What else do you do besides boss fights?

>Obstacles and Puzzles
Yes
>Platformer areas
Yes, though not by any means the focus
>Dungeons with traps etc.
Yes, tons of them
>Taverns
No, unless you count the hub or some guy living in a swamp who sells prawns as one
>Funny NPC's
Funny as in strange, quirky, oddly philosophical vagabond's? Yes.

There are puzzles. Like 'find the turtle' and 'hit the invisible wall that gives no indication of being an invisible wall' or 'wait for the big rolling contraption to go by or you might get hit!'
Really enjoying the game but the "puzzles" seem like basic competency tests a retard would be given before enrollment in retard school. Vague descriptions of some landmark that send you hunting for hours? Nah, here's a literal snapshot of a piece of the map. Can you find where the little picture is on the big map? Can you, Timmy? At least give me some fucking Uncharted death trapped sudoku shit.

The entire plot of Elden Ring is to follow the yellow and kill the boss

There's a shitload of content besides bosses. It's first and foremost an adventure game. Exploration and traversal are a big thing. You spot a landmark in the distance and it's about 'how do I climb up there?'. Or maybe you see a ledge at the bottom of a tower you're climbing and you realize you can drop down. There's a lot of hidden paths, secrets that require you to really explore every corner of the world, including vertically with platforming. There are small dungeons with a lot of traps and huge dungeons with a lot of non linearity and platforming, hidden paths, locked doors, invisible walls. You can unlock a lot of shortcuts. The idea that devs may have spent weeks designing a secret area with a cool environment and bosses and then hid it so most players won't even find it is one of the many aspects that make these games so special.

I can't even count the number of times I thought 'hey wouldn't it be cool if I could try to get there' and get rewarded with some unique little path, often times even opening up whole new areas that can completely change atmosphere and challenge. It's all so masterfully designed.

If you like traps then no one does traps better than from soft. There's even a whole new type of trap in there that's mind blowingly cool when you first discover it. And there's of course all kinds of environmental dangers and hazards like the infamous poison swamps.

No taverns with funny npcs, most npcs tend to be morose in souls games but there's always a couple of comic relief characters and there's a central hub for certain npcs and interactions. There's a lot of npc quest lines but they're not spoon feed via a journal or quest markers.

Very light on puzzle besides environmental exploration/traversal. But there are some, like requiring you to solve a riddle or discover certain hidden items, and the world in general is just so shrouded in mystery and full of satisfying discoveries.

nice write up

>taverns with funny npcs
No
>funny npcs
Definitely yes, but you gotta find em

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>Are there obstacles and puzzles?
yeah, many of the mini-dungeons have amusing gimmicks and puzzles though nothing as crass as sliding block puzzles
>Are there platformer like areas with crumbling bridges?
Yes, stormveil keep alone has some crazy rooftop exploring and can take hours to 100%, some of the crumbling ground scared the shit out of me too
>Are there dungeons with traps that throw spikes at your head?
yes and you can use them to kill your host :)
>Taverns with funny NPCs?
No

>Doing “quests” in Elden Ring feels like an organic experience
Haha I love being rewarded with sadness

I hate how there's no friendly town or village or even some kind of tavern in the overworld. It's always some stupid fucking reason to why everything wants to kill you on sight. Can't there be some small break to this shit that isn't a bonfire?

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That would involve competent world building which is not something soulsdrones appreciate.

Same man. The game would be a billion times better if the world made sense and had actual towns.

Someone will hate me for saying this but NPCs asking you to hunt for 10 deer meats would also improve the game.

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This nigger user hasn't played the game or hasn't made it past the first area.
There's all of that, except taverns

there npcs, merchants, ghosts
how would having a non hostile town improve the game?

Play the game more retard, there are puzzles

It fucking sucks because there's some nice looking villages that could be a cool new central hub, I found a comfy Westfall looking windmill farming village in the Altus zone and it's just all wasted with le generic hostile npc's. There's almost next to no kind of slice of life things to take a break from just killing shit every single time.

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Taking a break from the main gameplay loop and enjoying the atmosphere?

Jarburg is friendly. One of the smaller pots might get mad at you randomly though.

>NPCs asking you to hunt for 10 deer meats would also improve the game.
Thank god you will never be a game designer, holy fucking shit.
I could not imagine a more incorrect statement.

>gameplay loop
Yeah I need a break from the ""explore a vast world full of secrets, massive side quests, tranquil areas, amazing visuals, challenging bosses and enemies" gameplay loop""
Kill yourself you fucking redditor

why does the roundtable hold or a site of grace not do that for you? also enemies in ER have a way shorter leash so you can pretty much just take a sec and chill anywhere that isn't right next to a dudes face

>nooooooooooooooooooo this isn't Dragon Age Inquisition! help me Bioware, Im going insaaane

I went out of my way to a really obscure place in the south peninsula expecting nothing and I found a bat nest with a few dead dudes and a talisman it was a nice little hidden area, you may be missing a couple if you dont adventure user.

>'wait for the big rolling contraption to go by or you might get hit!'
spending half an hour getting humiliatingly steamrolled by those things only to watch them all destroy eachother at the end because I pressed a switch felt pretty great ngl

>NOOOOOOOOO YOU CAN'T HAVE OPEN WORLD QUALITY SIDE CONTENT AND A LIVING WORLD IN MY HECCIN SUPER CEREAL SOULSBORNE KINO HARDCORE GAME!
How about you kill yourself instead you nigger brained retard.

There is nothing wrong with normal quests. I'd actually prefer understandable quests to the
>bro just find x hidden NPC in this giant ass world after they randomly teleport so you can talk to them and have them teleport again
And a reason to interact with the world. RDR's hunting is comfy, ER's is just there for crafting.

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>AND A LIVING WORLD
ER does have this, just not the way you wanted it

Again, thank god you will never be a game designer.
Busywork quests are fucking boring dogshit and belong in MMOs and skinnerboxes for retards who treat those games as their second job.
Putting that shit in actual games is a fucking crime against man.

The world is way more alive than any other open world game.
You're just autistic

who the fuck equips the steed whistle in a regular item slot

>muh JRPG towns with canned terrible dialog
is this what you casuls whine about when you realize crying about quest logs isn't getting you any sympathy? git filtered bitch lmaoooooo

No you're just a jaded idiot who wants less from your video games. The game has hunting already but it's shallow as fuck and nearly pointless. Expanding what's in your game should be seen as common sense.

As an example, in GTA you can drive so they let you be a cop, a fire fighter, and a taxi man while also involving many main quests with driving. This is good design. Nu-GTA even has you hunting which was neat if not fleshed out. There are assassination missions too because there are guns.

Me, it's less finnicky.

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I don't think things need to be non-hostile. Fantasy is just generally better the more expansive it gets. You can have more low key detective type quests in urban areas or political/court intrigue, theft, or just generally funny shit.

>The game has hunting already but it's shallow as fuck and nearly pointless.
It allows you to gather materials for crafting consumables, meaning you don't need to spend runes to buy more.
Not every game needs to be RDR/GTA, if you want that go fucking play those games instead.
Busywork quests are shit, anyone who wants quests that devolve into "Hey faggot, go do some shopping for me, I need some deer meat and berries, chop chop," needs to fuck off back to MMOs where they belong.

The reused chariot dungeons takes so much away from the game if only they had 1 chariot dungeon and other dungeons with other shit but nope i have to walk down bypassong a chariot 10 times in a row in every dungeon

All RPGs have towns. Not just JRPGs. There are whole fantasy novel series that are just heist stories, except in a fantasy setting.