As an avid souls fan this was everything I wanted it to be. I got the pre order yesterday and have enjoyed everything I have played so far. No glitches or problems and the download time was really quick.
The game kind of blends the gameplay of Sekiro and dark souls together giving you much more freedom to experiment as well as all kinds of stealth and jumping mechanics. Luckily there is no posture or anything as I don't like that system from Sekiro personally.
Sekiro was a great game but I prefer the non linear story and more experimental gameplay (more weapons, armour, magic builds, dexterity builds, ect) of the other games in the series, as well as the excellent character customisation.
Even though I have only played around 5-6 hours it it is already one of the best open world games in my opinion with such a detailed and explorative world full of so many interesting locations and creatures. There are all kinds of new features and details that almost make the older games obsolete and made me ask why they didn't add that before.
In the previous games when you hit a difficult boss you were locked into beating them to continue. Due to elden rings open world design however you can easily come back to a boss after exploring and upgrading your character. You could do this in the older games but had to face the boss eventually, in elden ring there is so much side content and other areas to explore you can almost ignore the main story entirely and complete it at your own leasure.
The game does a great job of giving you enough freedom to explore and not give you a direct path whilst still having a set goal to get to. You have a marker and map, but they are so well utilised it doesn't affect the game at all. It also does a fantastic job at introducing the souls gameplay to new players, with an actual tutorial at the beginning. It is not in your face and is an optional part of the starting area.
There is one flaw in my opinion, the open world is so expasive that progression is more difficult than the other games in my opinion. After playing for a decent amount of time I still only have my starting weapon. There are weapons available from stores and such but none from enemies or ones you find, which is the best way to get them usually in other souls games.
This is not a big problem as it is more of a personal thing. I just love exploring the world anyway and I'm sure there are many weapons available.
In short ths game is just fantastic and does not disappoint at all. Easily recommend to any souls fan and anyone in general. Probably the best place to start the series as the game kind of encapsulates everything great about it. I already want to get back to and explore the game, just so glad it is as great as it is.
