An Elden Ring streamer has released the game's first damage-free walkthrough, beating the entire game without taking a single hit. It's an impressively monumental achievement considering the game's sheer scope and, of course, its overwhelming difficulty level.
Twitch streamer Seki announced the completion of his run without damage in Elden Ring on Twitter. The tweet has since gone viral throughout the Elden Ring community, garnering over 26,000 likes at the time of this writing. You can check out the tweet below, but beware of spoilers if you haven't yet completed the notoriously difficult game on your own.
WE HAVE THE RACE!!!!!!! THE FIRST ELDEN RING IN THE WORLD WITHOUT KNOCKS/DAMAGE. CRY MY LUNGS HAHAHA #ELDENRING pic.twitter.com/E46WSlXU3vApril 2, 2022
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Seki provided context for Elden Ring's no-damage run to Kotaku, saying, "No-Hit/No Damage is harder than a normal no-damage run because the player can't take environmental damage like fall/poison damage etc. This adds difficulty running, as I don't have access to buffs like the Red Feathered Branchsword, which could increase my damage if my health is low.
Without useful crutches like the Red Feathered Branch Sword, or the ability to take damage, Seki has had to rely on powerful equipment in most Elden Ring encounters. His weapon of choice was the Moonveil katana, a popular sword that scales with both Dexterity and Intelligence stats. The katana also features the incredibly powerful Transient Moonlight Ash of War, which fires a powerful magical projectile from the blade.
Seki, who also completed an undamaged portion of the brutally tough Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, claims to have spent over 130 hours alone in preparation for the Elden Ring race. This includes planning the optimal route to win the game in a reasonable amount of time and practicing some boss fights. The final race lasts just under three hours.
King of the Ancients
Needless to say, completing Elden Ring in under three hours without taking any sort of damage is extremely impressive, especially considering that a significant number of players are dealing with the game's first major boss fight.
It's also safe to say that Elden Ring is much more difficult to achieve a damage-free replay than other FromSoftware titles, as it lacks the relative predictability of the studio's other games, such as Dark Souls 3. In Elden Ring, the world map open Lands Between is riddled with traps. Sudden mobs of enemies or a crushing boss can easily stop a race in its tracks.
Elden Ring also features a noticeable difficulty increase in the later areas of the game and boss fights, many of which are arguably some of the hardest From Software has ever designed. Bosses like Malenia, Blade of Miquella, Fire Giant, or even recurring enemies like Crucible Knights are sure to present significant obstacles to anyone attempting a similar run.
Streamers and speedrunners on FromSoftware's back catalog have already completed "all bosses" damage-free runs for every game, meaning they've managed to defeat every boss without taking a hit, from Demon's Souls to Sekiro. A race like this could be considerably more difficult in Elden Ring, given that the game hides hundreds of boss fights in dungeons all over the map.
However, Seki tells Kotaku that he's planning an "all memories" run without damage next, which means fighting all story-related bosses that drop a memory item on death.
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