Did anyone else forget that Elden Ring had a crafting system? It’s explained to us in the early hours, labelled as a major mechanic that can be used to craft all manner of throwing weapons, healing items, and ammunition to help out in a scrap.
But I’ve hardly ever used it. Aside from crafting some items to summon friends or heal my poison and scarlet rot, it is one of the few systems in Elden Ring that could be removed, and I wouldn’t notice in the slightest. It feels complimentary to the experience as opposed to integral, helping out players pursuing a certain build or playstyle instead of being precisely baked into moment-to-moment gameplay. It feels like a bit of a missed opportunity.
You can access the menu at any time, but after a handful of hours I had completely forgotten it even existed. I’m a loser, so I even crafted a bunch of random things in high volume in the hopes of bagging a hidden Trophy, but to no avail. So I embarked on my journey subsisting on healing items, armour, and weapons I found across the world instead of wasting time crafting my own. I even purchased all the recipe books I came across, hoping that maybe they’d inspire something in me to actually use the crafting system instead of ignoring it.
The thing is my apathy towards it wasn’t even deliberate - I straight up just forget it was there. This happened in Cyberpunk 2077 too. CD Projekt Red offered an incredibly robust weapon upgrade and crafting system that we were encouraged to use and experiment with. But the gunplay wasn’t challenging nor diverse enough to ever bother with it. You were always picking up new and more powerful weapons anyway, so taking time to curate a very specific arsenal felt like a waste of time. Messy user interface design didn’t help matters either, adding an extra layer of effort to a mechanic that didn’t feel worth your time.
I imagine some players love the addition of such systems, but I can’t help but view them as an obtuse afterthought. Elden Ring’s crafting system is laughably extensive, but some of the only items everyone will need are ones related to summoning and healing status effects. The former can be acquired in excess without crafting, and I’m a stubborn bitch who will just push through status effects instead of healing them anyway. So there we have it, there’s little in crafting for me and that’s a shame. To be clear, I don’t count upgrading weapons in this kerfuffle. This is done from a completely different menu with unrelated resources, and unlike its sibling, actually has a demonstrable impact on gameplay.
I would challenge anyone to make it through the Elden Ring without upgrading a single weapon. This is more than possible for the masochistic amongst us, but it certainly wouldn’t be fun. But having a crafting system that perhaps blended into certain mechanics or played a more tangible role in combat would have been amazing. I’m not saying factor in weapon durability like Breath of the Wild or restrict healing items to a crafting bench, but be more considered in how the crafting system is used instead of having it feel like an afterthought or something I only use to sell materials for extra runes.
Elden Ring is a masterpiece, but its crafting system could have been so much more.
