I don’t plan on writing extensively about my adventures in Elden Ring, like I did with (most of) my first Dark Souls playthrough. However, I may feel like it’s necessary to share a story here and there when something really interesting/funny happens in the game.
For example, something that happened while I playing last night:
There are lots of skeletons in Elden Ring. They’re a pretty common enemy, and I’ve fought an entire legion of them by this point. I didn’t think that they were going to be the enemy type that surprised me, but lo and behold, it happened!
So I’m wandering through a graveyard, where skeletons will occasionally pop out of the ground to do battle with you. I come up against this one guy, who is an archer, and I run up and give him a good solid swipe with my claws. He reels back, and then… t-poses and starts lifting into the air. I assume that it’s some kind of weird collision bug, so I quip to nobody in particular “Well, I guess he’s gone up to Heaven now” and turn to walk away.
Then out of nowhere, this skeleton flies over me, circling around me in the sky while dusting me with some kind of power that causes death blight (which kills you immediately if the status meter fills). So I book it out of there and fling a glintstone icecrag spell at him to blast him out the sky and out of existence.
The skeleton/crop duster abomination had been downed, but it took another minute for me to come to grips with what just happened. I stopped and had a good chuckle at the complete ridiculousness of the situation. Not only because of the overtly humorous “takeoff” animation that seemed like a glitch, but also because it was awesome and fun that 60 or so hours into this game, an enemy that I had already killed thousands of had managed to surprise me by doing something I hadn’t seen before. Video games!
I actually did a Google search to see what the story was behind the flying skeleton, and I am not the only one who was caught off-guard by this phenomenon. There are several Reddit threads and even a GameRant article about this very same thing happening to other players. Makes me feel like if Elden Ring had come out 25 years ago, this would have been the biggest story on the playground for weeks.