"Elden Ring's Shadow of the Erdtree Too Hard for Gamers"

Despite receiving critical acclaim, the Elden Ring DLC, Shadow of the Erdtree, has encountered a mixed reception on Steam and drawn criticism from players regarding its high difficulty and performance issues across PC and consoles.

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Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree Debut Met with Mixed Reviews on Steam

Despite achieving the highest Metacritic score for video games before its release, Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree launched to a wave of negative feedback from players on Steam. Launched on June 21, the expansion was praised for its challenging gameplay but faced backlash over its demanding combat, perceived imbalance in difficulty, and performance issues on both PC and consoles.

Players Cite Performance Issues and Perceived Disproportionate Difficulty

Many players highlighted the intensity of the expansion's battles as a primary concern, noting that encounters felt even more challenging and sometimes disproportionately difficult compared to the base game. Reviews on Shadow of the Erdtree mentioned that enemy placements seemed "rushed" and not thoroughly designed, with "bosses having overinflated health bars."

Performance issues were also a common complaint, with numerous PC users reporting crashes, micro-stuttering, and capped frame rates. Even those with high-end systems experienced frame rates dipping below 30 FPS in dense areas, significantly impacting gameplay. Similar performance drops were noted by PlayStation users during intense gameplay moments.

As of Monday, Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree holds a 'Mixed' review rating on Steam, with 36% of reviews being negative. On Metacritic, it's rated as 'Generally Favorable' with a score of 8.3/10 based on 570 user ratings. Meanwhile, Game8 has given the expansion an overall rating of 94/100.