"I play the way I want to play"

Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree is already kicking players' asses. The tough DLC takes a challenging game and makes it even harder. Players have joked about how a character higher than level 500 and the strongest building in the game can be pulverized by a random creature in a field. Now that it's out, FromSoftware has successfully cemented its reputation for making difficult games again, but that's not all. The players themselves and the culture surrounding FromSoftware games can make playing Elden Ring even more difficult, as some players shame others for using certain items or fighting styles.

As FromSoftware developers have diversified the toolkits players can use to beat their game's many monsters, a subset of die-hard fans have responded by debating which ways to beat the game are valid. Tools like Mimic Tear Ashes can summon a duplicate of a player's character to fight alongside them during a boss fight, or magic spells like Meteorite of Astel can launch a barrage of meteors at an enemy. These items are available in the regular base version of the game, but some people claim that they can reduce specific challenges because they can be used from afar. Now, with the difficulty even higher for Shadow of the Erdtree, prominent streamers and players on social media platforms like Reddit are taking to the platforms to discuss why it's actually OK to use these tools – especially now that the DLC is even harder.

Im_dontai, a streamer with more than 1.9 million followers on Twitch, has been streaming the DLC since its release. In one clip, he pushed back at the larger culture of players who dislike using features like a magical construct or Mimic Tear and people who complain about the difficulty of the game.