Elden Ring may be infamously tough, but YouTube’s ymfah has found a way to complete it by simply walking and jogging. And maybe a bit of glitching.
It’s the law that all posts about FromSoftware’s output should begin by stating that its games are very difficult. Whether it’s Dark Souls, Demon’s Souls, Sekiro or Elden Ring, we’re duty-bound to remind the reader that they’re unforgivingly harsh – albeit fair. They reward patience and practice with a sense of accomplishment that is rare in today’s era of hand-holding triple-A experiences.
Unless you’re YouTuber ymfah – in which case you can complete the famously harsh (and vast) Elden Ring by simply wandering around.
Well, technically, it’s a little bit more complicated than that. ymfah’s method for beating Elden Ring involves careful timing of movement, and more than a few glitch exploits that allow the player to quickly teleport (or ‘zip’) between areas. Kotaku, which first brought this video to our attention, explains these exploits quite tidily. Through a combination of precisely-judged movements and exploits, ymfah manages to skip entire chunks of Elden Ring’s map.
It’s the latest in a string of quirky guides from ymfah; some earlier hits include ‘How to beat Skyrim without walking' and ‘How to “Gun Only” Bloodborne.’
Nevertheless, it’s mind-boggling that ymfah managed to find this route at all, particularly when you consider that the approach doesn’t use any attacks, spells, healing, or ‘official’ forms of fast-travel. We can only imagine how many hours ymfah spent on figuring out this approach, which uses only directional inputs (so the WASD keys on PC).
The video above condenses exactly how he does it into just under eight minutes. Predictably, the player still ends up dying a lot, but this is Elden Ring, after all. Did we mention how difficult it is?
Read more: Elden Ring review | Towering achievement
