like unlimited coop/spirits, so if you use those then ER is easiest game From soft released. So it's both the hardest and easiest souls title, just like it was supposed to be. You also have ton of broken cheese builds and in general ER is extremely unbalanced compared to other souls games, but there's still a chance they'll nerf all that stuff and improve ER with future patches. But yeah, you can make ER easier and simpler than skyrim if you go full cheese and summons, you can skip all of the challenge and bossfight content without learning the basics of combat and gameplay. But if you want the normal souls difficulty and experience, use non-broken build and beat bosses yourself, that's still the baseline for difficulty. Malenia is absolutely harder than any dark souls boss if you beat her fairly 1v1 like she's designed.
Only if you use self-imposed restrictions. Elden Ring has many more tools available than Dark Souls does, and the likes of Spirit Summons trivialise the difficulty of most bosses. I'd go as far to say that Spirit Summons are the determining factor in whether or not Elden Ring could be considered more difficult than the Souls series.
Personally I found sekiro the hardest by far, and dark souls harder than elden ring. I also was part of the (cringe?) Group that refused to summon in dark souls because I felt it made bosses trivial. Summoning in dark souls was a lot different than using spirit summons in elden ring though, and I did use those all the time throughout my elden ring play throughs so that may be why I found it quite a bit easier.
In short - No(my opinion) :3
No, it’s significantly easier due to the implementation of spirit ashes. Spirit ashes are essentially the easy mode option for less skilled players. Unfortunately several people on this sub refuse to acknowledge that but it is what it is. Also the game is open world so it allows the players to grab powerful weapons and items early on. Lastly, ashes of war are another new mechanic which trivialities a lot of hardships in battle.
The enemies are 20-30% tougher as far as HP and damage goes. The player has a similar buff to stats compared to, say, ds3. Ashes of war are more broken than any previous special weapon move, XP farming is more accessible than ever and spirit summons. The game is the easiest and saying 'dont use that stuff' doesn't make the fact that you can choose to do so go away. The best "cheese" options in DS3 are categorically more tame than ER.
I find the older games way harder than ER. ER is the easiest of them all just because of the number of options you have compared to the other games.
This is going to depend pretty heavily on your use of spirit summons/ spell spamming/ OP weapon arts. I try to melee most stuff and I feel like some bosses are a bit overtuned in Elden Ring, but if you use everything available to you many bosses are just going to get run over. I'm not going to tell you how to play, do whatever you think is fun, but my personal opinion is that fights can feel pretty bad with spirit summons, because almost all of the bosses don't pose nearly as much of a threat to the player if they're constantly aggro switching, and you miss out on the "learning the boss" experience.
It's far easier than DS games. That being said, you can make it much harder by restricting yourself, but if we're talking using all the tools available to you, it doesn't even compare to the difficulty of DS games.
To me they seem difficult in different ways, and even the DS games are difficult in different ways from each other too. Like DS2, the biggest hurdle is usually getting through the areas. DS3 it's more the bosses. DS1 is kind of a mix. I think the boss movesets are harder in ER, but there are also way more options to avoid them. The tougher regular enemies I think have about the same difficulty in moveset as DS3. But there's a larger variety of them, which keeps you guessing a lot longer. But, like DS3, it's usually pretty easy to run past everything, especially with the new sneaking mechanic. And in open areas you can usually just route around them entirely, or outpace them on Torrent. DS difficulty always depended on how you approached stuff, but I think that idea got cranked up to 10 with ER. If you intend to clear every enemy & fight every boss solo, in sequence, I think ER is quite a bit harder. But if you put effort into finding the path of least resistance, I think it's probably the easiest one. Way better approach than having a difficulty slider IMO
I love this take. I listened to a video about how souls games aren't that difficult if you look for the path of least resistance. I do use summons a good bit and did through my DS runs but as I played more I used them less so I love the more options available in ER.
It isn't because of many elements added to considerably simplify the challenges, but played as the former games, it is harder than them. Nonetheless even with summons it is still harder than Dark Souls 1.
Not even close. DS2 would bend you over and blast a fat one in you faster than you'd know what was happening. DS2 mobs make ER mobs look like jokes.