Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree is PC Gamer's next cover story: Here's a sneak peek

PC Gamer Shadow of the Erdtree cover
(Image credit: Future)

When I found out that FromSoftware president Hidetaka Miyazaki wasn't going to be able to talk to me at 3 pm as initially planned, I couldn't believe my luck. Good luck. His busy schedule meant our interview was pushed back by two hours, which meant that I had two more hours to play Shadow of the Erdtree. I spent a whole day sequestered in a media room in FromSoftware's shiny new offices in Tokyo, sitting in front of a PC and jumbo gaming monitor with the whole expansion tantalizingly open in front of me. I defeated its first two major bosses, reached a whole new area, and walked away feeling like I'd seen just a small portion of what this expansion has in store.

Shadow of the Erdtree may not be as big as Elden Ring, but it's almost certainly longer and deeper than most other videogames you'll play this year—I expect most players will spend dozens of hours trying to find everything hidden in the Land of Shadow. In our interview, Miyazaki explained that the expansion's map just had to be this big to recapture "that sense of discovery and that sense of wonder and exploration again." 

As we talked more about Shadow of the Erdtree, I knew our cover story would be about more than just the bosses and dungeons of the new map FromSoftware has spent the last two years crafting. It would have to grapple with the significance of this expansion serving as the end of Elden Ring (at least for now)—and the culmination of the fantasy RPG journey FromSoftware has been on since its first game, King's Field, released 30 years ago this December.

"Making a game as large and ambitious as Elden Ring was obviously not without its troubles," Miyazaki said. "It was a challenging and long process. But it was also extremely fun, as a creator. I'd love to recreate that experience for myself, more than anything. Every time with these games there's things that go well and there's things that don't go so well. With Elden Ring it's the same. That two-way process, the communication with the players, has been really good this time, I feel—it's something we've managed to lock into a little better. So taking those bits that didn't go so well this time with Elden Ring and incorporating those and improving those in a future title—that's something I'm really excited for." 

You'll be able to read the full feature on the website—including Miyazaki's thoughts on the evolving designs of FromSoftware's worlds, his "dream" fantasy RPG, and what kind of spicy food Elden Ring is—before the release of Shadow of the Erdtree on June 20. UK subscribers to PC Gamer magazine will also be getting their hands on the issue just before the expansion launches.

For now, check out more of our hands-on coverage of the expansion going live today: 

TOPICS
Wes Fenlon
Senior Editor

Wes has been covering games and hardware for more than 10 years, first at tech sites like The Wirecutter and Tested before joining the PC Gamer team in 2014. Wes plays a little bit of everything, but he'll always jump at the chance to cover emulation and Japanese games.

When he's not obsessively optimizing and re-optimizing a tangle of conveyor belts in Satisfactory (it's really becoming a problem), he's probably playing a 20-year-old Final Fantasy or some opaque ASCII roguelike. With a focus on writing and editing features, he seeks out personal stories and in-depth histories from the corners of PC gaming and its niche communities. 50% pizza by volume (deep dish, to be specific).

Read more
Best Expansion 2024: Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree
Best Expansion 2024: Elden Ring – Shadow of the Erdtree
Nightreign knight holds his fist in menacing fashion
Elden Ring Nightreign is FromSoft looking at nearly 3 years of mods and fan demands and going 'Hold my beer'
Elden Ring Nightreign screenshot
Elden Ring Nightreign's Steam page lets slip it'll have DLC bosses and player characters
Elden Ring: Nightreign mage
Elden Ring: Nightreign hands-on: 6 hours with FromSoftware's wild new co-op roguelike action RPG remix
A warrior in Elden Ring: Nightreign readies an arm crossbow before entering into bloody combat.
It's not the Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice 2 I'd hoped for, but Elden Ring: Nightreign might just sate my insatiable hunger for FromSoftware to pick up the pace
elden ring nightreign
3 hours with Elden Ring Nightreign helped me accept it's not the co-op FromSoft game I asked for, but damn fun in its own right
Latest in RPG
Henry from KCD2 wearing nice outfits
'Diversify your fashion endgame' with this Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 mod that gives Henry fly new gambesons, pourpoints, and caftans
Mark Darrah
BioWare veteran says a big delay is better than lots of little ones, because sometimes you just gotta 'burn it down and take the other fork in the road'
Honey B Lovely
The state of Final Fantasy 14 in 2025: It's in a weird spot, huh?
Alma, the handler from Monster Hunter Wilds, closes her eyes and looks a little disappointed.
This impractical method of getting a 1-second capture time in Monster Hunter Wilds can make you the fastest hunter alive—on paper
Monster Hunter Wilds Artian weapon crafting - Gemma holding hot metal
Gemma's English VA is right with us on Monster Hunter Wild's confusing menus, which makes me feel a little better for having to Google symbols all the time
No Rest for the Wicked Steam early access screenshots
No Rest for the Wicked developer Moon Studios is now 'fully independent' after acquiring the rights to the game from Take-Two
Latest in Features
Honey B Lovely
The state of Final Fantasy 14 in 2025: It's in a weird spot, huh?
Monster Hunter Wilds palico
One of the biggest victories of Monster Hunter Wilds' streamlining is I don't have to deal with those awful gimmick fights anymore
A vampire with a dark castle and swarms of bats in the background.
We need to decide on a genre name for Vampire Survivors-like games before a really terrible one sticks
Olivia, Alma and a palico
I wish Monster Hunter Wilds wasn't so afraid of letting me play Monster Hunter
SteelSeries QcK Performance mouse pads overlapping on a desk
The SteelSeries QcK Performance series has reignited my excitement over the simple pleasure of a quality mouse pad… and trying to click skulls with pinpoint accuracy
OneXPlayer 2 pro on a table
I never thought a handheld PC bloated with Windows could replace my Steam Deck, but after gaming on an old OneXPlayer 2 Pro I can see now I judged it too harshly